The Chosen Queen (32 page)

‘With me being so unwell, you mean. Everyone is waiting for me to die, Harold.’

‘Everyone is wishing you health, Sire. The longer you reign, the stronger England will be.’

‘You speak well.’

‘I speak true.’

‘They are right though, Harold.’ The king gripped his arm suddenly. ‘I am not long for this world and in truth, I am ready to depart it. ’Tis only my fears for what I
leave behind – or do
not
leave behind – that keep my feet tethered to this rough earth. You will take care of England, Harold, when I am gone?’

Harold looked nervously around. Servants were setting benches below them and showing the jury – twelve thegns rushed in from the local area – to their seats as the rebels moved
closer to the gates. This was hardly the time for such a weighty conversation.

‘Sire,’ he pleaded, ‘I have sworn too much on that already.’

‘Duke William?’ Edward waved this away like a dust mote and drew Harold further back on the dais. ‘I absolve you of that false vow. You know as well as I that a king’s
final words are absolute. The heir I name in my passing is the heir God honours and where God leads, the people must follow.’

Harold glanced over at the great mass of rebels and his heart quailed.

‘Sire, you are kind, truly, but I do not know how to rule.’

Edward just patted his arm, as if he had stated little more than apprehension at a new sword trick or the height of a horse’s jump.

‘You
do
know, Harold. Every part of you knows and always has. Now you just need to believe. That starts today. I wish you to lead this trial.’

Harold stared at him in horror.

‘Sire, I cannot do that. The rebels seek your justice as God’s representative on this earth.’

‘And I will give it, Harold, through
my
representative on this earth – you.’ He moved back to the throne suddenly and lifted the royal sceptre into his hand. It was
heavy and they both watched it wobble in his frail grip. ‘See, I am too weak to hold England.’

‘Nay, Sire . . .’

‘I am too weak, Harold. It is your turn now.’

He thrust the sceptre towards him and it shook so much Harold feared it would drop to the ground and shatter, but still he could not bear to take it.

‘The rebels will not stand down, Sire,’ he protested desperately. ‘I fear we will lose my brother over this.’

‘I fear, Harold, that we lost him some time ago. Now, please, take the sceptre for me as your king and, maybe more so, as your friend.’ Gently he reached out his other hand and took
Harold’s, pressing it firmly onto the sceptre. ‘I fought all my young life to rule England. It meant everything to me and I thank God every day that he granted me the honour of this
great throne. It has not been the same for you, I know, but God calls us in different ways, Harold, and we must respond.’

Harold drew in a breath. To his left he could see Torr coming out of his bower in his richest clothes and heading their way in sharp, angry strides. To his right the great rebel army was moving
through the compound gates, their collective footfall shaking the ground with giant determination. Dead ahead of him his king was waiting. He had no choice.

‘As you wish, Sire.’

‘As England wishes, Harold.’

‘Look, our lords of Mercia approach.’ Edward let go of the sceptre to point but Harold, feeling the weight of it in his hands, could not tear his eyes from its all-too-dazzling
promise. ‘Our lady too, if I am not much mistaken.’

At that Harold looked up and, following the king’s wavering finger, saw Edyth walking towards them, flanked by her brothers. She was pale but she stood tall, holding her beautiful crown of
Wales beneath her arm, and her eyes, when they met his, were steady. Harold could see no treachery in them, just calm, quiet support. And yet was she not here with enemy troops to force her brother
into an earldom? Confused, he made himself step down from the dais and hold his arms wide, willing the sceptre not to shake.

‘My lords, my lady – welcome.’

They all bowed. Harold was aware of everyone’s eyes on the rod of justice but it took his own brother, stood to one side, to ask the question: ‘What the hell are you doing with that,
Harold?’

Harold turned to him.

‘The king,
Earl
Torr, has asked me to wield it for him in this trial as he is still weak.’

Above them Edward bowed assent and sank onto his throne.

‘We welcome your judgement, Earl Harold,’ Morcar said, ‘and ask leave to present our evidence regarding the rule of Northumbria.’

‘Granted,’ Harold agreed and waved the myriad rebel leaders to the benches opposite the jury as their troops gathered in row after orderly row behind them. ‘Earl Torr . .
.’

He pointed to a chair set before the great crowd and saw his brother pale. For the first time in as long as he could remember, Torr looked frightened.

‘Harold, for the love of God . . .’ he started but it was too late for appeals, too late for anything personal between them. They were on England’s stage now and must obey
England’s rules.

Harold took his own seat and the rebels stepped up with a list of grievances, carefully read from an elegant vellum by a composed young lord, Osric of Northallerton. The evidence was
overwhelming. List after list of unattended problems, unfair judgements, tax frauds, abuse of the royal mints, and blatant favouritism were poured out into the soft autumn morning as the rebels
paced before Torr’s luxurious southern hunting lodge.

Lord Osric spoke eloquently and intelligently, a strong and passionate appeal for justice from a ruling elite. The jury listened intently but Harold could see from the way they looked at Torr
that they were disgusted by him. It made him nervous. He was disgusted too but Torr was his brother; they had scrapped since they were little boys. What they were facing here was much more
dangerous, for on this judgement rested the future of the whole kingdom.

‘We present this evidence to the jury, to the king and to Earl Harold,’ Osric eventually concluded, ‘and ask for justice for the people of Northumbria who wish only to be ruled
fairly and with due regard for their own interests and those of their country.’

Harold rose.

‘Does anyone stand in defence of Earl Torr?’ he asked.

Torr leaped to his feet.

‘I do,’ he spat. ‘These people know nothing of the business of government and nothing of its costs.’

‘Nay,’ someone called from the back, ‘we can see its costs right here.’

A bitter laugh rippled through the troops as all eyes roved around Torr’s extravagant lodge.

‘How dare you?! I am your earl. Do you expect me to live as you do, with your children in your bed and your animals at your feet and your . . .’

A great rumble ran around the crowd and instinctively Harold lifted his rod.

‘Earl Torr, you will show respect for these people and for this court.’

‘Why? They have shown none for me. I have done all I can to control their unruly land and this is how they repay me? It is spite.’

‘It is,’ Morcar agreed quietly, ‘but it is you who spite us – and it must stop.’

Torr went for his sword and, without thinking, Harold leaped to face him, his only defence the jewelled sceptre of the realm. The crowd gasped and pressed forward as the two brothers stood up to
each other.

‘You would do this to me?’ Torr hissed.

‘You have done it to yourself, Torr.’

‘You could stop it – you have the sceptre, brother dear, you have the power.’

‘This is England, Torr; it is not a dictatorship. Our people have the right to speak and today they have spoken. An earldom is not a toy to play with but a child to care for, and it is all
too clear that you have cared little for yours. Jury?’

He glanced across to the head of the jury, an elderly man, his back hunched but his eyes bright with understanding as he took in the rising tension around the arena. He shuffled forward and said
in a loud voice: ‘We find Earl Tostig guilty of failing to rule Northumbria in a just and fair manner.’

Harold knew what he had to do now but he felt as if he were screaming within. He could feel the sceptre pressing against Torr’s sword with all the expectation of the crowd behind it but he
could not form the words to condemn his brother to exile. What sort of a man did that?

He looked wildly round. He saw the king’s ice-blue eyes boring expectantly into him, young Morcar’s looking trustingly his way, and the troops, brows drawn, waiting. Then he saw
Edyth, stood as firm and as sparkling as the damned sceptre. There was no doubt in her at all. Why? He had told her in Bosham that he needed unity, so why was she bringing him division?

He looked around the arena, confused, and suddenly saw that there
was
unity here, unity against Torr. Without him England would be stronger and she had seen that first. She might be
standing opposite him but she was very much on his side and the strength of that crept through his spine, stiffening it. It was a rich, warm, energising feeling – it was, he realised,
belief.

‘Earl Torr, much as it pains me, as your brother, to do so, I must bow to the wishes of the people and the might of the great English justice system and pronounce you, for your own crimes,
an exile of this land. You will surrender the earldom of Northumbria and you will depart from these shores with your family within five days. After that time, if you are caught in England your life
will be forfeit. Do you understand?’

‘Harold, no! You cannot do this to me. You cannot—’

‘Do you understand?’

For a moment Torr increased the pressure of his sword against the sceptre but as the myriad nobles around him leaned forward he lost his nerve. Springing back, he lowered the weapon but his eyes
stayed fixed on Harold.

‘Oh, I understand, brother. I know treachery when I see it. Father would hate the man you have become.’

‘Father would do the same.’

‘You may think that, if you wish, but we both know otherwise. Family should stand together and you know it. You will pay for this, Harold Godwinson. God will make you pay for this and,
believe me, so will I.’

In a flash of scarlet cloak, he flounced from the arena. Cheers erupted and men flung their hats in the air in celebration but all Harold could see was his father’s face looking down on
him. ‘
It is Torr that has done wrong
,’ he told himself, ‘
Torr who has tarnished the family name
,’ but even amongst the mass of men baying for his
brother’s exile it was hard to believe.

‘You did right,’ said a quiet voice at his side and he turned to see Edyth.

She put out a hand and he clutched at it.

‘What is right?’ he asked.

She had no answer but her fingers in his kept him upright and for now that seemed enough.

‘
I
have brought you the north, Harold,’ Edyth said softly. ‘As I promised.’

‘So it seems,’ he agreed, drawing her away from the carousing rebels, before suddenly spinning round to trap her against an oak. ‘I thought you were against me,
Edie.’

‘Against you? Never.’

‘You led the Welsh against me.’

‘A handful, no more, to ensure the correct result for us all.’

She forced herself to smile up at him. She did not want him to know that her Welsh troops had been bought with Billingsley, the town he had once gifted her. It had felt a sore price when she had
negotiated it with Prince Bleddyn but it had been worth it.

‘England will be secure,’ she said now.

‘With your brothers holding the north for me?’

‘Exactly. They are true servants, Harold.’

‘I doubt it not, Edyth, but the south will be uneasy with your family holding the balance of power.’

Edyth laughed.

‘Hardly, Harold. Wessex is by far the most powerful earldom and your brothers hold all the riches of Kent and East Anglia.’

‘

‘The scales are even, perhaps,’ he conceded, ‘but the pans are not linked.’

‘My lord?’

He was talking in riddles and her tired brain could not work them out. Now he leaned in so close she could see the moon curved in the dark blue of his irises like sideways silver smiles. Her
heart pumped like a watermill in flood and she fought to quieten it.

‘I came here in peace, Harold,’ she protested weakly, ‘to offer you my family’s support and loyalty.’

‘Which I accept gratefully but, as with all treaties, it needs ratification.’

‘Ratification? You tangle me with snake words, Harold.’ She pushed out at his chest but the solid muscle resisted her feeble protest and now he caught her hand and she felt his own
heart beating hard against it. Her body pulsed treacherously. ‘You cannot order me around,’ she protested angrily. ‘I am not yours to command just because you are
sub-regulus.’

‘Do not call me that!’ His voice was sharp. He grabbed her shoulders, pulling her up against him. ‘I’m sorry. This is hard, yes, but you
do
understand me, Edyth
Alfgarsdottir. You have ever understood me. Your family and mine now hold England in our young hands and there is only one thing needed to make that alliance complete.’