Wulfwald Session 1, Part 2: Wiltunscir
A moderately sized village of two Tithings, Wiltunscir is one of the "frontier villages" that had been sponsored into being by King Cyneric's grandfather, Ecbert, as part of his efforts to populate (and thus fill with armed men) the eastern frontiers of Wessex. They were intended to serve as the early-warning beacons of sorts - their destruction and razing would hopefully lead refugees to come further west, warning larger and more substantial settlements of the initial forays of the sea-wolves (one of the monikers of the Northmen, who are believed to come from beyond the Grey Sea) and giving Witanceaster time to rally the banners. It is for this reason that the villages in the east are substantially better defended for their modest size; only the brave and adventurous (read: second sons without land) took up the offer of free land to settle in these parts.
(P.S. Brantwick is also a frontier village. So are basically any settlements within five days' march, though moreso if the land is to the east and north.)
The strategy, cold-blooded as it is, has been a moderate success. It now forms the primary backbone of Wessex's defensive strategy, the hill-fort villages dotting the kingdom's eastern marches providing local rallying points and centers for coordinated counter-offensives. Some would argue that it was this plasticity that delayed the Northmen's attacks to the point of Wulfric's death (by old age - the man was in his late sixties!), concluding for a time the wars and battles as the Northmen divided upon themselves for the control of eastern England they had so far conquered. Cyneric's Peace, so it was called, was purchased at heavy cost - chests of silver and gold, as well as two holy relics from Lindisfarne: a lock of hair of Joseph of Arimathea inside a silver pendant, and the fingerbone of the Virgin Mary kept inside a cage-capsule wrought in gold.
Thus things have been more or less peaceful three years. But trouble is stirring once more. Cyneric's spies flit in and out of his court in Witanceaster at a volume unseen since the war, and the King is said to stalk the palace, brooding in silence.
Treachery is the weapon of the wolfpack. The wolves are honourless, bereft of the grace of God, their souls bound to eternal damnation in the life to come hereafter. For what matters the things of this earth, which are doomed to rot and crumble to dust, compared to the provenance of one's immortal soul?
Yet in this life, if not the next, these merciless curs have something of an edge. They possess the mean cunning of the beast, capable of felling low honourable men.
Hear the tale of Aethelbert, Thegn of Wiltunscir, taken before his time by wolves.
Foul Blackmail
The Wolves circle round the fire-lit settlement, sniffing out weaknesses. Theirs is an ungodly task: to blackmail the wife of a god-fearing Thegn of Wessex, force her to denounce herself as engaging in extramarital dalliances, and proclaim her only son as an illegitimate bastard. So the Thegn of Brantwick has ordered them; so it shall be done.
Two of the she-wolves - the untrustworthy Asiatic Altun and the masterless thrall Mildrith - sneak into the wooden-walled hillfort, disguised as slaves, their filthy faces unwashed from three days' of forest travel giving them sufficient disguise. Like ghosts flitting between the lives of men, they make their way through the stout fyrdmen of Wiltunscir unnoticed. They find the wife of the thegn unguarded, at the innermost chamber of the longhall presumed secure; like the Snake of the Garden, they poison her mind with words, planting fear and doubt and coercing her into a great Sin - the betrayal of her lawful-wedded husband. Evidence of cuckoldry fabricated by the wife's own hands, the letter left on the sacred marriage-bed, the she-wolves stalk away from the hillfort and the settlement at large, fading away into the night to spring the next part of the trap.
Thegn Aethelbert returns from the patrol. A frontier town such as this has many calls for armed rangings, keeping an eye out for signs of Northman incursions and preparations for raids, and a thegn - the lowest of landed martial nobility - must spend much time out of his home in the woods and the plains. What horror he must have felt when his once-stable family was torn, who could say? We only know that he was full of wroth when he marched out from his home, all weariness from travel forgotten, too harried to even refill his food-pouch and waterskin as he rode into the night.
Ambush
Hooves are faster than feet, as the hidden wolves find to their chagrin. Altun arrives at the ambush spot, but the other she-wolf are yet to arrive at the hill-rise overlooking the valley, escorting as she is the now-former wife of Thegn Aethelbert and the five-year-old child, tarnished by self-confession of bastardry. Their disappearance will further fuel the flame of vicious rumour-mongering, staining the blameless thegn's reputation and honour, and destroy what hope he has of refuting intimations of unmanliness. And this is an age of the sword and shield; unmanliness is akin to uselessness, and a useless man may not lead. What fyrdman would follow such a warrior, line alongside him in the shield-wall?
The thegn rides with such fury, intent to catch the runaway wife and child, that the she-wolves do not make it to the hill overlooking the road in time. The rest of the wolves, while waiting, have neglected to set up any traps - a clear sign of their inexperience, one they may have to pay with their lives. Still, they are not entirely idiotic; the Asiatic fires from her bow an arrow envenomed with mind-clouding madness. The first misses entirely, the second a flawless hit (20) that evades all armour and ablatives to inject the venom directly into his bloodstream.
The maddening effect of the witch's brew is immediate. Already full of wroth, the hapless thegn roars with berserk fury as he attack the nearest living being, his greatsword Hildegicel (or War-Icicle) swinging, its uneven edges giving a jagged brutality to each of its swing. A head flies high with the first strike. Its first victim since its unsheathing is one of his own men: one of Aethelbert's own riders, kinsmen and hirth-warriors, young warriors who had ridden just behind for concern of their lord. The shock of such base treachery passes in seconds. Realising some witch-craft is at work, one of the riders looks about, finds the wolves lurking among the trees up the hill. While the man unhorses and climbs the hill with shield and spear, combat between the thegn and his men ensues.
Skalds sing of heads flying, swords gleaming. They fill the even hours with depictions of bravery and cowardice, narrating long lists of names of the bold dead. No such glory in an ambush; here the fight is short and swift, punctuated not with proud war-cries and challenges. Only the grunts, huffs, and the silver sound of metal against flesh disturb the afternoon's quiet.
Suffice it to say that doomed Aethelbert fought bravely, even if his foes were his friends in truth. His companions lay dead before him, one man against three, such was his prowess.
Contrast the wolves, who falter before a single spear-man who climbed up the hill. Mathghamhain flees after a brief parley against the warrior, the Celtic cravenness in full display. Altun stands helpless, the string of her bow snapped from ill-keeping and ill-luck. The Frankish spearman fights alone to engage with the already-embattered riders of the berserk thegn. He is dancing in the periphery, speartip poking, never fully engaging, weaving, dodging, hoping his speed will protect his unarmoured flesh.
The Witch
Mildrith, meanwhile, hears the sound of battle and makes to rush toward her comrades. The Saxon would make it too, being of stouter heart than flighty Mathghamhain, were it not for the wife's scream - a piercing shriek, accompanied by the clutching of her heart.
Wicce-craft, she realises, seeing the hand-made poppet and thorn in her hands. An unnatural curse, manifested through that doll as the medium.
From the trees she spots the accursed wyrding woman - a mere girl, in truth - hiding among the barks and rocks. She immediately lunges forward, heedless of any curse that might be heaped upon her. The witch-child gasps in surprise. Though knowledgeable in the mystical arts, she is less well-versed in personal combat. Her foulspawn familiar - a great white wolf, its unearthly outline blurred like mist - growls to fend off the attacker, but the stout Saxon shieldmaiden plunges ahead, beheads the child in one fell stroke. The curse is disrupted before it could accelerate in severity. The wife will live to fade away in anonymous exile.
The wicce dealt with, Mildrith turns toward the fight once more, grim determination urging her on where other Wolves fled.
Aftermath
Men die, kinsmen die, even cattle die. But a man's name - reputation, honour, credit, that remains. Alas for Thegn Aethelbert. His name is marred by cuckoldry and unmanliness. His only offspring has been denounced a bastard by his own mother; of his closest kin, none are near enough or strong enough to lay claim to the village. Thus Wiltunscir becomes without thegn, awaiting the coming of another.
Just as Thegn Raedwald planned.
The Wolves return to their lair, to receive the rewards of their unjust deeds. Aethelbert and his retinue rot under leaves and earth, their remains never to be found by kinsmen to be interred in godly graves.