by Swan Road
"Wulfgar is a bóndi— not a thegn," Ragnar ground out tersely.
"Is the life of your heir worth so little to you, then, that you would not raise up the man who spared it?" The words of Björn Ironside had a scornful sting, which goaded, as he intended. "Or can it be that you wear so much gold jewelry not as proof of your prowess as a Víkingr, but to blind us, so we cannot see how small the great Ragnar Lodbrók is, in truth!"
There was a huge clamor of laughter at this, for the Northmen were not so afraid of their kings as the men of the Southlands were of theirs, and the Northmen loved a good jest, besides— no matter if it were at the expense of a slave or a king. Gold was rare and, so, highly prized; and indeed, Ragnar wore more than his fair share of it. But Wulfgar did not join in the mirth, for he saw that Björn Ironside's gibe had angered Ragnar, whose face had reddened and grown dark with a scowl. Wulfgar knew that Ragnar would not forgive him the men's glee, but would add it to the growing list of grievances against him.
"The chance to swear oath at the festival, in exchange for my life"— Ivar spoke for the first time as, gritting his teeth against the pain, he slowly pried the wolf's jaws from his wrist. Then, grimacing, he staggered with some difficulty to his feet, cradling his injured wrist and hand. But while a whole man might be made the butt of a joke, a wounded thegn was an object of neither ridicule nor pity, it being the lot of a warrior to suffer without complaint whatever the Norns, the Fates, bestowed. So no one was foolish enough to offer Ivar assistance. "It sounds like a fair bargain to me," he said, and then he smiled a strange caricature of a smile, and his blue eyes leaped with a queer light.
With those coolly voiced words was Wulfgar's lifelong dream made possible; yet the taste of it was as ashes in his mouth, and a grue chased up his spine. What had he done? Had Goscelin, his Saxon mother, not named him for his brother spirit, the wolf, who would this day have slain Ivar? Too late, Wulfgar recalled Yelkei's warning— and at last understood it; for had he not, with a single stroke of his battle-ax, killed the wolf who would have disentangled his destiny from Ivar's and, by doing so, thereby decided his own? Fool was he, Wulfgar thought, the fool of all fools! He should have let Ivar die. Why had he not? He did not know. He knew only that, like Ragnar, Ivar would neither forget nor forgive this day— and yet was perversely glad Wulfgar was to become a thegn, a Víkingr.
Long did Wulfgar ponder this curious fact as the hunting party lifted the corpses of the two slain men, and bound the dead roe deer to spear shafts, which the freedmen, in twos, hoisted onto their shoulders for carrying back to the sledge. The wolf, Björn Ironside declared, was Wulfgar's own prize; and when, out of long habit, Wulfgar glanced instinctively to Ivar for confirmation of this, Ivar slowly nodded his agreement, earning a glare from Ragnar, who muttered a curse and then spat on the ground before turning away to mount up and gallop off, leaving the rest of the hunting party scrambling to catch up. Wulfgar tied a rope about the body of the wolf to haul it home behind him. It was an extraordinary beast, its hide worthy of a mighty warrior; and that, he would strive to become, Wulfgar vowed, to honor his dead brother spirit.
Chapter Three
The Betrothal
The Southern Coast of Usk, Walas, A.D. 865
To Rhowenna's great relief, her father did not die. But he never quite recovered from the treacherous attack upon his life, either, being plagued thereafter with a sudden weakness that would come upon him when he had taxed his strength, and a shortness of breath he had never suffered before. Although the royal manor had not come under assault, as had been feared, the King worried about the security of his kingdom, nevertheless, afraid that because of the attempt upon his life, Glamorgan or Gwent had come to view Usk as a tasty morsel and was intent on devouring it. For this reason, when he learned that Cerdic, a prince of Mercia, was in search of a wife, Pendragon sent messengers to Cerdic's court, proposing an alliance between Usk and Mercia, and offering Rhowenna as Cerdic's bride to seal the bargain. Rhowenna herself knew nothing of this, however, until the day when her father called her before him to tell her what he had done, and that Cerdic had agreed to the proposal and to take her to wife. She was as stunned by her father's words as though she had been stricken a dreadful blow, for although she had known she was destined someday to wed a prince or even a king, she had not thought to find herself betrothed to one of the Saxon wolves east of Offa's Dyke, who, since the time of the High King Arthwr four hundred years ago, had been Walas's bitterest enemies. Unable to restrain herself, she cried out softly in protest at the news; and at that, so she knew he was not without sympathy for her plight, her father said gently:
"I know that this arrangement is not what you had hoped for, daughter, or even what I would have wished for you. But I am not... as strong as I once was." The admission came slowly, so she knew how difficult it had been for her father to make. "I must ensure that Usk is secure from those who would swallow us whole or piecemeal, and Mercia is a kingdom far more powerful than Glamorgan or Gwent, whence this attack upon me must have come."
"I— I understand, Father," Rhowenna choked out, fighting to recover her composure and to hold at bay the tears that started as she thought of Gwydion and all her hopes and dreams, now dust in the wind. "And I will honor my duty to Usk— if not with a glad heart, then at least with an obedient one."
"Prince Cerdic is a rich and handsome man, the emissaries assure me, whole of body, sound of limb, and in his prime, well able to provide for you and to defend you. So you need not be afraid on that score, daughter." Pendragon handed her a small wooden casket he held on his lap. "He has sent you this as a token of his regard."
Opening the casket, Rhowenna could not suppress a gasp of surprise and astonishment as she spied lying upon a bed of purple silk a magnificent gold necklace set with amethysts that matched the violet of her eyes. Despite being princess of Usk, she owned no piece of jewelry to compare to this, and some of her hurt and disappointment was assuaged at this evidence of the unknown Prince Cerdic's esteem. The necklace was not only resplendent, but also suited her coloring, bespeaking not only a desire to honor her, but also a thoughtfulness of character that was a mark in his favor, she thought. Perhaps he would not be so hard and cruel as she had at first feared when she had learned he was one of the Saxon wolves east of Offa's Dyke.
" 'Tis beautiful, Father. Please have the emissaries convey my thanks and appreciation to Prince Cerdic, informing him that I am honored and that I shall treasure his gift always."
Her father was pleased by her response, Rhowenna could tell, and for that, she was grateful, for she did not want him to worry over her unhappiness; he had enough problems to fret him as it was. Nodding his approval of her, Pendragon spoke no more; and realizing the interview was at an end, Rhowenna left him quietly, taking the small casket away with her to lock it away inside her own larger, heavier jewel chest in her sleeping chamber, where it would be safe. Then, after she had closed and secured the lid of her jewel chest and returned her chatelaine to the fine, gold-mesh girdle about her waist, she tossed her light wool cloak about her shoulders, and made her way down the winding path that led to the beach where the Severn Sea merged with the Great Sea beyond.
Spring had come to Walas at last, the snow melting from all but the highest peaks of the land, leaving the gentle hills and the rugged mountains behind her as green as raw, uncut emeralds scattered against the lapis-lazuli backdrop of the endless sky, where the sun shone as golden as the necklace Prince Cerdic had given her and, wings spread wide, the gulls soared and cried their forlorn song. The wind was a melodious sigh that stirred the flowers and the grass, setting them a-ripple like the waves of a vast, strange, and wonderful sea that somehow soothed her aching heart a little. She had hoped to be alone to reflect on her father's devastating news and what it meant to her, but now as she drew near to the strand, Rhowenna saw Gwydion there below, his coracle drawn up onto the sand. Glancing up at her, he smiled and waved, causing her heart to turn over in her breast as he m
otioned for her to join him.
"I'm going fishing," he called gaily. "Do you want to come along?"
"Aye. Aye, I'll come!" Torn between sudden gladness and despair at seeing him, she gathered up her skirts to hurry on down to the beach. She was a trifle breathless when she reached him, her cheeks flushed becomingly, a strand of hair tumbled loose from her single long braid and billowing in the wind as she gazed up at him from beneath sooty lashes half closed against the bright sun. "It seems ages since I've been fishing."
"My own thought precisely. Here, help me shove off, then, and we'll get under way."
Together with an ease born of skill and long practice, they pushed the coracle into the water, then climbed into the light, round craft and settled themselves in its bottom. As Gwydion rowed them forward across the waves, Rhowenna fell silent, not knowing how to speak to him of her betrothal. She inhaled the cool, briny wind and watched the sunlight play upon the water, and it occurred to her now, for the first time, that although Gwydion had in the past told her that he loved her, he had never done more than kiss her cheek and, once, tenderly, her mouth. Yet, surely, she had not misread the expression in his eyes whenever he looked at her. Surely, he would be as dismayed by the arrangement her father had made with Prince Cerdic as she had been when she had learned of it.
At last, when they reached a spot where Gwydion thought that the fish would be plentiful, he drew in the paddle and laid it aside, letting the coracle gently drift as it would, while he and Rhowenna between them cast a small net.
"You are uncommonly quiet this day, Rhowenna," Gwydion observed finally after they had worked for some time in companionable silence, although with only a modest catch yet to show for their efforts, "and pensive. Something troubles you. What has upset you?"
For a moment, Rhowenna's hands stilled on the net she and Gwydion had emptied into the bottom of the craft. The fish they had caught thus far shimmered silvery in the sunlight, gasping and twisting and flopping. The fish were helpless out of their natural milieu— just as she would be in Mercia, Rhowenna thought, far away from home, a stranger amid strangers in a foreign land.
"Only a short while ago," she responded at last to Gwydion's question, turning away from the dying fish, "I discovered that my father... my father has arranged a... betrothal for me, Gwydion— with Prince Cerdic of Mercia."
"I see," he said softly, after a time, very still. "My felicitations. Prince Cerdic is very wealthy... and handsome, I have heard."
"Oh, Gwydion!" The cry was low and anguished. "Have you nothing more to say to me than that?"
"What more is there to say than that, Rhowenna?" he asked, a muscle flexing in his set jaw, his voice rough with feeling. Then, glimpsing the expression upon her countenance, his own face and his tone gentled. "I'm sorry. Did you dare to dream for us, then? I didn't know. You never said—" Gwydion broke off abruptly, striving visibly to master his emotions. Then, after a moment, he continued quietly. "I was not so brave, you see. I never dared to hope that there could ever be anything more between us than what we already share. You are princess of Usk, Rhowenna... and not for the likes of me, with no kingdom to call my own. Did you truly think that 'twould prove otherwise?"
"I— I don't know. Oh, I suppose that deep down inside, I knew better. But... oh, Gwydion! You are right! I did dare to dream! And now... now, all is changed, and will never be the same again. When you went away for your fostering, you knew you would return, but I won't be coming back, Gwydion. I will have to spend the rest of my life among the Saxon wolves east of Offa's Dyke, with a husband who is a stranger to me...." Her voice, sad and bitter, trailed away as she uttered the painful thought aloud, making it seem, finally, real and not just some dreadful misunderstanding or an event so far distant as to appear unlikely.
" 'Tis small comfort, I know, but strategically, from Usk's point of view, an alliance with Mercia is the wisest course of action, Rhowenna, considering the nature of the attack upon your father this past winter. We can no longer trust Glamorgan or Gwent to keep to its own boundaries. To launch an assault against Usk, Mercia would have to send its armies across Offa's Dyke and the river Severn both, so we would have ample warning of their approach and time to prepare to hold out against them. That means they would be the lesser threat and a more desirable ally."
"I know, I know. My own mind tells me the truth of your words, Gwydion. 'Tis my heart that rebels and calls them lies and wishes I were only a plain serving maid instead of princess of Usk, to be bartered away as the price of a treaty!"
"And I wish I were a prince worthy of your hand, Rhowenna. But I am not, nor likely to become one; and so I have loved you as a brother loves his sister, and spoken of no more than that, because it was not meet or possible and because I did not want to cause you pain. That I have done so anyway grieves me sorely."
"Nay, Gwydion." Rhowenna shook her head, blinking back tears and attempting to smile, although the result was pitiable. "If there has been fault between us, 'twas mine— and mine alone. I heard what I wanted to hear in your words. I longed for the moon when I knew in my heart that it was beyond my reach. 'Twas you who were wise and I who was foolish. You are not to blame for that."
But even as she spoke the words and although she recognized their truth, the fact that Gwydion had deliberately built a wall around his heart against her wounded her; she felt he could not have done that unless his love for her had been a shallow thing, unworthy of what she had felt for him in return. Had he loved her deeply, he would have taken her in his arms, kissed her feverishly, and begged her to run away with him, Rhowenna thought, to set sail in the coracle and to cast their fate to the wind, believing that wherever they were bound, whatever they must endure, it was enough that they were together, of one heart and one mind. Some part of her had hoped desperately for that, she realized now. But perhaps that, too, was a notion as foolish as all the rest of her romantic dreams had proved. Still, she could not put it from her head; and her disappointment in Gwydion was as painful to her as her father's news of her betrothal had been.
If Gwydion sensed this, however, he did not show it, but turned their conversation to light, inconsequential matters, seeming not to notice that Rhowenna made only monosyllabic replies and bowed her head and busied her hands at their tasks more than was necessary to avoid meeting his eyes. She would see naught save pity there, she thought; and she could not bear that, not from Gwydion. She would have thrown away kingdom and crown for him had he but stretched out his hand to her and asked her to go away with him. But he had not, and so her only refuge now was her quiet dignity and this pretense that there was nothing more between them than devotion and kinship.
When he remarked that it was growing late and that they had best be getting back to shore, she raised her head finally from the shining, dead and dying fish. The westerly sun reflected off the sea into her eyes, and it seemed that for a moment on the far horizon, a clutch of dragons rode the waves, crimson sails unfurled wide against the sun to catch the wind. She could not suppress a wail of terror.
"Rhowenna! What is it?" Gwydion's voice was sharp with anxiety as he stared at her eyes, huge and scared in her pale face, and filled with a stark blankness, as though she were tranced and saw something he did not. "What is it? What do you see?"
The sound of his voice penetrated Rhowenna's senses at last, and blinking her eyes, she realized with some confusion that the horizon was empty save for the fiery sun sinking into the sea, that what she had seen had been nothing more than a trick of the light, after all. Yet the vision had seemed so real that she could have sworn that it was...
"I thought... I thought— Gwydion, for many long nights now, I have had a dream, a hideous dream of the Northmen's coming to ravage Usk"— without warning, her terrible secret came spilling out— "and for a moment, I thought I spied their long-ships there in the distance, on the horizon. 'Twas only the sun in my eyes; I see that now. But I was so frightened—"
"The Northmen! Rhowenna! Have you told anyo
ne else of this?"
"Nay." She shook her head, biting her lower lip contritely, suddenly ashamed that she had permitted her fear to silence her when so many lives were at stake.
"But... why not?"
"I was afraid," she confessed, her voice low and remorseful, "afraid that Father Cadwyr would denounce me, would call me accursed, a witch. He has no tolerance for the old ways, for the old gods whence my dream comes to me, I know, Gwydion. He would not think it a true vision, but a wickedness visited upon me by the devil— and I've no wish to be burned at the stake because of a priest's blindness and stupidity!"
"Of course not. Still, Rhowenna, the Northmen! Do you not remember the tales of the slaughter and ruin they wreaked upon Anglesey some years ago?"
"Aye, I do. I do. That is why I have been so troubled and torn, not knowing whether to speak or to remain silent...." She paused for a moment, contemplating her dilemma. Then, finally, slowly, she continued. "There is still more, Gwydion, the worst of all, the reason why I did not tell even you about all this before. In my dream... in my dream, I saw the Northmen... strike you down and— and slay you, Gwydion!"
He went very still at this last announcement. Despite all the priests' exhorting, Gwydion was reluctant to accept that the old ways, the old gods, were false. He believed in her vision, too.
"Your dream is a strong and serious portent," he said after a long minute of consideration. "But 'tis also only the shape and shadow of what may happen, Rhowenna, not necessarily what will be. Now that we have been blessed with warning of it, we can change the future. If the Northmen do come, I need not perish as you feared. I will be on my guard, and I will survive— as will Usk. Together, we can surely think of some pretext that will alert the King and the Queen to the possibility of danger from the Northland— perhaps we can claim that some passing fisherman warned us that there have been several recent attacks along the coast— without mentioning your dream or exposing you to denunciation by Father Cadwyr."