Bryan Beal

© Bryan Beal

The stench was what woke him up. Coming from the heavy burden on his upper body, the stink was sickly sweet with the cloying gases of decay and flesh. Wetness, sticky with exposure to the air, still clung to his cheeks and face. He could feel it in his beard. He wriggled the weight off him and started to breathe easier. He sucked in fresher air, but it was only cleaner relative to being under the corpse that he now saw next to him on the ground.

In a moment of panic, the Dane flexed his right hand. Relief flooded him as he felt the hilt of his sword. Pushing through the nausea, the Dane rose to his knees and surveyed the hellish landscape around him. Odin would be feasting with many new warriors. A pang of jealousy and regret gripped his heart.

He licked his lips, tasting the salt and dirt of his own body mixed with the metallic tang of blood. His or another's, he could not tell. Then, what did it matter in a place like this?

Needing to move just to focus, more than anything, the Dane struggled to his feet. He swayed a bit before he noticed the mail coat that weighed him heavily. Shrugging it off, he had to bend right over and drop his blade to shuffle it over his head. Once freed, the warrior retrieved his weapon.

He looked at the ravens all around him, cawing to each other as they hopped from meal to meal in a feast on the dead. Not even the scavengers from the local village and farms remained. He could not even remember where he was or who had done this to his warband.

There were other dead mixed among those of his people. Some held spears and others held short, angular blades. Few had armour. Then he remembered. Saxons. The first he had met who had bested him or his people. He could feel the anger inside, but it was soon swamped by depressing resignation.

The salt in his wound was that the Valkyries had chosen so many, but not him. Questions flooded through his mind, yet he could still not fathom any reason why he had been denied Valhalla.

Walking a bow shot or more from where he had fallen brought him now respite from the torment of being the only standing Dane on the field. He happened to look east, to his left, and see the ships that had born them. They were smouldering ruins, their foremasts stripped and defiled. The ramming speed at which desolation careened into his soul was devastating. His knee almost buckled, but the pride of being a son of Odin kicked in.

The unholy, godly rage started to rise. As he walked, he searched. A movement attracted his attention. A Saxon was still breathing. The Dane kicked the man's sword away. He looked the fallen Saxon in the eyes, blue orbs in a blood-stained face. In a fit of rage, the Dane stabbed his own sword into the throat of the enemy. The Saxon gurgled for a moment and then no more. The only satisfaction the Dane felt was that Wodin, or whatever these feeble spawn called the God of War, would see one less of his kin.

The cooling air started to pierce the tunic and breeches that the Dane was wearing. He realised they were holed and tattered, but not how they got into so a condition. He found a Saxon of about his size who had only lost his head. His clothes were intact, though filthy. The Dane decided he could live with filthy if it were warm. Getting changed proved exhausting. But he did it.

His own broadsword was getting heavier, but the Dane was loathe to walk about unarmed. Besides that, the blade had history. One does not turn their back on where they come from. The Dane found a fallen comrade and rescued a scabbard that would do the job, if not perfectly. Strapping it on, he could free both hands from the burden of carrying the weapon.

He trudged on. Weary and resolute. Finding no other of his own, he just pressed through the field of the dead.