The Flame Bearer. Bernard Cornwell

glared at me, trying to kill with his eyes. ‘You are trespassing on King Edward’s land, earsling.’

      Brunulf flinched at the insult. I did not care. ‘You can produce this so-called charter?’ I asked.

      For a moment no one answered, then Brunulf looked at the younger priest. ‘Father Stepan?’

      ‘Why prove anything to this sinner?’ Herefrith demanded angrily. He spurred his horse forward a pace. ‘He is a priest-killer, hated by God, married to his Saxon whore, spewing the devil’s filth.’

      I sensed my men stirring behind me and raised a hand to calm them. I ignored Father Herefrith and looked at the younger priest instead. ‘Charters are easy to forge,’ I said, ‘so entertain me and tell me why the land was given.’

      Father Stepan glanced at Father Herefrith as if looking for permission to speak, but the older priest ignored him.

      ‘Tell me!’ I insisted.

      ‘In the year of our lord 632,’ Father Stepan said nervously, ‘Saint Erpenwald of the Wuffingas came to this river. It was in flood and could not be crossed, but he prayed to the Lord, struck the river with his staff, and the waters parted.’

      ‘It was a miracle,’ Brunulf explained a little shamefacedly.

      ‘Strange,’ I said, ‘that I never heard that tale before. I grew up in Northumbria, and you’d think a northern lad like me would have heard a marvellous story like that. I know about the puffins that sang psalms, and the holy toddler who cured his mother’s lameness by spitting on her left tit, but a man who didn’t need a bridge to cross a river? I never heard that tale!’

      ‘Six months ago,’ Father Stepan continued, as if I had not spoken, ‘Saint Erpenwald’s staff was discovered on the river bed.’

      ‘Still there after two hundred years!’

      ‘Much longer!’ one of the monks put in, and received a glare from Father Herefrith.

      ‘And it hadn’t floated away?’ I asked, pretending to be amazed.

      ‘King Edward wishes to make this a place of pilgrimage,’ Father Stepan said, again ignoring my mockery.

      ‘So he sends warriors,’ I said menacingly.

      ‘When the church is built,’ Brunulf said earnestly, ‘the troops will withdraw. They are here only to protect the holy fathers and to help construct the shrine.’

      ‘True,’ Father Stepan added eagerly.

      They were telling lies. I reckoned their reason to be here was not to build some church, but to distract Sigtryggr while Constantin stole the northern part of Northumbria, and perhaps to provoke a second war by goading Sigtryggr into an assault on the fort. But why, if that is what they wanted, had they been so unprovocative? True, Father Herefrith had been hostile, but I suspected he was a bitter and angry priest who did not know how to be courteous. Brunulf and the rest of his company had been meek, trying to placate me. If they wanted to provoke a war they would have defied me and they had not, so I decided to push them. ‘You claim this field is King Edward’s land,’ I said, ‘but to reach it you must have travelled over King Sigtryggr’s land.’

      ‘We did, of course,’ Brunulf agreed hesitantly.

      ‘Then you owe him customs’ dues,’ I said. ‘I assume you brought tools?’ I nodded at the cross-shaped trenches. ‘Spades? Mattocks? Even timber to build your magic shrine perhaps?’

      For a heartbeat there was no answer. Brunulf, I saw, glanced at Father Herefrith, who gave an almost imperceptible nod. ‘That’s not unreasonable,’ Brunulf said nervously. For a man planning a war, or trying to provoke one, it was an astonishing concession.

      ‘We will think on the matter,’ Father Herefrith said harshly, ‘and give you our answer in two days.’

      My immediate impulse was to argue, to demand we meet the next day, but there was something strange about Herefrith’s sudden change of attitude. Till this moment he had been hostile and obstructive, and now, though still hostile, he was cooperating with Brunulf. It was Herefrith who had given the signal that Brunulf should pretend to agree about paying customs’ dues, and Herefrith who had insisted on waiting for two days, and so I resisted my urge to argue. ‘We will meet you here in two days,’ I agreed instead, ‘and make sure you bring gold to that meeting.’

      ‘Not here,’ Father Herefrith said sharply.

      ‘No?’ I responded mildly.

      ‘The stench of your presence fouls God’s holy land,’ he snarled, then pointed northwards. ‘You see the woodland on the skyline? Just beyond it there’s a stone, a pagan stone.’ He spat the last three words. ‘We shall meet you by the stone at mid morning on Wednesday. You can bring twelve men. No more.’

      Again I had to resist the urge to anger him. Instead I nodded agreement. ‘Twelve of us,’ I said, ‘at mid morning, in two days’ time, at the stone. And make sure you bring your fake charter and plenty of gold.’

      ‘I’ll bring you an answer, pagan,’ Herefrith said, then turned and spurred away.

      ‘We shall meet in two days, lord,’ Brunulf said, plainly embarrassed by the priest’s anger.

      I just nodded and watched as they all rode back to the fort.

      Finan watched too. ‘That sour priest will never pay,’ he said, ‘he wouldn’t pay for a morsel of bread if his own poor mother was starving.’

      ‘He will pay,’ I said.

      But not in gold. The payment, I knew, would be in blood. In two days’ time.