Free Saxon 01 - The Last Kingdom by Bernard Cornwell

and her mother and grandmother were furious. "You tell the same tale as Rorik," Ravn said when I had finished.

"Because it's the truth," I said.

"So it would seem."

"He raped her!" Sigrid insisted.

"No," Ravn said firmly, "thanks to Uhtred, he did not."

That was the story Ragnar heard when he returned from hunting, and as it made me a Bernard Cornwell The Last Kingdom hero I did not argue against its essential untruth, which was that Sven would not have raped Thyra for he would not have dared.

His foolishness knew few limits, but limits there were, and committing rape on the daughter of Earl Ragnar, his father's warlord, was beyond even Sven's stupidity.

Yet he had made an enemy and, next day,

Ragnar led six men to Kjartan's house in the neighboring valley. Rorik and I were given horses and told to accompany the men, and I confess I was frightened. I felt I was responsible. I had, after all, started the games in the high woods, but Ragnar did not see it that way. "You haven't offended me. Sven has." He spoke darkly, his usual cheerfulness gone. "You did well, Uhtred.

You behaved like a Dane." There was no higher praise he could have given me, and I sensed he was disappointed that I had Bernard Cornwell The Last Kingdom charged Sven instead of Rorik, but I was older and much stronger than Ragnar's younger son so it should have been me who fought.

We rode through the cold woods and I was curious because two of Ragnar's men carried long branches of hazel that were too spindly to use as weapons, but what they were for I did not like to ask because I was nervous.

Kjartan's homestead was in a fold of the hills beside a stream that ran through pastures where he kept sheep, goats, and cattle, though most had been killed now, and the few remaining animals were cropping the last of the year's grass. It was a sunny day, though cold. Dogs barked as we approached, but Kjartan and his men snarled at them and beat them back to the Bernard Cornwell The Last Kingdom yard beside the house where he had planted an ash tree that did not look as though it would survive the coming winter, and then, accompanied by four men, none of them armed, he walked toward the approaching horsemen. Ragnar and his six men were armed to the hilt with shields, swords, and war axes, and their broad chests were clad in mail, while Ragnar was wearing my father's helmet that he had purchased after the fighting at Eoferwic. It was a splendid helmet, its crown and face piece decorated with silver, and I thought it looked better on Ragnar than it had on my father.

Kjartan the shipmaster was a big man, taller than Ragnar, with a flat, wide face like his son's and small, suspicious eyes and a huge beard. He glanced at the hazel branches and must have recognized their meaning for he instinctively touched the hammer charm Bernard Cornwell The Last Kingdom hanging on a silver chain about his neck.

Ragnar curbed his horse and, in a gesture that showed his utter contempt, he tossed down the sword that I had carried back from the clearing where Sven had tied Thyra. By rights the sword belonged to Ragnar now, and it was a valuable weapon with silver wire wrapped around its hilt, but he tossed the blade at Kjartan's feet as though it were nothing more than a hay knife. "Your son left that on my land," he said, "and I would have words with him."

"My son is a good boy," Kjartan said stoutly, "and in time he will serve at your oars and fight in your shield wall." "He has offended me."

"He meant no harm, lord."

"He has offended me," Ragnar repeated harshly. "He looked on my daughter's Bernard Cornwell The Last Kingdom nakedness and showed her his own." "And he was punished for it," Kjartan said, giving me a malevolent glance. "Blood was shed."

Ragnar made an abrupt gesture and the hazel branches were dropped to the ground.

That was evidently Ragnar's answer, which made no sense to me, but Kjartan understood, as did Rorik who leaned over and whispered