The Great Heathen Army marches to Wessex.
Death follows with it.
See Ecbert, King of Wessex and Mercia and perhaps some other lands he has forgotten about.
Credit: Jonathan Hession/History
Ecbert is a great man, and he is an old man.
He sits off his throne, long beard and long hair and mind far away.
No one could have foreseen the consequences of those actions, and the hundred of actions that followed.
“Save yourselves!”
To Wessex he returns, declaring a state of emergency.
The time has come for his family to flee.
The secession is quick, and as formal as formalities can be as the world ends.
Aethelwulf is now king, lord of lands conquered by invaders.
His path ahead is uncertain.
His father is hopeful.
“I know I have placed my kingdom in the safest hands,” says Ecbert.
“You go now, save yourself and your family.”
He tells Alfred that the greatest Christian virtue is humility.
And so here are the Northmen, arrived at long last within the walls.
Perhaps Ragnar’s beloved monk Athelstan wrote some of those translations.
They are all up in flames now, like so many of the dreams of old.
Truly, Wessex is becoming a funeral pyre of ambition.
Helge carries her “daughter” through the wreckage, promising to protect her.
Floki finds his beloved just in time to hear her final words.
“The world is too small for you,” she says, dying.
Wanderers are blessed, for they see the world, and cursed, to die so far from home.
NEXT: We Have To Talk About Ecbert
And what to do with Ecbert?
Ivar wants to carve the blood eagle into the king, as the brothers did with Aelle.
Bjorn thinks there’s a more complicated reality here.
The Saxon forces are scattered, but they shall gather again.
Ubbe reminds his brothers that their father did not just want to win battles and leave.
Ragnar dreamed of winning land.
And Ragnar never held a king to ransom, Hvitserk says.
“We do.”
“I am King of Kings,” he tells him.
He can give them legal right to a kingdom, East Anglia.
“No one can question that claim,” he says.
Ecbert will grant them the land.
His only request is that he choose the manner of his own death.
The land is signed over to the sons of Ragnar.
Ecbert hears voices from loved ones long gone, Athelstan and Lagertha, Alfred and Judith.
Floki departs, too, leaving behind his old life in the ruins of all that was.
He has died thrice over: with his daughter, with Ragnar, and now finally with Helge.
He gives himself to the gods, to do with as they wish.
He bids farewell to Bjorn, who has grown so strong since Floki first met him.
His destiny, if he has one, lies elsewhere.
But there must be a feast to celebrate, and there is wild celebration.
Bjorn declares that the great army has defeated two kingdoms.
But Bjorn must return to the Mediterranean.
And his brothers are already debating their father’s legacy.
“We have a great army,” says Ivar.
“And we should use it.
There are many other places I want to attack and raid.
Those of you who feel like I do, you should come with me!”
This is little Ivar’s moment, and he takes it.
Who wants to farm now?
Who wants to put on an apron and settle down?
How quickly they forget their unity.
And Ivar does not respond with words, but with mad action.
He hurls his axe into his brother’s stomach.
Sigurd pulls the axe out, and with his final breath steps toward his brother.
Murder is on his mind, but death claims his body first.
And greater dangers lurk.
Elsewhere in England, a bishop named Heahmund oversees the burial of a man.
He tells the widow that the Lord will find a way to console her.
Who can say anything about the Lord, but Heahmund offers his own consolation.
As they loudly copulate, we see Heahmund’s sword.
What blood shall decorate that blade?
With one battle over, what wars yet await us?
