Her voice trailed off. Elgiva recalled the wailing child she had seen when she entered the hall, then she pushed the memory away. The only child that mattered was the one that she would bear.
“Did you tell Siferth what happened?”
Aldyth shook her head.
“Eadric warned that it would be unfortunate for Siferth to hear news that might distress him. He might even come to harm.” Her mouth twisted into a grimace. “He smiled when he said that. Eadric can smile even while he does his filthy work. I think he is the devil come to life.”
No, not a devil, Elgiva thought. Just a man drunk with power. She stood up and studied her cousin, who looked more sick and weary, even, than Elgiva felt.
“A time is coming, Aldyth, when Eadric and the king will pay for their crimes against our family. I will have my vengeance on them for the murder of my father and brothers, and you and Siferth will help me get it.”
Aldyth gazed at her with dark, suspicious eyes.
“What do you mean?”
Elgiva placed her hands on the arms of Aldyth’s chair, and their faces were only inches apart.
“Three years ago my father betrothed me to an enemy of the king. Because of that act he was murdered and my brothers killed, but there were other men in the north who knew and approved of their intentions, although they escaped the king’s vengeance. I believe that your husband was one of them. What Siferth does not yet know is that the marriage took place. I am the wife of Cnut Sweinson,” she said in a fierce whisper, “and even now I am carrying his child.” She saw the understanding blossom on her cousin’s face. “Soon the Danish king and his son will claim my properties and the allegiance of my kin, and when that time comes, Æthelred had best look to his throne.”
She studied Aldyth’s face to read her response, but to her surprise her cousin pushed her away.
“You are a liar!” Aldyth cried. “My husband would never betray his oath to the king.”
“Don’t be stupid!” she snapped. “Any man would if he thought he could gain lands and influence as a result. And even if Siferth is innocent as a newborn lamb, your close kinship to me will make him suspect in Æthelred’s eyes. It already has, or he would not keep Siferth so closely at his side, nor would Eadric have dealt so harshly with your people. You have no choice except to help me!”
Aldyth covered her mouth with her hands, and Elgiva wondered if she would weep. But her cousin lowered her hands and glared at her.
“A moment ago,” Aldyth said, “you told me that there are always choices. Were you given a choice, Elgiva, when you wed this Danish prince?”
Elgiva scowled. Aldyth knew as well as she did that women were rarely consulted when it came to marriage.
“My choice,” she hissed, “lay in what I would do next. I could either crawl into a hole and die, or I could one day become a queen.” She sat down again, clutching the arms of the thronelike chair, steeling herself against the griping in her stomach that seemed to worsen under her cousin’s cold gaze. “I have chosen the latter course.”
Aldyth’s mouth twisted, as if she’d tasted something sour. “And what is it that you want of me?”
“Refuge—until my child is born next summer. You are my closest kin, Aldyth. I would have my child born here in your hall, not among strangers.”
“Here!” Aldyth bolted upright, panic flaring in her eyes again. “But what if the king discovers that you are here—”
“How will he discover it? Eadric was here only a month ago and found nothing. He is not likely to come back, and nor will anyone know that it is your cousin who bides with you over the winter. They will know me only as Ealhwyn, from Jorvik. At the very least allow me to stay until Siferth returns. If your husband commands me to leave, I will go.” And that, she was certain, he would not do.
She watched Aldyth, and could almost see her weighing the risks in her mind. Both the English king and the Danish king would be ruthless in their vengeance. Which one was most likely to win?
Finally Aldyth said, “Swein’s path to the throne will not be an easy one. Æthelred will resist. His sons and many of his nobles will fight for him out of kinship or out of fear.” She leaned forward. “You seek my help. Tell me: Do you expect me to give it out of kinship with you or out of fear of the Danish king?”
Elgiva shrugged. “I desire only that you help me, Aldyth,” she said. “I do not in the least care why.”
When the household gathered to eat, Aldyth led them in prayer, petitioning God’s blessings on the food and on a tedious and lengthy list of folk that included a guest who had apparently died the night before.
“I hope that not all of my cousin’s guests go from her hall straight to God,” Elgiva murmured to Alric as they took their places at the board.
“You need not worry. One of the grooms told me that the dead man was with a group of monks from Peterborough who sought a night’s shelter here. He was already sick when he arrived, and his brothers were forced to leave him behind. Unless you are sick, you have nothing to fear.”
He nodded to the servant, who was offering to ladle fish soup, the standard Advent fare, into his bowl. Elgiva clenched her mouth tight and waved the servant away. Of course she was sick. She was pregnant.
She broke a piece from the small, brown loaf in front of her and ate it in tiny bites, for the pain in her stomach had worsened during her conversation with her cousin. It was not illness that plagued her, she knew, but misgiving. Aldyth, who had shown little enough enthusiasm upon learning the purpose of this cousinly visit, had shared news that only added to her anxiety.
Thorkell’s army, which had ravaged for weeks unchallenged by Æthelred’s fyrd, had come to grief when it mounted an attack on London. The Londoners had defended their city from behind its great walls, and the Danes had lost good men and gained nothing for their efforts.
She took a sip from her cup, but the fear that she had carried with her from Holderness turned the wine to gall in her mouth. For all she knew, Cnut might be one of the Danish dead.
“Tomorrow,” she murmured to Alric, “you will set out for the Danish camp. I would know if I still have a husband living. If you find him, give him my greetings, tell him that I am with child, but make no mention of where I am.” She had no wish to give Cnut an excuse to berate her.
Alric slanted a speculative glance at her.
“And if he is not living?” he asked.
She toyed thoughtfully with the bits of bread in front of her, worrying them to broken fragments. Then she gave a careless shrug, for she would not have Alric see how much that thought frightened her.
“Swein Forkbeard,” she said, “has another son, has he not? One Danish prince, I think, is as good as another.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
December 1009
London
Athelstan arrived at the London palace in response to an urgent, early morning summons from the queen. He paused at the entrance to Emma’s chamber and waited for the steward to announce him. The scene before him, like the one that had greeted him belowstairs, was one of frenzied activity—the men and women of the queen’s household going swiftly about the task of packing up her belongings. Bedding, gowns, caskets of jewels, reliquaries, shoes, piles of embroidered hangings, blankets and small clothes for the child—all the armaments of a queen were being sorted into bundles and coffers.
Where did she think to go? Had the king relented and bid Emma join him at Worcester for Christmastide? His brother Edrid, recovered from his injury at the wall, had left for the king’s court at Worcester more than a week ago, and he had been unencumbered by an infant and a large household. Emma might arrive there by Christmas, but it would be an arduous journey over muddy roads into Wessex and into Mercia, even if the weather held fair.
He frowned, acknowledging to himself the real truth of the matter. Whether the journey she intended was eas
y or difficult, he did not want Emma to leave London. Yes, her presence here kept him on a sword’s edge between desire and despair. But maddening as it was to see her every day, unable to touch her or even to speak to her as freely as he wished—that torment was better than to see her not at all.
The steward beckoned him into the inner chamber, and here the packing was already completed. Coffers were shut and stacked. Emma sat at a small table while her clerk stood at her side holding a neat pile of what must be letters. A brazier along the far wall was the only other furniture left in the room.
As Athelstan entered, the clerk bowed himself out, leaving them alone. Emma rose to greet him.
“Thank you for coming so quickly,” she said. “I need to—”
“Tell me that you are not going to Worcester,” he said.
“Not to Worcester,” she replied. “I go to Headington.”
“Headington? To my sister?” Edyth was at the royal estate there, awaiting the birth of her child. “Is all well with her?”
She handed him a parchment and he read it with increasing astonishment. It was a letter demanding that Emma send Margot to attend Edyth’s lying-in, couched in language so imperious and condescending that he would have expected Emma to burn it, not agree to it.
“It is presumptuous, is it not?” she asked, with a wry smile. “The king’s daughter issuing commands to the queen? It shows how powerful Edyth and her husband have become. Or think they have become.” She clasped her hands together and began to pace the chamber. “I have been forced from the king’s side for nearly a year now, and in that time Edyth has insinuated herself into the role of queen. It cannot continue. I would risk the king’s wrath and go straight to the court at Worcester if Godiva were not too young to travel so far. Instead it seems I must content myself with a river journey to Headington so that I may remind Edyth who is England’s rightful queen.”
He tossed the letter onto the table. He recalled now that Edward, too, was at Headington.
“And you will see your son, of course,” he said. Emma did not fool him; it was Edward who drew her to Headington. There was nothing that Emma would not do for her son. Even her eagerness to resume her place at the king’s side was all for Edward.
“Of course I want to see my son,” she said.
He strode over to the glowing brazier, where he warmed his hands and did not look at her. He wanted to rebuke her for wanting to leave London—for wanting to leave him; but he did not have the right.
Was there any greater fool than a man who loved where it was not wanted?
“So what is it that you wish of me?” he snapped. He knew that he sounded cold and angry. Well, by the cross, that was how he felt. She would remove herself from his protection, far from his reach, and he could not help but resent it. He was only mortal.
“I must make a grand show of force and power when I descend upon Edyth,” she said, “and I want your assurance that you will have no need of my hearth troops here. Is it true that the Danes have returned to the camp at Benfleet? Is London safe?”
He hesitated. He could lie. He could persuade her that he needed her Norman warriors, and that she would be courting disaster if she set foot outside the city’s walls. But there was a trust between them that he would not destroy with a lie, even if it meant sending her away from him.
“My men and I shadowed the Danes all the way to Benfleet,” he said. “I expect they will remain in their camp through the Yuletide.”
“And then?”
He shrugged. “They will have to forage for food again, but I do not think that they will come to London. We have convinced them that they are wasting their time trying to break through our defenses. They tried stealth and were repulsed. Their attempt to fire our ships in the Thames met with no success, and their recent effort to lure us out of the city to give them battle failed as well.”
He stared into the glowing coals, tormented still by that memory. A large band of armed shipmen, rabid with drink, had formed a shield wall just out of bowshot from the archers that he had placed upon the wall. They had hurled insults and curses, challenging the defenders on the ramparts to come out and face them in open combat. He had seen it for what it was: a last, desperate effort to get them to open the city gates. Knowing this, he had given strict orders that the gates remain shut.
When no one ventured out to meet their challenge, the shipmen brought forward a group of English men and women, their hands bound behind their backs, presumably taken captive somewhere along the Thames shore.
The poor wretches were forced to their knees while behind them their captors continued to shout and threaten. After a time, a Dane stepped up to one of the prisoners and casually sliced his throat. There were shouts of outrage all along the wall, and Athelstan, imagining the terror of the remaining captives who could only wait to die, very nearly gave the order to attack. He knew, though, that if he should do so, much worse would follow.
The city gates remained closed.
They were butchered one by one, so that the last to die, a woman, was forced to watch all the others die before her. They had wept, howled for mercy, begged for rescue, while he and his army had watched the grim spectacle from the safety of their walls.
The Danes had left the bodies to rot in the mud and the gore, and the next day the shipmen had decamped. When at last the Londoners went out to bury their dead, he had counted the corpses. There were thirty of them—exactly the number of the Danish attackers who had first attempted to sneak into the city in the fog, and whose corpses he had ordered tossed outside the wall.
He understood the message: An eye for an eye. After all, it was what war was all about.
He was suddenly aware of Emma standing beside him. She must have read his grim thoughts, for she placed her hand on his arm and her expression was soft with compassion.
“You could not have saved them,” she said.
“I know,” he murmured. “But I cannot forget them. There is a debt owing, and the shipmen must be made to pay it.”
And on it would go, blood for blood on either side until the cost became too great for one side to bear.
“What will you do,” she asked, “now that the Danes are gone from your gates?”
He drew in a long breath and released it slowly. There were so many ways to answer that question.
“We will sharpen our swords,” he said, “and make ready to fight them again in the spring.”
She nodded.
“God grant you victory,” she whispered.
He gave her a long, sober look, took her by the hand, and studied their twined fingers. The words of a prophecy that he had long dismissed came back to him. He who would hold the scepter of England must first hold the hand of the queen.
He had believed once that it signified her son, a child whose tiny hand had clutched at his mother’s fingers. Yet now Emma’s fingers lay in his grasp, and he could feel the tension, sharp as a knife blade, that ran between them. If he tried to hold Emma, she would pull away, so for now he must let her go.
He released her hand, but he held her gaze for a moment as he said, “And God grant you a safe journey, my queen.”
He had taught himself patience. His father would not live forever. Someday the crown—and the queen—must belong to him.
December 1009
Headington, Oxfordshire
Emma stood at the prow of the royal ship as it nosed toward Headington under a sky pregnant with snow. Four more vessels followed hers, all of them riding low in the water, for they were crowded with attendants, supplies, household goods, and armed men from Windsor and Cookham as well as from London.
As her ship glided toward the shore, Emma scanned the palisade that surrounded the royal manor, searching for her son’s standard. But there was no ætheling’s banner floating above the towers that framed Headington’s gate.
Edward had l
eft, then. The king must have summoned him to Worcester for the Yule feast or sent him elsewhere—somewhere beyond her reach.
She straightened her shoulders and lifted her chin a little higher, for she could not show any sign of disappointment or regret in front of Edyth. It would be like handing her stepdaughter a weapon with which to wound her, and Edyth had enough of those already. She would not hesitate to use them, for she would surely resent the display of queenly power that was about to be paraded before her.
Emma hoped that the ensuing hostilities would be conducted in private and would be relatively bloodless although, knowing Edyth, she guessed that neither outcome was likely.
Once ashore, she led her attendants up the gravel path and through the open manor gates. She saw that word of her approach had preceded her, for within the king’s great hall a formal greeting had been prepared. Light glittered from the massive central hearth and from dozens of blazing candles and torches. The hall was filled with women—not only those of Edyth’s household, but also many of the noble wives of Æthelred’s court who had been invited to attend his daughter’s lying-in. Edyth herself stood on the dais, hugely pregnant, yes, but magnificently gowned in a loose robe of deep blue wool, its hem and its long, wide sleeves embroidered with gold. Golden threads glimmered in the mantle that was flung around her shoulders, and her honey-colored hair was caught up in a white silken coif held in place with a golden band. She looked as regal as any queen.
Emma was not surprised. It was an old ploy—the lavish display of royal wealth to inspire awe among the nobility and thus secure their allegiance. But if Edyth believed that she could play that game against a crowned queen and win, she had miscalculated.
Slipping her cloak of white fox from her shoulders so that it fell into the hands of the attendant following behind her, she strode confidently forward, aware that the firelight in the hall would be reflected in the shimmering silk of her golden gown, in the loops of gold at her throat, and in the twisted gold circlet upon her brow. The women in the hall made obeisance as she moved through them, and she greeted many of them with a word or a touch that was met with glad smiles. When she reached the dais she stopped, her eyes on Edyth.
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