104.
104.
The herald waving the pure-white flag halted at a distance.
Upon the green-dyed field, the wind-stirred grass and the pure-white flag above it.
The herald, who somehow seemed to bear a precarious air, raised his voice with all his might from a distance where barely a human form could be distinguished.
It gave a fair measure of the wariness he bore.
"Hear me, Helgi Ragnarsson, Konungr of the Northmen-!"
His voice was so loud it seemed to resound across the vast field. A fine choice of herald.
While I simply marveled at the herald's voice, the Jarls gathered beside me seemed to take it as an insult.
"Have the warriors of Mercia no guts? A wretch who lacks the courage to face our Konungr does nothing but shout...!"
"Are they not truly petty creatures without pride! As if our Konungr would do anything to a herald!? What do they take us for!"
'What do they take us for... raiders, probably...'
We might be warriors who deem a wound upon the back a disgrace, but were we not, from their perspective, pirates who had long plundered them?
I could well understand their caution.
In any case, my thoughts were my own, and others had their own as well.
With a face flushed red, Stórolf, who apparently took this as a grave insult to his Konungr's honor, immediately bellowed.
"You coward! If you have something to say, come here at once and show your face! Do you think we would listen to the words of one who lacks even that much courage!"
"Haha-! Well said, Stórolf! These cowardly bastards!!!"
"Since you lot have no need for them, how about we cut off the balls you have-!"
"What!? Bwahahaha-!"
Stórolf, Ubba. Refil, Oleg, Thorbjörn, Leon.
These people were nonetheless my high-ranking officials (?) of a sort... and their nerves were all on edge after breaking through that hellish forest path.
I was just glad they hadn't started mooning the enemy like some of the warriors did.
Of course, the herald from Leicester, subjected to this raw denunciation and collective mockery, soon looked as if his face would burst open.
Whether that herald delivered his message by voice, by phone, or by shooting an arrow with a letter tied to it mattered little to me, so I had to step in.
"Enough, all of you, enough. It is not right to do nothing but scold one who has come as a herald."
"Yes, Konungr!"
"Understood!"
Of course, I understood why my Jarls and warriors were in a foul mood. They had suffered such hardship in the forest, and the rangers of Huntadun were still fiercely fighting.
Unexpectedly, the Norse warriors and the Huntadun rangers had grown rapidly close.
'This is a very encouraging thing.'
If handled well, this could greatly aid the integration of my entire jarldom...
But for now, the fortress before my eyes took priority.
"Speak, herald! What are the words that Ceolwulf of Leicester Castle wishes to convey to me!"
The herald's voice was loud, and Stórolf's voice was loud as well.
But indeed, no one could match the power of my voice.
My shout seemed not merely to shake the space but to fill it completely.
A force so powerful that Leon, who had been gleefully recording the Jarls' curses, could be felt staggering for an instant.
The herald exposed before it stiffened his face, and his horse, startled, reared up and thrashed about.
Suddenly, in the space now occupied solely by silence, even the rough snorting of the horse as it exhaled in fright, [Purreuk-], diminished, and the herald, having barely steadied both himself and his mount, shouted out to me again in a far more cautious manner.
"I have come bearing an offer from Lord Burgred, Cyning of Mercia and all those beneath him at Tamworth!"
Not Ceolwulf, but Burgred?
What trick was this?
"Burgred Cyning sends his praise to Helgi Konungr's strength and honor, and states! That having fiercely contested once, he would express his gratitude if you would withdraw your forces at this point! Along with a promise of silver enough to fill ten of the ships you have brought, Konungr!"
Silver enough to fill ten ships? Remarkable. To think Burgred had such reserves left.
[Purrruk-]
Camembert, who had been with me so long that he no longer flinched at most loud noises or bloody environments, snorted as if bored.
I tickled his mane and asked the Jarls standing behind me.
"Ten ships filled with silver, he says. What do you all think?"
An enormous amount of silver. Those who were startled by the sheer scale cast their eyes about, but Ubba alone let out a scoff and smiled.
The words that came from this cynical brother's mouth were precisely what was in my mind.
"It seems Burgred's granary is quite full. That much silver might buy a day's time."
"A day... yes. I could grant him about a day."
I had guessed the moment I learned he was not a surrender envoy but a negotiation envoy. That they might offer silver to make us withdraw.
If they were going to surrender, they would have done so from the moment we entered the forest.
But that was a lie.
They had fought so fiercely for the past three days, and now they wanted to surrender? Saying, 'We've killed each other enough, so take this silver and leave'?
I could not accept such a surrender. The only thing I could accept was 'unconditional surrender.'
I would only be satisfied when I could decide the fates of Ceolwulf and Burgred with my own hand.
So I shouted to the herald.
"Herald, deliver this to your Cyning, Burgred! With that much silver, he can buy but a single day's time! Tell him to finish his preparations quickly and come face me!"
"...I shall deliver it so! Yah!"
[Dagrak- Dagrak- Dagak- Dagrak-]
If he had truly intended to negotiate, he would not have spoken by merely sending a herald to give notice like that.
In the end, this was nothing more than playing for time.
If it worked, good; if not, so be it.
'So Burgred is coming here.'
"My Jarls. Let the weary troops rest thoroughly for a day. Then, from the next day, we will prepare for a siege for three days, and after that, we shall take that fortress."
"Yes, Konungr!"
"Yes!"
[Kung!]
My commanders offered their military salute in unison.
An endless fighting spirit radiated from them.
*****
"Has any word reached the forces in the forest?"
Leicester Castle. The lord's office and council chamber.
Ceolwulf, who had already gone several days without proper sleep, revealed eyes that were blood-red.
The warrior before him, forced to report no favorable news, swallowed dryly and answered Ceolwulf's question.
"That is... the last message said the situation was dire, and then contact was lost... Ealdorman. That was at dawn today."
"...I see. So it was. Then I must assume they have all scattered to the winds."
Or all dead.
When one sat in this seat called Ealdorman, it was true that one came to treat those beneath them more carelessly.
But even Ceolwulf, who had held the rank of Ealdorman for well over ten years, could not help the heaviness weighing on his heart this time.
'The warriors committed to the forest alone had been five hundred. Five hundred. With their lives and the Cyning's stratagem, I had been able to buy no more than four, five days...'
Now the warriors remaining in the fortress numbered three thousand.
Had it not been for Wessex's Æthelwulf and his uniformly remarkable sons, he had secretly thought they might dare to vie with that Wessex.
That Northmen army was one to which the common sense of this Britain did not apply.
'How could those bastards who used to swarm in bands of twenty or thirty, merely plundering riverside villages and monasteries, move so methodically...!'
As his thoughts continued, his regret grew ever keener for the already dead Ealdorman Cœnred and the Burgred Cyning who had led him.
If they had not entered East Anglia, if they had kept that force intact and used it solely for defense.
If they had never supported Edmund of East Anglia in the first place?
But as the one defending what might be called Mercia's last bastion, he could not keep wallowing in negative thoughts forever.
Vigorously shaking his head to dispel the stubborn distractions, Ceolwulf nodded toward the warrior who regarded him with anxious eyes.
"Well understood. You keep watching the situation in the forest. Some unforeseen chance may yet befall them."
"...Yes! Ealdorman! Well understood!"
The answer was vigorous, but doubt lingered in his eyes. Unable to meet that gaze—which seemed to ask, 'An unforeseen chance for those Northmen?'—Ceolwulf gestured for the warrior to leave, and soon only the sound of wind stealing in from somewhere remained in the chamber.
'The Cyning had told me to buy more time. Yet even with the most generous estimate, holding out in this fortress would be seven days at most...'
And that truly was generous. Seven days.
If they had broken up and used the arrows remaining in the fortress, the sling stones, even the bricks from houses and the church—could they have held out two more days?
The reinforcement work on the fortress gate had been ordered long ago, but the most fundamental problem—the height of the walls—could not be remedied in a short time.
And an even greater problem was the morale of the warriors who would have to defend those walls with their own flesh and blood.
The river situated to the west of the fortress functioned as a natural barrier, but hardly any supplies could be expected to come from Tamworth.
Unless it were used as an escape route in an emergency...
'Their Konungr was said to value honor so highly. Then in the worst case, the elderly and the women and children could be...'
...
Good heavens.
What on earth was he thinking?
Startled out of his wits, Ceolwulf hastily offered a prayer to the Lord, begging forgiveness.
'Had I fallen so low...! Pull yourself together, Ceolwulf! I would sooner bite my sword and die...!'
Having harshly rebuked himself, Ceolwulf ended his prayer for forgiveness and vigorously summoned his adjutant, who was waiting beyond the firmly shut door.
Soon the Mercian warriors of Leicester, even as they prepared for the coming battle, began sending all the elderly, the women, and the children remaining in the fortress across the river to the west.
The refugees' destination was Tamworth.
The central city of Mercia where Burgred Cyning was busily mustering a new army.
Thus those leaving the fortress and those remaining looked at one another across the river.
"May God's protection be with you..."
People wishing each other luck in battle with the very same phrase.
As Ceolwulf watched that scene, the sensation came over him that it looked exactly like people awaiting their appointed deaths.
At last, the great horn blasts he had never wanted to hear began to resound one after another over the walls.
[Buuuuuu- buuuunnng-!!!]
[Buuuu- buuuunnng-!!!]
"O God..."
Watch over us.
[Srrrrng-]
Ceolwulf drew the sword stained with the wear of his hands from its scabbard.
Standing upon a high lookout tower, he looked down and shouted to those gripped by terror and fear.
"Lift your heads! Warriors of Mercia! God is with us!"
Under the protection of God—the strongest and greatest being they knew—the Mercian warriors summoned their strength once more.
"God is with us!"
"O God, protect us!"
"Archers—! Make ready—!"
"Archers! Make ready!!!"
Ceolwulf shouting his throat raw, the deputies relaying the Ealdorman's orders.
The tide of Northmen swiftly approached the walls of Leicester, which rang with the clangor of metal and surged with battle fervor.
"Fire—!"
"Loose!"
"Let fly the bowstrings!"
[Hyuu! Hyu-hyuu!]
Arrows flew through the sky, and at last the battle began.
*****
"Shields—!"
"Shields!"
[Shuuuu- Shuuuu- Tang! Tatan!]
Arrows plunging from above.
When shooting them, I hadn't known, but being on the receiving end was a wretched ordeal.
'Those bloody bastards.'
Anger was a warrior's greatest weapon.
Recalling the teachings of father, grandfather, grandfather's father, and the line that must have been handed down from above them, Oleg ground his teeth.
The focal point of the attack in this siege was the fortress's eastern wall and the fortress gate.
Though it was called a weak fortress, a wall was still a wall, so they had to find the weak points. After circling the fortress several times, Thorbjörn, the cavalry captain whose riding skill was breathtaking, had discovered that the eastern wall was cracked here and there and leaned inward.
All that remained was to hammer that spot with everything they had.
That was why he, along with Jarl Uva and Jarl Refil, had come out here.
"Keep advancing with shields up! There's no proper moat here! Anyone who doesn't hold his shield right and gets hit by an arrow, be ready to answer for it!"
It wasn't a voice as mythic as the Konungr's, but his own voice was not inferior anywhere.
"Yes! Jarl Oleg!"
"Don't worry, Jarl! Who are we? We are the conquerors of Huntadun! The Fort Hunters!"
'Conqueror of Huntadun my ass... More like Huntadun's friends.'
Regardless of his true feelings, in the official records (all the jarls now knew the work Leon was doing), he and his subordinates had become the first Norsemen in history to take a fortress.
When the Konungr himself had bestowed the nickname 'Fort Hunters (Pod Hunta)' upon them, they naturally swelled with pride and grew even more tightly knit.
This glory too, they would seize.
"Forward—! Push forward!"
"Hel!"
"Tyr!!!"
[Gachi! Gachi! Gachi! Gachi! Shuuuu- Shuuuu- Tang! Tatan! Puck! Tak!]
The warriors, shields pressed together, moving as one.
Amidst it all, Oleg felt himself alive.