The Swan-Daughter (The Daughters of Hastings)

by Carol McGrath

  Gunnhild nodded. A grudging tone sneaked into her voice as she replied, ‘He is Alan’s son by a leman.’ She paused. ‘Alan loves the child well, as do I, but he is in Normandy with the King.’

  Brother Matthew raised his head from the prostrate little body about which he was gently feeling for a place, the correct place, to make a cut. ‘Count Alan is often away,’ he remarked.

  ‘They have been fighting King William’s son Robert who has brought the King of France against his own father,’ she added by way of explanation.

  ‘Evil times, my lady, when sons turn against their fathers.’ The leech-doctor crossed himself and laid out his knife and cup on a small oak table close by Dorgen’s cot.

  Gunnhild watched closely. ‘Can you save him?’ The doctor did not reply. Dorgen looked so damp and fragile, like a little bird caught in a snare, struggling for its life. She felt angry at a God who could allow this to happen, angry at herself that Dorgen was ill. She sank down by the side of his bed again and tried desperately to pray that he would recover.

  ‘I shall hold his arm,’ Ann said, always practical in a crisis. Gunnhild stopped praying and watched. As blood dripped into a cup, Dorgen became utterly still, as pale as the linen curtain that hung about his bed so that the livid spots seemed even more vicious. She leaned over him, sure that he was not breathing. His little soul was quivering as if on a cobweb about to float away, but still it clung to life. ‘Oh, Dorgen,’ she whispered, her voice choking. ‘If you die, know that I have loved you.’

  Alan would blame her care of him. She shuddered as she recollected how angry he could become if he thought that he was crossed by her. Moreover, they had not managed another child and recently he said the fault was not with him since he had had a son with another woman. She complained that he was never at Richmond so how could she fall pregnant. If there was fault the fault was his neglect of his family. He had raised his arm to strike her but thought better of it and strode off down to the bailey yard and his soldiers. She never repeated the accusation.

  It was Niall who managed things in the garrison when Alan was in Normandy and it was Niall who always spoke gently to her when Alan’s anger flared up. It was Niall who took her and the children riding, and who brought them small but beautiful gifts made of woven wool when he led a garrison up north into Northumbria. She knew that it would be Niall who would comfort her now.

  She looked around the chamber. Dorgen’s russet riding cloak hung on his clothing pole along with his breeches and small tunics. Sadly, she studied the chest which contained his stocking and linens. She counted the child-size shoes and boots neatly lined up below it, their dyed leather chosen especially for him and made carefully to fit his growing feet by the shoemaker from the village. There were two pairs of each.

  Brother Matthew wearily put away his instruments, lifted his cup and went out into the hall. Moments later he returned to say that he was needed in the bailey. Amelia had returned with the bad news. He had to see a family with the contagion. They were in a bailey cottage, a groom’s children.

  ‘Oh no, not them too,’ Gunnhild whispered. ‘They were all playing together.’

  The leech-doctor shrugged. ‘It is God’s will, my lady. Try to get Dorgen to sup a little wine. I shall return soon.’

  The candle clock slowly burned down through the marked hours. Ann sat beside her, praying over Dorgen as they waited for the doctor to return. They kept the child’s lips moist but he would not swallow. He was fading.

  Brother Matthew returned before Compline with Father Christopher, the castle priest. There was nothing more he could do for the family in the bailey cottage. They were all dead already.

  ‘All of them?’ she asked.

  The priest nodded. ‘All excepting the father. He never caught it.’ Gunnhild looked down on Dorgen. Her lips moved in prayer. Her eyes filled with tears. The priest knelt by the child’s bedside and prayed beside her.

  The castle was still. The wind seemed to have dropped. Gunnhild could hear the distant dragging of benches over the hall’s floor. Just after dawn Niall came to them and reported that many of the servants were in the chapel praying for Dorgen’s recovery. The priest said in a soft voice, ‘I fear it is too late for prayer. They must now pray for God’s care of his soul. Our father in Heaven has claimed him.’ Gunnhild’s agonised wail echoed around the castle. Niall held her close and whispered, ‘Gunnhild. It was God’s will.’ She wept great tears of anguish into his surcoat.

  * * *

  Gunnhild sickened the following day. She was too unwell to attend Dorgen’s burial. Brother Matthew, the same leech-doctor, tended her with great diligence and kindness. She heard him say quietly, ‘Shall I bleed her?’

  Niall’s stronger voice was saying, ‘No, you must not. Let us wait and see.’ She fell into a sleep and for several days was mostly insensible.

  Ann nursed her because the doctor was needed in the bailey. After two nights her fever abated but she was still covered from the crown of her head to her toe nails with an itchy, vivid rash. Ann bathed her skin with juice of blackthorn and persuaded her to sip drinks containing dill to ease her into sleep.

  As the hour clock burned down and day after day was replaced with a new candle, Gunnhild slept as if trapped within an enchantment. The wider life of the castle continued. Five days later, she woke up feeling a sense of peace and she knew that since she was not in Heaven already or in Purgatory she would recover. Ann told her that there had been other deaths. ‘But, my lady, thanks to your precautions all of your ladies have escaped. And Maud is safe.’

  As April passed the castle recovered but a deep lethargy seized Gunnhild and she refused to move out of her bed. Ann tried potion after potion to build up her strength.

  ‘I am at peace here. Leave me alone.’ She turned her head away, finally turning back to Ann who possessed great patience with her. ‘What is it this time? Must I drink it?’ she muttered from her pillow.

  ‘Cuckoo-sorrel amongst other things, my lady. In any case, you are well. Time to be up. This is foolish.’

  Gunnhild turned away again. ‘I cannot. I can’t face anyone.’

  ‘You did not fail Dorgen.’ Ann stroked Gunnhild’s forehead. ‘God called him.’

  ‘God spared me, and he was just a child.’

  ‘You have another child. She has been asking for her mother for weeks.’

  Gunnhild studied Ann’s face for a brief moment and burst into tears.

  Ann wiped them away with a piece of soft linen. ‘My lady, you cannot change what has been. It is harsh and it is sad and we all miss Dorgen but it is God’s will. Sit in the sun at the window. It will raise your spirits.’

  Gunnhild shook her head and fell back into a deep dreamless sleep.

  Ann brought her more possets with snippets of news concerning Maud. Occasionally she smiled. A week later, she decided to rise. Slowly easing her legs from out of the covers she sat on the edge of the bed. ‘You are right, Ann. Maud needs me.’ Shakily she stood up. Her legs were surprisingly more solid than she had realised. She looked up at Ann. ‘Does his father know?’

  ‘Lord Niall has sent to him and he told him of your illness. I think it is time you wrote to Count Alan yourself. He will want to know of your recovery.’

  ‘Did he send a message back to Niall?’

  Ann shook her head. ‘Not yet, but it has been less than a month since the messengers rode out.’

  ‘I see.’ And Gunnhild did see. She saw that Alan must not care. If he had he would have written.

  Her green silk gown caught her eye as it hung from her clothing pole. She had everything she had wished for, almost; she had all the gowns she desired, a castle, servants, a lovely child – though Dorgen would haunt her thoughts for many a year and she would never forget him – but she knew deep in her heart now that she lacked a husband’s love, nor would Alan grant her forgiveness.

  Dorgen’s death would lie between them. She could never forgive herself that she had not taken bette
r care of Alan’s only son.

  Part Two

  Richmond 1082-1089

  St. Cecilia

  St Cecilia (picture from Wikipedia)

  16

  June 1082

  Five-year-old Maud was watching her mother in the castle laundry.

  ‘Are you ready, Maud?’ Her little girl nodded and took her place at the long bench.

  In the three years that had passed since Dorgen’s death, Gunnhild had watched over Maud like a she-wolf guarding her brood except that there was only Maud. She never conceived again. Gunnhild lifted the glass smoother out of the steam. Handling it with a wrapping cloth, she watched Maud lift up her own smoother. This was a flat round glass stone that was a miniature of her mother’s smoother but not heated. ‘Maud, remember that you must never touch mine. It is too heavy and it is hot,’ she said, pointing to her own.

  ‘I know. It is hot. Mama, you say the same thing every time we come here.’ She began thumping her tiny glass iron on her poupée’s little cloak.

  ‘And you are not to come here on your own, do you hear,’ Gunnhild added as she pressed her gown, protecting it with a linen cloth. She moved the smoother carefully from bodice to sleeves, half listening to Maud with a smile on her lips. Maud was muttering to her doll in a language of her own.

  Gunnhild pressed the glass iron down onto the stiff green silk, taking great pleasure in looking at Aunt Edith’s beautiful overgown once again. The overgown had remained in her coffer for three years, wrapped in linen amongst bags filled with fennel seeds. With the death of that little boy she could not bring herself to wear it. Dorgen had loved the dress, but tonight, she decided, she must lay the past to rest. She would wear Aunt Edith’s gown for St John’s feast and let go her sorrow for the loss of Dorgen’s short life.

  The maids bustled about carrying baskets of trestle napery from laundry to keep. The hall had been thoroughly swept and fresh strewing rushes sprinkled with camomile laid down in complicated patterns on the floor. The cooks would be busy making pastry coffins all morning and already a hog was roasting on a spit and small birds plucked for at least one of the many dishes they would eat later.

  She had almost finished pressing the dress when from outside, beyond the courtyard, came the sound of chains rattling and clanking as the castle portcullis was raised. Moments later a single set of hoofs clattered over the cobbles. With a thundering noise, more riders followed. Gunnhild laid down her smoother and raced to the entrance, Maud trailing behind her. If Alan’s retinue was returning from the borders she must drop everything at once and see to his needs. That way her peace would not be disturbed, her sense of harmony unpolluted and her ability to co-exist with him would continue.

  Alan had not blamed her for Dorgen’s death but he had blamed her for not conceiving another child during the two years that had followed his return from Normandy. He rarely lay with her now and she suspected, yet again, that he had found comfort elsewhere. Any excuse and he was clattering with his men down the Great North Road to London, to inspect his estates in the south, or off to fight for Normandy with King William and into Brittany to see to his trading vessels. He was away so frequently she wondered that she ever saw him at all.

  When Alan was home at Richmond, to her surprise, he had taken an interest in Maud, saying that she was growing into an intelligent and pretty girl. Maud, in turn, admired her warrior father, loving to sit before him on his stallion, reaching up for his pommel and riding with him through the town below the castle and into the hamlets that had grown up along the River Swale.

  Gunnhild stopped to catch her breath. She need not have hurried because, this time, it was not Alan who was climbing down from a stallion. It was Niall. He, too, had been patrolling the borders between Northumbria and Scotland. Her heart flipped over. It was always a pleasure to be looking up into Niall’s dark eyes and to see them smiling back at her. There seemed to be an understanding between them, though neither had yet spoken because, she realised, neither of them dared. They did not step across that invisible and forbidden line. Yet he had never remarried and more than once she wondered what prevented him from doing so.

  ‘Where is Alan?’ she asked, feeling herself smile as Niall walked his horse forward to greet her.

  He bent down from the saddle, lifted her hand to his lips and whispered so low no one else could hear his words, ‘Ah, if only it was me you come running to, to welcome home.’ He shook his dark head. ‘Gunnhild, you look as fair as the swans on the river, and, well, a never more welcome sight too after a hard campaign, have I ever met. You are truly the loveliest of countesses. I shall rename you, swan-daughter!’

  ‘A swan-daughter?’ she repeated, remarking the playful tone in his softly accented voice. ‘Ah, you mean my mother and her long swan-neck. Did you ever see her on your travels?’

  ‘Only from afar. Would you like to see her again?’

  ‘Yes,’ Gunnhild said without hesitation. ‘But as you well know all members of my family are destined to be kept apart from each other, in case we foment rebellion.’ She sighed. ‘Perhaps one day I can visit Canterbury.’

  ‘Forgive me, my lady, I should not have spoken of her.’ He slid down off his horse with concern in his eyes. Her heart contracted at his care for her feelings. He touched her arm and said in a cheerful tone. ‘Count Alan rode on to Edinburgh with Prince Robert to broker peace with the Scots. He sends his greetings.’ Niall glanced up at the castle keep, then back at Gunnhild. ‘And he says, “Niall, tell my lady Countess I am sorry that I cannot preside over my own board at St John’s feast.” ’ His black eyes were now dancing with mischief. ‘ “You must do so in my stead.” ’

  He lied of course. Alan had said no such thing. He would never show concern that he could not attend a feast with her at Richmond. He owned many estates throughout England, other places he could visit, some of which had once belonged to her own family, rich lands and manors that were fast accumulating great wealth.

  Niall cleared his throat and continued, ‘He has asked me to act as his proxy and sit beside you in the great chair.’ He waited, his dark eyes still dancing. Gunnhild felt colour rush into her cheeks.

  She glanced about the yard and, noticing dairy maids and approaching grooms close by, she replied loudly for all in the courtyard to hear. ‘If my lord asks you to preside over the feast in his stead then so be it.’ Surveying the dismounting riders accompanying him, she added, ‘Take your men into the small hall and I will have Ann send them dinner from the kitchens.’ With a smile playing about her lips, she returned to Maud who stood by the laundry door listening with wide, watching eyes. What does she see, thought Gunnhild? There is nothing to see, nothing between me and him.

  ‘Maud, I have tasks to finish,’ she said gently to her watchful child. ‘Go and play with Ann’s little girls.’

  Maud groaned, ‘Ailsa is foolish and Maggie is a baby.’

  ‘You were three years old once. Now run along and share your dolls with Ailsa.’

  Maud studied the poupée cradled in her arm. ‘Maybe the others, but not Catriona.’

  ‘As you wish.’ Gunnhild knew that the doll was special. It had been carved in Paris, a name-day gift from Alan, and no one was allowed to touch this poupée with its golden hair and its blue gown. She finished pressing the overgown and held it up, pleased to look on it again. This gown belonged to her. It was a part of her heritage, not bought for her as others had been. She would be glad to wear it once more.

  Its pearls glowed in the dim light, and fingering them Gunnhild became possessed by thoughts of the feast ahead. It had to mean something. The dress was magical and if she wore it tonight she would feel its power again. She was to preside over the feast with Alan’s brother, she reminded herself, and on this night for the first time in many years she would wear Aunt Edith’s dress and the Godwin embroidered slippers. Take care, Gunnhild, she whispered to herself. Do not give away your heart. Do not risk everything for velvet eyes and a gentle voice.

  17<
br />
  St John’s Eve 1082

  Already the spell has set its well-known stamp on my heart. O winged loves, how is it that you are able to fly to us, but have no strength to fly away?

  The Greek Anthology , Meleager, 6th century, edited by D.L. Page, 2008

  The mid-summer’s evening threw long shadows on the courtyard and over the garden below Gunnhild’s bedchamber. She peered out of the window embrasure, pulled her head back, wrinkled her nose and sneezed loudly. Smoke was drifting into the bailey and towards the keep from the fields where villagers had already lit bonfires. The village children had collected bones and other rubbish to burn on an enormous fire in the fallow field to purify the air. It was a popular tradition and a yearly event at Castle Richmond, one Alan frowned upon but was powerless to forbid because, just as with Beltane night in Brittany, this tradition stretched far into the depths of past time. Here in the north of England, St John’s Eve marked the summer solstice, the night that witches could meet and dragons would poison wells. Gunnhild felt its power. Anything could happen, anything on this night when some people thought the membrane between worlds was thinnest.

  Smoke flew through the half-opened shutters as if the witches and dragons were racing into instead of away from the castle. Coughing, she shut them on the unpleasantness. A long spell of hot dry weather had annoyed her throat more this year than ever before. She hoped that the breeze would drop and the ashy drift from the fires would settle before they visited the fields after the feasting to join in with the dancing.

  By early afternoon Maud was so excited she could hardly stand still. Gunnhild and her women clothed her in a dress similar to that worn by her poupée, Catriona. It was embroidered at the neck and edged along the flowing sleeves with green leaves and with white and purple daisies. Maud danced about the chamber in a little blue mantle.