" You’re a Northumbrian,” he said, “and I don’t know how they did things up there, but this is Alfred’s Wessex. You can do anything in Wessex except piss all over his church, and that’s what you just did. You pissed, son, and now the church is going to piss all over you.” He grimaced as the rain beat harder on the tent. Then he frowned, staring at the puddle spreading just outside the entrance. He was silent a long time, before turning and giving me a strange look. “You think any of this is important?” I did, but I was so astonished by his question that had been asked in a soft, bitter voice, that I had nothing to say. “You think Ubba’s death makes any difference?” he asked, and again I thought I had misheard. “And even if Guthrum makes peace,” he went on, “you think we’ve won?” His heavy face was suddenly savage. “How long will Alfred be king? How long before the Danes rule here?” I still had nothing to say. Æthelwold, I saw, was listening intently. He longed to be king, but he had no following, and Wulfhere had plainly been appointed as his guardian to keep him from making trouble. But Wulfhere’s words suggested the trouble would come anyway. “Just do what Alfred wants,” the ealdorman advised me, “and afterward find a way to keep living. That’s all any of us can do. If Wessex falls we’ll all be looking for a way to stay alive, but in the meantime put on that damned robe and get it over with.” “Both "

― Bernard Cornwell , The Pale Horseman (The Saxon Stories, #2)