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they kept their black-capped heads low, watching me intently with blinking yellow eyes. ‘Asgot is a blood-crazed old fool,’ I said, admiring the birds’ courage, for not one of them fled to the darkening sky. ‘He’s probably not seen a woman like Cynethryth for thirty years or more, that’s likely all it is.’
    Penda grunted. ‘There are eggs here,’ he said, coming to the nests I had passed. ‘We could add them to tomorrow’s pot. It can’t make Arnvid’s stew any worse.’
    ‘Those beaks look sharp as arrows, Penda,’ I said. ‘Let the birds keep their eggs. As for Asgot, if he’s hatching some mischief, we’ll know. Though I’d wager Cynethryth can take care of herself.’ In truth I was annoyed with myself for not seeing what Penda had. Asgot was dangerous. I did not doubt it. Along with Glum and Glum’s kinsmen, the godi had killed my old friend and foster-father Ealhstan. They had hung the old man in an oak tree and strung the purple rope of his innards round the trunk. They had sacrificed my friend and one of them had died on my sword for it, but not Asgot. His old dusty lungs still creaked well enough and his bloodthirsty knife was sharp as ever.
    ‘Aye, we’ll watch him, lad,’ Penda said, ‘and the old bastard had better not try anything shady.’
    When we reached the white rocks it was dusk. It was still raining and even the marrow in my bones was sopping. We leant on our spears and looked east into Frankia. Grassland stretched across rolling hills as far as I could see. Scattered throughout this green landscape were darker copses of oak and beech and there were no human dwellings to be seen, though some of the scouting parties reported making out curling smoke against the sky from isolated farmsteads further inland towards the south. The bay we had moored in must have been less than a day’s sailing from the mouth of the great Sicauna river which snaked into the town of Paris, the only Frankish town I had ever heard of. Olaf said there were other settlements along that river’s banks, maybe even small towns, and I believed him, for if the river was as great as folk said, it must surely support many people.
    We knew Ealdred would have to pass our bay some time, for he was no fool and would stay close to land for safety and to harness the offshore winds, though they would be less than a fart’s worth in that dismal weather. But when he would pass was anyone’s guess and so we would just have to wait.
    Penda unrolled two oiled skins and unwound some slender rope from his waist and we laid one of the skins beside a large storm-crumbled rock. Using our two spears as supports and the ropes as guys, we made a passable shelter under which we sat looking out to sea as the incessant rain tapped against the leather, reminding us that we were about to spend a miserable night. For stealth’s sake Sigurd had forbidden the sentry groups from lighting fires. He did not want any Franks, intrigued by flames or smoke, to come blundering into his camp. Neither did he want the crew of Fjord-Elk to fear making landfall, though the Norsemen all agreed that when Ealdred did come, caution would most likely carry him directly from the open sea into the Sicauna river, thus avoiding the rocks that can tear into a ship’s belly, and the greed of men who would attack a ship for the treasures in her hold. But caution would not save Ealdred or his champion Mauger from us. Their wyrd was death and it waited for them on the Frankish coast.
    I took a hunk of stale bread from my tunic and held it beyond the shelter, watching as the rain turned it into a foul-looking mush that would at least spare my teeth. Penda lifted a buttock and unleashed a fart that would have filled Serpent ’s sail for a day, then shook his head and chuckled.
    ‘I’ll never forget your face, lad, when the Welsh were all over us like flies on cow dung. That blood-red eye of yours shone like the devil himself. And your teeth . . .’ he