Daughter of the Wolf

by Victoria Whitworth

  Elfrun took a deep breath and sat back on her heels, resting her hands on her knees and trying to still her hammering heart.

  Perhaps she should send down to the minster and see what Ingeld had left in his chest, although Abarhild had refused to let anyone touch her darling son’s possessions, even Athulf, to whom they surely belonged by right. There were some fine things there – finer than anything Radmer had left behind him. Despite her grandmother’s intransigence they would need sorting, and sooner rather than later to judge by the state she had let her father’s clothes get into. Less than a year of neglect... She swallowed painfully, thinking back to Athulf’s righteous fury about the rusty sword, its cracked, flaking harness and tarnished silver buckles. He had been right, but she had been too angry to see it.

  And she would have to see these clothes put back into the chest, in some kind of order. Finn needed a tunic now, not in half a day. Perhaps the grey would do after all. If she took it into the light and had a better look at it...

  ‘Alvrun?’

  ‘What?’ He was right behind her.

  ‘You took so long. I wondered if you – if everything was all right.’

  ‘Sorry. I – I was thinking about moths.’ She thrust the tunic at him blindly.

  He grasped her wrist instead, and the grey tunic slithered to the floor. ‘Alvrun... have I thanked you? Thanked you properly? I would have died. What can I do for you?’

  The moment trembled between them. Elfrun felt something huge swelling under her ribs, like some great creature of the deep sea, rising and breaching the water and coming darkly shining into the air at last.

  She went with a rush into his arms, burying her face in his right shoulder, feeling the renewed warmth of his skin through the damp linen. So different from the corpse-chill of last night. His hand cupped the back of her head, stroking her hair.

  Him and his secrets. There were so many questions to which she should demand answers. She had no idea what Auli was to him. How had he come by that spider’s web of scars? Why these secret assignations with strange merchants on her land? But none of those buzzing, wasp-like issues mattered, not just at that moment. Someone had taken out her blood and replaced it with sun-warmed mead. She turned her face up to his and kissed him, hard and clumsy, right on the mouth, her arms around his waist.

  He was startled: he rocked slightly and found his balance again before kissing her in his turn. She could feel her knees caving in, the earth tugging her downwards, and she found herself pulling hard until they were both kneeling on the floor, among her father’s rejected finery, still kissing, fierce enough to bruise lips against teeth. He was cupping her face with his good hand, stroking his thumb over her cheekbones. ‘Alvrun...’

  She tried to tug him closer, to make him lie down beside her as she had lain by him in the ash coppice, but he jerked away with a wince. ‘Sorry – my shoulder.’

  Her heart was beating so hard she could hardly breathe; it was like some frantic wild bird struggling in the huntsman’s lime. She felt that if she spoke she would break the spell, that she would lose this ferocious determination, so she just nodded and shifted round and tried to pull him down against her on the other side. He groaned and buried his face in her neck, and suddenly she was terrified she had really hurt him.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Alvrun... Alvrun...’

  ‘What?’ She was properly frightened now.

  ‘Not here.’ The breath was catching in his throat. ‘I – My shoulder hurts. The bones grated. But it’s not that. Your charming steward might come in.’ He was sitting up, his breath steadying. His eyes were shadowed in the filtered light. Somewhere up in the rafters a mouse or a rat squeaked and scrabbled. ‘He might come in any moment. And then what about your name, and your reputation, Alvrun? And what price my life? You didn’t save me last night to see me die at the rope’s end.’

  She batted away the buzzing, unwelcome cloud of words, hanging on to the first two. ‘Not here? Then where?’

  He sighed. ‘What is it you want?’

  ‘You.’ She was amazed by her own boldness.

  ‘As a means to what end?’

  ‘What?’ She shook her head at him, not wanting to talk, wanting to recapture that honey-warm energy of a moment since.

  ‘There’s something going on with you. You’re frightened of something. What’s frightened you so badly that you want to use me to bring your world crashing down around you?’

  ‘That’s not true, any of it.’ She was appalled by his words. ‘I’m not using you. I dream about you.’ She closed her mouth, because it had been about to say, I love you.

  ‘Then what is true? A dream?’ He shook his head. ‘You have the right of it, Alvrun. I am no more than a dream. A thief in the night. A creature of shadow. You don’t want me.’

  That torrent of blood and desire was ebbing now: she could feel it slowly withdrawing like the turn of the tide and the slow retreat across the sand; and a deep mournful longing taking its place. There was anger in there too, but she didn’t know why, or with whom she should be angry, and she bit it back.

  ‘You’re right in one thing.’ She breathed out sharply, a short huffing sound. ‘Luda could come in, or anybody really.’ She pulled away from him, rearranging her rucked skirts. Too late, her modesty was reasserting itself, and she could feel hot shame staining her cheeks. ‘Here.’ The grey wool. ‘It’s the softest, although the moth have—’

  Finn caught her wrist. ‘Would you come away with me?’

  65

  Of course she had turned him down.

  But first there had been a long stunned moment, like the floating time of shock after a bad fall; a moment in which a whole other life had unfolded itself before her, one in which she was free of Donmouth; in which guilt and grief and terrible responsibility were no more than the rags of last night’s dream; in which she and Finn wandered the green lanes in some endless summer.

  It was so real, she could see the cow parsley and the meadowsweet and the loosestrife, all in bloom at once and as high as her head, the air fragrant and buzzing with the laden bees, and Finn’s face warm and golden and turned towards her own.

  Then, ‘No!’ She had shaken her head at Finn, furious with him for even summoning up that tantalizing illusion. ‘How can I?’

  It was like her stupid dream of taking her father’s silver and fleeing to some haven with Widia as escort, but a thousand times worse because it was Finn and it was real and he was looking at her with those silver-grey eyes and the little lift of the eyebrows that somehow put all the humour and the charm back into his weary face.

  She scrambled to her feet, thrusting the grey wool into his arms and backing towards the door. ‘Don’t look at me like that.’

  He followed her out into the lighter space of the high-raftered, echoing hall. ‘I mean it. Come with me.’ There was a tight look to his jaw now, and she wondered whether he was angry with her. She felt her own temper rising in pre-emptive retaliation.

  ‘I can’t. Don’t be ridiculous. Put that tunic on. Be careful with the left sleeve – the moth—’

  ‘Never mind the moth!’ He stepped forward quickly and took her by the hand. ‘I really mean it, Alvrun. You should come with me.’ His gaze flickered towards the door and back to her face. ‘You have no idea.’

  ‘Donmouth—’

  ‘Donmouth can shift for itself. There’s not a soul here who cares for you as they should. Look at you! I thought you were too thin when I met you a year ago—’

  ‘You said I was beautiful!’ She hadn’t meant to speak, but this betrayal tore the words out of her.

  ‘You are beautiful.’ He was shaking his head. ‘And strong, and brave. And kind, too, for that matter. Kinder than you have any call to be. But your face...’ He lifted his other hand and stroked a finger down from her eyebrow to the corner of her jaw, holding her gaze with his until she felt as though she were drowning. ‘You’re all bones and hollows and corners, Alvrun. Donmouth isn�
��t hungry, not this year. You aren’t looking after yourself, and no one is looking after you.’ He gripped her wrist tighter. ‘But this isn’t what I meant to be saying. Alvrun’ – and his voice was sombre suddenly – ‘I’ve heard things...’

  ‘About me? What things?’ The floorboards seemed to shift beneath her.

  ‘No, no. Not about you. About... things. On – on the roads.’ He paused, hunting for words. ‘You do, you know, travelling. At markets. Folk – I think folk forget I’m there.’ His eyes were shadowed, remote, as though he were looking into the depths of his memory. ‘Bad times are coming.’

  ‘To Donmouth?’ The ground was still lurching.

  ‘To all Northumbria. But from what I’ve seen and heard – yes, perhaps particularly to Donmouth.’

  The gravity of his tone terrified her. She tried to fight the fear with anger. ‘Then how can I possibly go? My folk need me, Finn. How can I go with you? Are you asking me to be your woman?’ A flash of memory: Ingeld’s brown hand resting with such affectionate possession on the soft pale curve of Saethryth’s hip; and she battled a sudden hot rush of tears. ‘What makes you think I’m so easy?’

  ‘Easy? You?’ Finn closed his eyes. ‘I should never have asked you. Never. And if bad times do come it’s at least in part my fault. Better for both of us maybe if you had left me where I lay, last night.’

  She was speechless for a long moment. His words made no sense. Then, ‘But you would have died.’

  ‘Yes, most like.’ He shrugged his good shoulder. ‘Men do die, you know. They die all the time.’

  The flat fatalism of his tone drove her to fury. ‘Do you think I don’t know that?’

  ‘I don’t know what you know, Alvrun. And I don’t know what you want. I wish you would come with me. But never mind.’ He turned a little away from her and started to pull the grey tunic on over his head, flinching as he worked his left arm gingerly into the sleeve. He lacked some of Radmer’s breadth, and she could see that the seams sat awkwardly across his shoulders and upper arms, but at least the moth damage was invisible. ‘I’ll stay here tonight, if I may.’ His voice was stiff. ‘I need to rest, with your leave. Then I’ll be off at first light tomorrow.’

  ‘Where will you go?’

  He shrugged, and winced again. ‘York, probably. After that, who knows?’

  ‘But you’re hurt.’

  ‘I’ve been hurt before. I’ll live.’ He turned towards the main door of the hall, the one that gave out into the yard.

  ‘Finn!’ She was knocked by a sudden gust of panic, a longing to hold on to him, to regain some of the ground they seemed to have lost. ‘You must be starving. Come with me to the bake-house. It must be about time to give out the bread to the slaves.’

  Finn stopped, one hand on the doorjamb, his back to her. ‘Indeed. My life is yours to command.’

  ‘What?’ She pushed her hair out of her face.

  ‘So feed me with your other thralls. I’ve known worse masters.’

  Elfrun felt a terrible draining despair, as though someone had turned a spigot and let all the life and mirth run out of her veins. Only a few minutes ago they had been so close, and now he had cased himself in ice and bitterness, and she had no idea why.

  ‘Go then.’ Without wanting to she was mimicking his own bitten-back tone. ‘Speak to Luda. Tell him I said he is to give you whatever you need. Then go and sleep.’

  ‘Alvrun...’ He pivoted.

  ‘Just go.’

  He stared at her for a long moment, then turned and did as she had ordered, and his very compliance only made her feel worse. After he had gone she gazed at the empty doorway, numbed, a lump in her throat. Then she went into the weaving shed and sat herself down at her loom and forced herself to concentrate on thread count and colour and not bashing the cloth too hard with her batten. She stayed there in the half-light for the whole day, speaking only when she had to.

  Widia came back late, with all his companions but Athulf. The mist had retreated at last, to leave a warm golden evening as its legacy. One of her women stood awkwardly in the door of the weaving shed and beckoned her out to the yard.

  ‘We found nothing. Oh – hoofprints, and dung, and a smothered fire. And this.’ Widia jerked his head, and one of the others urged his mount forward, swinging a crushed and battered wicker basket from his back. It was Finn’s pack. She didn’t need to look inside to see that it had been emptied of its treasures.

  ‘But no clue as to where they went?’

  ‘Athulf’s still out there. Still looking. He said he would be late, and not to worry.’

  ‘On his own?’ She couldn’t hide the shrill edge of alarm.

  Widia shrugged. ‘He can look after himself.’

  ‘Against three armed men?’ And there could be more than three.

  ‘Lady’ – and Widia’s voice betrayed that he was weary to the bone – ‘you’ve tried quarrelling with him before now. How far did it get you?’

  She nodded, suddenly beyond all arguing. He was right. Somewhere in the last year or so the little cousin whom she had thought she knew had vanished. Athulf was a man now. He had his sword. He could look to himself.

  ‘Thank you, Widia.’

  His face softened. ‘You’re more than welcome, lady.’ He paused, then said, ‘I’d like a word with you, when you’ve time? Something important. But not now – I need food and fire, and you’re too weary for me to burden you further.’

  ‘Of course. Whenever it suits you.’ Too saddened to be curious, she bent to lift the pack, and carried it through to the stable. The horses were still out in their summer-field and the place was quiet; at first she thought it was empty, but then she saw that Gethyn and the dog-boy were there, and as she approached the dog-boy put a finger to his lips, eyes wide and nodding his head.

  Finn was lying in the straw, fast asleep. When she had first gone into the weaving shed that morning she had ordered one of the women to make a bed for him in the stable, and to dress his shoulder; she could only guess now how massively the bruising had spread, as it was hidden by the soft grey wool. He looked as calm and comfortable as he was ever likely to. Bones and hollows and corners, he had called her, but he was little more substantial than a shadow himself. She hunkered down and looked hard at his face. A gross intrusion, to take advantage of his oblivion, but she couldn’t help herself. The air in the stable was warm and sweet with new hay.

  ‘Is this your man then?’ Saethryth had come in silently. Gethyn padded up to her, tail wagging.

  Elfrun rose hot-faced and stepped back swiftly, a denial on her lips, but it died unspoken. My man. She tried out the words, shaping them with her lips but giving them no sound.

  ‘I was wrong then,’ Saethryth said. ‘You do understand.’ She moved round to stand at Elfrun’s side. ‘My da says he’s some beggarly pedlar who should be whipped out of Donmouth. He says to tell you he’s sent men down to the marsh to deal with the carrion. Burn them. His words.’

  Elfrun nodded, carefully ignoring Saethryth’s first sentences. Yes. The bodies. It had to be done.

  ‘Who hurt him? Who killed them?’

  It was the question Elfrun had been dreading. ‘We don’t know. Outlaws.’

  ‘So they’re all saying. You know what I’m thinking, don’t you, lady?’

  ‘Thinking?’ The two young women stared at each other, until Elfrun had to lower her gaze.

  ‘I told you before. You should never have drowned Hirel.’

  Elfrun swallowed. ‘Ingeld’s throat was cut. He was stripped. Not speared and left to drown. It’s not the same.’

  ‘But like enough. Robbed and killed.’ Saethryth paused, looking down at Finn. ‘What are you going to do? He’s pretty, isn’t he? But he looks a cold fish. Not much life in him. That Thancrad, he’s the better bet.’

  Elfrun fought her fury. ‘Of course there isn’t much life in him, not just now. But that isn’t – isn’t normal. He’s wounded, that’s all.’ She squatted down beside him again,
blocking Saethryth’s view of him as though Finn needed protecting from the other woman’s limpid cornflower gaze.

  ‘Wounded?’ Saethryth laughed, the old gurgling laugh that had set Elfrun’s teeth on edge for so many years. ‘That’s his excuse, is it?’

  ‘Anyway, he’s leaving tomorrow.’

  ‘And you’ll just stand back and let him go.’ Saethryth shook her head. ‘You’d better get him to take you to that house of nuns your gammer’s always talking about. Best place for someone like you.’

  ‘What do you mean by that?’ Elfrun half rose, but Saethryth just shrugged and vanished into the yard.

  Just stand back and let him go...

  Elfrun sat down at Finn’s feet. Someone had put an old blanket over him, and his breathing was easy and regular. Her own cloak was hanging in the hall, matted and filthy, in need of careful brushing and sponging after the night’s trials. She crossed her legs and folded her hands in her lap, looking down at her interwoven fingers, brown and grubby against the faded blue of her patched dress with its ragged and muddy hem. Her nails were a disgrace. Abarhild would have something to say – would have had, she emended. Her grandmother was so vague, these days, so lost in her memories. A reprimand would have been a welcome sign that she was engaging with the world again.

  Elfrun came to a sudden decision.

  She would go to the king and the archbishop, and ask them to take Donmouth hall and minster under their protection. She could do no more. She had been trying for a whole year, and all had been disaster. Rust and moth, theft and corruption and adultery, and now outlaws running free on her hills.

  And what of her own fate? Elfrun lifted her head and gazed unseeing at the far wall of the stable, the bridles and halters hanging from their pegs.

  A house of nuns, if the great powers agreed with Abarhild.

  Marriage. Most women her age were two or three years married, one baby at the breast and another in the ground. It was more than likely that the king would give Donmouth into the hand of some proven and deserving retainer, a hard-eyed, heavy-bearded man of thirty or forty with a wife or two behind him already, her body as the seal of the bargain. Someone like cousin Edmund. And is the maiden willing? Of course, she could always say no, but she could imagine how coldly that would be received.