Free The Empty Throne (The Warrior Chronicles, Book 8) by Bernard Cornwell

criss-crossed with silver bands. A silver chain hung at his neck. A dark-red cloak was spread by his wide shoulders, clasped at his throat by an ornate brooch studded with garnets. He wore no helmet. His red hair was longer than most Saxons liked to wear it, framing a face that had seen many enemies. He had gouged a cross onto his right cheek then rubbed the wound with soot or dirt to leave the dark mark that proclaimed him a Christian warrior. He was a hard man, but what else would he be? He had stood in the shield wall, he had watched the Danes come to the attack, and he had lived. He was no youngster. His beard was grey and his dark face deep-lined. ‘My Lord Uhtred,’ he said. There was no respect in his voice, instead he spoke sourly as though my arrival was a tedious nuisance which, I suppose, it was.
    ‘Brice.’ I nodded to him from my saddle.
    ‘The king sent me,’ he said.
    ‘You serve King Edward now?’ I asked. ‘What happened? Did Lord Æthelhelm tire of your stench?’
    He ignored the insult. ‘He sent me to fetch the boy bastard,’ he said.
    I looked up at the wooden tower that crowned Æthelflaed’s church. A bell that had cost her a heavy chest of silver hung there. She had been so proud of the bell, which had been made by Frisian craftsmen and brought across the sea. It carried an inscription about its skirt: ‘Æthelflaed, by the grace of God and by the blessing of Saint Werburgh, had this bell made’, and by the grace of God the bell had cracked the very first time it was struck. I had laughed when it happened, and ever since the bell had not rung to summon folk to church, instead it just hurt the sky with its harsh noise.
    ‘Did you hear me?’ Brice demanded.
    I took my time to turn from the cracked bell, then I looked Brice up and down. ‘Which boy bastard?’ I finally asked.
    ‘You know who,’ he said.
    ‘I should buy the Lady Æthelflaed another bell,’ I said to Finan.
    ‘And she’d like that,’ he said.
    ‘Maybe I’ll have “the gift of Thor” written on the thing.’
    ‘And she won’t like that at all.’
    ‘Lord Uhtred!’ Brice interrupted our nonsense.
    ‘You’re still here?’ I asked, pretending surprise.
    ‘Where is he?’
    ‘Where is who?’
    ‘The bastard Æthelstan,’ he said.
    I shook my head. ‘I don’t know a bastard called Æthelstan. Do you?’ I asked Finan.
    ‘Never heard of him, lord.’
    ‘The boy Æthelstan,’ Brice said, struggling to restrain his temper, ‘King Edward’s boy.’
    ‘He’s not home?’ I pretended surprise again. ‘He should be at home or else at school.’
    ‘He’s not here,’ Brice said curtly, ‘and we looked in the school. So find him.’
    I took a deep breath, then dismounted. It took an effort to hide the pain and I had to hold onto the horse for a moment as the agony drained from my side. I even wondered whether I could walk without support, but then managed to let go of the saddle. ‘That sounded like a command,’ I said to Brice as I took a few slow steps towards him.
    ‘From the king,’ he said.
    ‘The King of Wessex?’ I asked. ‘But this is Mercia.’
    ‘The king wants his son returned to Wessex,’ Brice said flatly.
    ‘You’re a good warrior,’ I told Brice. ‘I’d welcome you into any shield wall, but I wouldn’t trust you to empty my piss pot. You’re not clever enough. That’s why you don’t command Æthelhelm’s household troops. So no, you don’t serve the king because the king wouldn’t want you. So who did send you? Lord Æthelhelm?’
    I had annoyed him, but he managed to bite back his anger. ‘The king,’ he said slowly, ‘wants his son, and you, Lord Uhtred, will find the boy and bring him here.’
    ‘You might find it strange,’ I said, ‘but I don’t take orders from you.’
    ‘Oh, you will,’ he said, ‘you will.’ He thought he was hiding his nervousness by belligerence, but I could see he was confused. He had orders to fetch Æthelstan and the boy had gone