The Chosen Queen

by Joanna Courtney

  ‘Ut! Ut! Ut!’

  The women flew from the city, streaming out across the plain towards the marching troops and there, at their head, banner high and smile as broad as the moon itself, was the king.

  ‘Harold!’ Now Edyth was running too, tripping over her royal robes in a headlong rush towards him. ‘Harold – you did it!’

  She lifted her arms and he reached down and swung her onto his horse in front of him. She felt him quiver with the effort and saw, up close, how spent he was, but he was whole and he was victorious.

  ‘You did it,’ she said again, twisting in the saddle to look into his eyes.

  ‘Did you ever think otherwise?’

  ‘No! No, of course not.’

  ‘Liar.’

  ‘Did you?’

  ‘Many times but I ignored it.’

  Edyth thought of Edwin’s words ‘a man can only ride into battle certain of victory’; it seemed he had spoken true.

  ‘My brothers?’ she gasped out.

  ‘They are bringing up the rear but they are well, Edie. They fought fiercely despite their injuries. You should be proud of them.’

  ‘I am proud of you all. Is it over?’

  ‘For now it is. Hardrada is dead.’

  ‘You killed him?’

  ‘No. Garth had that honour – he fought like twenty men.’

  ‘And Torr?’

  Harold’s face clouded.

  ‘He is dead too. I tried to save him, Edyth. Twice I offered him terms – before the battle and again when Hardrada was struck down – but he refused. We had no choice.’

  ‘No choice,’ she confirmed, running her hands up around his neck. ‘You have done well, Harold. It is a great victory for England – one of the greatest ever.’

  ‘It is, though at great cost too. Many noble men lost their lives today.’

  ‘Then we must honour them tonight.’

  They were at the city gates now and all those who had stood a silent guard over the troops that morning cheered them inside. Householders offered bread, ale, even precious meat to the soldiers and York erupted in celebration. Edyth fetched Ewan, Morgan and Nesta to her, covering them in kisses as the bells of the cathedral pealed out across the furthest reaches of the great north moors. Harold praised the boys’ bravery and together the royal family led the way to the great hall. Barrels were opened and the people of the north were drunk at the very first sip – drunk on victory, drunk on joy, drunk, above all, on relief.

  Stories flew around.

  ‘We caught them lying like cats in the sunshine.’

  ‘They wore no armour – insolent bastards.’

  ‘And came with only half their force.’

  ‘The rest came later but from too far and at too great a pace. They were sword-fodder from the start.’

  After a while Edyth felt herself almost as sickened by it as she had been walking through the destruction at Fulford just a few short days ago and she clung to Harold. The details of the battle were as hideous as the last but at least this time the pain had a reward. England was safe from the invaders who had tried – and failed – to rip her apart. Whatever the horror, it was a blissful feeling.

  Three days later messengers came: Duke William had landed.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  Ware, 5 October 1066

  ‘Harold, Sire – the men are weary. We cannot go on tonight.’

  Edyth thought she would weep with relief at Garth’s words. They’d been travelling for five days solid and even on horseback she was weary to her bones. Heart still aching from the pain of nearly losing her dear boys to Hardrada, she had sent them and little Nesta to the relative safety of Godiva and Meghan at Coventry whilst she rode south with her king, but parting with them had been hard. She could see now why Svana kept her own boys in Nazeing even though Godwin, at least, was old enough to fight. It sometimes felt as if the world were too dangerous a place into which to release anyone you held dear, especially this year.

  She prayed her dear children would be safe with her mother, but she carried another to fret for now. She felt permanently sick and longed for respite but she had not told Harold why she was suffering for fear of him leaving her in some backwater abbey. A night’s rest would be most welcome and, seeing him look longingly to the far-off beacons at the edges of Westminster, she stepped up to his side.

  ‘We can go on at first light, Harold. It makes little difference where we sleep.’

  He nodded reluctantly and gestured to Garth. The command rippled back down the long line of soldiers and the men parted, barely making the shelter of the woodland before hitting the ground and curling into it as if it were the softest down. As on so many occasions these last few days, Edyth was moved by their stoicism and their persistent cheer as they trod the long, long road to another battle.

  ‘We will be in Westminster tomorrow,’ she said to Harold, ‘and you can muster your forces against the duke.’

  ‘I am impatient to do so, Edyth,’ he admitted. ‘I want the bastard off our land before he poisons it with his evil ambitions. He has not the soul to rule England. He knows little of government or law; little of economics beyond collecting for weapons; little of art or music or poetry. He does not even own a hawk. He is a barbarian who covets only land and titles and he cannot be allowed to take our throne. We must drive him away.’

  Those were words she suspected he said to himself over and over – a rite as strong and vital as the Lord’s Prayer, but far less sustaining. His eyes were ever fixed on the horizon these days, his fingers ever tensed on his sword. He slept little and ate only for show. It seemed terrible to Edyth that his victory over Hardrada, the scourge of all Europe, had been so swiftly sucked into the fear of this hideous march. Had any man ever fought two such foes so close in time, and yet so far in distance? And if they had – had they won?

  Doubt gnawed constantly at her but she feared it was eating Harold alive. So many times, she’d watched him striding between his men, praising them, reassuring them, tending to them, but who did the same for him? She’d tried, God knows she’d tried, but she had not the peace in her soul to soothe his. Only one person could offer that.

  ‘Edyth is a marvel, Garth,’ she’d overheard Harold tell his brother last night as they’d chatted beyond the tent where she was supposed to be sleeping. ‘I am blessed to have her as my queen.’

  ‘I hope you’ve told her that.’

  ‘Many times – though she will never believe it.’

  ‘Because of . . .’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Do you miss her – Svana?’

  The name had driven into Edyth like a sword-point and she’d craned forward to hear the answer but there had been only a long silence before Harold had said: ‘I must to bed.’

  Edyth had heard the ashes being kicked out and forced herself to lie down and feign sleep but the missing answer had haunted her and now, as she looked out on the little town of Ware, so familiar to her from trips into East Anglia, she knew what she had to do.

  ‘We are close, Harold.’

  ‘To London, maybe, but Hastings is a long way yet.’

  ‘Nay, Harold, not to London.’

  He looked at her strangely and she turned her eyes east, up the road to nearby Nazeing. His whole body seemed to quake but he said nothing and Edyth touched a hand to his chest.

  ‘You should go. Now. The men sleep – they will not miss you.’

  ‘It wouldn’t be fair, Edyth.’

  ‘No, Harold.’ On this Edyth felt very certain. ‘It hasn’t been fair for a long time but tonight maybe we can shift the balance.’

  He placed a hand softly over her arm.

  ‘You would have me go?’

  ‘No!’ her heart screamed. ‘No, I would have you lose yourself in me and find the strength you need there,’ but that was not fair. Svana had sent Harold into her care when the times demanded it and now she must do the same.

  ‘I would have you go. Now. Take care and give her . . . No ma
tter.’

  ‘But you . . .’

  ‘I will be quite well.’

  His protests were token and there was a new light in his eyes that he could not hide. Edyth gave him a little shove and turned away and when she dared to look back, he was gone. She thought of Svana ducking his touch in the Trimilchi dawn and prayed she had not made a terrible mistake, but deep down she knew that at Nazeing it would be different. Svana would welcome the man she had handfasted beneath God’s open skies and for one night Harold would be able to stand barefoot again. The bruise in her own foolish heart was as nothing to the salve that would offer him.

  ‘We need to strike now!’

  Harold pumped his clenched fist into his palm and glared round at the assembled council. Edyth watched him from beneath her crown. He was afire with energy and purpose, the Stamford Bridge victor again, not the weary leader he’d become on the march south. Perhaps it was being back in Westminster that had invigorated him, or perhaps it was scenting William, or perhaps – most likely of all – it was his night with Svana. He’d returned at dawn but had not joined Edyth in bed and she had kept her own distance, fearful she might catch the soft meadow scent of her old friend on his flesh.

  ‘You are well?’ she’d managed.

  ‘I am well.’

  ‘That is good.’

  ‘And you, Edyth? Did you sleep?’

  ‘Yes.’

  They had both known it was a lie.

  ‘She sends you her blessing.’

  ‘She is too good, Harold.’

  ‘And we must keep her that way. She knows you are as much a pawn in this crazy game as she, Edie. It is I who am at fault, yet she does not blame me either.’

  ‘She loves you.’

  ‘For all that has cost her.’

  ‘It is better, surely, to know love whatever it costs?’

  She had to believe that, not just for Harold but for herself. She’d longed to ask him more about his night, longed to know what they’d said to each other, done to each other, but known too that she must not. Even at Trimilchi Svana had been more a ghost than solid flesh and now it was almost as if Harold had crossed, for the space of a night, to the other side. If he had, though, he’d returned more alive than ever and Edyth was both grateful and shamefully heartsick.

  ‘You’re here now,’ she reminded herself, glancing around Westminster Palace, but it felt like small consolation for Harold was very much the king again.

  ‘Surely, Sire,’ the Bishop of London was saying, ‘we are better to wait until we can gather a greater fyrd? William does not seem to be moving from the coast.’

  ‘No, but he is ravaging the lands all around – my lands; my people. And he might move at any time. One night he might mobilise the whole damned lot of them and suddenly we’ll be on the back foot. He’s a cunning bastard. I know. We need a battleground of our choosing and to gain that we must reach it first. We wait only for the troops from the west and the east and then we march. We can meet with the southern bands on our way through.’

  ‘But Sire,’ the bishop protested, ‘the men from the north . . .’

  ‘Are here already. They came with me.’

  ‘And brave they are to do so, but there are only a thousand of them. Mercia and Northumbria are meant to provide five thousand.’

  ‘Yes, and the rest lie dead below Viking swords, giving their life to destroy the greatest commander Europe has ever known so that you can sit safe in Westminster.’ The bishop cowered and Harold moved closer. ‘Despite their great losses, the earls Edwin and Morcar are marching with reinforcements, may the Lord bless them. In the meantime, however, we must look to our own men to fight. I hope your armour is well oiled, my lord.’

  ‘I have no armour, Sire, save the grace of God.’

  Harold snorted.

  ‘Does that deflect a Norman blade?’

  ‘I trust so.’

  ‘Then you are a fool, Bishop. God’s altar is for shining out his glory, not for hiding behind. You are concerned about the number of soldiers I take into the field, so arm yourself – all of you. We march in four days’ time.’

  ‘But Sire—’

  ‘Do you not have better things to do than chatter with me? You’ll find armourers in Steel Street but hurry, they’ll be busy.’

  The gathering broke up and the clerics scuttled from the hall, heads bobbing indignantly.

  ‘Was that fair, Harold?’ Garth asked.

  ‘Of course it was. We’re going to need everyone we can to defeat William. Have we heard from the north?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘But they will come,’ Edyth said, keen to speak up for her brothers.

  Harold had left Edwin and Morcar in the north to muster more men. They had promised to follow their king south as soon as they had sufficient troops but as Edyth and Harold well knew it was a long and slow road.

  ‘We must keep pressing forward,’ Harold insisted now. ‘We have defeated Hardrada and we will defeat William. Let them see that this island is not to be conquered.’

  His spirit was infectious and it spread rapidly around the troops that filed endlessly into Westminster over the next three days. The Chelsea meadowlands on which they had so carelessly danced in May now burst with armed men, and the whole of London, it seemed, was an army camp. Soldiers huddled on every street corner or, if they dared, in every tavern. All were hot for Norman blood and the place was alive with eager swords, too eager sometimes, especially of an evening.

  Harold spent all his time patrolling and Edyth was unable to find enough time alone with him to even tell him of the gift she was now certain she was carrying. On the morning they were due to ride out, she went with him through the makeshift camp. There was a smell of mingled mud and sweat, of leather and wool and rough stews. Everywhere holes in the trees told of sword and arrow practice but now the fires crackled gently and the men murmured to each other and Edyth caught snippets of wives and children, homes and villages, called up in words.

  ‘Oh, she’s a beggar about boots on the bed,’ she heard one man say fondly.

  ‘Mine too. Gives me a right tongue-lashing if I’ve not scraped ’em off.’

  The second man sighed as if this were the greatest pleasure of his life and rubbed carefully at the rough leather jerkin that would be his only protection in battle. All around, men sharpened their weapons as carefully as they did their memories and the air rang with the scrape of stone on steel, honing blade edges and hammering dints out of shields. Sparks flew and men cursed and Edyth threaded between them, watching Harold talking tirelessly to the nervous battalions. All faces turned up to his and all men listened intently, as to an oracle.

  ‘Has he spoken like this with everyone?’ Edyth whispered to Garth.

  ‘Just about and he’s not yet finished. I think he is waiting for someone to complain or to protest about his right to lead them but no one has.’

  ‘Or will. They love him, Garth.’

  ‘As they should. Never, I swear, has a king given so much of himself for his country.’

  Edyth nodded and went to his side.

  ‘Must you ride out tomorrow, Harold?’ she begged. ‘Can you not wait for my brothers to come?’

  ‘I dare not, Edyth. Every day William’s hold on the south coast gets stronger.’

  ‘He has no hold on the coast, I swear it. His only true hold is over you.’

  He winced and looked around his men as they lined up for the heavy march south.

  ‘You think so? You think this battle is all for me?’

  ‘No! This battle is all for England but it is exacting a heavy price on you. You have done so well, Harold.’

  It sounded hollow, wrong, like something you would tell a child, not the King of England, and she was not surprised when he pulled away. He paced a few yards then suddenly spun back, his face pinched.

  ‘I cannot pray, Edyth. I have tried but I cannot feel God any more.’

  Edyth grabbed his hands.

  ‘God blesses
you, Harold, truly he does. He must or you would not have defeated Hardrada.’

  ‘Hardrada had no right to England. William though . . .’

  ‘William is nothing. You were promised the throne on Edward’s deathbed, Harold, a promise sanctified by God, so do not doubt it now. You have told me many times that Duke William can never be allowed to rule England and you must hold fast to that.’

  ‘You speak true.’ Harold clasped her to him. ‘God, Edyth, I could never have come this far without you – you do know that?’

  ‘Nay, Harold, I am but a substitute.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Fret not. I am a willing one, too willing perhaps.’

  ‘You are no substitute, Edyth. It is not that simple. It may look that way to others but we – you, me, Svana – we know. Tell me we know?’

  Edyth thought back through the years, through the tumble of events and emotions that had carried them, somehow, from that innocent day when Harold brought her, ripped and scared, into Svana’s pavilion through to here. They had been buffeted, all of them, by the tide of England’s greedy needs. They had been thrown tight together and pulled too far apart but maybe Harold was right – through it all, in whatever strange patterns they had formed, they had been stronger for having each other.

  ‘We know, Harold,’ she said.

  She glanced around. Harold’s housecarls were taking their places around him ready to lead the men south and the commanders were mustering their battalions into marching order behind them. Time was running out. She drew in a deep breath.

  ‘I have something to tell you.’

  Harold pulled back.

  ‘You are not riding to battle, Edyth.’

  ‘No. No, not that. I, I am with child.’

  ‘You are?’ He looked down at her, eyes bright with joy. ‘That’s wonderful.’

  Her heart sang at his simple response and only now did she see how much she had feared it.

  ‘It should be born next Eastertime.’

  ‘Easter, when Christ was born again. It is a sign, Edyth. Nay, more than that, it is an heir – an heir for England!’

  ‘It is.’

  She laughed as he lifted her into his arms and for a moment it felt as if the whole of Westminster looked up at the sound and smiled.