Mother of Kings

by Poul Anderson

  “M-my lady, here in the North—most who’re christened—they’re hardly more than that, Christians in name. But you, you want to know; you seek the truth.”

  “Help me, Brihtnoth, wise man, holy man.”

  “No, no, I’m not.”

  “Let’s stumble ahead side by side, then. You do know the way far better than I. Maybe—at its end—maybe you can bring me to where—I too can pray for Haakon’s soul.”

  “Oh, my lady!”

  She let a holy stillness fall, then calmed the talk until it was of everyday things. Henceforward, she knew, he was in her hands.

  Yuletide came. Folk flocked to the hall from widely around, to meet, feast, and be glad. Only Brihtnoth shared none of the mirth. Rather, it was as if the darkness of the season seeped through his skin and filled him, with not a glimmer of what fleeting daylight the land saw. As lady of the king’s household, Gunnhild had no time free for cheering him. He sat by her in the hall, but even then she could spare him few words. Otherwise he said well-nigh nothing, and drank unwontedly hard.

  The second day after the mass of Christ’s birth yielded to early night. Food had been eaten and boards cleared away. Good smells still twined through the smoke. Pinecones tossed into the fires added more and crackled happily. Lamplight enriched the hues of tapestries, shone off gold and silver and amber, stroked the women who went to and fro keeping ale horns full. Laughter burst here and there in the surf of men’s voices.

  Gunnhild called across the floor to her son: “It grows late for your mother, Harald.”

  The big young man who looked like his grandfather raised brows. “Why, we’ve hardly begun to drink.”

  She threw him a rueful smile. “I’m not what I once was.”

  “Well, then, a good night to you, Mother.” Harald sounded a bit eased. The same uplift of mood showed on nearby faces. Men who were in awe of her, or slightly afraid, could now be as boisterous as they liked.

  “Poor Brihtnoth.” Gunnhild turned to the priest. He sat slumped, staring into his horn. He started and straightened at her touch. “Come, best that you too seek your bed.” He blinked and slowly nodded. “It’s dark out. I’ll lend you a guide.” She raised her arm. Kisping sped from the end of the room where he was benched among the lowly. She had told him to be ready for this, and what to do.

  He took Brihtnoth’s elbow as the priest stepped down to the floor. “I’m not drunk,” Brihtnoth said. “That’s a, a swinish thing to be.” Those who overheard glared at him, but none would show anger at the queen’s chosen talkmate.

  “Of course not, Sira,” Kisping answered with his easy smile. “However, you should not have to be your own torchbearer.”

  They stayed until the queen had left. The night was cold, stars thronging overhead, hoarfrost gray on the ground. Footfalls thudded stonily. Two guardsmen saw Gunnhild to her door. A maidservant let her in. “Go back with them,” Gunnhild told her. That was no surprise. More often than not she sent her attendants away at eventide. She never said why; it was her will. Some folk thought she did not want any blunderer breaking in on her dreams. They might well be more meaningful than even a king’s. Others whispered that maybe she didn’t always go at once to her rest.

  Alone, she waited. After a while she heard a knock and swung the door halfway open. Brihtnoth stared bewildered. Behind him sputtered and flared Kisping’s torch. “Good. Now snuff that and stand watch till I send you off,” she bade her footling. “Let nobody by.” He nodded beneath the hood of his cloak. Gunnhild gently drew Brihtnoth inside. She shut and barred the door.

  “What is this, Queen?” he mumbled. “He was taking me to my hut, then suddenly— Why?”

  Her smile flowed as warm as the low blue fire. “Fear not,” she said huskily. “It’s but a thought of mine. I’ve seen the sorrow waxing in you. Yes, this is a bad season to be among strangers. Could a quiet talk with a friend help? And then maybe a shared prayer for your soul’s peace?”

  “Friend?” He raised a shaky hand. “Queen—”

  “No, tonight your friend. Surely you had many aforetime.”

  “None like— They were men. I’d known most from childhood. And it was long ago—” He squared his shoulders. “I’m sorry, my lady. I babble. Unmanly of me.”

  “Not so. Brave you were to come here, when you could have gone to your England. But I think our feast has awakened memories that overwhelm your heart. Your Yules weren’t like this in Norway, were they?”

  “No. We few Christians kept the holy days by ourselves. But—” A dam broke. “But it’s not that, that I miss the old cheer and larking at home— It’s that I think—”

  She stroked fingers across his hand. “Speak freely. You’ll not be the less dear to me.”

  “Now Haakon stands at a heathen sacrifice!” he cried. Tears ran forth. “He eats horseflesh, he drinks to demons—”

  “Take heart, Brihtnoth. He’s not lost yet, is he? Not while he lives and can repent.”

  “No, but—”

  “We may bring him to repentance,” said Gunnhild aside.

  It went past Brihtnoth. “Stained with the blood of slain beasts— You, who’ve been so kind to me, your sons—if they cast him down in his sins, down into Hell—”

  “Brihtnoth, you’ve known this from the first.” Her voice did not reprove; it laved him. “What’s made it such a knife twisting in you? I think our Danish Yule is indeed calling up too many memories.”

  “Ghosts, God help me,” he groaned. “Christmases in England, joyous, innocent, Haakon and I and all our friends—Everybody loved him.”

  “As they loved you.” She took his hands in hers.

  He looked down at them. His gaze fled from the ring he wore. He looked back up at her, blindly. “No, no—Queen—”

  “Brihtnoth,” she breathed, “you’ve given me more counsel and comfort than ever you knew. Tonight let me help and comfort you.”

  She laid her arms about him. He shied. She smiled and did not let go. “Don’t be afraid,” she whispered. “We’re alone. You have leave to weep.”

  His head sank onto her shoulder. The sobs shook him. She held him close and murmured.

  From there, one thing led to another. Priest, sometime warrior, redesman to a king, he was else a boy.

  At first, down on the bed, he hardly knew what was happening or how it had begun. She bestrode him. Afterward he wept again. She consoled and, in a while, taught him. At last he slept.

  She lay beside him, thinking. He’d better go before dawn. She could trust Kisping. That lad understood well what his own welfare sprang from and how easily he could get his throat cut. Brihtnoth would keep silence too, even to his confessor, until he could take ship for England. She would make sure of that, and of whatever more she wanted of him. It wouldn’t do to have folk snicker about her. She and her sons were not strong enough to shrug it off.

  He was no Eirik—oh, Eirik! But he was sturdy, and she rather liked him, and the years had grown long in which she had nothing but her fingers and make-believe.

  Also, she thought in the dying firelight, while he would never knowingly betray Haakon, she could now tease many small truths about her foe out of him, which taken together might show her where next to strike. She had turned his heathen against Haakon, then his Church, and still he was unbowed. There must be some way to bring him down.

  XXII

  Haavard Jarl had another sister with a son called Einar. This was a gaunt man, harsh and grasping, wherefore he was known as Einar Hardmouth; but like his cousin, he was a chieftain with warriors and ships at his beck. While he was a Yuletide guest Ragnhild made herself agreeable to him and they talked more than once at some length. That was less than it had been with Einar Bread-and-Butter, as stiff and short-spoken as this Einar was; nor were they ever alone, and to him she spoke well of her husband. Nevertheless he went home very aware of her, though not of how deeply she had sounded him.

  In spring Haavard shifted to a holding of his at Stenness on Mainland.
Ragnhild had slipped him the thought. True, the stead was somewhat lonely, but there he could hear what was on the minds of men who otherwise could not readily see him. And there—for of course everybody knew of the move well beforehand—arrived Einar Bread-and-Butter with a pack of men outnumbering the guards.

  Haavard went to meet them. The fight was short. Haavard fell, what was left of his following scattered, and Einar held the ground that ever afterward was known as Haavard’s Field.

  Before he could go on to the hall, Ragnhild had gathered her servants and a handful of men-at-arms and fled back to the bay on Wide Firth. At once she sent after Einar Hardmouth.

  The Orkneymen seethed. They had on the whole liked their jarl, and he had done no harm they knew of to his nephew. The deed of Einar Bread-and-Butter seemed foul, the more so as gossip went that he had hatched it with Haavard’s wife. When Ragnhild heard, she said hotly that this was a lie. She wanted nothing to do with the killer. Instead, she stoked higher the feelings against him.

  Einar Hardmouth came as she had asked. She told him in the hearing of others how shameful it was that Haavard lay unavenged, and she would do whatever was needed to set things right. “The man who carries out the work will win honor from all goodfolk,” she said, “and the jarlship as well.”

  Einar narrowed his eyes. “They say, my lady, you don’t always utter everything that’s in your head. Whoever takes this up may want more than the jarlship. He may look for you to give what is not less.”

  She sent him a slow smile. “He will be worthy of it,” she answered.

  He soon went back to make ready. Ragnhild sent to Arnfinn’s and Haavard’s brother Ljot Thorfinnsson, begging his help in staving off Einar Bread-and-Butter. He was a tall, handsome man, well thought of everywhere in Orkney. Ragnhild set herself to getting to know him.

  XXIII

  Early in spring Harald sent to his brothers around Denmark, asking that they meet again. His uncles Aalf the Shipman and Eyvind the Braggart came too. When all were on hand and had feasted, they gathered next morning in Gunnhild’s house, where nobody else listened.

  She told them at length what she had learned about Haakon Aethelstan’s-foster. That he was fearless in battle they knew already. That he was bound to keep his kingship was only to be awaited in a son of Harald Fairhair. For this he had even set aside the Faith and joined in heathen rites. He had also taken a queen. Having given his folk that much, he brooked no further stubbornness. There was little or none anyway. The Norse deemed his laws wise, his judgments righteous. Their land lay at peace; trade throve. That the years went on yielding good harvests ashore and at sea made them believe the gods loved him as they themselves did.

  Yet there were hidden weaknesses. He leaned heavily on Sigurd Jarl of Hladi for counsel and backing, and Sigurd was growing old. Beneath the boldness and cheerfulness beat a heart sorely troubled—about the God he had forsaken if not quite forsworn; about Christian priests who shunned him and laymen gone cool toward him; about his wife. After all, he had wed the first and best he happened upon; they were not much together, and only newly was she with child; he showed no thought of adding any women who would bind him to houses more powerful than a hersir’s. He was ever more headlong in what he said and did. Unless warnings were from Sigurd, he was apt to shut them off with a harsh word. So far these things did not matter much; but they could be played upon.

  “These are deep insights, Mother,” said Gudröd low.

  “They are true,” she answered.

  “How did you get them, sister?” asked Eyvind sharply. “They smack of witchcraft.”

  “Be still, brother,” growled Aalf. “You always rush ahead like a blind boar.”

  “You know how the Queen Mother gathers bits of truth from everywhere and weaves them into a whole,” Harald told him mildeningly.

  “I’ve not spent hours, day after day, with that former chaplain of his for nothing,” said Gunnhild. “And, yes, whoever else had anything to tell. I’ve thought long and hard about all I heard.” And had raised dreams by means she did not speak of.

  “What is your rede, then, Mother?” asked Gamli, as eagerly as Eirik once did.

  “Do not try again soon to overthrow him,” she said.

  Harald nodded. “No, hardly this year. We need to build back our strength.”

  “Nor next year—”

  “Hold!” Sigurd broke in. “How long to wait?”

  His disrespect drew frowns. Before a squabble could waste time, she said, “Don’t sit idle either. Make a few small raids, two or three ships at a time, striking fast and straightaway leaving. Mostly, though, let them merely see the dragons pass by. They’ll light their beacon fires; the kingdom will rise to arms, and find it was for naught, over and over. Lesser vikings will pluck up heart to try raiding on their own, making the burden on the defenses heavier yet. But the Norse cannot know beforehand how much lesser those are, not worth turning out whole shires for. After a while Haakon will grow weary of bootlessly hastening off. I told you he’s not as long-suffering as he was. Besides, he thinks he has better things to do.”

  “Such as what?” sneered Ragnfröd the Red.

  “Giving law and justice; binding Norway together into one true kingdom.”

  “And leaving it in Satan’s hands,” snarled Erling.

  “Set that aside,” Harald bade. “First we must overcome him.”

  “And avenge our brother Guthorm,” said Ragnfröd.

  “How long to wait?” Sigurd cried anew.

  “Until the time is ripe,” Gunnhild told them. “We’ll see when that is.”

  Harald shook his head. “No, Mother. You are wise, and we’ll do as you want this year, and maybe a ways into next. But we can’t well dawdle beyond that.”

  “We will not,” said Gamli, his face more than ever like Eirik’s.

  “If nothing else,” Harald went on, “our men would get too restless. Oh, we’ll go harry Wendland, and maybe Ireland or wherever, such of us as aren’t pestering Haakon. That’ll help. But too many of them have homes back there, and hopes of return and reward. Then there’s my namesake Harald Bluetooth. We’d better not let him give up on us.”

  Yes, Gunnhild thought, the Dane-king had taken the setback at Agdir much amiss. “Let me seek him out,” she said. “I think I can make him willing to bide as long as need be.”

  Ragnfröd’s voice fell surprisingly soft. “Can you make us willing, Mother?”

  “He who runs too fast will be winded before the end of the race, if he hasn’t stumbled and fallen.”

  “A rede for lynxes, sister mine,” answered Aalf. “Wolves don’t stalk their prey or lie long in wait for it.”

  Gunnhild knew starkly that he spoke out of the years he had known her sons and many more of their kind. It had not been the way of Eirik Blood-ax either.

  “Well,” she said, “at least we’ll have a year to see how things go.” Rising, with a wry smile: “Now I’ll leave you to wrangle till we meet at mealtide. I ought to oversee that, Harald.”

  The young king grinned back at her. “As you wish, Mother.” Gunnhild had never wanted whatever leman he was keeping at the hall to get above herself. “Thank you for all you’ve given us.” The same rumbled around the room. Before she crossed the threshold, they were at their wolves’ business.

  She did not go straight between buildings, but took a path offside. There was no need for guards when men were widespread, working the fields, every free one with his spear in reach. They often saw her stride this way, thinking thoughts they were shy of wondering about. Once the trail had passed through a meadow where livestock grazed, it was used by few but hunters who went after hare or grouse on the heath: for it wound by a dolmen and on along the haunted mire.

  This day was utter springtime. Sunlight poured around tall white clouds, down among untold wings, through air soft and sweet-smelling and full of birdsong. A mist of green over land and trees had thickened to a foam, fast becoming a sea. Raindrops glinted on shrub
s. That weather had not muddied the little-trodden path, though puddles gleamed. A man stood under a leafing oak. Nearing, Gunnhild saw anemones clustered at its roots.

  Most folk would have hastened onward. The dolmen brooded nearby atop its hillock, great rough stones spotted with lichen, walls and roofs of a den for uncanniness. Whoever dared meet here would stand in sight of everybody and yet be alone. Now and then, walking, talking, Gunnhild and Brihtnoth had done so.

  When he spied her he quivered, made no unseemly dash but called, “My lady!,” half in gladness, half like a beggar for alms.

  She halted before him and smiled. “Greeting. How good to find you.”

  “I waited—remembering—I hoped—”

  A song she sang in her house shortly before her sons arrived might have had something to do with that. But she also knew he would indeed hope.

  “Speak freely, my dear,” she offered him.

  “W-with you— Is this the last time?” he stammered.

  She nodded and made her voice wistful. “Yes. I told you before, it would seem queer if we both dropped from ken tonight of all nights.”

  “Yes. Of course— Your honor in their eyes—”

  Tomorrow he left with a band of Aalborg men going to Aarhus. A chapman’s knarr lay there, loading for England, the first of the season. She had had Kisping get him a berth aboard.

  “And yours.” She sighed. “We’ve stolen some lovely hours, haven’t we, you and I.”

  His look said: You did. How could I have? What could I ever do but your will, my lady, my lady, with my soul in my thanks?

  “Well, we’re at the end of them,” she said. “I never found a believable way for you to stay here.”

  He steadied. “Nor could I,” he sighed. “No, I must back to England, and make my peace with God.” He had sworn to her that his confessor there would keep the secret. Among other things, Brihtnoth belonged to a high-standing family. “And you, Gunnhild, you too—”