The King's Hounds (The King's Hounds series Book 1)

by Martin Jensen

  With my arm still around her shoulder, I led her over to it. “Do you know him?”

  She gasped. “It’s him! Horik, the one you were asking me about.”

  I heard both Godskalk and Winston inhale.

  “Thank you, my girl,” Winston said, placing a hand on her shoulder. “Halfdan will walk you back. But would you do me a favor?”

  She nodded.

  “Would you keep this a secret for the time being?”

  Once she had promised to do so, Winston looked at me. “Hurry back now,” he said in a teasing tone. Unfortunately, I knew he really meant it.

  I took my leave of Frida by her cooking fire once the filthy wench had sulkily handed the ladle back to her. But before I left, I promised to come back and see her again as soon as I could. A promise I planned to keep, given the farewell kiss we shared.

  Chapter 19

  I found Winston bent over the dunghill. Godskalk was leaning against the wall of the building, watching him, and the two housecarls I’d seen earlier were waiting in the narrow lane as three other housecarls carried a borrowed door into the fenced area. Winston looked up as I approached him.

  “He was killed here,” Winston said. “See?”

  He poked around in the dung with his foot, and I saw the bloodstain under the straw and shit.

  “Then the killer covered up the blood?” I asked.

  Winston nodded and looked at me, even though it didn’t make any sense.

  “If you’re right,” I began, “and the killer wanted the body to be noticed, then why cover up the blood?”

  Godskalk cleared his throat. “It’s easier to explain why you have manure on your shoes than blood,” he suggested.

  That thane had a head on his shoulders. I quietly kicked myself for not having thought of that myself. Since the killer had maneuvered the body onto the dunghill, there was no way he could have avoided stepping in dung. But, before doing so, he had covered the blood with straw to make it safe to step there.

  Winston nodded at the housecarls. “You can take him away.”

  They loaded Horik’s body onto the door and were about to leave when Winston stopped them with an upheld hand.

  “Wait a moment,” he said, looking around. Godskalk and I watched incredulously as he walked over to a pile of trash in the corner of the yard and started rooting around in it. Eventually he held up a tattered horse blanket. “Cover him with this. It would be best if we could keep this to ourselves for a while.”

  “Where are they taking him?” I asked

  “To the church,” Winston said, stepping over to the fence to speak to the waiting housecarls. “If anyone asks, he died of sickness,” Winston instructed. We watched as they carried the dead man away.

  “Why do you want to keep it secret?” I asked.

  He gave a small shrug. “It may not be important, but I want to see how Tonild reacts when I tell her about the murder, and I want to make sure she doesn’t hear the news through the rumor mill first.”

  “But what about the woman who found him?” I said. “Surely she’s already shared the biggest event of the day with her neighbors and friends.”

  “No, Godskalk made sure of that,” Winston said.

  “The woman’s husband is a housecarl,” Godskalk explained when I looked at him. “He knows how to keep his mouth shut, if I ask him to.”

  That explained why the murderer’s plan for everyone to find out about the dead man in the yard hadn’t worked. The wife of a housecarl would obviously notify her husband before running all over town spreading gossip.

  “Speaking of asking,” Winston said, placing a hand on Godskalk’s arm, “Would you mind having your last two housecarls here question the people living along this lane? I’d like to know if anyone saw anything—though I doubt they did.” Winston could tell from my face that I didn’t understand the reason for his doubt, so he added: “We haven’t seen even a single curious onlooker this entire time.”

  Godskalk had already nodded to his men, who turned on their heels and headed off down the passage. Then he reminded us, “And perhaps you two will remember that the king would like to see you.”

  Winston nodded. “I haven’t forgotten. But let us pay Tonild a visit first.”

  “So someone is killing men and leaving them out in plain sight,” I summarized for Winston, speaking softly so that I wouldn’t be overheard as we pushed our way through the crowds.

  Winston gave me a look. “That’s not how I’d put it.”

  “No?” I said, stopping in surprise.

  “No,” he said, grasping my arm and pulling me along. “Someone is killing Saxons and leaving them out in plain sight.”

  Osfrid and Horik. And Frida, too, if I hadn’t been there to prevent it.

  Well what did that mean? Was Cnut behind it after all? Had a Dane seen this as his chance to kill off some English enemies?

  Or could it simply be a coincidence?

  It didn’t sound like Winston thought that was the case.

  When we reached Tonild’s tent, I was struck by another possibility: It could also be an Englishman killing off defectors.

  Tonild’s guard wouldn’t let us in.

  “Lady Tonild is in mourning for her husband and would like to be left alone,” he said, his face as stiff as a woodcarving. The guards behind him didn’t so much as twitch.

  “And yet I must insist,” Winston said, his voice quiet, but firm.

  Laughter, shouts, girls squealing, hoof beats, and whinnying could be heard all around us. Though the camp hadn’t grown much in size since that morning, everyone had obviously decided to enjoy themselves as they waited for the king to open the joint session of the Witenagemot and the Thing.

  A variety of cooking scents mingled, and smoke from the countless cooking fires danced in the breeze between the tents, swirling like elvish maids. A chaotic jumble of servants, farmhands, and clergymen’s housekeepers were carrying casks, jugs, bowls, barrels, cans, crocks, and pots to and fro, while soldiers, noblemen, ladies, lads, and well-guarded maidens sat in the grass or traveled between tents to visit one another. Only the Saxon widow’s tent sat silent and closed amid the frenzy.

  The guard did not respond. Winston bit his lip.

  “I’m here on official business for King Cnut,” he said.

  The guard emitted a scarcely audible snort.

  “Would you like me to send for the housecarls?” Winston asked.

  The soldier shrugged. “Be my guest. If you think they would dare barge into the tent of a grieving English widow, that is.”

  He had a point. I could tell that Winston realized that as well. There was no way Danish royal housecarls were going to force their way into Tonild’s Saxon tent. Cnut’s express desire to create peace between his peoples precluded such an action.

  Winston tried again. “If you could just let Lady Tonild know that I would like to see her, then she can make up her own mind.”

  The guard was unwavering. “I don’t need to let her know. The lady does not wish to be disturbed. At all.”

  I spotted a familiar face over the guard’s shoulder. Winston was so preoccupied with trying to figure out how to get past this guard and his many well-armed colleagues that he didn’t notice as I walked off.

  Frida lit up when she saw me, but then the gleam in her eyes faded. “I don’t have time,” she apologized.

  A platter she was holding confirmed that. It was heaped with thick slices of roast beef. A manservant stood behind her holding another, equally heavily laden platter. Judging from the smell, I guessed that his was full of lamb.

  “Lady Tonild certainly has a healthy appetite,” I joked, smiling at Frida.

  Frida opened her mouth, but an elbow from the lamb man shut her up.

  “The lady’s affairs are not the concern of strange soldiers,” the manservant said, giving Frida another push.

  I followed them with my eyes as they made their way to the front of the tent, where a guard flung the flap open for
them. I waited for them to come back out, but when they did the manservant had a firm grip on Frida’s arm and forced her past me. There had already been one attempt on her life that day, and I didn’t dare push my luck. I had to hope the bastard simply thought I was a girl-crazed soldier looking for a beddable wench.

  Winston hadn’t gotten any closer to the tent door when I returned. The guard appeared bored, but no less vigilant.

  “Let’s go,” I said.

  Winston turned to me in surprise. “Absolutely not. I need to speak with Tonild.”

  “Which we’re obviously not going to get to do. Let’s go,” I repeated.

  Winston’s eyes widened when I winked at him. I gave the guard a snide look and walked off. Winston followed.

  “What are you winking about?” he whispered as soon as we were out of earshot.

  “She has guests,” I informed him.

  “Guests?” he asked, bewildered.

  I told him about the heaping platters of meat. “Which is funny,” I added, “because I’ve heard grief makes you lose your appetite.”

  Winston rubbed his chin. “We have to find a spot from which we can keep an eye on the tent.”

  I’d already figured that much out.

  “Is your wench of the day nearby?” Winston asked.

  “We have to steer clear of her,” I said somberly. After an insult like that, he didn’t deserve any further explanation. I looked around. “There!”

  A narrow opening between the backs of two tents facing away from Tonild’s, it was the perfect spot. We could sit between them, hidden from sight, with an unobstructed view of Tonild’s tent. We could use the time to fill each other in on what we’d each learned that day.

  Chapter 20

  We were well hidden between the tents. Someone passing by would only see us if he looked right between them, and even then the shadows would likely keep him from noticing us. The tents’ heavy wool cloth muffled sound so we could speak relatively freely as long as we didn’t raise our voices. The din of the camp had died down now that most of its inhabitants had filled their bellies and switched to ale, mead, and wine. Winston sat up very straight and kept his eyes on Tonild’s tent.

  “You talk, I’ll keep watch,” he said.

  He listened silently as I described my meeting with Estrid, my mistaken assumption about her relationship to Osfrid—which brought a faint smile to his lips—and my subsequent conversation with her.

  “So she is actually Osfrid and Osmund’s half sister, and she confirmed that Osfrid might have been planning to take a new wife?” he asked.

  I shook my head, but then I realized his eyes were still trained on Tonild’s tent.

  “No,” I said aloud. “I planted that idea in her head, and she elaborated on it. There’s little love lost between her and Tonild. In fact, she took great delight in hinting that Tonild might be behind the murder.”

  “But you don’t think Tonild did it?” Winston asked.

  “How would I know?” I scoffed. “I’m just saying that Estrid would like to think it was Tonild.”

  “Well, do you think Estrid did it?” he asked.

  I knew he was going to ask me that. “Hardly,” I said. “Why cut off the hand that feeds you?”

  “Good point,” Winston said, rising up into a crouch as Tonild’s tent flap was flung aside, but it was only another servant, who hurried across the grass in long strides.

  “And Osfrid fed her well, you say?” Winston asked.

  “A pound of silver a year,” I told him. “I know a good many people who would kill for a sum that great.”

  “Hmm,” Winston said, his eyes leaving the tent for a moment to give me a teasing look. “Yes, I’m sure you probably do.”

  “There is something I’ve been wondering about, though,” I hastened to add, ignoring his remark. “Why is Estrid intentionally making herself appear poorer than she is? I mean: a pound of silver a year, a house with a kitchen garden, and a poultry farm. She’s not poor.”

  Winston chuckled to himself. “She told you the answer to that one, herself. She knows that Osfrid’s death means her source of funding has just dried up, and now she’s turning to the only option she has left: the abbey. All the abbeys I’m familiar with value silver every bit as much as those of us who live out here in the lay world. If the good Estrid lets word get out that she is a wealthy woman, any prioress or abbess will charge her accordingly.”

  We sat in silence for a while. I was just about to ask Winston to tell me what he’d gleaned from the brothers of Osfrid’s first wife when he continued, “And there was one question you didn’t ask that Estrid answered all the same.”

  Winston’s eyes were twinkling in the twilight, but, infuriatingly, I couldn’t figure out what he was referring to.

  “The question of why Estrid, an illegitimate daughter of a nobleman, wasn’t married off to advance the family’s interests.”

  That thought hadn’t even occurred to me. I chewed my lower lip in frustration and waited a moment before opening my mouth.

  “Let me keep watch now while you fill me in,” I said.

  Osfrid’s first wife, Everild, had two brothers: Ulfrid and Torold. Their father, Beorthold, had been an ealdorman under King Ethelred in the shires of East Anglia. For various reasons, Ethelred had had this Beorthold assassinated by none other than Eadric the Grasper. Ethelred and Eadric had used compurgators to swear they were innocent of the killing, and were acquitted. Ethelred and Eadric recognized Ulfrid and Torold’s claims as Beorthold’s heirs, but, enraged by the murder of their father, the brothers had switched their allegiance the moment they came into their inheritance. They sold off their property in East Anglia, forswore their allegiance to Ethelred, and pledged fealty to Morcar, a thane in Northumbria, which was not a fief of Ethelred’s.

  Later, after Eadric had murdered Morcar as well, King Ethelred sent a message to Ulfrid and Torold in which he told them that they had been sufficiently penalized and that he would accept them back into the fold. But now, furious not only about the murder of their father but also that of their patron Morcar, Ulfrid and Torold swore they would never serve Ethelred again. They stayed on their lands in the Danelaw to the north, and their loyal warriors repulsed attacks from the south more than once.

  When Ethelred the Unready died, his son Edmund Ironside sent a message to the brothers that, as far as he was concerned, all that business was history and water under the bridge and so on and so forth. Ulfrid and Torold realized there might be some benefit to being King Edmund’s men, rather than continuing to live as Englishmen without a patron in the Danelaw, so they sold off their lands and property and returned to Wessex, where King Edmund treated them honorably.

  In serving Edmund, however, the brothers refused one thing: they would never associate or join ranks with the “bloody ealdorman Eadric,” who had their father’s and Morcar’s blood on his hands. At the Battle of Assandun, Ulfrid and Torold fought loyally on foot in the ranks of King Edmund. Ulfrid later admitted his deep regret that he had refused to serve with the traitor Eadric—because if he had, Ulfrid could have axed him from behind when Eadric turned his back on his countrymen and joined Cnut.

  After Edmund Ironside’s defeat at Assandun, Ulfrid and Torold continued to serve Edmund loyally to the bitter end. Their reputation of integrity was so great that Cnut recognized their claims and rights in Wessex without hesitation, which is why no one grumbled when Ulfrid and Torold assumed their rightful seats in the Witenagemot.

  “And what about their sister, Everild?” I blurted out.

  “It is just as Tonild said. Everild married Osfrid and bore him a son. She then died in childbirth with her second child.”

  The tent door opened again, but it was only one more servant coming out.

  “And did Osfrid leave Ulfrid and Torold anything?” I asked.

  “He did,” Winston replied. “Whether they think they got their fair share is another matter. But yes, he left them something.”


  “Hmm,” I said, staring at the tent and its stonelike guards. “So Osfrid had a good relationship with his brothers-in-law?”

  “It seems so. And yet … Ulfrid said …” Winston hesitated, until I gave him a look to continue. “When the conversation turned to Everild’s death, Ulfrid spat on the ground and said it was lucky for Osfrid that Everild had died giving birth to a son.”

  “What did he mean by that?” I asked.

  “That a nobleman can’t have enough sons,” Winston said, suddenly leaning forward. “Hey, something’s happening over there.”

  The guard by the tent flap was scanning the area.

  “So what would have happened if Osfrid had let their sister die giving birth to a daughter?” I asked.

  “I’m sure you can guess,” Winston said, standing up.

  The guard had flung the tent flap aside, but the expected stream of noblemen did not emerge—rather, one lone man stood in the opening, waiting for the guard to gesture for the man to proceed.

  I strained my eyes. I’d seen him before, but it took me a moment to place him. “I know him.”

  “Who is he?” Winston asked, not taking his eyes off the tent’s entrance.

  “He’s staying in the same lodging house as Estrid,” I explained.

  “Is that all?”

  “He also came in and had a drink at the market stall where Estrid and I were drinking,” I added.

  “And what was he doing in Tonild’s tent?” Winston asked.

  Winston’s guess was as good as mine, so I didn’t bother answering.

  “Follow him,” Winston said. “I’ll wait here and see if anyone else comes out.”

  But as I stepped out into the path between the rows of tents, I suddenly found myself face-to-face with five housecarls who did not look as though they planned to step aside. Their leader, a bald, one-eyed man, flashed me a hostile smile.

  “You’re the guy who’s with that Saxon painter, right?” the one-eyed Danish warrior asked me.

  There was obviously no point in denying it, so I nodded.