and I praise him when he gives me the strength to resist the temptation.’
Both Beocca and Alfred stared at me as if I had sprouted angel’s wings. I was only repeating the nonsense I had heard Beocca advise Alfred in the dark, but they thought it revealed my great holiness, and I encouraged them by trying to look meek, innocent and pious. ‘You are a sign from God, Uhtred,’ Alfred said fervently. ‘Do you say your prayers?’
‘Every day, lord,’ I said, and did not add that those prayers were addressed to Odin.
‘And what is that about your neck? A crucifix?’ He had seen the leather thong and, when I did not answer, he leaned forward and plucked out Thor’s hammer that had been hidden behind my shirt. ‘Dear God,’ he said, and made the sign of the cross. ‘And you wear those too,’ he added, grimacing at my two arm rings which were cut with Danish rune-letters. I must have looked a proper little heathen.
‘They make me wear them, lord,’ I said, and felt his impulse to tear the pagan symbol off the thong, ‘and beat me if I don’t,’ I added hastily.
‘Do they beat you often?’ he asked.
‘All the time, lord,’ I lied.
He shook his head sadly, then let the hammer fall. ‘A graven image,’ he said, ‘must be a heavy burden for a small boy.’
‘I was hoping, lord,’ Beocca intervened, ‘that we could ransom him.’
‘Us?’ Alfred asked, ‘ransom him?’
‘He is the true Ealdorman of Bebbanburg,’ Beocca explained, ‘though his uncle has taken the title, but the uncle will not fight the Danes.’
Alfred gazed at me, thinking, then frowned. ‘Can you read, Uhtred?’ he asked.
‘He has begun his lessons,’ Beocca answered for me. ‘I taught him, lord, though in all honesty he was ever a reluctant pupil. Not good with his letters, I fear. His thorns were prickly and his ashes spindly.’
I said that Alfred did not understand jokes, but he loved that one, even though it was feeble as watered milk and stale as old cheese. But it was beloved of all who taught reading, and both Beocca and Alfred laughed as though the jest were fresh as dew at sunrise. The thorn, ð and the ash, æ were two letters of our alphabet. ‘His thorns are prickly,’ Alfred echoed, almost incoherent with laughter, ‘and his ashes spindly. His b’s don’t buzz and his i’s,’ he stopped, suddenly embarrassed. He had been about to say my i’s were crossed, then he remembered Beocca and he looked contrite. ‘My dear Beocca.’
‘No offence, my lord, no offence.’ Beocca was still happy, as happy as when he was immersed in some tedious text about how Saint Cuthbert baptised puffins or preached the gospel to the seals. He had tried to make me read that stuff, but I had never got beyond the shortest words.
‘You are fortunate to have started your studies early,’ Alfred said to me, recovering his seriousness. ‘I was not given a chance to read until I was twelve years old!’ His tone suggested I should be shocked and surprised by this news so I dutifully looked appalled. ‘That was grievously wrong of my father and stepmother,’ Alfred went on sternly, ‘they should have started me much earlier.’
‘Yet now you read as well as any scholar, my lord,’ Beocca said.
‘I do try,’ Alfred said modestly, but he was plainly delighted with the compliment.
‘And in Latin too!’ Beocca said, ‘and his Latin is much better than mine!’
‘I think that’s true,’ Alfred said, giving the priest a smile.
‘And he writes a clear hand,’ Beocca told me, ‘such a clear, fine hand!’
‘As must you,’ Alfred told me firmly, ‘to which end, young Uhtred, we shall indeed offer to ransom you, and if God helps us in that endeavour then you shall serve in my household and the first thing you will do is become a master of reading and writing. You’ll like that!’
‘I will, lord,’ I said, meaning it to sound as a question, though it came out as dull agreement.
‘You will learn to read well,’ Alfred promised me, ‘and learn to pray well, and learn to be a good honest Christian, and when you are of age you can decide what to be!’
‘I will want to serve you, lord,’ I lied, thinking that he was a pale, boring, priest-ridden weakling.
‘That is commendable,’ he said, ‘and how will you serve me, do you think?’
‘As a soldier, lord, to fight the Danes.’
‘If God wishes it,’ he said, evidently disappointed in my answer, ‘and God knows we shall need soldiers, though I pray daily that the Danes will come to a knowledge of Christ and so discover their sins and be led to end their wicked ways. Prayer is the answer,’ he said vehemently, ‘prayer and fasting and obedience, and if God answers our prayers, Uhtred, then we shall need no soldiers, but a kingdom always has need of good priests. I wanted that office for myself, but God disposed otherwise. There is no higher calling than the priestly service. I might be a prince, but in God’s eyes I am a worm while Beocca is a jewel beyond price!’
‘Yes, lord,’ I said, for want of anything else to say. Beocca tried to look modest.
Alfred leaned forward, hid Thor’s hammer behind my shirt, then laid a hand on my head. ‘God’s blessing on you, child,’ he said, ‘and may his face shine upon you and release you from your thraldom and bring you into the blessed light of freedom.’
‘Amen,’ I said.
They let me go then and I went back to Ragnar. ‘Hit me,’ I said.
‘What?’
‘Thump me around the head.’
He glanced up and saw that Alfred was still watching me, so he cuffed me harder than I expected. I fell down, grinning. ‘So why did I just do that?’ Ragnar asked.
‘Because I said you were cruel to me,’ I said, ‘and beat me constantly.’ I knew that would amuse Ragnar and it did. He hit me again, just for luck. ‘So what did the bastards want?’ he asked.
‘They want to ransom me,’ I said, ‘so they can teach me to read and write, and then make me into a priest.’
‘A priest? Like the squinty little bastard with the red hair?’
‘Just like him.’
Ragnar laughed. ‘Maybe I should ransom you. It would be a punishment for telling lies about me.’
‘Please don’t,’ I said fervently, and at that moment I wondered why I had ever wanted to go back to the English side. To exchange Ragnar’s freedom for Alfred’s earnest piety seemed a miserable fate to me. Besides, I was learning to despise the English. They would not fight, they prayed instead of sharpening their swords, and it was no wonder the Danes were taking their land.
Alfred did offer to ransom me, but balked at Ragnar’s price that was ludicrously high, though not nearly so steep as the price Ivar and Ubba extracted from Burghred.
Mercia
