by Joan Wolf
"He hates Ceawlin," Niniane said. "He will never be reconciled to Saxon rule, no matter how benign it may be. He is Ceawlin's enemy, Sigurd. Nothing I said could change that. You don't know Coinmail. He is like a stone; he never changes."
"He is like you," Sigurd managed to say, and saw her eyes fly to him in astonishment.
"I? I am not like that at all! I hate that in Coinmail, that ... coldness ... that inflexibility."
"And how do you think you were, Niniane, when Ceawlin said he did not want you to go to Glastonbury?"
Her eyes were enormous dark pools in the fine pale oval of her face. "What do you mean?"
"You just said almost the exact words about your brother that Ceawlin said to me when he asked me to take you to Glastonbury. He said that you were like a stone, that no matter what he said, you wouldn't change."
"I ... I ..." She was deadly pale. He was hurting her by talking this way, but suddenly he felt within himself a savage desire to hurt her. She had hurt him.
Sigurd went on relentlessly. "Ceawlin said he could either give in to you or break you, that he had no other choice." He stared at her out of eyes that were bleakly gray. "You are hard, Niniane, on those who do love you most." And only he knew he was speaking of himself.
Brilliant color flushed into her face. He saw the glitter of tears in her eyes. "You are right, Sigurd," she said. "Ceawlin is so good to me. Too good. I don't deserve his goodness to me." The tears glittered but did not spill over. "You're right too when you say that he is the only one I am so hard on. But you see, Sigurd, I fear for him. He is so unafraid for himself that I feel I must be the one to fear for both of us." The baby had finished nursing and she shifted him to her shoulder to burp. Sigurd had a brief glimpse of a white breast before she covered herself. She was completely unself-conscious, sitting there nursing her child before him. It never once crossed her mind that he might think of her in any way save as Ceawlin's wife.
"Why should you fear for him?" he asked, his voice hard. "If ever a man was able to take care of himself, it is Ceawlin."
"I don't know why," she said, and her own face was almost as somber as Sigurd's. She patted her son's back with a gentle hand. "But when I think of Ceawlin ... of my children ... when I think that anyone might be a danger to them ... I feel ... ferocious." She did not smile, was deadly serious. Nor, looking at her small, fragile figure, was he inclined to laugh.
There was a long silence. The baby burped loudly and Niniane murmured to him. Sigurd got to his feet. "I am going to check the sentries," he said, and left her to settle herself to sleep by the fire.
* * * *
"Ceawlin pampers that woman ridiculously," said Cuthwulf.
"He should not have allowed her to leave Wessex," Cutha agreed. "But she is safe home now and naught has happened."
"Safe thanks to Sigurd." Cuthwulf raised his cup to his brother.
"There was no real danger," Sigurd said mildly.
"That is not what I understood from the other thanes." Cutha looked slantwise at Sigurd, but Sigurd's face did not change. He had been back in Winchester for two full days, but this was the first chance he had had to speak with his father. Cutha had not been in the royal enclave when Niniane's party returned.
Cutha's hall was the same as it had always been, but the rest of Winchester had changed. Much of the change reflected the different way of life that the king and the queen had adopted. The unmarried thanes still slept on the hall benches in the great hall, but more and more men had married and moved out of Winchester, onto the lands given to them by the king. The bower had become quarters for those girls who had lost their fathers or natural protectors and who in consequence must look to the king to see them properly married. New halls had been built for the men who had fought with Ceawlin in his struggle for the kingship, men whom he had named eorls, but these men spent at least half of the year on their own lands. Only Cutha remained in Winchester at the king's side, as of old. Cutha and Sigurd, who were known to be the king's right and left hands.
They sat this night in Cutha's hall, Cutha and Sigurd, and listened to Cuthwulf's familiar complaint. "Gods, but life is dull in Winchester these days! Ceawlin is turning us into a nation of farmers."
"Ceawlin is turning us into a nation," his father replied. "And I do not want to hear of any more foolish exploits by you, Cuthwulf. Ceawlin was remarkably tolerant of the last one, but his patience will not last forever."
Cuthwulf slammed his wine cup on the arm of his chair. The night was warm and they were sitting with the hall door open to let in a breeze. "Exploit!" he exploded. "What exploit? All I did was raid a few British farms. Gods, Cynric would weep if he could see the woman-ridden cur that Ceawlin has turned into."
"That is enough!" Cutha's voice clashed with and carried over Sigurd's angry protest. "Ceawlin realizes, as you do not," Cutha continued, his voice cold and controlled, "that the King of Wessex is no longer merely the leader of a war band. He is a law-giver, a peace-maker, a king, Cuthwulf; not just a ring lord, a king."
"And what have you got out of this kingship of Ceawlin's, Father?" Cuthwulf s lower lip jutted out belligerently. "Oh, he pays lip service to your advice, but does he really listen to you? Does he listen to anyone except that British wife of his? That is why he is so careful of the British, my father. It is Niniane's doing. Make no mistake about that." He leaned forward further in his chair. "And whom is Ceawlin to call upon if he does need to raise a war band? Who is left in Winchester these days to heed his call? All the eorls and thanes are scattered around the countryside on their farms! Where you have banished me." He shot his father an accusing look.
"I sent you out of Winchester to get you away from Ceawlin, Cuthwulf. You have too ready a tongue, my son, and not enough respect for your king."
Cuthwulf snorted eloquently, and Cutha frowned.
"The eorls and thanes are pledged to answer to a call to arms from the king," Sigurd put in, in answer to his brother. "You know that as well as we do, Cuthwulf. Your problem is that you are an inveterate brawler and don't know what to do with yourself when you are called upon to use your brain and not your sword."
"Your problem is that you are as bewitched as Ceawlin is by that redheaded British bitch," said Cuthwulf brutally. Then he jumped to his feet as Sigurd hurled a cup of wine full in his face.
"Cuthwulf!" His father's voice stayed the furious lunge Cuthwulf had launched toward Sigurd. Cutha looked from the panting Cuthwulf to the coldly furious face of his younger son. "Go home, Sigurd," he said softly. "Your brother is drunk. Go home to Edith and forget what he has said."
There was silence in the hall as Sigurd walked across the room, his footsteps sounding loud on the wooden floor. When he had gone out, Cutha turned to his eldest son. "You are a fool," he said, but without heat.
"What I said is obviously true." Cuthwulf flung himself back into his chair. "He is as besotted with her as Ceawlin is."
"Ceawlin saw too much of what happens to a man when he is caught between two women," Cutha said. "He grew up watching his father try to placate both Fara and Guthfrid, grew up in the midst of the discord that will always reign when a man has two wives. He holds to Niniane because it is easier that way. And she has given Ceawlin and Wessex four sons. She has done her duty as a queen, Cuthwulf. Give her her due. Nor is she vindictive or power-hungry, as Guthfrid was. Ceawlin could have done much worse." There was a pause as Cutha regarded the angry profile of his belligerent eldest. "Do not say such a thing about Niniane and Sigurd ever again."
Cuthwulf gave his father a startled look. "Why?"
"Because you have upset Sigurd."
"He is too much under Ceawlin's shadow," Cuthwulf said. "He has ever been too much under Ceawlin's shadow."
"Perhaps, but it is too late to change that now." Cutha's eyebrows rose. "I am surprised that you saw so clearly into Sigurd's feelings, Cuthwulf. You are not usually the most discerning of men."
Cuthwulf grunted. "I didn't see it," he said. "I just
said it. He gave himself away."
"Yes, he did." Cutha leaned back in his chair. "I did not see it either," he said, and looked thoughtfully at the tips of his shoes.
* * * *
In East Anglia a king was dying. Guthfrid's father, Redwold, who had reigned full thirty years from Sutton Hoo on the coast of the Narrow Sea, lay in his great hall dying. Around him were gathered his sword thanes, his eorls, his daughter, and his son and heir, Aethelbert. Aethelbert was forty years old, had waited a long time for this moment; at last he saw the kingship within his grasp.
Shadows crept across the land and the old king's life ebbed with the light. Guthfrid stood beside her brother and watched, her face set like stone. Her father had been too old to desire a war with the younger, more vigorous King of the West Saxons; her brother would be different.
Redwold's eyes opened and it seemed to Guthfrid that he looked directly at her. Then a strange rattling sound came from his throat and his face seemed to collapse inward upon itself. She stepped to the bed and bent to listen. "He is dead," she said and, straightening, met the eyes of her brother.
In East Anglia they cremated their kings. Redwold's queen had long been dead, so Guthfrid, as his only daughter, was the one to order the funeral. It was a woman's prerogative to send her man to the gods.
Guthfrid ordered a great pyre to be built, and men labored through the night to heap up the wood. It was not easy to burn a human body; it took a tremendous amount of heat. With those of lesser importance it did not matter so much if the entire body was not consumed; with a king they would be more careful. All knew that the higher the smoke rose into the air, the higher would rise the man whose pyre it was in the land of the dead.
The women dressed the old king in his finest garments and decked him with his jewelry. Then he was placed on an oaken pallet with his best bedding and carried to the pyre. His helmet was placed on the pyre with him, as well as assorted bronze drinking vessels for use in the other world.
The morning was gray and overcast and the pyre jutted up bleakly against the leaden sky. Guthfrid stood beside her brother; the eorls and thanes of East Anglia were grouped about the pyre. "Bring out the horse," Guthfrid said.
The only sound on the field was the crying of the birds overhead. The priest led Redwold's horse, a gray stallion, to stand before Aethelbert at the pyre. The stallion came quietly. He was old, like the king, and had been drugged as well. Redwold's son raised his father's ax. At the last minute, however, the old horse sensed danger, threw up his head, and tried to rear. The priests held tightly to the halter ropes, but Aethelbert missed the artery. The stallion screamed and thrashed and Aethelbert had to strike again and again; the sound of the horse's screaming drowned out the birds. Finally the stallion lay still and they dragged his carcass closer to the pyre. Aethelbert laid the ax he had used on his father's pallet.
"Bring out the woman," Guthfrid said next. Even the birds were silent as Redwold's slave girl was led across the field toward the pyre. She was escorted by three thanes and an old woman dressed in black. The girl walked as if she were drunk.
"Do you wish to die with the king?" Guthfrid asked.
"Yes," the girl replied. The pupils of her eyes were strangely dilated and she looked dazed. Guthfrid nodded to the old woman, who untied a rope from about her waist. She wrapped the rope once around the girl's neck and gave an end to two of the thanes. The third thane held the girl against him, pinning her arms to her sides. Then they strangled her and placed her body on the pallet next to Redwold.
"Light the fire," said Guthfrid. As the flames shot up, she commenced to wail and to weep. The funeral fire was soon roaring, the flames a brilliant orange against the heavy gray sky. The smoke rose higher and higher into the air. The onlookers saw the flames touch the bodies, saw the clothes ignite. Guthfrid led the women in dirge as the fire did its cleansing work, sent Redwold in glory to his gods.
Then the East Anglian folk made for Redwold a great funeral pyre and hung it with all his household treasure. Then in its midst they laid their king, beloved ruler of thirty years. They lighted the fire, the wood smoke climbed, the people lamented their king and their lord.
So sang Redwold's scop in the great hall of Sutton Hoo later that evening. The funeral fire had died down and the remains of the bodies and the grave goods had been collected. The ashes had been put into a bronze vessel engraved with the swastika of Thunor for protection and carried to the royal burying grounds. On the morrow the thanes would erect a great barrow to mark for future generations the place of Redwold's grave.
Aethelbert, as Redwold's only surviving son, sat this night in his father's high seat. Beside him sat his wife, mother of his five children. To his left sat his sister, Guthfrid, with her husband, Edric. Aethelbert looked around the benches, at the anxious faces of his father's thanes, and thought of the morrow. He felt within himself all the zeal and impatience of a man too long kept from his own. East Anglia, once among the foremost of all the English kingdoms, had fallen of late years into the shadows. For too long had an elderly king steered at its helm.
It was common knowledge among the East Anglian eorls and thanes that the king had been at odds with his son. For many years now the two had not been able to meet without clashing. Aethelbert had actually spent the last five years in Kent, with his mother's folk, because of the antagonism between him and his father.
The chief cause of their falling-out had been the way his father chose to handle the return of Guthfrid. Aethelbert burned to avenge the humiliation of his sister, the death of his sister's son. And Redwold had accepted wergild! Aethelbert raged whenever he thought of it. Ceawlin had murdered his own brother and been allowed to pay wergild, to buy his way out of a blood feud that should demand nothing short of his life. It had made East Anglia a laughingstock; of that Aethelbert was sure. He had heard it spoken of more often than he cared to remember in Kent.
He looked now at his sister's still-bright hair and thought of Wessex. There had been a blood feud between his house and the house of the West Saxons even before the death of Edwin. The marriage of Guthfrid had been his father's attempt to heal the feud, another craven gesture of peace that had proved disastrous.
In vain had his sister begged his father all these years to redress her wrongs. Well, she would beg in vain no longer. Redwold had been a senile fool, had not seen the usefulness of having Guthfrid's son, the rightful claimant to the West Saxon throne, right here in his own hall.
He felt Guthfrid looking at him and turned to meet her burning dark eyes. Soon, my sister, he said to her in his heart. First I must get my house in order here at home. Then will I deal with Wessex.
* * *
Chapter 26
The years of exile in Kent had only served to drive Aethelbert's character ever more firmly into the tracks of a few unwavering obsessions. These were a burning desire to win back for East Anglia the pride he thought his father had betrayed by accepting wergild for the murder of Edwin, belief in his own military genius, hatred for the King of Wessex, and ambition to increase the boundaries of his own kingdom. All of these obsessions dovetailed neatly into one single course of action: the invasion of Wessex and the defeat and death of Wessex's king. Unfortunately, this was not a plan Aethelbert could put into action immediately. First it was necessary to get rid of the older thanes who had abetted his father in Redwold's humiliating policy of reconciliation with Wessex, and replace them with younger, braver, more daring men. This task of revenge and rebuilding took Aethelbert the rest of the year 567 to accomplish. By the time winter was showing signs of relinquishing its grip upon the world, however, the King of East Anglia had assembled in Sutton Hoo a war band of more than five hundred men. The wind was blowing raw off the Narrow Sea on the February afternoon that Aethelbert sat with his sister and his sister's husband to discuss his plan for the invasion of Wessex. The three were sitting around the hearth in the great hall, and with them was Guthfrid's son, Edgar, the boy Aethelbert was proposing to plac
e upon the throne of Wessex. At twelve years of age, Edgar was old enough to understand what was being planned for his future. "You will invade by the Icknield Way?" Edric asked. "Yes. It is the most direct route into Wessex from East Anglia." Aethelbert's eyes, a lighter brown than his sister's, glowed with the fire of conquest. "For too long has Ceawlin been allowed to claim the upper Thames valley for Wessex. Another one of my father's mistakes. We will begin the war by reclaiming that land for East Anglia." "Ceawlin has held that valley for eight years and more," Edric said. "He will not have left it unguarded." "He has given it under the protection of one of his eorls," Aethelbert returned. "This much have I learned."
"Which eorl?" Guthrid asked.
"The one named Penda."
"Penda will stay loyal to Ceawlin," Edric said after a moment's thought. "I think he will fight, my lord."
"Perhaps," replied Aethelbert. "But I have near six hundred men, Edric. How many thanes can an eorl keep on his country manor? Twenty?"
"No more than twenty, certainly," said Guthfrid.
"Ceawlin will bring a war band out of Winchester as soon as he learns of your presence in the Thames valley," said Edric. "You will not long have the advantage of surprise, my lord."
Aethelbert smiled complacently. He was a heavy-shouldered man and he habitually hunched his shoulders forward, as if he could not wait to throw himself into whatever difficulties might be looming in the path before him. "You have not heard the rest of my plan," he said.
Guthfrid's dark brown eyes narrowed. "What else are you planning, Aethelbert?" she asked at last as her brother allowed the expectant silence to prolong itself.
"My kinsmen Oslaf and Cnebba will invade Wessex from Kent at the same time I am coming from East Anglia."