Wulfnoth's
Mutiny
Part Three
Paul's comfort in high places was due to his extremely fine sense of balance. He was never dizzy, and never knew the fear of heights. But when he went to sea for the first time, his fine sense of balance worked against him.
He could not stand the constant pitching of his body, and he began at first to become dizzy, and then to become very nauseous. He stood his ground as well as he could amidship, but he had no sea legs, and soon began to get very ill. He was ordered to take a turn aloft. He tried to limber up the mast, but the pitching became more violent the higher he got. Finally, it was all he could do just to hang onto the mast. He closed his eyes as his nausea overcame him, and he began to vomit generously all over the crewmen below. As the mast swung around in the choppy sea, he also swung widely about high above the crewmen, who scrambled to get out of the way of his wild retchings. Unfortunately for them, Paul had eaten well before they sailed.
When he finally climbed down the mast and crawled into the ship's bottom to die, everyone was mad at him. He lay there as sick as can be for three days at sea. Nobody would talk to him for the first two days, but by the third day they were all laughing about it and urging him to go back up the pole again so that they could sail amongst the enemy, him puking all over the Danes, thereby making them quit England never to return.
By the time they joined the rest of the fleet at Sandwich anchorage, he was one of the crew.
The entire Royal Fleet had been stationed at Sandwich for three weeks when all the sea commanders were ordered ashore for the interrogation of Wulfnoth. He had been denounced in London by the Lord Eadric of Mercia, as a result of Eadric's searching investigation of the Northumbrian plot. Several men had already been arrested in connection with the plot, and tortured until they confessed. They had implicated Wulfnoth. Eadric had ordered the transcripts of their confessions to be taken to the King after the guilty men had been executed. The money Wulfnoth had supposedly collected from the Danes was "discovered" and delivered at once to Canterbury, where Aethelraed had moved with his court and his treasury.
Eadric was in great favour at court, and Aethelraed sought his counsel on all matters concerning the kingdom, most especially on the war with the Danes. Eadric continued to give Aethelraed unraed advise on all subjects.
Wulfnoth realized after the accusations were clearly stated that he had been betrayed. His uncle, commanding officer Brihtric, kept his silence throughout the entire interrogation. Wulfnoth kept staring at Brihtric, and more than once expected to be saved by him. But there was nothing Brihtric could think of to save Wulfnoth. He could not even save himself. Only Wulfnoth could save Brihtric, by saying nothing.
Wulfnoth never felt defeated, though. He was not a man to submit. He intended, as soon as he heard the damning half-truth of his treason against the King come out in this very public forum, to save himself. At first, he pleaded with these men who knew him well. He protested his innocence to the Court Martial and demanded his rights to a defense by oath-swearing. He further demanded a defense by combat. Finally, he demanded to swear himself before the King, but only after the Viking fleet had been destroyed. He reminded them of his importance in the offensive sea battle ahead. His fireships were the key to the battle. These protests delayed his immediate arrest. The North Sea Fleet Command ordered him confined to his ship, and sent word to the King that they had taken steps to see that the King's justice was served.
Wulfnoth was escorted back to his ship by his friends there. Brihtric was not among them. When he got back to his own flagship, he struck colours and ordered the twenty fireships under his command to weigh anchor and set sail for the south coast without delay. Since his own small command was well ordered and loyal, they obeyed readily. Word of the accusations against him had quickly gotten round, though, and he was asked guardedly about them. As they sailed away, he announced to his own crew that indeed he did have money from the Danish ransom. Lots of it. He promised to share it with them if they were successful in saving his cause. He needn't have bothered. They obeyed him out of personal loyalty. He was the only Sea Commander they knew, and if he was in trouble, they were all in trouble together.
The Fleet Command was stunned by his departure, and had to meet to discuss their response. They did not want to abandon station, so they ordered Brihtric to give chase with forty ships. The entire fleet was up in arms by this time, and when Brihtric ordered forty ships to weigh anchor in pursuit of the mutineers, eighty ships set sail with him, leaving the anchorage at Sandwich almost empty.
By this time, it was nightfall, and the main fleet moved slowly to windward to clear the coast. Wulfnoth was well down the coast, and with more favorable winds made good time past East Anglia, crossing the Thames outfall as the morning came on. Sunrise brought rising wind and the promise of bad weather.
When they reached the coast of Kent, Wulfnoth raided ashore to resupply with food. His men were conscious of their criminality by now, and began to behave like pirates ashore. Young Paul went on a raid to a large manorhouse on the coast, and was deeply shocked by the way some of the crewmen treated the women they found. He had seen fights all his life, but had never seen real brutality of this kind. He looked to the leader of his shore party to put a stop to it, but the man was only concerned about the time they were taking. When they were ordered back to the beach, all hands obeyed. The mutineers were laughing and loudly cursing the Kentishmen hiding out of sight.
Paul could not help but feel God's wrath following them back to the ships. He knew that their adventure had been cursed. In his heart, he begged for mercy. In reply, the gathering storm broke into full fury. They beat out to sea with difficulty.
Once again in deep water, Wulfnoth made for the southwest just as the Royal Fleet hove into view northwards. The scudding water and rain then hid all from sight, as the storm came close to hurricane force.
From the top of the masts, Brihtric's lookouts had made visual contact with the mutineers before the storm hid them from view. In spite of the rising seas, Brihtric thought to make gains on Wulfnoth by cutting short the swing around the sand shallows ahead. He could save twenty or thirty miles of easting and back. So he committed his fleet to a broad reach across the shoaling race. The ebb tide picked up pace as they made their way. Halfway across the shoal water, the waves crested steeply. The port side broaching became dangerous, and his ships began to founder. Beset by the tides and the cyclone, Brihtric broke off the chase and set a windward heading, beating into the mountainous shoal seas.
As the wind came round twenty degrees, the visibility cleared for a few minutes up to a range of ten miles. Wulfnoth once again saw the Royal Fleet come into view, this time beating upwind. They had broken off the chase. He saw right away the distress they were in. He wasted no time in seizing the advantage. Coming about, he set a broad reach across surging bluewater to get well upwind of Brihtric.
In the hour of sailing this difficult course against the starboard broadsides, Wulfnoth had his ships crews signalled to prepare for an engagement with the enemy. All of the bitumin was unpacked for firing, and the ships' live coals stoked up into little roaring furnaces. His men made ready their action stations, and rigs were set aloft for the advantageous release of firebombs at close quarters.
Within the hour, he was where he needed to be, and Wulfnoth's mutineers came about to port and began running downwind with the sea towards the oncoming Royal Fleet. Running under storm rigs with the hurricane force wind and the mountainous seas to their backs, his vessels were far less pressed than Brihtric's, giving Wulfnoth the manouevering advantage over the long distance. His practised crews broke off one at a time, taking their range of targets and picking the line of ships they would attack.
Brihtric's struggling boats could do nothing to prevent the oncoming attack. Soon, the mutineers reached the first of them, and so began the brilliant offensive Wulfnoth had conceived. As they passed through the larger Fleet, the fireships bore down on one vessel after another at close quarters, loosing bitumin firebombs with their catapults on deck and with well aimed drops from the topside artillerymen. As quickly as the bombardment came on, they blew past and were away again. On Wulfnoth's flagship, Paul was aloft swinging blazing bitumin pots and dropping them onto the bottoms of the passing vessels of Aethelraed's North Sea Fleet. One after another, the raging flames took hold inside the King's ships which burned out of control as their crews lost the firefight and fought each other for possession of the last refuge aboard.
In just twenty minutes, the mutineers had passed through the entire Royal Fleet, leaving half of them ablaze to their waterlines. Most of the rest of Brihtric's vessels foundered in the huge breakers as they came about broadside to the waves in the worst of the shallows to attempt the chase after Wulfnoth. Brihtric's stunning lack of seamanship bore ill fruit that day.
The North Sea Fleet was no more.