The Price of Blood

by Patricia Bracewell

  “No,” she replied, “he was not pleased. Nor did he offer a warm welcome to his new ally, although I suppose that is only to be expected. What I did not anticipate, though, was that today’s council session would be so ugly.”

  “There was opposition to the alliance, then,” Father Martin said.

  “There was a great deal of opposition, yes,” Emma replied.

  “And Lord Athelstan?” Wymarc asked. “Did he oppose it?” Emma knew that she was remembering Athelstan’s rage at All Hallows.

  “He was not there,” she said. “None of the æthelings were there.” They had not been summoned, she had been told, and it was just as well. The meeting had been hostile enough without them. “The king himself said very little,” she continued. “It was Eadric who directed everything.”

  Eadric, who had hastened to the king with his version of the events at All Hallows even before Ælfheah had been laid to rest. Eadric, who had embraced the Danes and their forty-five dragon ships like a lover.

  “Today I saw a side of the ealdorman that I have never witnessed before,” she said. “He was no honey-tongued flatterer, using half-truths to persuade and cajole. He was a bully. He abused any man who spoke against him so savagely that he may as well have walked into the hall with a cudgel.”

  In spite of that, many men had opposed him, for they were bitterly against the king’s alliance with the Danish warlord. She had been hard-pressed to translate all the rapid, angry exchanges for Thorkell’s benefit, even as she suspected that he understood far more of what was said than he was inclined to reveal.

  “It is strange that the king would trust anyone else to handle the negotiations, even Eadric,” Father Martin observed. “Could it be that the injuries from his fall still plague him? He is not a young man.”

  Emma considered it. She had seen the sinister gash across his brow, and she had been told that he needed a staff when he walked. But if he had been in pain he had hidden it well. She was familiar with Æthelred’s black moods, and it was not pain that she had discerned in his glowering silence, but a seething rage that he barely managed to keep in check.

  She was about to speak of it when a servant appeared with a summons for her from the king.

  “There must be some mistake,” Wymarc protested. “She has only just come from the hall. She’s not even had a chance to catch her breath.”

  But the servant was adamant. The king was in his chamber, and the queen was to attend him there.

  “It appears that Æthelred is about to break his silence,” she said as Wymarc helped her with her cloak.

  Her friend’s brow was clouded with concern, for they both knew what this was about. Emma squeezed Wymarc’s hand to reassure her, but as she followed the king’s man, her heart was hammering.

  She found Æthelred seated in his great chair, his bandaged foot stretched out in front of him. His only attendant, Hubert, was reading aloud from what appeared to be letters, but when she entered the chamber the steward’s high-pitched voice abruptly ceased.

  As she approached the king he pinned her with a black look. Yes, she thought, this is going to be unpleasant.

  As it was clearly a formal interview, she made an obeisance. He did not bid her rise, though, and she realized that he wanted her on her knees before him, like a penitent at the feet of an angry God. But she was no sinner come to ask forgiveness. She was his queen, and she had done nothing for which she needed to repent. She met his gaze and, despite the rage that she read there, she stood up, defiant, regarding him with practiced calm as she waited for him to speak.

  “I see that the office you performed at the council today has swelled your sinful pride, lady,” he snarled. “How it must have amused you all these years to keep me ignorant of your excellent command of the Danish tongue so that now, at long last, you could make me look ten times a fool. If you think that I am pleased to discover that my queen can parley with my enemies so effectively, you are much mistaken.”

  “My lord, until now I saw no advantage to you in revealing something that might raise suspicions that I could somehow be a Danish—”

  “It is not your task to determine what is and is not to my advantage!”

  “It was not to my advantage, then,” she said. A bitter memory assailed her, of the beating she had suffered in the early days of their marriage. She had upbraided him for ordering the slaughter of Danes settled in his kingdom, and he had left her battered and bleeding. But to dwell on that would make her angry, and anger would not serve her today, so she thrust the memory aside. “Now that Thorkell has given you his pledge,” she continued evenly, “my knowledge of his language can be of some service to you. Use it or not, my lord, as it pleases you.”

  “Oh, I will use it,” he sneered, “for you have insinuated yourself into Thorkell’s confidence, and he will trust no other. But do not profess that you are acting for my benefit, Emma. I know you too well. Thorkell is but another name to add to your list of allies, for you continue to labor under the mistaken belief that you have some claim to power at my court. This is not Normandy, lady, although I do not doubt that you wish it could be.”

  “My lord, you wrong me if you believe that I covet power for my own sake,” she said evenly. “I seek only to protect my children.”

  He barked an angry laugh. “And do you think I would accept the word of one who by her own admission has been lying to me for ten years?” He glared at her, his eyes filled with malice. “If I had my way you would find yourself across the Narrow Sea, stripped of titles, lands, crown—of everything, I think, that you hold most dear.” Leaning forward, he spoke in a voice laced with threat. “Enjoy your tiny sphere of influence while you may, but I’m warning you: If you use your newfound power against me I shall repay you sevenfold. There is a reckoning coming, Emma. Forget it at your peril.”

  No, she thought. She was not likely to forget it.

  When he dismissed her, she made him another graceful obeisance and left the chamber with a purposefully measured tread. She was still England’s queen, and despite his threats, nothing he could do would change that. Not now, for she had given him three children. They must be her shields against him.

  She was trembling, though, for the interview had troubled her greatly.

  She did not return to her chamber, but climbed the steps that took her to the walkway along the palisade. The daylight was fading, and the cloud-filled sky had a sullen cast to it. Below her the royal hythes that had been bustling at midday were deserted now, and the Thames flowed silent, its surface swept clean. For a time she stood there, looking to the river for a serenity that eluded her.

  Æthelred claimed that she had allies—a sphere of influence, even—yet it seemed far otherwise to her. Granted, Thorkell supported her, but every man at today’s council session, whether churchman or royal thegn, had been injured in some way by Thorkell’s army: lands burned, churches pillaged, daughters raped, sons slain. They had good reason to hate and fear Thorkell, and to be suspicious of the queen who had befriended their enemy. She had seen the hostility in their faces; she could not hope to find allies among them now.

  Casting her mind back to All Hallows, she questioned the decisions she had made there. Had it been wise to throw in her lot with the Danes? Was it truly what Ælfheah would have wanted? She was still uneasy in her mind about that, although in Thorkell she had gained a protector for herself and her children; a protector for the realm, come to that.

  But Thorkell was not one who could give her wise counsel, and there were few now that she could turn to for advice. How she grieved for the counselors whom she had lost! Margot, Hilde, Ælfheah—they lived now only in her memory.

  And there was another loss, too: Athelstan. She had trusted him, had loved him as she had loved no other man. But at All Hallows he had set himself against her, would have sacrificed Edward for the sake of vengeance. It was a betrayal that filled her with
anguish still, and added to the weight of her fear for her son.

  And as she counted her losses, the king’s dire words came back to haunt her.

  There is a reckoning coming.

  She knew him too well to consider it an empty threat. As he saw it, they were locked in a game of power and control, and he had some move in mind to make against her. Of that she was certain, although she could not see yet what it might be.

  If I had my way you would find yourself across the Narrow Sea, stripped of everything that you hold most dear.

  Would he send her away from England? Was that to be his weapon?

  No, he would not dare. He would fear her brother’s swift and harsh response. But if the king should try to drive her away, should make her life here so hateful that she would willingly choose to cross the Narrow Sea, what then?

  She drew in a long breath. What then?

  All around her the darkness was falling, but in the gloaming the Thames had become a shining silver ribbon. She looked from that glimmering line to the downs, their countless shades of green still beautiful even under a darkling sky. In that vast sweep of field and meadow, of river and forest and sky, she found the answer to her question, and she found, too, a balm for her troubled soul.

  She could not deny her Norman blood, nor would she sever the family ties that bridged the Narrow Sea. But long ago she had pledged herself to an English king and to his people. Come what may, that was not a pledge that she would lightly disavow. Her family now was English, not Norman, and her destiny must be here.

  Despite all that a king could do, she belonged to England.

  Author’s Note

  The entries in The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle spanning the years A.D. 1006 to A.D. 1012 are grim reading. A litany of woe, they describe the turmoil and bloodshed in England caused by successive invasions of ever larger Viking armies that eventually scoured nearly every shire.

  In that account of battles and of repeated, futile attempts by the English to rebuff the enemy, there is no mention of Queen Emma. This is not surprising. The chroniclers were recording the major events of Æthelred’s reign some years after they occurred, and they had no interest in the activities of royal women. Where Emma was and what she was doing in this period must be a matter of conjecture. There are clues, though.

  Emma’s name on the witness lists of four of the dozen or so charters of Æthelred that have survived from this period confirms her presence at some of the meetings of the witan. Why she witnessed some charters and not others is impossible to say. Historian Pauline Stafford, in her book Queen Emma & Queen Edith: Queenship and Women’s Power in Eleventh-Century England, suggests that Emma’s main concerns at this time would have been children and family. I have followed her lead and have used the dates that she has surmised for the births of Emma’s daughter and younger son. But I also have had to address the issue of why there were so many years between those births. Æthelred’s children by his first marriage appeared to have arrived annually. That he sired only three children with Emma suggests several possibilities: There may have been miscarriages in between; Emma may have chosen to nurse her infants, which would have delayed conception; king and queen may have been separated by military actions or by choice. I have used all of these in my story because, quite simply, we do not know what really happened.

  Emma’s close relationship with Archbishop Ælfheah is conjecture on my part, but it is based on Ælfheah’s twenty-year tenure as bishop of Winchester before his appointment to Canterbury. Emma, indeed all the members of the royal family, would have had a personal acquaintance with him at the very least. After his death, Ælfheah was immediately revered as a martyr. Looking ahead to A.D. 1023, when Ælfheah’s remains were ceremoniously moved from London to Canterbury in a procession that included many nobles and ecclesiastics, it was Queen Emma, not the king, who accompanied the saint on that journey. This may have been no more than good royal public relations and a display of religious devotion; but it may hint, too, at a personal bond between Emma and the archbishop, and I have played with that idea in the novel.

  The events at All Hallows and Emma’s role there are fictional, although Ælfheah’s capture, imprisonment, his refusal to allow ransom to be paid, and his brutal death are all documented. It is also true that on the day after his murder the archbishop’s body was brought to London along with an account of how he had died. Shortly after that, according to The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Thorkell and forty-five of his ships submitted to the king “and promised him, that they would defend this land, and he should feed and clothe them.” It is no great stretch to think that these two extraordinary events were somehow linked, but the details, including the reason behind the attack on Canterbury, are unknown. I have made them up to suit my story.

  One cannot help but wonder what was going through the mind of King Æthelred during these difficult times. In the twelfth century, William of Malmesbury would describe him as lazy, among other things. Modern historians opine that he was given poor counsel and that, at best, he wasn’t up to the task of fending off the Danes. There is no question, though, that the king was troubled by unrest from within his borders as well as from without; the debacle with the fleet in A.D. 1009 underscores that. The chronicles do not specify what accusations were made against the nobleman Wulfnoth at Sandwich; that was my invention. But Æthelred’s flight, the astounding decision to send eighty ships to capture Wulfnoth’s twenty, and the destruction of the fleet are all documented. The loss of those newly built ships must have been a massive blow to the king and the entire nation.

  Æthelred was not so much unready as unlucky. As the Anglo-Saxon poet claims in “The Wanderer,” Wyrd bið ful : Fate is relentless. According to William of Malmesbury, Æthelred’s ill fortunes were tied to the murder of his half brother, King Edward. He was haunted by that murder, and there were yet more killings that followed that one.

  According to a twelfth-century chronicler, King Æthelred ordered the murder of Ealdorman Ælfhelm, and the deed was carried out by Eadric, who at some point was given the nickname Streona (the acquisitor). What crime had Ælfhelm committed that he should be punished with death and his sons blinded? We can only guess. Historians have seen it as a symptom of palace intrigue of some kind. I think his crime was huge, and I’ve put Ælfhelm’s daughter, Elgiva, right at the heart of it.

  And here I must explain something about Danish marriage practices, as well as define the term concubine. In eleventh-century England, Denmark, and Normandy, a concubine was a secondary wife, and it was acceptable for a man to have a wife and a concubine at the same time. More important, the children of a concubine, if they were recognized by their father, would have inheritance rights. As you may imagine, the Church frowned upon this, and under its pressure this practice would eventually disappear. That would not happen for some time, though, even in England.

  It was also claimed that the Danes practiced a kind of marriage by abduction—snatching a bride and legitimizing the relationship with a dowry after the fact. It is unclear if this sort of thing actually happened, or if later Christian writers were simply piling more dirt upon the already infamous reputation of the Vikings. Factual or not, this practice was certainly in my mind as I wrote the book.

  That Elgiva was Cnut’s concubine is a certainty. Many years later there would be rumors that Elgiva, desperate to give Cnut a son, passed off someone else’s child as his. The truth about that remains a mystery, but Elgiva, as I’ve imagined her, could easily have attempted a stunt like that.

  The date that is usually accepted for the beginning of Elgiva’s liaison with Cnut is A.D. 1013, but that is conjecture based on the fact that Cnut was known to have been in England that year. I have brought them together much earlier, in A.D. 1006. We don’t know where Cnut was between A.D. 1006 and A.D. 1013, and we don’t know where Elgiva was sheltered after her father’s murder, so I’ve filled in those blanks with my own story based on the very
few facts (and rumors) available. The wedding-night scene in Holderness, by the way, sprang from my imagination, not from any documented evidence about Viking traditions.

  Regarding the sons of Æthelred by his first wife, we know more about Athelstan and Edmund than about any of their brothers. We can be certain that they were wealthy; they owned estates, weapons, armor, horses, and they had retainers and attendants. It appears that the relationship between Athelstan and Edmund was a close one. We do not know how their brothers Ecbert and Edgar died, only that in a given year their names disappear from the charters.

  There is, of course, no record documenting what the æthelings felt toward their stepmother, Emma. The eldest brothers would probably have been about the same age as she was, so it’s doubtful that they would have regarded her as their mother. The passion that I have imagined between Athelstan and Emma, I admit, is pure fiction. I fell in love with them both, and so I made them fall in love with each other. There is, however, historical precedent for a marriage between a king’s son and his widowed stepmother. In A.D. 858, the newly crowned West Saxon king Æthelbald married his father’s young, widowed queen. She was a Frankish princess named Judith, who had married his elderly father two years before. There is probably a great deal more to that story than the chronicles reveal.

  As this novel ends, though, Emma is not a widow—not yet. She is a queen and a mother, with three children to protect and nurture. And as bad as things were for Emma and for England between A.D. 1006 and A.D. 1012, in the book that will follow, things will get even worse.

  Acknowledgments

  My thanks once again to my tireless agent, Stephanie Cabot, for her encouragement and shrewd advice, and to the helpful team at the Gernert Company, especially Ellen Goodson and Anna Worrall. I’m grateful to my terrific editor at Viking, Emily Murdock Baker, for loving this book as much as she loved the first one; and to everyone at Viking Penguin who helped with the novel’s production. Special thanks to Matt Brown, yet again, for the wonderful maps of England and London.