The Betrothed Sister

by Carol McGrath

  Katya had instructed Thea that she should be veiled as she entered Novgorod. If her husband could not see his bride’s face before their wedding, then his people should not see her face either. Thea could feel the spring breeze lift the delicate silk to fan her face. Her loose linen gown fell to either side of Starlight’s flanks and her matching blue woollen mantle lay elegantly over his rump. She knew she looked well and she did not care if the Rus ambassadors gave her disapproving glances when they caught glimpses of her hair. She asked Earl Connor if Vladimir would be waiting for her at the fortress.

  ‘My lady, unless a magician can whisk him to you with a twitch of his wand he will not be here. His stepmother and her court will greet you and make you welcome until the prince and his father can leave Kiev and fetch you south. Sadly, Kiev remains a dangerous city. Since the prince’s uncle has returned from exile and reclaimed his kingdom, his two brothers have come from their cities to support him, but the tribes are still a danger to the city’s security. It will not be safe for you to travel south. Nor will your prince come north for some time.’

  Thea felt disappointment. ‘So I am to be like a prisoner here.’

  ‘There will be much to occupy you, Thea, and you will soon get to know the royal ladies in Princess Anya’s retinue.’

  ‘I see.’ Thea turned away. She did not want the royal ladies, she wanted her betrothed. She wanted him to greet her wearing a mantle trimmed with ermine, with his glossy black hair falling onto his shoulders and his soft brown eyes only for her.

  Earl Connor led the procession into Novgorod’s main square where merchants and peasants alike stopped to stare at the English princess as she passed through the lower city. A peasant woman threw flowers at Thea, crying out, ‘Welcome, Princess of the English.’ Padar caught the straw-wrapped posy and handed it to Thea. She dipped her nose into the pleasantly scented little red roses, lifted her face and smiled back at the woman who had tossed it to her. ‘Speciba,’ she called back in the Russian language. ‘Thank you.’ She held onto the posy with one hand as she rode on, its pleasant scent lessening the fishy odours of the street that mingled with the stink of cattle dung, horse and human sweat. When a second posy was thrown Padar picked it up and offered it to Thea. She took it and then found holding her reins and the posies awkward. Starlight side-stepped and she almost dropped her flowers as she tugged the reins to control him. Padar leaned towards her and said, ‘May I, my lady, give this to …’

  ‘Gudrun. Of course, take it to her.’

  Without hesitation he trotted back to the palanquin where Gudrun sat with Katya. Thea smiled to herself.

  Once they had passed through the large town square Connor resumed his conversation. ‘The people seem to welcome you, Lady Thea. And you will have time to adjust, become familiar with the ways of the Rus and, my lady, Novgorod in summer is a pleasant city. It has become my home of late.’ He turned his laughing blue eyes towards her. ‘As I am a merchant trader, I am often here.’

  ‘And no wife, Earl Connor, not yet?’

  ‘No wife, Lady Thea. That hope died two years ago, as you must know.’ She felt him searching her face. She did know.

  ‘Yes. I would have welcomed you as a stepfather.’

  ‘Thank you, my lady.’

  Thea had been delighted when she discovered that Earl Connor was to be part of her escort to Novgorod, just as she had felt sad when her mother, Elditha, declined his suit two years before and had instead retreated into a nunnery in Canterbury. If she could not have her father, Earl Connor would have become a very acceptable substitute. ‘My lord, will you reside here again this summer?’ she asked, departing from a difficult subject. All she had left of her mother’s life was secured in her travelling bag – the Godwin christening gown and a little book of riddles, her swan necklace, and a portion of the precious healing mugwort root. She wondered if she wrote a letter would her mother ever receive it? Perhaps a Rus messenger would be permitted to deliver a letter to Elditha.

  Did her mother know about her betrothal yet? Would anyone tell her?

  Their horses turned onto an incline. Earl Connor was saying, ‘I shall not remain here long. It is the sailing season. Look.’ He pointed up to a tall keep surrounded by whitewashed walls and turreted towers. It dominated the strange tall-roofed wooden city below.

  She gasped at its splendour.

  ‘You may well be impressed. For all its beauty it is a fortress. You are safe behind its walls. It is impregnable.’

  ‘So everyone tells me.’ Thea could not resist a shudder as she looked at the kremlin, as this keep was called. As their cavalcade approached the gate, she fancied for a moment that once she was shut inside it she might never ride out again. She patted Starlight’s mane. ‘You, too, Starlight. You feel it also.’ Her horse snorted. She leaned down and whispered, ‘I shall never be shut away!’

  Padar, who had caught them up again, glanced at her with concern in his eyes. ‘It looks more austere than it actually is, Lady Thea. The chambers within are comfortable and the terem ladies do have their own garden, I hear.’

  As if a garden was any consolation for incarceration. This splendid castle did not resemble King Sweyn’s manor or his large sprawling house in Roskilde, nor did it resemble the palaces she had known in England with their open gates and the beautiful wooden halls of her childhood. She determined not to allow memories to possess her spirit. Soon she would marry her prince, and it was for him that she had crossed the wild Northern sea road and had ridden through mysterious and haunting, dark forests to Novgorod.

  The temporary governor and a noblewoman called Lady Olga had welcomed Thea in fluent English. Lady Olga explained that Thea’s mother-in-law to be, Princess Anya, was about to give birth to her first child. ‘The princess is in Novgorod for her safety. Prince Vsevolod’s home on the Steppes south of Kiev, holds many dangers these days,’ she said as servants presented Thea with a sweet cherry drink, savoury pastries and delicate little honey cakes.

  ‘I hope I meet her soon,’ Thea said in halting Russian.

  ‘Indeed, when the princess is purified and everything in her chamber has gone through the ritual, you may meet her.’

  Thea was confused and determined to ask Katya later why the princess had to be purified. She did not like to show her ignorance to the tall, thin, severe-looking Lady Olga.

  Soon after her welcome, Lady Olga led Thea away to her new chamber in the terem tower where a bath was prepared and a long rest was promised. After her three-week long journey by sea and forest roads, Thea felt grateful.

  Olga escorted Thea through long, sconce-lit corridors to the guarded Terem Tower.

  Thea tried to make conversation, to find out why she could not meet the princess now. ‘It is customary in Denmark and in England for the ladies to assist at a birth. Is it so in Russia?’

  ‘Midwives will look after the princess.’

  ‘I see. When is the birth expected?’

  ‘Within the month. She is very large. The summer heat is exhausting for her now.’

  ‘My mother had six children who survived. One of us is a prisoner in Normandy and he is only nine years old. My brother Magnus was killed in a battle nearly two years ago.’

  ‘I am sorry,’ Lady Olga said. Thea noticed that by her casual tone Lady Olga did not really mean it. Lady Olga did not know her brothers, so how could she understand Thea’s loss?

  When they reached the tower, and a guard opened the terem door, Thea felt uneasy. It was as if she were to be locked away like a princess in a fairy tale and Lady Olga the wicked witch.

  Lady Olga lifted her skirts to mount the wide, curving staircase. The servant that followed with Thea’s clothing coffer waited as she explained to Thea, ‘The kitchens and a refectory are both here on the ground floor. Steps lead down to the store rooms. Except for special occasions and some of our feast days you will not leave the terem.’ She turned around and placed a finger on her thin lips. ‘Princess Anya resides on the first floor so your serv
ants must climb up and down the staircase quietly as mice in the granary.’ She turned back and quietly cautioned the servant bearing Thea’s clothing coffer on his shoulders to travel upwards slowly. She frowned at Katya and Gudrun when their boots banged against a step.

  When they entered Thea’s chamber after several turns of the staircase, Lady Olga drew Thea over to her chamber’s window. ‘I shall care for you, Princess, until your wedding. My husband is an important courtier here. He is Princess Anya’s steward.’

  Thea nodded, hoping she would remember who everyone was.

  The sun shone through the window glass with a soft glow and a distortion of what lay outside. Lady Olga remarked, ‘I make it my business to know everything that happens in this castle and further beyond its walls. If you need anything send for me.’ She smiled in a kindly manner. ‘Call me Olga,’ she added before Thea had time to thank her. ‘That is when we are alone, my dear.’

  ‘Olga, when we are in private as we are now you must call me Thea. The governor called me Princess Gita. That is not the name my friends use. You see it is my grandmother’s name also.’

  Olga placed a hand over her hand which rested lightly on the deep window ledge. ‘You will eat with us in the terem. I shall send you my own maids in the morning to escort you up to our large chamber.’ She swept her hand around the vast room that Thea was to share with Gudrun and Katya. ‘This is the best room in the tower. It will be cool in summer and warm in winter.’

  Thea glanced around the spacious room. One wall was decorated with a fresco painting of the Madonna and her ladies seated amongst painted meadow flowers. A high bed with steps covered with thick counterpanes took up much of the space. Two pallets had been left for her maids.

  Olga walked over to a wall opposite and flung open a low door. ‘The pallets must be hidden from sight by day. Come.’ Thea crossed the room, followed by Gudrun and Katya.

  They peered into a shadowy alcove set into the thick walls. Olga picked up a lamp from a chest and held it up so that it illuminated the wooden clothing rails. ‘Your maids may start unpacking your coffer. This must be kept as you now see it. Their own travelling bags must be kept here too, out of sight.’

  Olga lifted lamp higher. The room reached deep into the wall where shelves held linens and useful items such as needles and embroidery silks. There was a chest for the sleeping pallets and covers, and further along behind a screen stood a covered glazed pot for the necessary.

  Olga turned to Gudrun. ‘Empty the chest of clothing. Shake the garments out and hang them. I shall inspect this chamber for perfection after morning prayers tomorrow.’ She returned to Thea. ‘After your bath, which my maids will now prepare for you, I shall send food for you. Tonight, you may eat in your chamber. After tonight you will join us in the terem refectory for all meals unless you are indisposed.’ She sniffed delicately. ‘We do not eat with men. It is not our way in Russia.’

  ‘Thank you, Lady Olga,’ Thea said.

  Lady Olga bowed her head, ‘Goodnight, Princess.’

  Thea could hear her padding down the stairway and telling the terem maids to be quiet as they carried something heavy towards her chamber. She supposed it was the bath tub and welcomed it.

  As days and nights passed, Thea began to understand the rhythm of the terem. She came to like the women who dwelled there. She grew used to the spiced meals that the terem cooks prepared for them. She spent secluded days in the work room above her chamber. She studied the different traditions of the Rus Church. However, no matter how hard she tried to conform to the rhythms of the terem, she became restless. When would her prince come to free her? The more she thought about Prince Vladimir the more magical he grew, so magical that he was increasingly like a prince from a story than a man made of flesh and blood that she would one day reach out to touch. She confided in Gudrun and Katya and they exchanged looks. Finally Katya said, ‘My lady, try not to dream too much lest your dreams cause disappointment.’

  ‘I shall never be disappointed by Prince Vladimir, Katya.’

  Every day during prayers in the chapel Lady Olga sent two slave girls to inspect Thea’s chamber. Thea thought sadly, I have no secrets but if I had any Lady Olga would tear my secrets from the very walls. It is just as well that my life here is so predictable that I have nothing to conceal. What if I did have secrets? she thought to herself.

  Life was too predictable. There was a garden and she walked in it. There was the work room. There was a beautiful church which she came to love. But there was no freedom. Perhaps I can ride out on Starlight, she thought, but when she asked, she was told she was not to ride out of the fortress. There was no one to escort her.

  ‘Padar could,’ she said. Lady Olga shook her head. Anyway, Padar was setting up his trading business with Earl Connor. Padar rarely visited the fortress. She felt so alone.

  If she felt alone, she noticed how Gudrun pined. Gudrun’s appetite was like that of a sparrow. She was turning into a little bird before their very eyes. ‘I do eat,’ Gudrun protested when Thea tried to tempt her with delicious honey sweetmeats.

  ‘Padar will return soon,’ Thea said as she tried to forget her own longings.

  We are both pining, Thea thought to herself, and we feel our confinement but what can we do about it? The other women are kind but they are so content to pass their days in a beautiful gilded cage, or they will sew, help with making kvass or supervise the endless work of the ovens. They play with their children. Their men come and go but they go more often than they come. I wish I could feel content as they do.

  ‘This is the way of it,’ Katya said when she complained.

  ‘I hope I get used to this life,’ Thea sighed, and tried to study her new prayer book.

  15

  June 1070

  The possession of a secret crept up on Thea.

  Lady Olga had introduced her to the ladies who lived in the terem and had then set her to work on a linen embroidery that was to record the most significant events of her life.

  Lady Olga presented Thea with a length of linen as long as the stretch of her arms and as wide as the window opening above them. ‘A rushnyk is very individual. You will use stem stitches and cross stitches. It is important that you stitch carefully.’ Thea opened her mouth to speak, to ask more about it.

  Lady Olga stopped her question. ‘Before you ask any questions, it is a sacred towel, sacred to God and sacred to you. You will keep it with you all your life. It will follow you into St Sophia on your wedding day. One day it will be used to lower your coffin down into the grave.’

  ‘Just that, just a linen towel?’ Thea said in her halting Rus as she stared at Olga, and at the length of linen lying across her knees, shocked at this new information, puzzled by the skeins of red, blue, yellow and white embroidery threads neatly set out on the low table by her designated sewing chair. ‘Wh-what must I embroider on it?’ She was bewildered.

  ‘You embroider your path of life from your coming to your new land until your wedding and, in time, significant events after it. It tells your life, your life in perfect –’ she touched Thea’s hand and repeated, ‘– mind, in perfect cross-stitch work, just as the Nons spin out the lives of the Norse people under their tree of life. We also have a tree of life in our tradition. You can embroider the tree into your rushnyk.’

  Thea nodded. Lady Olga knew so many things for a lady whose own life was apparently spun out in a closeted terem.

  ‘What else do I embroider?’ It would not do to make mistakes here and embroider the wrong thing.

  ‘For your wedding, you should work a duck and a drake to symbolise Prince Vladimir and yourself. Ducks represent water which gives us life and I hope your marriage begets plenty of new life.’ She lowered her voice. ‘Many children, of course. Your husband expects it of you.’ Olga swept her hand over the table with the needles and skeins of thread. ‘These needles are special.’ She lifted a bone needle with a blue silk thread dangling from it and passed it to Thea. ‘Take it. It is part
icular because it is your needle and it is yours alone. They are all new. If the needle breaks, you must have a new one for the blue thread to replace this one.’

  She lifted the piece of fabric from Thea’s lap. ‘Now you are ready to begin. If you work on your arrival here in Novgorod at the top, then I think you could stitch a ship and a horse, a girl with a crown of course as you will marry our prince, and a castle and church.’ She looked thoughtful and her mouth pursed. ‘Just your life here; nothing else is of any consequence. Yellow is the colour of the sun, black is the earth and for your wedding you will use red and blue.’

  Olga wrinkled her brow in thought for a moment. ‘You could stitch a sun at the bottom corner as you have come to us in the summer.’ She paused and turned to the two watching girls, Gudrun and Katya. They were seated on stools beside their mistress. She said sharply, ‘You two are responsible for the care of your mistress’s sewing threads. None must go missing. They are silk. They will be delivered carefully to her chamber every day and never left here by night.’

  Now Thea understood why a whole shelf in the wall alcove of her chamber was set aside for embroidery threads and needles.

  The girls nodded. ‘Yes, my lady,’ Katya ventured.

  ‘Good.’ Olga glanced down at the silks again and stretched out two long, slim fingers towards the threads that lay on a low table. She touched the red. ‘For the large wedding section you embroider the duck on the left and the drake to the right. Your drake, Thea, will be stitched in red. It represents his energy.’ Her fingers momentarily hovered over the blue skein. ‘The duck is blue, blue representing purity, sky and water.’ Olga then lifted the red thread and showed it to Thea who felt defeated before she even began to sew.