The Deepening Night (The Kingdom of the East Angles Book 3)
Read The Deepening Night (The Kingdom of the East Angles Book 3) Online
Authors: Jayne Castel
The Deepening Night
A Historical Romance set in Anglo-Saxon England
Book Three
The Kingdom of the East Angles
Jayne Castel
Historical romances by Jayne Castel
The Kingdom of the East
Angles series
Night Shadows (prequel
novella)
Dark Under the Cover of
Night (Book One)
Nightfall till Daybreak
(Book Two)
The Deepening Night (Book
Three)
The Kingdom of the East
Angles: The Complete Series
The Kingdom of Mercia
series
The Breaking Dawn (Book
One)
Darkest before Dawn (Book
Two)
Dawn of Wolves (Book
Three)
All
characters and situations in this publication are fictitious and any
resemblance to living persons is purely coincidental.
The
Deepening Night
by Jayne Castel
Copyright
© 2014 Jayne Castel. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be
reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any
means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without the prior
written permission of the author.
Edited
by Tim Burton.
Cover
photography courtesy of
www.istockphotos.com
.
Cover
design by vikncharlie:
http://www.fiverr.com/vikncharlie
Maps
courtesy of Wikipedia.
Saewara’s
lament in the Prologue is adapted from
The
Lament of Deor
– an Old English poem)
Visit
Jayne’s website and blog:
www.jaynecastel.com
Follow
Jayne on Twitter at:
@JayneCastel
***
For Tim.
Ic þe lufu.
***
Contents
Character list for ‘The Deepening
Night’
Family Tree: Kingdom of the
East Angles
Family Tree: Kingdom of Mercia
Chapter One – A King’s Sacrifice
Chapter Two – The Widow’s Escape
Chapter Three – Between Brothers
Chapter Six – The Lovers’ Dance
Chapter Seven – In the Darkness
Chapter Nine – A Gentle Moment
Chapter Ten – The River Crossing
Chapter Twelve – The Handfasting
Chapter Thirteen – The Way of
Things
Chapter Fourteen – The Devil’s
Work
Chapter Seventeen – New
Beginnings
Chapter Eighteen – The Gathering
Storm
Chapter Nineteen – Lovers and
Longing
Chapter Twenty – A Meeting in the
Woods
Chapter Twenty-One – The Undoing
Chapter Twenty-Two – The Shadow
Approaches
Chapter Twenty-Three – On the
Eve of Battle
Chapter Twenty-Four – Saewara’s
Decision
Chapter Twenty-Five – The
Captive
Chapter Twenty-Six – The Battle
of Exning Woods
Chapter Twenty-Seven – Things
Unsaid
Character list for ‘The Deepening Night’
Annan
– King of the
East Angles.
Saewara
(pronounced:
Sewara
)
– sister of Penda, the King of Mercia.
Aethelhere
(pronounced
Aythilhair
)
– Annan’s brother.
Hereswith
– niece of the
Northumbrian King – promised to Annan.
Eldwyn
–
Hereswith’s handmaid.
Penda
– King of
Mercia.
Cyneswide
(pronounced:
Sinswid
)
– Penda’s wife.
Aldfrid
(pronounced
Oldfrid
) – one of Penda’s most trusted ealdormen.
Sabert
(Saba)
– Ealdorman and Annan’s best friend.
Hilda
– slave in
Annan’s hall.
Family Tree
:
Kingdom of
the East Angles
Family Tree: Kingdom of Mercia
“Better to die on your feet than
live on your knees.”
- Emiliano Zapata
Prologue
The
Funeral
Tamworth,
the Kingdom of Mercia – Britannia
Spring
630 A.D.
The croak of ravens echoed through the morning air. Their
cries followed Saewara through the curling mist, mocking her. There was not a
breath of wind this morning; the shrouded hillside sat in a world of its own, a
lonely island in a milky sea.
Head hung low, so that others could not see her face, Saewara
followed the mourners up to the barrow where
Egfrid
would be entombed alongside his forefathers. Behind her, she could hear the quiet
sobbing of his mother, who had been inconsolable ever since hearing the news of
her eldest son’s death.
Egfrid had been one of the king’s bravest and most
formidable warriors. His death, in a border skirmish against a band of Celts
just three days earlier, had shocked them all.
The dead man lay upon a litter; his face
chalk-white, his arms folded over his chest. They had dressed him in his finest
clothes: a fur cloak, a fine royal blue tunic and an embossed leather
breastplate. Gold rings crowded his muscular biceps, each one won for his valor
and presented after battle. His long brown hair had been brushed and tied back
against his nape.
Egfrid’s wounds had been terrible; he had been slit
open from sternum to bowel. It had taken the women most of the night to prepare
him for burial, binding up his wounds so that he could be dressed in his
finery. In the end, they had succeeded in creating the illusion that the
warrior had come to a peaceful end. To look at him now, no one would have
guessed at the deep lacerations beneath his clothing.
The mourners climbed the last stretch before the
barrow. Egfrid’s burial place marked the end of a line of mounds where Mercian
kings and nobility lay. The last king to be buried here had been Cearl, nearly
five years earlier. The last peaceful King of Mercia, he had ruled without
incident for nearly two decades, before finally succumbing to illness.
Saewara halted before the entrance to the barrow,
watching as her husband’s litter was lowered before it. Beyond, the shadows loomed.
Darkness stretched out toward Egfrid the Strong, beckoning him toward the
afterlife.
As his wife, Saewara was expected to sing the
lament for his death. Steeling herself, she squared her shoulders and lifted
her head, filling her lungs with cool, damp air. Then she sang, her voice
lifting above the mourners and drifting through the encircling mist.
Egfrid the
Strong
What great
loss we suffer
A warrior, a
husband, a son
That went
away, this also may
Sorry and
longing are ours
Exile in the
cold winter
For he no
longer serves his lord
That went
away, this also may
It is the will
of fate
That shapes
all our lives
Grief, loss
and suffering
That went
away, this also may
Saewara’s voice trailed off, while around her the
eyes of many present brimmed with tears at the lament’s haunting beauty. Saewara
cast her eyes down once more as Egfrid’s brothers slid his body inside the
barrow and sealed the entrance.
The mourners drifted away from the barrow, and retraced
their steps down the slope. Saewara lingered on the knoll for a few moments
longer, before following them. The mist was even thicker now. It created a milky
shroud around the mourners, blocking the outline of the Great Tower that rose from
a grassy hill to the south. Saewara walked slowly, lost in her thoughts.
She did not notice a tall figure fall into step
next to her.
“You played your part beautifully, Saewara – ever
the actress.”
Saewara started, and looked up at her brother’s cruelly
handsome face in surprise.
He knew her grief was feigned. She had thought
Penda had gone ahead. Yet, instead he had lingered behind to speak to her.
In the pale morning light, Penda was a striking
sight. He wore a magnificent black fur cloak, clasped to his broad shoulders
with gleaming amber broaches. Despite the iron crown on his head – a plain
circlet with a garnet at its center – he dressed like the warrior he was. His
heavy sword swung at his side as he walked, and his tall, muscular frame was encased
in leather armor. His blond hair, so pale it was almost white, hung in a smooth
curtain over his shoulders.
Not for the first time, Saewara wondered at how
different they were. Her brother was as tall, cold and pale as a mountain
summit; in contrast to Saewara’s dark hair, small frame and fiery disposition.
She was so short that the crown of her head barely reached the center of his
chest. Their eldest brother, Eafa, who had died in East Anglia a few years
earlier, had spent years taunting Saewara about her looks – even going as far as
to say that their mother must have lain with a Celt savage to beget her, for she
could not be of the same blood as Penda and him.
“You enjoyed the lament then, brother?” she asked
coolly, preferring to respond to Penda’s barbed comment with a question.
“Yes, you have an enchanting voice.”
Saewara did not reply. She and Penda rarely spoke
these days, and he did not usually seek her out unless he had some purpose. She
guessed that this was also the case now. As such, she waited for him to speak
again.
“You do not mourn him.”
It was a statement rather than a question.
“No,” she replied quietly. “Do you blame me?”
Penda shrugged. “I care not what goes on between
man and wife. It was a good match – or it would have been if you had given him
a son.”
Saewara looked away, slowing her step so that the
mourners before her drew ahead. She did not want her mother-in-law
eavesdropping on their conversation.
“We tried, but my womb never quickened.”
“You are barren.”
Saewara bristled. “He had other women, you know
that. None of the others bore his child either.”
“If a marriage does not produce children ‘tis the
woman’s fault, not the man’s,” Penda replied with a snarl in his voice.
Saewara clenched her jaw and bit back an angry
reply. She knew she should mind her tongue. Many thought her husband’s ready
fists would have taught her meekness over the past few years. Indeed, it had
made her wary of men; yet, Egfrid’s violence only served to make the rage
within her grow.
Soon, all of this will not matter,
she consoled herself.
Soon you will be free of this place and all the vile,
scheming people who live here.
“Yes, brother,” she managed finally. “You are right.
I am barren and no good as a wife. In a few days, I will leave here and go to
Bonehill, where I will take my vows. There, I will be out of your life, and no
longer a thorn in your side.”
“Bonehill?” Penda queried coolly. “I think not,
dear sister. Barren or not, it would be a waste to send you off to a nunnery
for the rest of your days.”
“
Hwaet?”
Saewara lost her tightly won control for a moment.
She stopped and swiveled toward her brother, her gaze sweeping up to meet his.
“But there’s no point in marrying me to anyone else!”
“You are of royal blood,” Penda reminded her with
a cruel smile, locking her arm in his and forcing her to continue walking. “And
too valuable to cast aside so young. I have plans for you.”
Saewara walked on, her heart thumping against her
ribs. She could not believe she was hearing this from Penda. After the
sacrifice she had made for him – marrying a man all knew to be a brute – and
suffering greatly as a result, this was the ultimate betrayal. She knew that
Penda held no love for her – she imagined him incapable of truly loving anyone
– but now he appeared to be exacting some kind of twisted vengeance upon her.
“Who is it?” she gasped finally. “What animal will
you marry me to this time?”
“Use that tone with me again Saewara and I will
strike you to the ground,” Penda replied, flatly, “sister or not.”
Saewara shivered. Having seen what her brother was
capable of, she knew he would do as he threatened.
They walked in silence for a short distance before
the king spoke once more.
“You will marry Annan of the East Angles,” Penda
informed her dispassionately. “Annan has ‘bent the knee’ to Mercia and I need
to ensure that he will continue to do as he is told. You will play a role in
uniting our two kingdoms in readiness for the day I take East Anglia for our
own.”
Saewara was shocked into silence.
This was worse than she had ever anticipated. Her
brief glimpse at freedom, at a life away from being a pawn in a man’s world,
dissolved like smoke before her eyes. Not only would her brother barter her
like a fattened sow at market, but he would give her to his enemy to further
his political ambitions, without a thought to her wishes.
She dipped her head, letting her cowl fall over
her face and block out the world.
Tears flowed, hot and bitter, down her cheeks.