Daughter of the Wolf

by Victoria Whitworth

  She squatted, the better to look over the other girl’s shoulder. ‘What are you looking at, Wynn?’

  ‘Cast handle.’ The girl appeared to be talking to herself. ‘But the flat bit is a sheet, beaten. How do you beat it so flat? See how they’ve fitted the one into the other?’ Elfrun hadn’t registered how the T-shape of the handle was more than simply beautiful, that it allowed the fragile front and back plates of bronze to be supported and braced. ‘And three rivets... but the back was engraved before they ever riveted it...’ Her voice faded away, and she had bent so low over the mirror that both it and her face were hidden by her lank brown hair.

  Finn caught Elfrun’s eye, and they stood up, leaving Wynn for a moment to her musing.

  ‘Who is she?’ His voice was low.

  ‘The smith’s girl.’

  Finn nodded. ‘That makes sense.’

  Elfrun swallowed. ‘It was her brother who died, last time – last week – when you—’

  ‘Ah.’ He nodded again. ‘Hard times for Donmouth.’ He glanced towards the dunes. ‘Too dark now for visiting, but is tomorrow a better day, lady? Will I find a welcome under your mother and father’s roof?’

  Tomorrow? She had simply taken it for granted that he would be coming back to the hall with her now. Without realizing, she had clasped her hands tightly, one over the other, and she did her best now to relax them, to breathe, to speak with the ease and command which Abarhild had been trying so hard to teach her. ‘My mother is dead. And my father is from home.’ Where had this man come from, that he didn’t know that? ‘I am lord in his absence.’

  ‘You? The lord? I see.’ He was silent for a moment. ‘Then, like me, you know about shouldering a burden.’ And at last she saw that radiant smile, and she could feel her own face lighting up in response. ‘Has he gone far, your father?’

  ‘Rome, on a special mission for the king.’

  ‘And you are proud of him.’

  She nodded, pressing her lips together hard and breathing deep through her nostrils. After a moment she said, ‘It’s strange with him gone. It’s not just him – he’s taken a few of his men, his sword-bearer – and so many of the hangings, and the cups, and the cushions... He needs to look good on the journey, and in Rome, to show the world that the legate of Northumbria’s king is a man to be reckoned with. But Donmouth feels very’ – she groped after the words – ‘small and grey and – and fragile without him.’ She stopped abruptly. She had never meant to say so much, and such vague, stupid things too.

  But he was nodding, not laughing, and his face was interested. She found her breath catching in her chest.

  ‘How much?’ At the sound of Wynn’s voice they both turned. Elfrun thought the girl had been asking the price of the mirror, and she bristled. But Wynn hadn’t been talking to them. She was still looking hard at the mirror, and her voice sounded angry. ‘How much tin?’ She tilted it this way and that, peering at the surface, scowling hard.

  ‘How would you make such a thing?’ Finn went to crouch beside her again.

  ‘Me?’ Incredulity. ‘I couldn’t make this. I couldn’t coax the metals to make this colour. The warmth of it!’ She sounded more furious than ever. ‘And look at it. Just look.’ She thrust it up towards Elfrun, who peered obediently at the engraving. ‘It’s perfect. That pattern. Perfect. I could try for a month and not make lines like that. Not a single line.’

  ‘I’ve seen a gospel book,’ Elfrun said slowly. ‘In St Peter’s Minster, in York. My uncle showed me. It had patterns like that.’

  ‘A book.’ Wynn’s tone was rich with contempt. ‘They say on vellum you can make a picture of anything, and if it goes wrong you can scrape it out and do it again. But this’ – she gave the mirror an angry little shake – ‘there’s no room for a slip here. It won’t forgive. This is a perfect thing. Take it away.’ She shoved it, handle first, at Elfrun, who took it tenderly. ‘It hurts me to look at it.’

  Elfrun looked helplessly down at the little bronze object. She had thought it beautiful, but she had none of the sense of craftly achievement which was causing Wynn such anguish.

  ‘You’re a maker,’ Finn said.

  ‘I want to be.’ The girl had gone sullen, her voice flat. ‘But I’m not.’

  ‘You can learn, though, can’t you? If you truly love it, you can learn.’

  A shrug, and a contemptuous glance.

  Elfrun’s temper flared at the girl’s bad manners. ‘Wynn! Show some courtesy to our guest.’

  ‘Sorry, lady,’ and she turned to Finn. ‘Sorry I was rude.’ The girl’s voice was pure misery, and Elfrun was bitten by remorse.

  ‘I’m sorry, too. I spoke more harshly than I meant,’ she said. ‘Go home now, Wynn. Take the cockles to your father.’

  Wynn rose awkwardly to her feet, clutching the damp and sandy folds of her skirt around the sea-fruit. She ducked her head at Elfrun – ‘Lady’ – then nodded to Finn – ‘Thank you’ – before she turned and dashed away, sprinting up the slope of the dune despite her burden, as though she were some long-legged shore-bird.

  ‘So,’ Finn said.

  They were alone, and Elfrun didn’t know what to say. She looked down at the mirror, and then held it to out to him. ‘I can’t afford it. I should have said before—’

  ‘You don’t know the price.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’ She was dreadfully embarrassed. ‘You heard what Wynn said. It’s a perfect thing. It’s fit for the king’s wife. You should take it to York, or Driffield, or bring it to the market at the next spring meeting.’ She could hear herself babbling, and despised herself.

  ‘I could do.’ He folded his arms, ignoring the proffered mirror. ‘But I don’t know where I’ll be, come the spring.’

  ‘Not round here?’ The words were startled out of her.

  He smiled. ‘Folk like me are like the swallows, Alvrun. Here for a season, but who knows where the winter might take us?’

  ‘Will you really not come up to the hall now?’ He shook his head, and she felt it like a blow. ‘Then you must take this with you.’ She held the mirror out to him again. ‘I have to go. I need to take this lot home’ – she gestured at the basket with her free hand – ‘they’ll be wondering where I’ve got to.’

  ‘And where have you got to, Alvrun?’ He was ignoring the outstretched hand, looking out at the dull grey water, his hair beaded with wet.

  ‘What?’

  ‘You’re kind,’ he said, ‘which is more than beautiful.’ He was hugging himself with his arms, not looking at her, and she turned to follow his gaze, towards the hungry, choppy waves. ‘You said sorry to that child, and you didn’t have to. She was rude, and you are her lord. You were well within your rights to rebuke her.’

  ‘I – She – she’s not having an easy time.’

  ‘That was plain, for those who know where to look.’ He sighed thickly. ‘Keep the mirror for me. Keep it for the winter.’

  ‘But what about tomorrow?’ She could hear the anxious keen in her voice and tried to temper it. ‘You’ll come up to the hall for food and fire?’

  ‘If I can.’

  She wanted to cry out, to ask what might stop him, but she felt she had trespassed on his patience enough. ‘And if not, you’ll be back for it? In the spring?’ Oh God, she was like one of Widia’s hound-puppies, begging for scraps.

  ‘I’ll try.’ He was nodding. ‘Go home. Get dry. Eat your cockles.’ He smiled, at last. ‘Warm, with butter.’

  She nodded, clinging to the smile and trying to muster one of her own in exchange. She knew she had already been dismissed, but she felt a terrible reluctance to leave him. Just one more smile, one more kind word?

  ‘Go on,’ he said.

  ‘But—’

  ‘Go.’

  So she went, awkward, balancing the rake on one shoulder and lugging the cockle basket with its sacking-wrapped treasure tucked in safe on top, her wet skirts dragging at her thighs. Every few steps she turned and peered back through the t
hickening mist and dusk, but he wasn’t looking at her, he was gazing out to sea, and he didn’t turn or call her back. Before long the high curve of the dunes and the green-grey prickly grasses blocked him from her sight.

  33

  ‘Who’s this, then?’

  Athulf pulled his elbows in and stiffened his spine, but one man couldn’t hide himself in a group of four, and the others had stepped away from him anyway. They had come in out of the freezing rain after a long and fruitless day trying to net duck in the marshes with the aid of a couple of dogs, and now they were jostling their way to the hearth, the others flinging down their sodden cloaks, talking big and shouting for a cup of ale.

  He had been to Illingham a couple of times over the last few weeks, but had never yet been invited into the hall, and now he was trying not to stare. It was longer and higher than Donmouth’s, with beams whose carving was fresh-painted; and where Donmouth was sparse and poor with the lack of Radmer’s trappings, Illingham was a blaze of colour, with embroidered hangings on the walls and a finely worked cloth draped centrally over the high table. Smoke, and sweet hay crushed underfoot, and something good cooking.

  ‘Go on, Thancrad. Where are your manners? Who’s your new friend?’

  A woman no taller than he was himself, round and soft, with black eyes in a doughy face, and a sweet smile. She was offering him a pottery cup, and he took it gratefully, realizing as he did so that the others had not yet been served.

  ‘Be well, guest.’

  He scrabbled after the proper reply. ‘I drink your health, lady.’ He raised the cup and sipped. Mead, with a different blend of herbs from the little vats of Donmouth. Sweeter, and very much to his taste.

  ‘See, Thancrad?’ The little woman had turned. ‘Some young men have lovely manners.’

  ‘Athulf is my name, lady.’ This must be Thancrad’s mother. Switha of Illingham. He badly wanted her to think well of him.

  ‘Let’s get you out of your wet cloak.’ She snapped her fingers and he relinquished the sodden square of wool into friendly hands. ‘We’ll hang it by the fire. Now, where are you from, Athulf? Who are your parents?’

  ‘He’s from Donmouth.’ It was Addan or Dene speaking, from somewhere behind him. ‘The abbot’s son.’

  His stomach tightened painfully, waiting for the cutting remark, the cold shoulder.

  But her face lit up. ‘Ingeld?’ She made it sound as though this was the best news she’d heard all winter. She clasped his elbows and stared intently into his face. ‘You’re Ingeld’s son? Of course you are! Look at you! How could I ever have missed that? The spirit and image of him. And you’re wet through. Come and have a seat. There are some oatcakes, fresh from the stone.’

  Confused and flattered, he let her lead him, chattering sweetly all the while, bring a creepie-stool forward with her own hands, refill the cup of mead. He hid his face, leaning forward and fiddling with the wet bindings round his calves, feeling as though all the world was mocking his hot cheeks.

  The others were joining him, taking up all the space round the fire. One of the women was bringing more wood, feeding it carefully into the blaze. Thancrad’s mother was at his elbow with hard cheese, more oatcakes, some relish of onion chopped with herbs. He was starving, and he ate and drank everything she offered. He was always hungry, and usually it felt as though there was not enough food in the world to satisfy him, but at last he shook his head, and she motioned away the woman with the basket of flatbreads.

  ‘Now,’ and she was sitting next to him. He looked down at the hand she had placed on his arm. A little, pale paw, broad with stubby fingers and tidy nails, Silver-gilt shimmered on one finger. ‘Tell me about your dear father.’

  ‘My father?’ A wave of bitterness and exhaustion rolled over him. But she had called Ingeld dear. She wouldn’t want to know his true thoughts.

  ‘Is he settling into being the abbot of Donmouth?’ She laughed, and her tone was warm and affectionate. ‘It’s so hard to imagine. Pious, virtuous... I remember how we all sighed over him, before I had to go away, when he was still only in minor orders. Of course, I was long married, and already a mother, but even so...’ She shook her head. ‘But he would never have looked at me, even then. I was never pretty enough to catch his eye.’

  Athulf couldn’t work out if she was praising his father or criticizing him. Whichever, it made him uncomfortable, and he wondered how old she was. It was so hard to tell with women; once they were veiled they all looked the same. As old as his father, by the sound of it, and his father had turned thirty last year. That was why they had made him be a priest. You couldn’t be a priest until you were thirty. His cup was somehow full again. The others were talking over the day’s adventures, the flocks of duck that had stubbornly dodged the net, the valour of one dog and the stupidity of the other, the hilarious moment when Addan had stumbled and tripped backwards into the bog.

  ‘Ingeld’s not pious,’ he said. Despite everything Athulf felt the need to defend his father. ‘He says mass, of course, but apart from that...’

  Dene had hauled himself to his feet, re-enacting the story of Addan’s fall. Misjudging his step, he collapsed heavily into Athulf’s lap. Athulf’s cup went flying from his hand, and to his horror he saw it land and break in two on the edge of the hearth.

  He cowered, waiting for the reprimand. But it was Dene on whom Thancrad’s mother turned her censure. ‘Get off, you great oaf. That’s no way to treat a guest. Let me get you a fresh cup, Athulf.’

  So this was what it felt like, when you were the man who mattered most in a company. Warm, glowing, cosseted. Athulf thought he could easily get used to this. He looked across the fire to find Thancrad was watching them, his face solemn, hands loosely clasped between his knees. Thancrad could be such a bore, reining in him and the others. So serious, stern even, he reminded Athulf sometimes of Radmer at his humourless worst.

  But he was being given no time to dwell on Thancrad’s shortcomings. Switha was at his elbow again. ‘Try some of this. It’s a different brew. There’s more meadowsweet in it.’

  He sipped. Cloying and sticky and so sweet it set his teeth on edge. He drained it at a draught.

  ‘I’m so glad that you and Thancrad have become such good friends. That was wonderful, you spotting the whales. That’ll help us all through the winter. Tell me about it.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. He wanted to say something interesting, so she would go on thinking him wonderful. ‘I saw them first.’ But his tongue was thick in his mouth, and he couldn’t find the words.

  It didn’t seem to matter. She went on talking, asking more questions about the whale-drive, drawing him on to tell stories about his life, about Donmouth hall and minster. Shy at first, the words started coming willy-nilly. What it was like with Radmer gone. Cudda’s death, and he felt the tears he had not yet shed prickle the corners of his eyes. How Abarhild and Ingeld between them had thwarted his hopes.

  ‘But of course you must have a sword! Are there no swords left at Donmouth?’ She pulled back and stared at him, those warm, dark eyes round with astonishment. ‘Look at you! It’s not just who you are – who your grandfather was – but such a promising young man...’ Her eyes were flickering this way and that, assessing his shoulders, his thighs, her gaze as palpable as a spider darting over his skin. He sat up taller. She tutted. ‘Why on earth would they think to make you a priest? You could have Donmouth as a lay abbacy, if they put their minds to it. Surely Osberht would see the advantages to that? Whatever is Ingeld thinking of?’

  ‘It’s my grandmother.’ He cradled his empty cup and tried to remember everything Abarhild had said. ‘She says if I don’t become a priest I won’t get anything.’

  ‘Abarhild.’ There was contempt in her voice. ‘That meddling old besom. She always did think she knew best.’

  For all the fog and muzz of the mead, Athulf felt as though he had climbed a steep slope to emerge on a sunlit plateau with views to the far horizon. He had been trapped in confusion
and anger for days. But it didn’t have to be like that. Meddling old besom. The phrase was delightful. Everything was delightful. Switha was holding up a jug, those sparkling black eyes quizzical.

  ‘There are swords at Donmouth,’ he said slowly. ‘But they’re locked away.’

  ‘And who has the key?’

  Athulf opened his mouth to say that Elfrun and Abarhild had the keys to the hall heddern, but a sudden lurch of nausea prevented him. Switha had turned away to replace the jug and, looking across the hearth, he found Thancrad still watching him, the firelight flickering on his cheekbones. Thancrad’s eyes narrowed, and he got to his feet. ‘Come on.’

  Athulf clenched his throat against another queasy surge, and he was only too relieved to let Thancrad steer him outside, into the chilly yard. He barely had time to register that the rain had stopped before he staggered and spewed heroically against the side of the hall. Retch after retch, until his throat and eyes were burning.

  Thancrad was laughing softly under his breath. ‘I was watching you putting it away. I knew there’d be trouble.’ Laughing, but he sounded bitter rather than amused.

  Athulf was cold and sweating, but now that the mead was out of his belly he was more master of himself. His first instinct was to swing his fist against Thancrad’s face, but he reined that in, swallowing down the bile. When he could speak he said, ‘Your mother is very kind.’

  ‘My mother?’ Thancrad was outlined against the open door of the hall, and Athulf couldn’t see his expression. ‘Yes, she’s very good at drawing people to her. I can see why you’d like her.’

  People? He wasn’t people. Athulf needed very badly to think that Switha’s smiles, her questions, that assessing, admiring gaze, had all been special, all been for him.

  34

  ‘Come to bed, wife.’

  Saethryth was sitting between him and the hearth, a dark shape with a faint golden outline. She had said she was going to finish her carding, but he had been watching her ever since lying down himself, and she had not moved, combs and fleece left untouched in the basket at her side. Her back was to him, and she sat with her arms around her knees, gazing into the little fire. If she wasn’t working, she should come to bed. She still had her dress on over her linen and a shawl around her shoulders, as though she had no idea that he was waiting for her.