The Queen of the Elves

by Steven Malone

  THE QUEEN OF THE ELVES

  By Steven D. Malone

  www.stevenspen.com

  Copyright © 2016 Steven D. Malone

  All rights reserved.

  Alfnoth the deacon, servant to the children of God at Lydbury, to Henry, by the grace of God king of the English and duke of the Normans, sends greeting and eternal blessedness in Christ.

  I cannot render adequate thanks, as you have deserved, for the friendship of your brotherly love, which you often for the sake of God showed to me in my necessities. I pray Almighty God that he may recompense you in the high summit of the heavens with the reward of his favor eternally in the joy of the angels.

  It pleases me to reply to your request for my witness to the visit paid your blessed and loving father William, late king of the English and Duke of the Normans, by the rebel Edric of Shropeshire and his wife Godda, known as the queen of the Elves. However, I fear the wrath of God for keeping memory of such vanities and the displeasure of you, my king, for the false and deceived railings of this woman, a true daughter of Eve.

  I served faithfully as a soldier by your father’s side in all the years since, until full of the infirmities of age, I entered in service to Almighty God some six years ago.

  In this duty, I was present on the day traitorous Edric gave up his rebellion and swore fealty to William. To the lesser thegns like myself, the rebel was known as Wild Edric. The peasants on the fens taught us that name. He earned it in our eyes for he fought well and we lost many in the three years we faced him. We all marveled, your father not the least, at Wild Edric when he bowed down for his oath. He showed all the weight of his defeat in a haggard brow and tattered raiment but he stood proud and with arrogant eyes. It was I that whispered into the king’s ear the rumor that set us on the road of our separate dooms. Wild Edric is married to the queen of the Elves, I whispered.

  William marveled anew at Edric, immediately falling into conversation with the rebel. Wild Edric boasted of the truth of my assertion. Before all of the host, your good father required Wild Edric to wait upon the King’s court accompanied by his elfish wife at her earliest opportunity, for this was a wonder of the English their conqueror dearly wanted to see for himself. The tattered rebel bowed his assent.

  The herald of Wild Edric appeared at the burnt doors of York some weeks later, as your father drank in celebration of the ravaging of the northern shires. This unholy thegn dressed in Edric’s green raiment and decorated himself in the talismans and jewelry of the old gods’ Yule trappings. The fierce man’s horn sounded like Gabriel’s doom and his voice came like thunder. All of us cowered before him and your father also, God forgive me, such was his visage. The herald announced, without so much as a by-your-leave, that it pleased Godda, queen of the Elves, to appear before William on the day we call St. Cuthbert’s Day near Eastertide. The man’s great horse reared and neighed mightily and was gone leaving us staring of into a foggy twilight.

  There was talk of little else among William’s host amid the desolate North Country or along the road to Winchester castle where your father held Eastertide. Everyone from thrall to earl, in anticipation, doubled and redoubled their efforts in preparation for the event. All of the Norman and English churchmen, and as many London burghers as could get invited came for the night of marvels. Your father demanded the best food and drink brought in from all the surrounding lands. His craftsmen busied themselves preparing the gifts he required. Though all was prepared, few slept on St. Cuthbert’s Eve.

  After noon it was when we heard music and song coming from the west road. Wild Edric and his company arrived. Edric led wearing armor of leather and bronze and clothes of green wool. His levy of warriors followed behind with musicians and singers and thrallmen. Behind those came several heavily laden carts. The whole company glittered in the sunlight from jewels and bronze armor and merrily colored clothes. But there was no queen of the Elves with them.

  King William and Wild Edric approached each other with greetings. The King’s was cold for there was no wife with Edric. Edric’s was proud and haughty and not that of a defeated enemy. He did, finally, kneel before the King.

  However he spoke his wife’s apology while on his knees saying, “The queen, my wife, believes the King will understand that there are duties and constraints that come with her office and begs me to give you the time of her coming as required by her station. She will be before you when it is neither day nor night, she will come neither walking nor riding, she will see you neither under the sky nor under a roof, she will be seen by you when it is neither dry nor rain.”

  “God’s very beard!” came your father’s oath. “Will she come as I command or not?”

  “She will come when all these things come to pass, my King,” Edric said. “Queen Godda knows that her primary mission here today is to prove she is who she is. She will come!”

  The King’s doubt remained but he led us into the great hall where a great feast sat spread across the tables. Edric and his company, comely and happy, were good guests. They enjoyed the King’s table with great delight. Their conversation was refined and charming though each declined to talk about the lady Godda. Finally sated, Edric rose and addressed King William saying his company came with entertainments and diversions for the host if it pleased the King. William answered that he would be pleased.

  Edric stepped to the center of the hall and shooed away the thralls that continually kept our drinking horns filled. He then began a story of long ago when Godda’s elves roamed the English isles freely and without fear of man. It was a wondrous story filled with passion and war and revenge and tragedy. It was the tale of how Godda and Edric met and loved. Such was the tale that all the host cried and clutched at their hearts sharing the grief of the two lovers. But, then Edric’s tale turned. His story filled with ribaldry and errors and farce. The hosts’ tears were now of laughter and their sides hurt from an excess of mirth. Finally, your father called a halt to the story unable to withstand Edric’s verbal onslaught. All of us were grateful for the relief.

  “Now, my Lord and all here, some of my friends and I offer you magic and music and magic again,” Edric proclaimed.

  To the hearth came a peculiar man of heavy brow and sparse beard dressed in a thick hide robe glittering with golden thread and sparkling stones. This one carried a harp of wood inlaid with more gold and carved in elaborate monstrous shapes. To his haunting music and rocking dance, Edric sang a song in a strange language. The beat of the music raced faster and grew in volume. The strange man began to twirl. Faster and ever faster he twirled. A wondrous green smoke rose up from his great robe until he fairly disappeared in the cloud. There sounded a great crash from I know not where. The one man, tall and commanding, became two, short and dwarflike, before my very eyes. Men rose up in alarm. Women screamed.

  Wild Edric, joined by the two dwarves, sang a new song of such sweet melody that all the host stilled without words from the singers or from your father. With the new silence Edric’s song ended.

  One of the small men stepped forward as Wild Edric returned to sit by the King. He announced that he and his little friend were knowers of all secrets and the two proceeded to prove it to all the host. His little friend began to leap and bound and contort himself about the hall stopping first near this person and then another. With each stop he would hug or stroke the hair or clasp the hand of a man or a maid. The first of the little men then would tell that one’s name and then another’s secret such as the name of the hall where they lived or maybe what was in his pocket or some such thing. They were a marvel to all and a great diversion for the passing of time.

  Without our knowing it, the afternoon waned and evening approached. Such was our wonder that none noti
ced Queen Godda arrive.

  I was first to feel the breath of cold wind and to see the Lady Godda. However, as one all the host by an unheard signal turned to see her. The great doors, barred though they were, guarded though they were, stood open. Godda, Queen of the Elves, sat astride a small paint pony with feet touching the floor. Neither standing nor walking. The pony’s front legs were in the hall the back legs stood in the grass. Neither inside nor outside. Behind Godda lay a thick misty fog dark in the twilight. Neither rain nor dry – neither day nor night.

  Lady Godda wore flowing, and most immodest, gauze that first seemed a silvery white but on closer scrutiny seemed to be a shimmering flow of rainbow that covered her head to ankle in a luminous veil. Godda was neither clothed nor naked, in my eyes, for as the thin, shining veil covered her it exposed her. My Lord, words fail me. I cannot describe her beauty.

  The pony stepped from beneath the elfish woman and she entered a silent hall and bowed to the king.

  “Greetings in Christ to you, Lady Godda,” William said amused and maybe a touch red-faced.

  “Ave, conqueror of England,” Godda said. “You demanded the presence of a queen of the Elves.”

  “I required the presence of the wife of Edric of Shropeshire to see if she was Queen of the Elves.”

  “See her then,” said the lady from beneath clothes of rainbow.

  “What proofs, wife. What proofs do you have for the king?” said Wild Edric.

  “Do you require proofs, duc de Normandy?” Godda said.

  “Forgive my caution, Lady, my priests,” your father gestured to his prelates at table. “My priests teach me to doubt such things.”

  “The court of the Queen of the Elves is a proof.” She gestured to her company. “My entrance here is a proof.”

  The King sat silent. Wild Edric stood and brought forward two of the Shropeshire men to give witness. The first told a tale of money. The Lady Godda came to him asking for implements made of iron for elves defer from working iron. The man left iron tools on his stoop evenings, mornings saw a silver penny in their place. The second man chanced upon Lady Godda and her sisters in his forest at a twilight. They danced and frolicked in the mist as he watched. Their singing, he claimed, set a spell on him so that he slept. When he awoke seemingly unharmed he returned to his home to find he had been gone a year and a day.

  “I’ve seen no elven pennies,” said the King. Many of the host grumbled agreement.

  “Have you, any of you, looked in your purses of late?” said Lady Godda.

  The King and everyone fished their secret places and out came silver – a silver penny from the days of Penda of Mercia. I confess I was not alone in being delighted. Everyone seemed delighted save the King.

  “I’ve not seen Lady Godda as clearly as did the good man who saw the dance.”

  The two dwarf-like men began to play. Lady Godda began to sway. Came the thunderous crash of the King’s hand slapping the board before him.

  “I do not expect to sleep a year and a day, my Lady!” he cried.

  Perhaps I saw the smallest of smiles on her lips, the smallest of nods, as she continued to sway. Perhaps I saw nothing.

  The music played faster. She began to dance. To frolic. The drape of silvery cloth twirled and glittered and shone in the lamp light. As it twirled to the alien music, Lady Godda stepped out of it by some elfin magic and danced before the dumbfounded king as naked as a minnow. Long golden hair flowing loose down her back. Skin the color of moonlight… (Illegible, possibly erased – ed.) …(s)aw nothing of her that proved her more than a mortal woman. The wondrous dance enthralled all present with no blush on cheek or shame in heart.

  The music ceased leaving the hall in silence, Godda kneeling bent over her knees supplicant and modest despite her nakedness. All the host sat bewitched at our cups. The King, your blessed father, broke the spell.

  In a flash of blood-red light and a resounding thump, he freed his sword from its sheath turned it and drove its point into the table. He rose to stand before the host a fierce scowl on his face.

  “Enough! Enough tricks and songs and dances. No proof lies here. No truth. Fear me, the King of England, if this be a lie,” William shouted.

  “I do fear the wrath of the Conqueror. All of the twilight realm fear you, William of Normandy,” Lady Godda said though I saw no fear in her. “Feel the fear of the Ealderfolk!”

  The distant thunder sounded and grew louder coming ever closer. The floor beneath my feet trembled. The walls shook. Serving dishes and ale cups danced and clattered. Wine spilled. The host screamed and signed to ward off evil. Lord, I have never know such fear as that in my belly and throat as I did that night. At the Elf Queen’s command, the Wild Hunt roared above us.

  I saw Lady Godda stand and command her robes with a gesture. Of its own the cloth of rainbow flew from the ground to wrap around her shoulders.

  “Silence!” she commanded. The shaking stilled. The Wild Hunt receded into the distance.

  This daughter of Eve looked again into the eyes of the King.

  “What proof do you require, my Lord? For once and for all, know that I am Queen of the Elves.”

  King William, dazed, stared out at the woman. Slowly, he returned his sword to its scabbard and sat again.

  “It is said,” he said with a strained voice. “That the Ealderfolk are far-seeing and can tell past and future. See for me the future.”

  “Lord, I do not see the future.”

  “Lady, see the future or earn my wrath,” William said though I felt hesitation in his voice.

  “I say again, Lord, the time not yet come is not given me to see.”

  “I ask one last time.”

  “My Lord, allow me to dream for you. Only my dreams have weight in future times. Even then, things are not always clear but muddled,” she said and awaited his pleasure.

  The King nodded his head and the Lady gestured to Edric. The thegn rose from his bench and approached his wife. Lady Godda pulled from her shining robe a strangely wrought spear point.

  “Sire, the Spear of Saint Brigit, matron of poets and healing and the metal forge,” Godda bent a knee and sat the spear on its point. A flick of the wrist started the copper colored thing spinning slowly. By itself, the spear point stayed upright as it turned round and round.

  Lady Godda, her husband beside her, sang a haunting song in her silvery Elfish language. She swayed slowly back and forth with eyes closed as her dwarves played on lyre and pipe. After a time, her singing ceased, though not the music. She stiffened as if asleep.

  Wild Edric touched her forehead. Lady Godda fell backwards caught by her husband. He placed an arm under her and lifted her above the revolving spear point. Edric stepped back and the Lady floated in midair!

  Before the alarm of the host could sound, Edric turned to hush us with a gesture. “Allow the Queen of the Elves her sleep and her dreams,” he said.

  We watched the floating apparition as a wind of unknown origin stirred the draping robes as if pushed by the dwarves’ music. Lady Godda spread forth her arms, twirled upright in the air, and flew to hover above your startled father. A voice came from the air, deep and throaty, that might have been Lady Godda’s though I did not see her lips move.

  “Ave, William, conqueror of the English. Hear the dream of the Queen of the Elves. Born from the breast of a Griffin with a holy scepter are three birds. The first, a noble hawk, wars against the Griffin and lives by rapine and unfulfilled avarice. He will die chained in a cage. The second, a cruel and fearful eagle, rules the Griffin’s prize by unholy violence dying apostate. The third, a cough, the thief of birds, steals his legacy but holds it forever sitting on a hoard of gold…”

  My lord William jumped from the table throwing his ale horn to table with a great crash.

  “Cease these lies, Hell thrall!” he cried. Torn from her dreaming, Lady Godda fell to the floor and the spear point ceased its spinning. “How dare you slander your king?”

  Helped up
right by her husband, Godda slurred. “Lord, I dream only of birds.”

  “Silence!” The King strode forth to stand over the couple. He considered them with a fierce scowl while the host trembled and waited.

  I waited for the order to kill the Lady and her husband. We all knew she spoke evil lies.

  My Lord Henry, forgive me for writing to you of what follows. I fear your wrath but I write at your command a true witness of this unholy night.

  Your father turned from Lady Godda to look upon his children at their benches. One at a time, he looked first upon you at suckle on the paps of your wet nurse, then at your brother Rufus, called so even then for his devilish red hair, as he sat grinning at the deeds of this woman, and finally at the darting dark eyes of cursed Robert, the first born. Your father turned back to the wife of Wild Edric.

  “I see those birds, Lady. It does no good to a king to renounce what is there to see in his eyes and in his heart.” King William softened his glare. He turned to his butler, known as Hugh of Ivry. “Bring forth gifts for the Queen of the Elves. Make music. There is time enough to worry over my little birds. My doom is not yet come.”

  The next morning, Wild Edric and Lady Godda dispatched to Shropeshire gift laden. William returned to London happy in the knowledge that he entertained the Queen of the Elves. That said, I never knew your father to look upon his sons the same way again.

  This is my witness truly told of the night Wild Edric and Lady Godda came to the court of your father. This is the birth of the legend of the Children of the Conquering Griffin. I know not of the truth of any queen of Elves, though I believed it that night. To this day, it is said that William Rex thought of Lady Godda when he divided his domain between you and your brothers, giving Normandy to Robert where he might live by his sword, and England to William Rufus so that he might be saved from apostasy, and giving you only money so that there would be no stealing. In all my time of service to your father, I heard no such consideration. I did not fight your father’s wars with Robert. I did not attend your brother Rufus when he fell to the ash wood arrow in the new forest. I saw no theft when you entered the treasure room to become the last heir of conquering William.