Prologue
Elsewhere, and Elsewhen
From the rocky promontory the two figures stood in silence as they watched the plains before the City. Across the distance the ululation of the horns and beat of the drums warbled into chaos. Glimmering points of light danced among the procession as the warhost trundled slowly through the gates.
“So much, over so little.” It was the first either had spoken in quite some time. The one that offered this opinion sighed sadly.
“Their temper is terrible,” said the other with a voice as weak as the morning wind. “I knew that, before.” The speaker was clearly close to tears. “I can’t say I didn’t. Oh …” and with that, a pair of knees thudded down to the dusty ground.
“No, do not despair. Don’t give up,” said the first, helping the other get back upright. “You have always been so strong. You can’t lose that, not now.”
“I think … I think I’ve made a mistake.”
“Never, my dear. You were so brave. I couldn’t be more proud.”
Silence again, while they just held each other. Then:
“Okay. I think it’s time.”
“Where will you go? They will never stop hunting you, you know. You’ve wounded their pride.”
“I’ve been thinking about it. There’s one place they won’t look.”
“You can’t mean –”
“Hush, don’t say it, I couldn’t bear to hear it aloud. But yes.”
“That is … beyond brave. It’s mad. It’s
unconscionable.”
“I know.”
“You’ll change things.”
“Hah. I’ve already changed things. They’ll never go back to the way they were.”
“But … surely, surely you’ve done enough, to change it all. Everything, for an Eternity. Isn’t that enough?”
“Not everything. Not yet. Not just this Eternity. All of them. That’s the path I’ve started down, I see now. And you’re right – there’s no turning back. So I have to press on. I must. I can’t not.”
Another silence, but a shorter one this time: they both knew they didn’t have the luxury of wasting time.
“Aren’t you frightened?”
“Terrified. More than I’ve ever been. But I was frightened before, too. And now at least I have this sense of purpose burning within me.”
“I am too. Terrified, I mean. But … I’ll stand by you.”
“You don’t have to. I know you’ve been given a part in the Score.”
“No, I will. I decided I would long before all this started. Because you deserve a friend, at the very least. And …”
“What?”
“… well, I don’t know if you could do it alone.”
“… nor I. Thank you, my love.”
“I’d better go. You’d better go, too.”
“You’ll know where to find me.”
“If I dare. But I will. Good luck. I’ll do what I can from the City.”
“You’ll help so much. I can’t thank you enough. So, until we meet again.”
“I’ll miss you.”
“You too.”
They embraced, and then departed, each in their own way. The only sign they were ever there was the pair of footprints on the dusty ground, and the morning wind made short work of those. It barely shook the few tufts of weed and grass on the bluff, as if they were quivering in apprehension at the army assembling below.
~
Wareham, Dorset
January, Anno Domini 867
… num custos fratris mei sum?
He dreamt that he was lost in a cold dark forest, and the wolves were howling. He ran and ran, but the wind always carried those whispered words. The nightmare always ended the same way – he would find the old stone chapel, the half-rotten door hanging off the hinges, creaking in the wind. Inside, it was dark. He knew the raggedy-cloaked man would be there, but he could never see him from outside. It was only when he knelt by the cracked altar that the dream-figure stepped out of the shadow, startling him every time. And each time, the slender man would say nothing – just hand Alfred the wet crown, and even though he could barely see it, he knew it was slick with blood.
Alfred of Wessex, Earl of Dorset, awoke in a sweaty tangle of bedding. It was just after dawn but not yet sunrise, and the morning twilight was casting a gentle corona around the window shutter as he pushed himself upright and waited for his heart to stop hammering. He was not going to get back to sleep, so he threw aside the blankets and pulled a heavy cloak on over his nightgown.
Cold the stairs underfoot as he descended from his chamber. He could hear movement from somewhere deep within the bowels of the castle; the servants, doubtless, preparing for another day. But he did not see any of them as he crossed the courtyard in the crisp fresh morning air to the chapel.
A single candle was not enough to chase the night away – in fact it only made the frittering shadows of the pews and columns and the earl himself seem longer – but it provided enough light that Alfred could at least see. Taking a knee, he intended to think about the nightmare, but in the end simply spent a few moments enjoying the tranquillity.
“God be with you, my lord.” Had he been asleep? How embarrassing for Ealdmund to discover him … and then, as he stood up to explain himself, he realised it was not his chaplain.
“And you … though you are not Father Ealdmund,” said Alfred perfunctorily. It was better than saying nothing, after all: it would not do for him to appear surprised in his own castle.
“Nay, my lord, though I am a man of God,” replied the strange priest. “I am a traveller in your lands, nobody of note – though I know who you are, of course.”
“Then I bid you welcome, traveller,” said Alfred as he took a better look at the other man. Tall, and thin, there was something familiar about the priest.
“Thank you, my lord. Can I be of help to you this morning?”
Alfred spent a moment thinking it over, and then nodded. “I was going to speak to Ealdmund, but as you are also a man of learning … I have been troubled by dreams. One in particular.”
“Ah! Great men so often are,” said the priest with neither a hint of flattery nor irony, “and even the wise cannot know all of their secrets. But the Lord does sometimes speak to us in such signs and symbols.”
“I do not pretend to be so important,” Alfred replied quickly, “nor would I trouble anyone else with night-time phantasies, but I have had this same one, night after night, for weeks now.”
“Unusual, but not unheard of,” said the priest in the silence that followed.
“Father,” said Alfred, “what does ‘num custos fratris mei sum’ mean? It sounds Biblical, but my Latin …”
“Ah,” said the priest. “That is from Genesis, from the story of Cain and Abel. ‘Am I my brother’s keeper?’” He paused. “The scenes that you see – are they events you would like to see unfold in life?”
Alfred’s face must have been response enough, for the priest’s expression hardened. “I see.”
The earl wiped the guilt from his features, and shrugged. “It is the war in the north, father. The heathens are so many, and we are so few. My brother is a good man, and has been a fair king since the lord took Æthelbert from us two years ago – but he is not the man our brother was. I cannot see how we come away from this the stronger.”
There was silence in the chapel. When the priest did speak up, he had a thoughtful tone.
“When you say your brother – you mean Æthelbert?”
“He was king before Æthelred,” said Alfred.
“And yet he was not your father’s heir. As I recall, it was Æthelbald who ruled Wessex when Æthelwulf died. And – if you will forgive me – as good a king as Æthelbald was, the realm prospered more when Æthelbert succeeded him.”
“That … is true,” Alfred allowed, yet he was slightly uncomfortable with this line of talk.
“Then,” said the priest, “just as Æthelwulf’s second son proved to be a better king than his first, perhaps his fourth son will yet prove to be better than his third.”
Alfred swallowed. “You cannot be suggesting –” but he was interrupted.
“God’s plans for us are mysterious, but above all they are
long. The Lord has set events in motion in ages past that only now come to fruition, and only in the fullness of time will we see the results of our actions here and now. For what is one human lifetime but a blink in the eye of the Almighty? The war against the Northmen is lost,” the priest said matter-of-factly, “but that is not the end of Christian rule on these islands. They will win the war, but they cannot win the peace. You must think of the future, my lord, and how best you will strike back against the heathens when they grow fat and complacent in their victory. And it must be you. The throne would suit you far better than your brother. You know that, and many others at court have seen it. I cannot speak for God Almighty, but I know well that He would not want His people felled in some glorious last stand if that should mean their legacy wither and die from these shores. Ælla brought his own doom upon him. Learn from his mistake, and they will call you Alfred the Great yet.”
“Who are you?” whispered the earl in terror.
“But a traveller, my lord, and now the road calls me on. God bless you, Alfred of Wessex.” And with that, the priest took an unmistakeably raggedy cloak from behind the chapel door, wrapped up and stepped out into the sunrise. By the time the glare faded from the earl’s eyes, the other man was nowhere to be seen.
~
Winchester, Wessex
February, A.D. 867
The mood in the war council of King Æthelred of Wessex was grim. The assembled earls stewed in impatience as the scouts presented the latest from the north, and then each in turn reported on their own meagre levies that had answered the call of the throne. The king ran his hands through his thinning hair.
“So this is to be our end,” he said morosely. “Scant two thousand of us, against the Great Heathen Army ten times our number. This is how the good Christian kings go to die.”
The court was silent, but the spectrum of emotions on the assembled faces was overwhelmingly loud. Some were angry; some were scared; some were simply resigned. Alfred was lost in thought, as he had been for many a day since the encounter in the Wareham chapel.
“Ælla brought his own doom upon him,” he muttered, under his breath. Æthelred looked at him.
“What was that, brother?” Alfred’s attention came back to the council chamber. The others were looking at him expectantly. Some seemed to agree with what they thought he was saying.
“Ælla brought his own doom upon him,” Alfred repeated, and his voice found conviction. “Let it not be ours. My lord, we cannot hope to drive the heathens back. But they have no reason to come this far south. Northumberland will fall by summer. East Anglia probably sooner.” Murmurs of shock rippled around the room, but there were tones of support mixed in. “What use is there sending good Christian men to die needlessly? That cannot be the right thing to do.”
“It is the
honourable thing to do, brother,” said the king pointedly.
“Then we will die honourably, and delay the pagans not a day in their conquests. It would be far better to draw back now, marshal our strength, prepare to fight them –”
“An interesting perspective, brother,” Æthelred said through gritted teeth. “It is good that you should say the unthinkable, if only so that we can instantly put a stop to that line of thought. Of course, if we do not show the pagans that we mean to resist them, nothing would stop them from pushing further and further south. We must make our stand, before it is too late and we are too weak and divided.” But his sour expression was not so contagious that it stopped all the others there from staring at Alfred thoughtfully.
Later, Oshere of Tottenham, the Earl of Wiltshire and Sussex, approached Alfred as the younger man was walking in the manor gardens.
“Those were brave words in the council, my lord.”
“It was not my place to criticise the king,” said Alfred, staring dead ahead.
“On the contrary, my lord, as his brother you are the only one who can, so you are obligated to tell him the truth. Even when it is so uncomfortable.”
They walked in silence for a while. Alfred’s stomach was churning as he tried to find the perfect words to say next, but in the end it was the elder and wiser Oshere who broke the silence.
“I must congratulate you on your engagement to Princess Gisele. She is the very flower of womanhood. And I understand King Charles the Bald provided quite the wedding gift.”
“A beautiful stallion from his father’s stock. The beast is magnificent,” Alfred said.
“The wealth and majesty of the Karlings will never cease to amaze me. You are lucky to call them family.”
“Well, they are a fractious bunch,” said Alfred with a smile. “I may have made some enemies in the same stroke as I made kin.”
“Perhaps,” said Oshere. “And yet … the king remains unmarried. And with no progeny, you are his heir.”
“That is true.”
“As each of your brothers has died in their turn, God rest their souls, and passed the crown along to the next.”
“And I am the youngest, and last in the line of succession,” said Alfred softly.
“Indeed. But if King Æthelred has his way, you may be called to duty after all our glorious deaths in the north.”
Alfred swallowed. Then:
“The battlefield is a dangerous place.”
“That it is, my lord. Such is the nature of war. It cuts down the just and the unjust alike, and those of us who survive must do what we can to rebuild from the ruins. A task that some of us are more adept at than others.”
“I should hope to do my duty well,” said Alfred. He stopped in his tracks and caught Oshere’s eye.
“Duty is a terrible weight,” the older earl said softly. “For the good of the realm, it has us do cruel things. But you are young yet, and should not trouble yourself with such thoughts. Leave that to we elders, in our winter years. I think, Alfred, that your spring is just beginning.”
~
Buckingham, Oxford
12th of March, A.D. 867
They had not yet left Wessex when it happened. Alfred was poring over the map of England while Æthelred made one last inspection of their army before they rode out to join forces with King Burghred of Mercia. And then, suddenly, the royal tent was stormed by Earls and servants, carrying the king. They quickly cleared a bed and laid him out. There was an arrow quivering in his gut, and his tunic was trenched with blood.
“He was too close to the firing range,” said Oshere softly as Æthelred roared against the pain.
“My God,” said Alfred, rushing to his brother’s side. “Send for the physician!” He grasped the king’s hand; Æthelred only gave another animalistic grunt.
“We have, of course,” said Oshere. “But I fear it is too late. He has bled too much.” As if to punctuate this, the king spat a glob of bloody phlegm from his mouth. His eyes rolled, and he seemed to notice Alfred for the first time.
“Alfred … Alfred,” he said weakly. His body spasmed. “God forgive me!” he roared. “And … God forgive you too, Alfred.” His gaze did not drop from his brother’s eyes until his body went limp.
Oshere reached over and closed the king’s eyes. Overcome with nausea, Alfred stumbled out of the tent. Collapsing to his knees, he vomited, once and again, the physical waves crashing over him like the shame and terror he felt. When he was done, Oshere helped him to his feet.
“I think,” said Alfred weakly. Then he took a deep breath and steeled himself. “We go home, and stand down. I shall write to Burghred at once.”
Oshere nodded, his face carefully blank.
“The king is dead,” he said. “Long live the king.”
