Chapter 10

A noise woke me, it was Lucille moving around. She was making breakfast, I dressed and went outside for a piss. The dawn was just breaking, I stood still and listened for a while but the village was as still as the dead. I slapped Lucille’s arse as I went back into the hall. She giggled and called me an oaf. We ate breakfast and washed it down with cold water from the villages well.

The men returned as the sun broke through the dawn sky, we heard them coming before we saw them as they called out my name as they approached. I grabbed my short sword and headed out into the centre of the village.

Jarun and Osgood were soon walking into the village, they had the five Celts with them, Cyalif and Yanto. As well as them they had the three Celts we had released from the slave hut, I found out their names were Conyn, Dafydd, and Edern. Plus there was a handful of my own crew. That made a nice little war band, I asked Jarun to go and get Hjort and Oykel from their look outposts at the archer’s village.

The Celts were all armed with spears and they had brought spare swords and shields with them.

At midday, I sat the men down and talked through my plan. It was a simple plan, we would attack the village at midnight. We would kill the guards and burn the halls, a hall burning was a Viking tradition and if done right we could kill most of the fifty archers while they slept.

The men slept that afternoon and that evening we feasted on food stolen from the Saxon lord’s larder. I drew a map of the village in the dirty with the tip of a spear. Each of the men was given a task as was Lucille. If we all did as I planned it would be easy to take the village.

So as darkness fell about us we started to move out to the archer’s hamlet. I took the lead and saw that only four guards patrolled the village. I took out one and Osgood and Hjort took care of the other three. Once we had the guards taken care of, I called the Celts down to the barn.

They had the pick of the bows and took a couple of quills of arrows each. I told them to prepare arrows with shreds of cloths wrapped around them, at the same time I told Lucille to make some torches and stack them by the fire pit in the centre of the hamlet. She used some small branches to make up two dozen torches, each had one end wrapped in cloth ready to set fire to.

As they did that I and the other men took hay bales and placed them around the sides and back of the two huts. We place five or six in front of the doors of the hall.

With four well-armed Viking warriors in front of each door, Osgood, Jarun and I took up torches and set the bales alight, first the ones at the doors and then the rests. At the same time, the archers started to fire burning arrows onto the thatched roofs.

It didn’t take long for the halls to start burning well and ten minutes after the first flame had touched hay the archers inside started to shout. The front doors were well ablaze and I heard men hammering at the sides of the halls.

On the right-hand hut, I saw the panel of the wall being smashed out and four men ran out, their hair alight, small daggers or eating knives in their hands. The warriors moved toward them but they all fell under a volley of arrows from the Celtic archers. More men tried to get out of the burning building but the Celts did their job well and proved to me that they knew how to use a bow alright As I watched them cut down any men that tried to run from the building my nose was filled with the smell of burning flesh. There was a crash as the roof trusses of the left-hand hall fell in and a whoosh as more air spurred on the flames. No men made it out of that left-hand hut alive.

We stood for an hour or more watching the halls burn, they could be no man left alive in either of them. We had stopped the archers before they had a chance to kill us and had done a little to even up the fight ahead.

I went around the little hamlet, the two carts laden with arrows would be of use. I called the Celts to me and told them to take what bows they needed. Each took four or five spares as did Jarun and Lucille. They both knew how to use the bow but I guessed not as good as the Celts. There were some horses in a paddock and we used them to pull the two carts of arrows. The other cart was burned, there was no point leaving any weapons for the Saxon bastards to use and we could not take it with us.

So we made our way up the track out the village, I looked back a few times but there was nothing but smoke and flames to see. It might attract Saxon attention but there was little I could do about that now.

I sent Jarun and Osgood ahead of us to keep a good watch. The going was slow and I was worried that we would not get to the beach in time. We walked for a few hours and then came across another deserted village, this one had no guards.

We camped there for the evening and as night fell Jarun and I scouted the land ahead of us. We were only half an hour’s walk from the beach that looked out over our little island. There was a steep cliff down to the beach, it was an ideal place to launch our attack. We walked its length, there was a small pathway down to the beach wide enough for one man at a time. Nice and easy to defend. As we walked back to our camp I heard the sound of a horse. It was moving along the track at pace.

We hid in some bushes and Jarun took aim with his bow. His first arrow missed but his second took the man in the shoulder and he fell off the horse a few yards from us. I ran out onto the track and slid my sword from its sheath.

“So Saxon, where are you going so fast?” I asked. At first, he was not eager to answer but when the tip of my sword bit into his flesh he decided to tell me.

“I am to get the Archers, to bring them here as the battle starts tomorrow at dawn,” he said, “They are to hide until they hear the great drum being beaten.”

So now I knew their plans, and I killed the Saxon as he was no longer any use to me. We dumped his body in the shrub at the side of the track and headed back to the camp. We ate well that night as it could be our last meal. We took his horse and tied it with the other four we had.

I slept with Lucille in my arms and she told me she loved me. I told her to sleep as tomorrow would be a long hard day. We awoke before dawn and pushed the carts as close to the cliff as we could. Then carried the quivers of arrows the rest of the way. Soon there were seven piles, one for each of the Celts and one each for Jarun and Lucille. Some spare bows were stacked there as well, as once they started firing there would be no time to replace a broken bowstring.

We sat back from the edge of the cliff and watched as dawn broke over the beach. The sight on the beach was amazing, there was a shield wall that must have been six men deep and a hundred men wide. Behind that there we more men, spearmen ready to throw over the wall. Behind them, there were around a hundred mounted men. Osgood and I guessed their number at well over a thousand men.

Our forces on the island were well outnumbered. We had started out with three hundred but had lost some in our skirmishes. As I pondered that thought I saw the dragon-headed longboats being rowed around the tip of the island. The sea had calmed and the boats came toward the shore at a good speed.

Whatever I was going to do I needed to do quickly. We now had five horses, so I took Lucille, Jarun, Hjort, and Oykel with me. We cantered off toward the Lord Aldwyns village. We stopped on high ground about half a mile from the village, we could see his armies on the beach another half a mile from the village, from the noise they were making it was obvious that our Viking brothers had landed.

We needed to act and act fast. There was a smithy on the edge of the village, I could see its fires burning and a huge plume of smoke in the still morning air. The fire had worked once for us, I wondered if it would work again. Just passed next to that was a slave cage. We could see a dozen or so men in the cages.

The timing had to be right, I told Lucille to go back to the cliff and when they saw Saxons heading back to their village they should start to fire at them, I took her bow from her before she left as well as her quill of arrows. We discounted and left the horses tied to a tree. I hoped we could sneak into the village, it seemed most of the people left there were watching the action on the beach.

We made it to the smithy, there was a Saxon on fire watch but he was soon dispatched to his god by Oykel and his sword. We took the arrows we had, two quivers so around a hundred arrows and using scraps of cloth made them into torches. As we did that Oykel released the slaves, there were four Celts, four young Viking warriors and four men with dark skin that spoke a language I didn’t understand. Oykel offered them the choice to fight with us or to run to safety. All of the Viking and two of the Celts were with us the others ran off up the track toward the hills. Oykel armed the men with weapons that he found in the smithy, some had swords others had spears.

Jarun and I stood either side of the smithy and Oykel and Hjort passed us burning arrows with we fired into the village. Jarun was much faster and more accurate than I was.

It didn’t take long for the thatched huts to start to smoulder, and ten minutes after the last arrow was sent flying there were thick plumes of smoke meandering into the sky. When the arrows where gone I told Jarun to climb to the roof of the smithy and watch the beach, to shout when any of the Saxon armies came toward us.

The time for arrows was gone, now it was time for the sword, the spear and the axe to do their work. We hunted as a pack, I kicked in the door of the first hut I came to and three women looked up at me as they were sat around a small fire, I put them to the sword and kicked the fire around, lighting up the hut.

As I stepped out into the daylight I could see the men creating havoc all around me, it was a pure slaughter. It was the only way, we hacked, we stabbed, and we set light to all we could see. We had to make a diversion. I smashed into another hut, two old men ran at me with short swords, they were too old for the battle but old enough to fight. I parried some good blows away before the first man dropped his guard and I slashed his face with the sharp tip of my sword, he dropped to his knees, the second man stepped over him and swung at my head, I dropped to a knee and slashed across his thighs, blood sprayed as he screamed. His sword arm dropped and I slashed at his throat. He dropped to the earth and I stepped out of the hut.

A young girl ran at me with a spear, she lunged and as she did I knocked the spear from her hands and ran my sword into her guts. The village was now full of smoke and full of screaming. I saw a Saxon knock one of the freed Celtic slaves to the earth and pierce his stomach with a pitchfork. I ran at the Saxon, my blade crashed into his neck, he was dead seconds later.

The rest of the men fought well, we killed, we injured, we maimed. My eyes stung with the smoke that was drifting from the burning buildings. Three young Saxon lads ran around the side of a hut armed with swords. The first ran straight into me and was dead before he knew what was happening, the other two ran at me as one. I raised my small round shield and parried a blow; at the same time, I hacked at the other Saxon. One of them backed off, the other hacked at my shield, I raised my shield higher and he hacked at it again but left his body unguarded. I slashed his stomach and he screamed, his friend ran to his aid. I slammed the shield into his face and he dropped to his knees. It took three more thrusts from my sword to send both of the men to their graves.

I heard Jarun shouting over the sound of our melee

“Uthred, Uthred the horsemen are coming” he shouted at the top of his voice.

I called out for him to run to the horses. Another Saxon ran at me, armed with only a fishing spear. I sidestepped and chopped at his leading arm, it dropped to the floor followed quickly by the Saxon himself.

It was time to go...

I called out to the men to run, I ran between two burning huts, Oykel was in front of me. When I got to the horses I jumped on mine and looked across the field toward the village. Hjort was coming, as were one of the Celts and three of the Vikings we had released from the slave cage. We pulled the men onto the horses and spurred the horses into a gallop. We could hear the shouts of the Saxons as they gave chase. After a few minutes, I looked back and saw two dozen horse-mounted warriors still giving chase.

We rounded a corner and I called at the men to dismount. We slapped the rumps of the horses and they ran off down the track. We ran into the woods at the side of the track and watched as the Saxons rode on past us. It took less than half an hour to make it back to the cliff.