After repelling the relief force, Vig pressed his men to continue felling timber and building siege engines. By December, the cold had grown bitter. Snow lay more than a hand deep, slowing the assembly of militia everywhere.
Late one night, Vig sat at his desk with a Latin manuscript in hand, lost in thought. Written by a missionary, it was simple, describing the geography and customs of the Frankish realms.
"The region of Perche abounds with fine pastures. After 732 AD, local horses were crossbred with Arabians and Andalusians, producing a new strain—docile in nature, tireless in strength, and well suited for war."
732 AD?
Vig recalled the Battle of Poitiers.
The Arabs, after conquering Iberia, had crossed the Pyrenees and driven deep into Frankish lands. Charles, the palace mayor, had met them at Poitiers, winning a decisive victory. From then he was called "the Hammer." His son Pepin III seized the throne, founding the Carolingian dynasty. Under Pepin's heir, Charlemagne, the Frankish kingdom reached its zenith.
"So that was it. After Poitiers, the Franks captured Arabian and Andalusian horses, improving their own stock."
Closing the vellum, he rubbed his tired eyes and pulled another scroll from the chest—an alchemical treatise from centuries past. After a glance, he shoved it back.
The whole chest had been delivered by the Ivar merchants, part payment for earlier arms. Nearly a third were alchemy texts, full of talk of a mysterious substance called Lapis Philosophorum. From his high school chemistry he knew only scraps, not enough to make sense of it.
(Lapis Philosophorum—the Philosopher's Stone. Said to transmute base metals into gold and brew the Elixir of Immortality.)
Another fifth dealt with Hippocrates and humoral theory. Vig yawned and stacked them aside.
The rest—divination, cryptic flame rites, occult fragments—gave him a headache. At times he wondered if he had stumbled into some sorcerer's world.
"A whole chest of manuscripts, and not even a third worth anything. Ivar all but swindled me. No—these aren't worth forty pounds of silver."
Business was business, friendship or not.
He unrolled papyrus to draft a letter. But just as the quill touched the sheet, a scream ripped through the night.
Enemy attack?
He dropped the pen, donned armor with his guards' help, and rushed outside. The gale howled, pelting snowflakes into his face, scouring away fatigue.
"Form up!"
His shout carried across the camp. Thirty shield-bearers tumbled out of their barracks, strapping armor, forming ranks within five minutes.
Ulf's twenty shield-bearers were slower—still fumbling as Vig's line was already ready. A few drunkards hadn't even left their beds.
"No more waiting. The east is under assault—I'll take my men there. You cover north, west, and south."
Vig dashed to the eastern edge of the village. A section of palisade lay smashed. Countless Mercians with torches were pouring through the gap, shadows seething everywhere.
Thinking quickly, he called five names—ordering them to gather scattered bowmen, climb rooftops, and fire down into the breach.
"Jorund, take ten men. Round up the routed and rally them in the central square. The warehouse has spare arms. For every twenty you gather, assign a shield-bearer to lead them, then send the rest to me."
Next, he had a wagon dragged across the street to serve as a barricade. Behind it he formed his two dozen shield-bearers. Armored and disciplined, they cut down the first wave. Then the second. Then the third.
Minutes passed. Archers scrambled onto roofs, loosing shafts into the packed mass below. Every shot found a mark, easing the pressure.
Two more minutes—reinforcements arrived, routed men reorganized under Jorund's hand. They relieved Vig's exhausted guards. Gradually, the tide turned.
A mournful horn wailed from Tamworth's walls. Realizing Norse reinforcements had sallied from the east camp, the Mercians broke off, fleeing with torches back into the city.
At dawn, Vig inspected the field. Many of the fallen wore iron armor. Interrogations revealed they were palace guards.
"One hundred fifty armored men. Six hundred militia," he tallied, a chill creeping into his heart.
"If the crown prince had thrown in the rest, and attacked from the south as well, nine chances in ten they'd have overrun this camp."
But then he reflected—even if he had fallen, Ragnar's main army still stood in the east. The war's outcome would not have shifted.
"They cannot win a pitched battle. All they can do now is harass us with these raids. Likely the prince only hoped for a small victory to lift morale."
After two assaults, Ragnar dispatched Nils with three hundred men to bolster the northwest camp. But the Mercians had lost the will to attack. They watched, helpless, as the siege engines rose higher each day.
December 20th.
After more than a week of snow, the skies cleared. By midday, Vig and Ulf rode east to a war council.
"How fares the northwest camp?" Ragnar asked.
Vig listed their progress: three trebuchets, three siege towers, a hundred scaling ladders. The two Mercian raids had slowed the work, but not stopped it.
Leonard reported next—his camp south of the Tame River was unsuited for assault, so he had focused on building ten trebuchets.
"Plenty," Ragnar concluded. "Two days ago fresh supplies of fire oil and arrows arrived. With the thaw, conditions are perfect for assault."
The men had labored bitterly through winter. Ragnar would not delay further. He ordered all three camps to bombard the walls, hammering down the defenders' morale until the time came for the final storm.
When the meeting broke, Vig and Ulf returned to their camp, driving the men to readiness.
At dawn the next day, almost in unison, trebuchets from three directions hurled their first stones at Tamworth's walls.
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