Káta leaned back against the fencing and looked at Alvar. “No, my son, you are wrong.”
Alvar raised an eyebrow. “Is that so?”
She did not drop her gaze. “Sometimes, one small drop of knowledge is enough to calm a stormy sea of envy. I am wise enough to let you go to the queen, for I understand that while you might love her, it does not mean that you no longer love me, any more than my staying here means that I do not love you. Go, with my blessing.”
Siferth said, “Thank you, Mother.”
A warmth from his belly spread through Alvar’s body until it burst out as a grin that threatened to split his face. He said, “Yes, thank you.”
She lowered her voice to a whisper. “I was not speaking to him.”
Alvar made a grab for her tiny hand and squeezed it. “I know.”
“Mother. Mother! Look at what I can do.”
She turned her head to look at her son, but kept eye contact with Alvar until the last possible moment. She said, “Well, if you must learn, then as you say, you should learn from the best. But if my lord gets broken again…”
Káta walked back to the enclosure gate.
Siferth said, “Mother spoke as if she were teasing, but she must think that you are a great man, for she is keen not to have you sick again.”
Alvar grinned. “Your mother is a wonderful woman.”
Káta pressed each item into his hand. “You must put this salve on, for there will yet be swelling, more so after a hard day’s ride. And I showed you how this must be boiled up to a brew. I know that they have Leeches in the south, but it is hard to step in and take over where another has begun the healing. It will be sore for many weeks yet and even after that you might still have twinges.” She looked up. “I am speaking too swiftly.”
He stepped outside, put the things into his pack, and beckoned her from the hall doorway. She stepped towards him but her legs felt unsteady. A gust of wind slapped her dress against her legs and she pulled her cloak tight round her body.
He reached out and lifted her chin. “I will see that no harm comes to him. He is the son of my best-loved thegn, and his mother is most dear to me. You must not worry.”
He dropped his hand and she kept her face tilted towards him. She tried to meet his eyes, but had to look away, for the tears were hot and ready to boil over. “I know you will look after him. But I…”
Helmstan came striding out from the hall and Siferth followed him, a smile pinned to his face, and his eyes wide like a child’s on its birthday.
Helmstan rubbed his arms in an effort to keep warm against the wind. “The snow has melted but you should find the roads hard enough to ride before it all turns to mud.”
Káta held her arms out to Siferth but he glanced up at Alvar and wriggled from her grasp. “Mother…”
His father laughed. “Now we know that he is full-grown, if he will not wear his mother’s arms.”
Káta clamped her hands to her sides until Alvar and Siferth had mounted their horses. Alvar nodded to her and Helmstan, and before the horses clattered out of the gateway, Káta released the tears. She and Helmstan waved long after the riders had stopped casting backward glances.
Helmstan said, “I know it is hard for you my love, but he is old enough to be with a foster-father and I know of no other man whom I would entrust with my son’s life.”
A sob broke from her and she flung her arms round his neck. “Oh, you are a good man. There is none better.”
Chapter Sixteen AD 975
Deira (Yorkshire)
Alvar prayed that Earl Beorn had not retreated to Earl Wulf’s territory in the ancient kingdom of Bamburgh. A ride of any great distance these days aggravated his damaged thigh; he did not want to arrive at Beorn’s residence only to ride yet further north. From Leicester they took the old Roman road from Doncaster, through Castleford and on to Tadcaster. The terrain was the usual shrouded, water-logged hell pit that he found so hard to navigate and he did not trust the warty, withered old man who guided them. But he had chosen this route to avoid the ferry crossing at Barton-on-Humber and now had to rely on this little warlock to steer a course through the sodden misty marshland. Brandon, who was so keen to please and so familiar with murky fenlands, would have felt more at home here. But the task had been asked of the lord of Mercia and duty had saddled his horse.
Wulfgar was riding beside him, with Helmstan close behind, leading a party of twenty Mercian thegns. Too many, Alvar thought, but it was ‘Better to have them and not need them than rue the day they were left behind.’ It made sense; more so than the finger of doubt that tickled his spine and would not be stilled. The July sky darkened. The rain, which all day had threatened to fall from the solid grey cloud, broke free in a vertical assault that attacked the backs of their necks before they had a chance to pull on their hooded cloaks. In the humid afternoon, many had been riding in only their breeches and undershirts, but they were no cooler when the rain came, and as the thunder growled and lightning rent the blackened sky, they quickened their pace when told that a short gallop would see them to their journey’s end at Wighill.
Alvar had not sent an advance rider, but he was sure that Beorn knew he was coming. Would he wait for him?
They slithered to a halt outside Beorn’s hall and dismounted. Alvar wiped at the smell of wet mud in his nostrils. He detailed a party to stay with the horses and took only Helmstan, Wulfgar, Brihtmær of Chester, Aswy of Shropshire, and Ingulf of Worcester into the earl’s hall with him.
The premature evening rendered the inside of the building gloomy. The fire in the hearth burned low, and in the corner of the room a whistler was playing a mournful tune on an apple-wood flute. It was a popular instrument in York, but Alvar found the tone too morose and he hoped that he would not have to talk over the noise. He and his men took off their sodden cloaks and shook them before handing them to a servant who set the garments by the fire to dry.
Earl Beorn was seated upon the dais. A gold arm ring was hanging loose around his wrist. He was touching the fingertips of both hands together and allowing the ring to slide from one wrist to the other and back again. As Alvar approached, he let the ring fall to the table where it whirled, clattered, and lay flat. Only when the noise died away did he speak. “My lord Alvar, how do you like our northern weather?”
“It is a little wet for my liking.” Alvar’s words came out as if his voice belonged to someone else. He coughed.
“Be thankful, then, that you did not have to fetch me from my house in York; the dale will most likely be flooded by morning.”
It was a poor effort at humour and with the mention of York, Alvar had no need to make the pretence of a smile. “You know then, why I am here?”
“I do.” Beorn signalled the piper to stop. “What I do not know is what you are going to do.”
The silence was an oppressive successor to the awful music. Helmstan and Wulfgar kept rigid guard either side of the doorway, and the other thegns stared at the food and drink on the table, though none reached forward to take it. Beorn remained motionless and looked at the lifeless arm ring on the table. Away from the warmth of the fire, Alvar smelled for the first time the musty dampness which must have pervaded the hall at his every visit. A lump in his throat, his companion since he left Wessex, quivered in his windpipe. His head throbbed from the strain of keeping his eyes dry. The musician sat with the pipe now harmless in his lap and Alvar felt the stilled air begin to thicken until it pressed his bones. “God’s ballocks, man, what were you thinking? The king is dead; you should be with me and the rest of the witan while we choose an atheling as the new king. Instead, we hear that you made straight for the archbishop’s house and tried to kill him.”
Beorn tried a grim joke. “At least with me at York, you cannot blame for the king’s death.”
“I wish I could. It would tell me how a man of three and thirty, strong and healthy, dropped down dead after no sickness.” Alvar jumped onto the dais and threw himself into a chair
alongside Beorn. They stared out into the hall. Alvar waved at the other men who were waiting by the hearth. “Eat,” he said.
Brihtmær and Aswy helped themselves, while Ingulf took some bread and cheese over to the men standing guard by the door.
Beorn looked round. “What news from Wessex?”
Alvar shook his head. “The queen is at her wits’ end, in deep mourning. As are we all, but that does not stop the fighting over which of the athelings will become king.”
“Æthelred must be the one. It was written in law. His mother is a queen.”
“She is a queen, you are right. But she is a queen who is hated by Dunstan. We have much to argue about before it is settled. And before we speak about it, I have to deal with you. Why did you do it?”
Beorn waved a hand and a servant appeared from the shadows, darted over to the thegns’ table, and came back to the dais with some ale and two cups. Beorn waited until the drinks had been poured. “I can only say that a black madness came over me. When I heard that Edgar was dead I thought only of his beloved Oswald, who was an arrow in my side. I thought of how he sat in York, taking land from men who held it freely from me, forbidding the clerks from getting wed or even to make wills, so that their land would go back to the Church upon their death.” He drew a deep breath, sighed and lowered his head. “I had too much to drink and I rode to York not knowing what I meant to do when I got there. Thank God that I was too drunk to wield my knife with any skill. Either that, or the ale that stirred my wrath also washed it away.”
“You are truthful at least. And it is to your credit that in the end, you stayed your hand. After years of all his doings and having to watch him build all those monasteries, I do not know if I would have had the strength to withhold.”
Beorn laughed, but it rang hollow, like one sharp beat on a drum. “Then it would have been my task to ride to fetch you. Either way, we stand together. Even so, you are far too steadfast in your friendships, and that might not be wise for you any more.”
“Do not worry, my friend. Your Northumbrian shit will not stick to me.” Alvar laughed too, but there was no force behind it and the sound melted away. He said, “Standing true to those I love has not come cheaply. I do not think I have any more to lose.” In the silence that followed he stared at Beorn’s fire. Like every other man and woman in England, Alvar valued the hearth as a source of heat, giving not only warmth to the body, but drawing to it the company of others that helped to sustain the soul. But sometimes, a hearth alone could not make a home.
Beorn spoke again. “I would not have sat here waiting for any other man to come and tell me my fate. But I willingly waited for you, my friend. So tell me, what must I do? Am I to swing from a rope?”
“Not while I draw breath. You are sent from these shores, forever to be thought of as Nothing. It has fallen to me to witness your leaving, never to come back.”
“I wish to God that I had thought it all through before I brought this shame on my kin.” Beorn sighed. “But I knew it would come to this, even if I hoped otherwise.” A shutter blew back from the window and hammered back and forth as the wind swept round the hall. Beorn sat forward and placed his arms flat on the table. He gave a formal speech. “My hall is dim; God has sent the darkness and the rain, and now I must go to the faraway, where there will be no hearth-fellows. We must all float with the ebb and flow of life, but I wish I could bide here to tell the tale’s end. Have I time to share a drinking horn with you one more time, my beloved friend?”
“A ship lies in the Humber and will make sail upon my word. I will stay here until you leave.”
Beorn drained his cup and the servant leaped forward to refill it. “Leave it man, I will do it. And fetch my horn.” He spoke to Alvar once more. “You do not believe I would leave?”
“I believe that you would go. Your word is always good enough for me. You know why I am here. I am here to make sure that word does not spread too far. Canterbury does not want it known that there has been a threat made upon York.”
Kingston, on the Thames
“I will do to him what Beorn threatened to do to Oswald. I will wring his neck until his eyes burst out… Strip off his wretched skin with my hand-saex and spill hot wax on his heart… Pull out his stammering tongue and nail it to the hearth and grind his bones into tinder…” Never, even on the battlefield, had he been so enraged. It was as if his anger had been simmering in a cauldron for all these years and now the fire had been stoked enough for the whole pot to boil over.
They were in the queen’s bower, well away from the meeting hall, but still Alfreda looked anxiously over her shoulder. When she spoke it was with a voice unknown to him, cracked and hoarse from crying. “My lord, I beg you to still your wrath.”
“What?” Alvar stopped and looked at her. Her eyes were lost in dark circles, painted by the sleepless nights following the death of her husband and protector. Æthelred was pale and frightened and a poor substitute for his father, but no-one in the witan had ever pretended that either of the two princes was ready to be a king. No-one had expected Edgar to die.
Alfreda looked at the floor. “Dunstan said that there must not be another wrangle over the kingship. He said that the land must not be weakened by Edgar’s death, and must not lose that which the king and the Church had made strong.” She lifted her head. “My lord, will you sit down before you wear a hole in the floor? Your limp is worsening, and I need you strong and whole.”
Alvar panted as his journey from shock to anger ended in stunned curiosity. “How was this thing done? Why did no man put a stop to it?”
“Being an anointed queen did me little good, for Dunstan would have no son of mine on the throne. Edgar wore his hair shirt for the sin of Wulfreda, so in Dunstan’s eyes, a son born of that match is worthy to be atheling. Wulfreda was of royal kin so her child is throne-worthy; therefore my son is not. There were not enough who would speak for my son, and too many who would name Edward as their king.” Alfreda tapped her fingertips. “I will reckon them up for you. Oswald stood with Dunstan, and wherever the Dane stands you can be sure that the lord Brandon will be stuck to his side, and he brought the lords of Essex with him.”
Alvar counted too. “But my thegns in the south, Wulf in Bamburgh, all of Mercia, would have stood by Æthelred,” he said. “We all would have followed Edgar’s wishes.”
The queen dropped her gaze again. “Bishop Athelwold stood by us, as did my late father’s Devonshire kin, but…”
“Mercia was not here.” He slammed his fist into his other palm. “No, they saw to it that I was not here. What a witless empty-head I have been. Beorn, of course, could do naught, but Wulf could have ridden south given time.” He looked up as the door opened and he nodded when Siferth came in. “But Wulf was never sent for, was he? And I… I, daft turd that I am, dragged my sorry arse and all my men to Northumbria, stayed there long enough to see Beorn gone from our shores, and for Dunstan to put the king-helm on Edward’s head. God curse him for a word-breaking heap of shit.”
“Uncle Alvar, my lady…”
“Has often had her ears warmed by your uncle’s curses, Siferth; do not worry,” Alfreda said. She put a hand up to push her hair from her face. “Lord Alvar and I have always had an easy way with each other and this will carry on, I am sure, now that we…”
Alvar sat down. “And you, youngling; what will you do now?”
Siferth came to stand behind the queen. “I have sworn to Lord Æthelred, Uncle, as have many here who once were thegns to Edgar. You can sleep restfully to know that my queen and my lord Æthelred are well looked after. We would lay down our lives.”
Lives? He was still some months shy of his fourteenth birthday. “I am glad to hear you swear it, although if I think about it there is not one among you who is old enough to shave. Do not be stirred, I am teasing you. I know you are steadfast. As to your sword skills, well, you were taught by the best.” He grinned at Siferth, noting how the boy had broadened across the shoulders.
Alfreda gave a high-pitched laugh. “Come now, Lord Alvar, this is too much like fatherly pride; it is almost as if Siferth were your own son. And there is no need for such silly talk, for I will be safe enough with y...”
Her mood lurched again and the haunting shadows washed across her face. He wondered if her lighter tone reflected nothing other than a monumental effort to turn his attention back to her and away from Siferth.
She said, “My lord of Mercia, my dearest friend, will you bide here in Wessex with us for a while?”
He looked across at her. Her breathing was easier now, as was his. He shook his head. “My lady, whatever Siferth says, I cannot sleep restfully, and I am not a hound that lies down to have its belly scratched after a kicking.” Alvar bowed low and stalked off.
Dunstan was in the writing-house with Oswald and several scribes, whose hands were stained with vermilion ink. As Lord Alvar crashed into the room the scribes attempted to collect their parchment and leave. Oswald backed two steps nearer to the far wall, his gaze fixed upon Alvar’s sword arm.
Dunstan, though, looked at the intruder and smiled. He opened his mouth and heard his voice ringing out sweetly, lubricated by the hour he had spent this morning singing in the chapel, giving thanks that although his beloved Edgar had gone, at least Alvar’s power had been buried alongside him. “My lord, I know that you have some words for me, but I will speak first, as I fear that there might have been a small misunderstanding.”
“For which you have earned my undying hatred.” Alvar stepped so close to him that Dunstan had to shuffle backwards. “But by my leave, speak on.”
Dunstan swallowed. He bolstered his resolve with the memory that he’d initially crowned Edgar in similarly hurried circumstances, years before, and thus the precedent had been set. “I may be g-guilty of the sin of pride, but I have shown that you, as one man, are not England, nor do you speak for the whole land. There has been no brawling over the kingship, and we of the Church are free to go on with our work as before.” He held out a hand. “I know that Edward is not yet the king that he could be, but I can lead him, as can Bishop Sideman, who has been a good teacher to him all these years. No, my lord, I am glad of how things are, and if I must stand and take a tongue-lashing from you, I say it will have been worth my while.” He shut his mouth and kept his head erect, waiting for the verbal onslaught.
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