It was a cold night. We cut wood, mostly alder and birch, and used it for fires, confident that the fighting men of the district were far away. We had stripped Arnborg’s hall of pelts, fleeces, even woolen rags, anything that might keep us warm. I placed sentries who gazed into the frost-bright night beneath a star-filled sky. The few high clouds were drifting southward and the next day promised to be dry, cold, and hard.

We had two ways to reach Eoferwic. The easiest route, and the longest, was to follow the good Roman road south to Mameceaster, then take another Roman road that went northeast and led straight to Sigtryggr’s city. The shorter route also followed Roman roads, but one of Arnborg’s slaves, a sullen Saxon who had driven cattle across the moors, told us the road was decayed. “You can get lost up there, lord,” he had warned me. “There are places the road is washed out. It’s hard to follow.”

Nevertheless I was determined to use the shorter route. I needed to reach Eoferwic swiftly, needed to discover what had happened in eastern Northumbria. Perhaps Sköll Grimmarson had not ridden to Eoferwic, but had gone to Bebbanburg instead? I only had Beadwulf’s word for where Arnborg had gone. “Wasn’t he worried you’d betray him?” I asked Beadwulf in the heart of that freezing night.

“He was holding Wynflæd as a hostage, lord.”

I grimaced. “The power of women.”

“Besides, lord,” he went on, “I only discovered what they planned when I returned. When I came to you I still believed what Arnborg had told me, that Prince Æthelstan was under siege.”

“And Arnborg paid Prince Æthelstan tribute,” I said.

“He did once, lord.”

But the Danes and the Norse who lived in the western wilds of Cumbraland had seen Mercia weakened by rebellion, and they, like Sigtryggr, had been living under the fear of a Saxon invasion. The Mercian rebellion had encouraged them to break free. “Why didn’t they just ally with Sigtryggr?” I asked. “He fears the Saxons as much as they do.”

“They believe he is weak, lord.”

I laughed at that. “Sigtryggr? He’s not weak.”

“They call him a client king, lord.”

“Client to who?”

“To the Christians.”

“Christians! He’s a pagan like me!”

“But Eoferwic is filled with Christians, lord, and the archbishop is there, and he’s a Saxon.”

“Hrothweard is a good man,” I said grudgingly.

“Snorri says that the archbishop has ensorceled Sigtryggr, lord.”

“Ensorceled?”

“Used magic spells to make Sigtryggr obedient, lord. And Jarl Arnborg says there are too many Saxon Christians in Northumbria, lord. He fears they would fight for Mercia if it came to war, and King Sigtryggr is blinded to the danger.”

I shook my head. “Eoferwic is a Christian city, and Sigtryggr rules there. He needs the Christians, he tolerates them, and he tries hard not to make enemies of them.” I turned and looked back into the firelit fort. “Most of my men are Christians. What am I supposed to do, slaughter them?”