In the yellowish light from lamps and candles, Aric’s hair shone sleek and pale, pulled tightly back from his face and gathered at the back into a short plait. A narrow gold band was set over his forehead, his sun-bleached brows and short neat beard emphasising the square jaw and determined set of his mouth, which Thored took as an indication that he would be no pushover. A chill crept along Thored’s arms and neck. Thirty years ago, he, too, had had this man’s arrogant stance, legs like tree trunks encased in leather breeches and a slender waist belted low down on slim hips. He, too, had made women blush like girls.
Aric’s thoughts on Earl Thored ran along similar lines with admiration for his elegant deep red tunic and the massive gold buckle at his belt, a sign of authority. Negotiations with this old fox, he thought, would have to proceed with care, for although the Danes’ demands would have to be met, one way or another, he had heard that Earl Thored was a man with more than one strategy up his sleeve. Other things he had heard about the Earl were less complimentary, things which would have to be addressed today while there was a chance. His king, Swein Forkbeard, had given him the task of taking four of the ninety-four longships up the coast to Jorvik to treat with Earl Thored on his behalf. Swein was also aware of Aric’s other mission which, although secondary to the business of Danegeld, was of great importance to his family’s honour. Aric himself might have only twenty-seven winters under his belt, but he was one of King Swein’s most trusted jarls, a military leader of numerous missions across the North Sea. He would make sure his name was remembered as a man who got what he came for.
Tipping his head towards his hovering wife, Thored beckoned her forward to begin her duties, showing the guests to their seats in order of precedence with no more to go on than their clothing and the number and size of gold armbands, pendants and cloak pins. Standing further back down the hall, Fearn held a flagon of red wine, waiting for the signal to begin pouring it. But her attention was instantly kindled as the Danish leader moved into the direct light of a lamp hanging from a low beam, casting its glow over the smooth back of his flaxen hair with its stubby plait resting on the beaver fur of his cloak. Clutching the flagon close to her body, she strained her eyes to search for the darker streak on the fur she knew so well, then for the band of red and green tablet-weaving in a zigzag pattern that bordered the hem. As he turned in her direction, she saw how the bands continued up the two front edges, and she knew without a shadow of doubt that he was wearing the beaver-fur cloak she had gifted to her husband only weeks ago on his feast day. Casually, he threw one side of the cloak over his shoulder to reveal the brown woollen lining that she had spun from the native sheep and woven on her loom after weeks of work. Barda had worn it, to her dismay, to go on this latest scouting expedition for the Earl only because the nights could still be cold this early in the year and because the beaver fur was brown, easily hidden in the woodland, waterproof and hard-wearing. Fearn knew that neither Catla nor Hilda would notice, but the revelation buffeted her like an icy blast of the north wind, rippling the surface of the wine in the flagon. Her body shook and she was unable to tear her eyes away from the evidence that must surely mean Barda had been taken or killed, for no man would willingly give his cloak to the enemy.
Yet even as she stared, frozen with shock, the powerful Dane stared back at her as if she were the only woman in the hall. The distance was too great for details; only the compelling force of his dynamism released in her direction from two unpitying eyes seemed instinctively to understand the reason for her wide-eyed expression of outrage that he was daring to wear the garment she had made for another man.
Screams, accusations and frenzied shows of anguish would have been most women’s reaction, at that point, forcing some kind of explanation ahead of the Earl’s diplomacy. Yet it was not the Dane’s arrogant stare that kept Fearn silent, but the certain knowledge that it would not serve Earl Thored’s purpose to embarrass either their Danish guests or him, and certainly not to have Barda’s mother screaming and wailing and, naturally, Hilda, too, at such a critical moment in the proceedings. She must keep her secret knowledge quiet. She must. Against all her impulses to challenge the man, she must wait until the right moment. Or perhaps not at all. Perhaps the knowledge would emerge in some other way, when the Danes had gone.
Aware of a discomfort against her ribs, she realised she was pressing the flagon tightly against herself, almost to the breaking point, and that of all the emotions chasing through her numbed mind just then, incredulity and relief were the only ones she recognised. The Dane was still staring at her while Earl Thored told him who she was. Trembling, Fearn turned away, thankful that it would not be her to pour his mead, but Hilda.
* * *
The rest of that momentous discussion passed like a strange dream in which the information she held struggled in her grasp, waiting for the moment of release that did not come as she moved like a shadow through the hall. Usually, she was aware of men’s eyes upon her but, this time, she was aware of only one man’s, though she tried to evade them. But by the time she was obliged to respond to his request for wine instead of mead, he had shed the cloak to reveal a fine tunic of honey-coloured wool, which she knew would have been dyed with onion skins, its braided edging round the neck and sleeves glistening with gold thread, the delicate circular pin at his neck surely of Irish origin. For the first time, she came close enough for him to see into her eyes when, in spite of herself, she saw how his own narrowed eyes widened fractionally as if responding to a trick of the light. She saw the tiny crease between his brows come and go as he spoke in the mixture of English and Danish everyone in Jorvik understood. ‘Lady Fearn,’ he said, holding out his drinking horn to her, ‘I understand you are the daughter of the previous Earl.’
Earl Thored, seated opposite, interrupted. ‘The exiled previous Earl.’
Aric continued, ignoring the correction. ‘Do you miss him still?’
The rich red liquid wobbled as it poured, though Fearn tried to keep her voice from doing the same. There was hardly a day when she did not think of her parents. ‘I miss all those who are taken from me suddenly,’ she replied, purposely filling the horn up to the brim so that it would spill when he moved it away. Movement and speech were suspended as the drinking horn was held motionless, as two pairs of eyes locked in combat, hers challenging him to an admission of murder, his countering her challenge with his own brand of indifference. By this time, several men had noticed what was happening, laying silent wagers on the outcome. Aric the Ruthless would not be beaten by a woman, especially not by Thored’s foster daughter, though Fearn’s only aim was for him to tremble and spill the blood-red wine on the table as a sign of his guilt. He would surely understand her message.
Slowly, and without a tremor, the drinking horn was taken smoothly to Aric’s lips and tipped, not a drop escaping, its curved point encased in a silver cone pointing upwards. A ripple of applause accompanied the laughter, but with a look of contempt, Fearn turned away, sure that the Earl would have something to say about her behaviour towards his guest at a serious meeting. But for her, the meeting was an ordeal from which she was not allowed to excuse herself, even though she was now sure of the reason for her husband’s disappearance. This she was obliged to keep to herself for the time being, though Catla had expressed concern. ‘I don’t know where he is,’ Fearn told her, truthfully. She, too, would have liked to know whether he lay dead in the woodland or tied up in one of the longships.
Distancing herself from Catla and Hilda, Fearn went over to sit with Arlen the Moneyer and his wife Kamma. Obeying instructions, Arlen had filled sacks with coins and some hack silver—chopped-up disused pieces to be melted down for newer coinage—helped in the task by his young son, Kean, a good-looking lad of some ten years. He smiled as she sat beside him, clearly honoured by her presence.
‘Do you understand what’s happening, Kean?’ she whispered.
‘Oh, yes, my l
ady. The Danes are demanding a great deal of my lord Earl.’
‘You think there’ll be enough there?’ she said, nodding towards the sacks.
‘Hope so. Those sacks are heavy.’
The bargaining seemed to go on for ever, going through all the motions of trading peace for wealth, as if in their minds it had not already been settled down to the last silver penny. Roars of outrage, thumping on the tables, accusing fingers and sometimes the quieter voices of compromise and concession rose and fell as, for two or more hours, Thored faced down the enemy and tried to fob them off with less, even as he knew the price of peace was rising. To some extent, it was a performance that only prolonged the moment when agreement, if one could call it that, was reached in time to give the Danes a period of daylight to carry away the heavy sacks of treasure and depart.
Setting her heart against the arrogant Dane and his absurd demand for ten thousand pounds’ worth of silver, Fearn had no option but to watch the Danish warriors enter, wearing swords and shining round helmets with nose guards half-hiding their satisfied smiles, pick up the heavy sacks between them and carry them out across to the gates of the enclosure. No words accompanied this disgraceful looting, only a heavy silence, glowering faces and the almost unnoticed gathering of armed Danes around their leader.
The Danish demands appeared to have been met, but Aric’s demands were not yet over. Turning, he pointed towards Kean, the young Moneyer’s son, beckoning him to his side. Thinking that the Dane had some words of wisdom for him, Kean went to him willingly, not flinching as the man’s hand rested on his shoulder. Thored’s hand went to his sword hilt while, next to Fearn, Arlen and Kamma leapt to their feet with yelps of protest.
‘No!’ Thored bellowed. ‘Oh, no, not the lad!’
Kamma’s hands flew to her mouth to stifle the wail, though it leaked through her fingers. ‘Tell me,’ said Aric to Kamma, ‘how old the lad is.’
She ran towards him, her face contorted with fright. ‘He is ten years, my lord. He’s too young to be taken as a slave...please...he’s our only child.’
‘Your child, is he?’ Aric said. ‘Did you bear him? You? Yourself?’
Earl Thored knew where this was leading. Angrily, he kicked over the table before him with one mighty shove of his foot, sending drinking horns and beakers flying and bouncing across the floor. He strode over the edge of it towards Kean who now looked anxiously from one adult to another, wondering what this was all about. But as Thored moved towards Aric, the helmeted Danes closed in around their leader and the boy in a semi-circular defence. ‘So this is why you wanted them here,’ Thored growled. ‘So that you could insult the parents and steal their child. And is this how you repay my hospitality, Dane? Is this the price of peace, after all?’
‘We have bargained for peace, Earl,’ Aric said, with an icy calm, ‘but this is not a part of that and I believe you know it. Cast your mind back twelve years to that time when several young Danish couples sailed into Jorvik asking to settle here. You had been Earl five years then. Remember?’
Impatiently, Thored shrugged. ‘Vaguely,’ he said.
‘Not so vaguely, I think, my lord Earl. You will recall one of the young couples, newly joined, very comely they were. Especially the woman.’
There was a muffled cry of distress from Hilda to whom this situation was all too familiar. Thored took no notice of her. ‘So?’ he said. ‘What are you implying, Jarl? Let’s hear it. You’re probably quite mistaken.’
‘No, I think not. There are enough Danes here in Jorvik to tell their relatives in Denmark what happens here, especially to young husbands who stand in the way of their Earl’s needs.’
‘Relatives? Which relatives, exactly?’
‘Me. Brother to the young woman who sought a life here with her goldsmith husband of one year. Prey to your lust, Thored.’
Lady Hilda’s sobbing could now be heard by everyone in the hall, yet Thored would not glance in her direction. ‘Your...sister?’ he whispered, frowning in disbelief. ‘You lie. She never mentioned...’
‘She wouldn’t, would she? I was a mere lad of fifteen then, not a king’s jarl. But I was not too young to swear revenge on the man who arranged my brother-in-law’s death and then took my sister for himself and fathered a child on her. Yes, this lad here. My nephew. Your son!’
Furiously, Kean shook himself free of Aric’s hand, whirling round to face him. ‘No!’ he yelled, pointing at his parents. ‘No! There is my mother and there is my father. I have never known any others, I swear it.’
‘Well said, lad,’ Aric said. ‘But the truth is, like it or not, that your mother was my sister Tove and your father is a man as weak as water when it comes to women. I took an oath on Odin’s name to return you to your own family and my chance has come, as I knew it would.’
Hilda, with her head on Catla’s shoulder, was racked with sobbing and of no help at all to her husband, whose unfaithfulness was nothing new to her. She had borne him no live children and had now stopped trying, though the pain of Thored’s easily found comfort was like a wound that was not allowed to heal. He had foisted the five-year-old Fearn on her, not as an act of kindness, but because it suited him for her banished parents to know that he had their child’s life in his hands. The appearance of the young Danish woman called Tove in their household had lasted only a year. Fearn remembered Tove as a beautiful young woman whose child had been born a year after her husband’s violent death in a street fight and had always understood that both Tove and her child had died, although she could recall no burial rites from that time. Now, it appeared that young Kean was Thored’s own son and Tove’s.
Kamma, the woman Kean had been calling mother for ten years, fell in a heap at Aric’s feet, begging to keep her son. ‘Lord...my lord...do not do this. We are innocent of any crime. We have cared for him...loved him...please,’ she wailed.
‘Yes, lady. I know that, too. Your husband was made a moneyer to the Earl for his compliance. Not a bad reward for your silence. But the facts are there for all to see. Look at his colouring, for one thing. Can you doubt he is of my family?’
It was hard not to see the similarity, Kean’s flaxen hair against the foster parents’ darkness, his ice-blue eyes like Thored’s. ‘His home is here, lord,’ said Arlen, catching Thored’s nod of permission to speak. ‘We have nothing if you take him from us. He is our only son. He will be a moneyer, too.’
Thored found his voice again after the shaming revelation that he had taken the life of the husband who stood in his way. ‘Revenge,’ he said, loudly. ‘A blood feud, no less. You intend to tear up the lad’s roots and ruin the lives of these two good people, for what? For your gratification? And will he fill the void your sister made, when she left your family of her own free will? She gave herself to me willingly. I did not force her.’
‘You took the life of her husband, Earl,’ Aric yelled at him. ‘Deny it!’
‘I do deny it. Tove’s man was killed in a street fight. I took her in and cared for her, and—’
‘And made her pregnant and killed her in the process.’
‘It happens like that, sometimes. The mother is forfeit. Or the babe.’
‘As you well know, Thored,’ said Aric, making clear his meaning while the Earl’s wife howled in anguish. It had happened like that to her too many times and the losses were still as raw as they had been at the time. ‘But this child lived, didn’t he?’ Aric continued. ‘And he was a son. The only son you’ve ever had. A bastard, but a son, nevertheless. My sister’s son. My nephew. And my family demands his return in exchange for my sister’s life.’
‘Your sister had already left Denmark, Jarl,’ Thored bellowed. ‘And the lad belongs here in England with his foster parents and all that he’s known since birth. It makes no sense to uproot him from that. He’ll be a fine moneyer, like Arlen here. Accept your losses. You’ve taken enoug
h from us already this day. Tell your family the lad is happy here. Well cared for. Will be wealthy, too. Tell them that and let their revenge lie with the gods. Let them deal with it.’
Within the tight cage of her ribs, Fearn’s heart beat like a war drum at the sight of these two men facing each other like bulls stopping just short of physical violence, Thored red-faced, angry and discredited by his own lechery, Aric standing proud and fearless on the moral high ground. She could not see Thored ever yielding to the Dane over this, Kean being to him more valuable than she had understood, though now she saw how Hilda must have suffered as much as she herself did at her husband’s constant unfaithfulness. To pagans, this was an accepted part of a husband’s behaviour, but not to Christians. Thored wanted it both ways: the lax morals of the old religion with the respectability of the new.
Beside her, the boy’s foster father was trembling with emotion, unable to interfere in this terrible dilemma, sick at heart at the threat of losing Kean, the lad he loved like a natural son. For ten years, he and Kamma had kept their secret, having every reason to be grateful to Earl Thored for supplying them with a child they could not produce themselves and for the reward that attended the lucrative position of Moneyer, coin-maker to the King. Fearn felt the man’s longing to speak breaking through his reluctance to join in the argument without permission. Finally, he could contain himself no longer. Stepping forward, he spoke the first and most obvious words on his mind with little regard for their implications. ‘Better still,’ he said, looking from the Dane to Earl Thored and back again, ‘take an alternative. Is there not someone of more years you could choose, who would be of more use to you?’ Flinching under the Earl’s furious glare, Arlen stepped back again, too late to undo the damage.
Aric’s approval overlapped Thored’s blustering protest. ‘He speaks well, your Moneyer,’ Aric said. Taking everyone by surprise, he swung round to point a finger, like a spear, at Fearn. ‘There! That one! The woman. Your foster daughter for their foster son. How will that do, Earl? I’d call that a fair enough bargain, eh? I’ll take her for one year, then return her to you and take the boy. He’ll have another winter under his belt by that time and she might well have something interesting under her belt. Now that’s what I call an alternative. See, Thored? I’ve backed down for you.’
The Spaniard's Innocent Maiden Page 26