The Price of Blood (36 page)

Edyth appeared unmoved. “Yet even my father regrets now that he chose to make you queen,” she said.

That gave Emma pause. She did not doubt that Æthelred often regretted his decision to give her a crown, but he was not one to admit his mistakes. She thought it unlikely that he would voice that particular regret to anyone, least of all to his daughter.

“Has he said as much to you?” she asked, and was gratified to see the little frown of uncertainty that clouded Edyth’s brow. “I would remind you, Edyth, that the king has given me two children, as well as income and estates to provide for them, and that he has named my son as heir to the crown.”

“Edward will never wear the crown,” Edyth spat. “When my father dies, Athelstan will take the throne, and all the nobles will support him. You will be sent back to Normandy, and your children with you.”

Emma sighed. She would not be drawn into a pointless argument about events that might never occur.

“It must be a comfort to you to be able to read the future so clearly,” she said. “I confess that, for me, it is a mist that I cannot penetrate no matter how hard I try. For now, therefore, let us concern ourselves with matters as they stand. The king still lives, and I am his anointed queen. However much it offends you to bend the knee to me, you have no other choice. You saw what happened in the hall just now. The only person humiliated in there was you, and it will happen again and again unless you recognize my authority, however unwillingly.”

She waited for some response, but Edyth merely stared, stone-faced, into the flames. Emma took her silence as a small victory, and decided to broach the issue that was most on her mind.

“As you have mentioned your brother Edward,” she said, “perhaps you can tell me if he has gone to his father in Worcester.”

Still Edyth did not look at her, but she answered, “My husband and your son were summoned to the Christmas court. They set out two days ago. Eadric did not wish to leave me, but . . .” Then she seemed to gather herself from wherever she had been and looked straight at Emma. “They were here together for some time, though, and Edward developed a marked fondness for Eadric.”

For the first time, Edyth smiled, a cold smile, for her words were meant to wound. And they succeeded. That Edward had fallen under the wily Eadric’s spell was even more terrible than the realization that Emma had missed her son by only a few days. It made her want to weep with vexation.

“Ealdorman Eadric,” she said slowly, choosing her words with care, “has charm that must appeal to all who meet him.” Snakes, too, were charming in their way, and Edward was far too young to recognize the danger of such a one. She wondered if Edyth even saw it.

But Edyth was frowning now, and then the frown became a grimace. She clutched at her belly and looked up at Emma with frightened eyes.

“I think the babe is coming,” she whispered.

For an instant the rancor between them fell away, and they were merely two women facing the miracle of life—and the very real possibility of imminent death. Emma stood quickly, called out for servants, and sent one of them for Margot. Once she was assured that Edyth was in good hands, she slipped from the chamber. Edyth had made it clear that she did not want her there.

There was nothing she could do for her stepdaughter now but wait and pray.

Chapter Twenty-Three

December 1009

Worcester, Worcestershire

A
t the invitation of Archbishop Wulfstan, who had chosen to spend Advent and Christmas at his northern see of Jorvik, Æthelred had settled into Wulfstan’s Worcester palace for the winter. Once the ecclesiastical apartments had been augmented by the king’s royal furnishings they were comfortable enough to suit him, but the chapter house was little to his liking. He found the paintings of saintly bishops that glowered at him from the plastered walls oppressive. Lit from below by banks of candles and from above by clerestory windows, they seemed to regard him with stern dislike. On this day, much to his irritation, their disapproving expressions were reflected in the faces of the three high ecclesiastics who had summoned him to meet with them.

The Canterbury archbishop and the bishops of Winchester and London sat at a table that held an elaborate gospel book and an assortment of scrolls. Ælfheah had appropriated the bishop’s throne, and Æthelred scowled at him from his somewhat humbler chair in the center of the chamber. The only witness to what he was beginning to regard as a trial by ordeal was Eadric, and if Æthelred had realized what his insufferable bishops would inflict upon him, even Eadric would not have accompanied him. For the better part of an hour they had been forced to listen to an endless litany of the sterling qualities of Queen Emma.

It was a travesty. He had appointed all of these men to their sees, yet they seemed to think that they could call him to account.

At first he had regarded Ælfheah’s lean, spare, earnest figure with equanimity, but that had turned to ire as the archbishop, whom he had counted among his friends, pelted him with scriptural references to husbands and wives, then read to him letters from numerous prelates commending the queen to her husband’s grace.

When Ælfheah looked to him for a response, he only just managed to control his rage. Through clenched teeth he acknowledged the wisdom of their counsel and agreed to embrace his queen and keep her at his side. Ælfheah, still grave but apparently satisfied, gave him a final blessing, then led his two fellows from the chamber.

The king waited until the massive oak door closed behind them, and until the monk who had crept in to retrieve the gospel book had lumbered away. Then, rising from his chair, he strode to the table and with one savage swipe knocked everything on it to the stone floor. Parchment rolls skittered along the pavers, candles in their silver holders clattered noisily, and still he felt his temper throbbing like a drumbeat in his head.

“You see how they school me to treat with my wife?” he snarled to Eadric, who had stood, deferentially silent, throughout the interview. “You are my chief counselor. Why did you say nothing in my defense?”

“One chooses one’s battles, my lord king,” Eadric replied. “Who am I to argue with the counsel of two bishops and the archbishop of Canterbury not to mention”—he gestured to the parchment rolls now scattered across the floor—“a host of abbots and a Norman archbishop as well? Your lady wife is eager to return to your side, judging from the arguments of the men she has persuaded to plead her cause. In any case, what does it matter if Queen Emma returns to your court? She is but a woman. Get her with child again, and you can send her into seclusion once more.”

Æthelred grunted and slumped into the episcopal throne that Ælfheah had abandoned. He kicked one of the scrolls out from under his foot and gestured the ealdorman to a chair.

Eadric’s words were true enough. What maddened him, though, was not the thought of Emma at his court, but the knowledge that she had so many damned allies. His first wife had lived in his shadow, where she belonged. Emma, though, courted his churchmen and ealdormen, garnered information, and corresponded with men of power. His mother had done the same, and her ambitions for him had led to the murder of a king. When he considered that, his ill temper turned to misgiving. What might Emma’s ambitions for her son lead
her
to do?

“I already have one son who covets my throne,” he muttered. “I do not want Emma’s son slavering after it. I would keep her away from Edward.”

“Send Edward back to Ely Abbey in the spring,” Eadric said. “He need not even see his mother.”

Æthelred frowned. “It will not do. The queen began to shower Ely with offerings from the moment that Edward arrived there. I’ll wager that every altar in that church is adorned with gifts from the queen. She all but owns the prior. Who knows what lessons he might teach Edward about the acquisition of power? No, I dare not send the boy back there. He must go where Emma’s hand cannot reach.”

For a moment he considered sending the child to his wife’s kin across the Narrow Sea, but he rejected that idea at once. Emma’s brothers would raise the boy a Norman, then send him back in five years’ time at the head of an armed fleet with orders to seize England’s crown as his birthright. No, he could not send Edward to Normandy.

“Then give Edward to me,” Eadric said.

Æthelred looked at his son-in-law. The candlelight threw up shadows that flickered across Eadric’s comely face and made the dark eyes glimmer. The thin lips framed by an elegantly trimmed beard curved in a feral smile.

“To you?” he asked.

“Let me take him to Shropshire for fostering. One of my thegns has lands near Wenloch, and the college of canons there can provide tutors for the boy. You need not trust Edward to Ely, and you can wean him from that Norman priest who hovers over him like a mantling hawk.” He paused and his black eyes narrowed. “Edward will be your son, not Emma’s. Is that not what you want?”

Æthelred considered it. The plan had merit. Edward would be far from court, far from his half brothers and, most important, beyond the reach of his mother. Emma would not like it, but she could hardly complain. In any case, she had a daughter now upon whom she could lavish her maternal attentions.

Eadric, of course, would profit from the arrangement. Edward’s welfare would be in his hands, and that would give him power not just over Edward but over Emma as well.

He studied his ealdorman, who was watching him with glittering eyes. This would mean more wealth, more influence for him. And why should Eadric not have it? He had been a good and faithful servant and would continue in that role. If he was well provided for.

“Yes,” he said, nodding slowly. “Take Edward with you across the Severn. And send word of this plan to Emma. I will not have her complaining to the bishops that I have hidden her son from her.” He’d had his fill of disapproving priests, and of Emma and her son. He called for wine and, leaning forward, he raised the question that had been hovering at the back of his mind since Eadric had arrived at the palace gate this morning. “Tell me what you have discovered about Elgiva.”

Eadric’s smile faded and he, too, leaned forward. “If the lady is north of the Humber, then she is well hidden. My men have searched for her from Beverley to Durham and have found no trace of her.”

“What of Siferth’s wife? Does she know anything?”

“Nothing, my lord. I went to her myself, and she denied all knowledge of her cousin. I am certain that she spoke me true.”

Æthelred did not ask what made Eadric so certain. The methods of persuasion that Eadric used had been proven effective, and the details were unnecessary.

“I trust that Siferth’s lady will not complain of you to her husband and thus negate all the gold I have spent to gain his loyalty.”

“The lady will make no complaint,” Eadric said.

Æthelred stared for some time into his wine cup, weighing possibilities.

“So if it is not Elgiva who is stirring up disaffection in the middle shires, then it must be Athelstan.” His eldest son had ever been a trial to him—stiff-necked, stubborn, and far too fond of his own opinions. Would Athelstan challenge him for the throne? His son’s mind had ever been a mystery to him, so he could not say what he might do. “The bishop of London claims that Athelstan has done well in defending London from the Danes.”

“Surely that is good news,” Eadric observed.

“It is not!” Æthelred snarled. “My son fights the Danes from behind London’s high walls and claims a victory, while I look a coward because I refused to meet them in the open field. It is a measure of kingship to protect your people against a foe. My son is building a heroic reputation, and so I must wonder what else he may be building.”

His words seemed to echo ominously in the lofty chamber. Eadric pursed his lips and met Æthelred’s steady gaze, and the silence between them lengthened.

Finally Eadric spoke. “You are not alone in your fears regarding your eldest son, my lord. Few men will speak of it to you, but his disdain for your rule and his desire for the throne are there for all to see. Do not listen to his counsels, for they are not given with your interests in mind. Mistrust him. Fear him, even.”

Fear him.
Hearing those words, Æthelred felt a sickness of heart that became a physical pain, a heaviness in his chest that made him sweat in spite of the December chill. He pressed the heel of his hand against the pain and although it eased, its echo lingered.

He saw a movement in the darkness behind Eadric, a deeper shadow among the shadows. The ghost of his brother regarded him, eyes glowing with portent, his baleful, silent gaze a reminder that royal kin could rarely be trusted.

December 1009

Greetham, Lindsey

Elgiva opened her eyes, recognized the brightly painted carving on the rafters of her cousin’s guesthouse, and shut her eyes again. She had vague memories of waking before this, lightheaded and too weak to sit up, each time with Tyra bending over her, forcing her to drink some foul liquid and, far above, the swirling dragons carved into the roof timbers. The dragons had slipped into her dreams, scorching her with fiery breath then winging her to a mountaintop to leave her there, naked and frozen. She had tried to convince herself that all of it was a nightmare. There had been a lucid moment when she had begged Tyra to tell her that none of it was real. But Tyra was a truth teller, and she had insisted that what had happened was no dream.

She’d lost the child. Nothing else mattered but that. The days of horror as the pestilence felled the members of her cousin’s household; her own fear when she realized it had caught her in its grip of slow, grinding pain; the terrible stench of shit and vomit and death; the blood, slick as sweat, that had fouled her shift and bedding. None of that mattered now because the child that had been growing in her womb was gone.

She might as well have died too, now that all her careful plans were in ruins.

When she opened her eyes again Tyra was there, helping her to sit up.
Dear God
, she was thirsty! She opened her mouth like a babe to sip the broth that Tyra spooned into her, and she noticed something she’d never seen before. Dangling from a leather thong about the woman’s neck was an amulet of amber with runes scratched upon it. Had the amulet protected her? Was that why Tyra had not taken ill?