Army of the Wolf Read Free Page B

here just to ride back north,’ said Bernhard bluntly.
    The count smiled. ‘Many things concerning the king’s wife make little sense.’
    Bishop Albert was surprised that the count would talk about the wife of his lord thus, but then remembered that Count Henry had once been a prisoner of Valdemar and perhaps that episode still rankled with him. But he said no more about the queen and when the ship had docked he escorted the two bishops and abbot to the monastery beside the cathedral, a large stone building with thick walls and small windows sited beside the brick cathedral in the centre of the city. There they were greeted by Bishop Peter of Roskilde, a portly man wearing a golden mitre, a gold pectoral cross dangling from a green cord around his neck.
    The travellers were fed well that night and the next morning rode north on splendid horses provided by the bishop’s private stables: well-groomed palfreys with smooth gaits and fitted with plush saddlery. Bishop Peter himself joined the party, riding on a magnificent black stallion that had been groomed so much that its coat shimmered in the spring sunshine. He was not only the Bishop of Roskilde but was also the king’s chancellor, responsible for Valdemar’s external affairs. Count Henry’s soldiers, horsemen wearing surcoats emblazoned with his coat of arms – a yellow griffin on a blue background – and attired in mail, provided the escort, the count himself riding with the two bishops and Abbot Bernhard. The latter’s presence intrigued the count, who was well acquainted with the military career of the Bernhard von Lippe, the former warrior who now wore a simple white woollen mantle and tunic.
    ‘You do not wear your sword, lord,’ said Count Henry.
    ‘My time as a soldier is over,’ replied the abbot. ‘And my title now is “abbot”.’
    ‘Do you not miss the sound of trumpets and the clash of steel, abbot?’ probed the count.
    Bernhard sighed. ‘They are with me always, count. They fill my dreams every night. There is no escape from the horrors one has committed, count.’
    Count Henry looked at him. ‘Not even for a man of God?’
    ‘Not even for a man of God.’
    Though they were surrounded by an armed guard there was little need for soldiers as they rode north along a track snaking across a lush green landscape. Zealand, like the rest of Denmark, was blessed with a mild climate, fertile soil and evenly distributed rainfall. The landscape was dotted with timber-framed buildings with walls of wattle-and-daub and roofs of trussed rafters. Cattle grazed on the abundant grassland. Farmers walked behind ploughs hitched to oxen to grow the grain that fed their families and was given as tithes to either the local lord or to the church. The herds of cattle produced milk, butter and cheese in abundance, which meant that the population grew, the church and nobility prospered and Denmark’s kings had men and money to fight their wars.
    Bishop Albert pulled up his horse and rested his hands on his saddle’s pommel. He studied the verdant terrain of Zealand. Count Henry rode his horse to his side.
    ‘Is your horse lame, lord bishop?’
    ‘One day Livonia will look like this,’ he mused.
    ‘That day is some way off yet, brother,’ said Theodoric.
    ‘But we have made a start, a good start,’ replied Albert.
    Count Henry looked around. ‘I have heard bishop, that Livonia is all forests and lakes where the pagans walk around naked covered in mud.’
    Bernhard laughed. ‘You should not always believe what you hear, count. It is true that there is an abundance of forests, rivers and lakes, but the area around Riga is beginning to resemble what you see before you: flat land filled with fields and farms.’
    ‘And Estonia is more open and rolling than you would think, count,’ added Theodoric. ‘It is a fine country.’
    ‘Filled with savages,’ said the count.
    ‘Filled with those who have yet to receive the wisdom of God’s word,’ Bishop