The Price of Blood (8 page)

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At midnight Æthelred stood in the darkened church among his family and his court. A line of priests bearing glowing tapers—symbols of hope and resurrection—made its way through the nave. But as he watched the candlelight begin to blossom around the altar, something flickered at the edge of his vision, some movement in the shadows that lingered outside the light. His eyes were drawn toward that darkness, and there his dead brother—a dark wraith amid the shadows—stared back at him with black intent.

Pain crawled up his arm and into his chest, and he clutched his shoulder to ease it. Beside him, Emma reached out a hand, but he shrugged it off. This enemy was his alone—a burden he could share with no one, least of all his queen. It had already taken two of his sons, and it sought to sunder him now from those who were left.

He cursed it under his breath, and as if in response the shadow faded, taking the pain with it, and he drew a long, grateful breath.

Released from his brother’s malignant spell he sought and found Athelstan and Edmund, their youthful faces lit by the tapers in their hands. His thoughts swept back to the events of an hour before and to his sons’ protestations of loyalty. He put little faith in them. Athelstan, he did not doubt, was laying the foundation for his own rule in England. It was what
he
would do, were he in Athelstan’s place.

Ambitious sons, he reflected, were like wild horses that had to be kept in check—with force, if necessary. It had not come to that yet, but it would. His dead brother’s vengeful shade would likely hasten the day.

And when it came, he told himself, he must never flinch. He must do whatever was needed to hold on to his kingdom, even if it cost him his sons.

Chapter Eight

Easter Monday, April 1006

Western Mercia

E
lgiva shivered as she peered into the gloom of the little manor chapel, saw that it was empty, and stepped inside. She did not like churches, but she needed a place to think, and this was as good a place as any to take refuge from unwanted company and from the sudden chill breeze that was scrabbling across the manor yard.

Pulling her cloak tight about her, she gazed up at a portrait of Saint Peter that had been elaborately painted on the chancel wall. The saint’s right hand was raised in benediction and in his left he held a magnificent silver key. A golden halo encircled his head, and in his white-streaked hair and beard she could make out a marked resemblance to King Æthelred.

Had the man who drew this, she wondered, ever seen the king? More to the point, she thought, as she began to pace the chapel’s floor, was
she
ever likely to see the king again?

The gloom seemed to deepen around her as she forced herself, once more, to face the truth. Even if the king had sent someone to rescue her from the living death of a Danish marriage, no one would think to look for her in a stronghold on the western edge of Mercia. Yet here she was, despite her protests that she was unwell and that she should not be made to travel so far to attend some wretched noble’s Paschal feast.

“You are well enough,” her father had barked. “And I have business with Eadric.”

Yes, she thought bitterly, business that involved hunting and drinking and the swearing of oaths, none of which had anything to do with her. This Eadric—newly come into his father’s estate—was a man of some substance now it appeared. Her father likely wished to bend the new man to his own purposes, to forge another solid link in his chain of alliances. It was a worthy enough goal, she supposed, although she knew there was some larger purpose behind it that her father, curse him, kept from her. As for Eadric, she guessed that he had invited them here in order to court the favor of his powerful overlord.

And still, none of it had anything to do with her.

She passed through a shaft of light that speared down through a high window, and the sudden dazzle drew her mind back to last night’s gathering in Eadric’s brightly lit hall. If his purpose in urging her father’s sojourn here had been to impress, Eadric had succeeded. Yesterday’s feast had been lavish, and he had shown her father great honor. He had even been gratifyingly attentive to her, which had mollified her somewhat for the arduous journey across Mercia that she had been forced to make in order to get here.

In truth she had found the young thegn’s manner to be so charming that she wondered why she had taken so little note of him before this. Black-haired, with a neatly trimmed beard, tawny skin, and dark eyes, he had the look of an outlander, although his family had been settled in Mercia for hundreds of years. Or so he said. She had caught a flash of cunning in his glance that had made her suspect he was not entirely to be trusted, which only intrigued her the more.

She had dreamed about him last night, had meant to tell him so this morning, but all the men had ridden out to hunt. It was vexing to find herself alone here but for a few servants, reduced to staring at the painted walls of a wretched little church while she waited for the bell to ring for the midday meal.

She completed a circuit of the chapel to find herself in front of Saint Peter again, and she scowled at him, for he was a reminder of the king’s indifference to her plight. She was about to turn away when a hand clamped over her mouth and an arm clutched her tight at the waist, pulling her against a hard male body. She struggled to escape but could not move.

“It is Alric,” a voice whispered urgently in her ear. “Do not cry out! Your father is dead, lady, and you are in grave danger. This has all been an elaborate trap, and if you wish to escape you must come with me now before it is too late.”

For a moment she stood frozen, paralyzed by terror and indecision. Alric was one of her father’s thegns, and one whom she trusted. But what he was telling her was monstrous! Impossible!

“Lady, we must fly!” He turned her about so that she was looking into his face. His familiar, mocking smile was gone, and there was fear writ plain in his wild eyes. “Will you trust me?”

And she knew then that she had little choice. She nodded, and at once he snatched her hand and pulled her toward the door. He halted there briefly, glancing to the hall and then the stables before leading her out and around the corner of the building. Two horses stood there, saddled and tethered. He helped her to mount, and as she clutched the reins she heard, through the fog of shock that had settled over her like a shroud, the winding of a distant horn.

“That will be Eadric and his men returning,” Alric said. “A stroke of luck for us because they’ll have opened the gate. There is no time to lose. Stay close behind me, and do not stop for anything. Are you ready?”

She hesitated, for she was not ready, not for this. She wanted to pelt him with questions, to curse, to howl, but the grim set to his face kept her mute. At her nod he spurred his horse, and she followed him, charging toward the open gate from behind the cover of the church wall.

The few servants in the yard scattered away from them like frightened geese. The gate ward, though, stood his ground at first, waving his hands frantically until he dove sideways to avoid being trampled by Alric’s mount. She followed Alric through the yawning gateway and up a track that led away from the sound of the horn winding yet again, closer now than it had been before.

He led her on, clearly pushing the horses hard to put as much distance as possible between them and, if he had told her true, the pursuit that soon must follow. She could not ask any of the questions that flooded her mind, nor could she still the words that echoed in her ears like a tolling bell:
Your father is dead
.

It seemed to her that the whole world had just gone mad.

Easter Monday, April 1006

Cookham, Berkshire

Emma stood alone atop the new wooden rampart that had recently transformed the king’s Cookham estate from manor farm to fortified burh. In the grounds below her, tents and pavilions lay in neat rows, lit by firelight and by the shimmer of a half moon that glowed in the clear night sky. From a nearby tent she could hear a woman singing softly, soothing a whimpering child to sleep. In her own apartments, hidden from her sight just now by the massive bulk of the great hall, her own son was tucked into his cradle beside Wymarc’s little Robert. Edward had been sleeping when she’d left him, watched over by Wymarc and Margot and Hilde.

Æthelred’s daughters had been there too, and it was the sight of the two older girls, Edyth and Ælfa, whispering and giggling, their heads drawn close, that had driven her to seek a few moments alone. They had reminded her so of herself and her own sister, Mathilde, when they were children.

And there had been news today of Mathilde—of her death in Normandy.
Struck down by a fever at Christmastide
, her mother’s letter had said.

She had wept for her sister; Margot—who had guided them both into the world—had grieved with her, rocking her as if she were a child again.

Poor Mathilde. Even as a girl she had been plagued by fevers and agues; half her days, it seemed, spent abed. And now she had lost her final battle.

“How is it that I did not know?” she had asked Margot. “We were once so close. I should have felt it in my blood and my bones that she had left this world.”

Yet she had not known.

Now she gazed into the night, remembering other times and other places. Just like Æthelred’s daughters, she and Mathilde had been born a year apart, had shared beds, lessons, and duties. They had looked to each other for friendship and counsel; had quarreled, wept, and forgiven. Until her marriage had separated them forever.

It was Mathilde who should have come to England and been crowned Æthelred’s queen, for she was the elder. But their mother had deemed otherwise, and so Emma had wed a king and, a year later, Mathilde had become the bride of a Frankish count. Had she ever found happiness in that life? Emma had longed to know, but although she had sent letters, begging for some word from her sister, there had been no reply from the Countess of Blois.

The younger sister’s royal marriage had been too great a blow for the elder sister to forgive. There would be no forgiveness now.

She began to walk, her eyes misted with grief. She halted, though, when she realized that she was not alone, that in front of her a man stood beside the parapet, looking out through an opening toward the dark plain that led to the river.

“You should go within doors, lady,” he said. “The night is cold, and you would not wish to catch a chill.”

It was Athelstan’s voice that came to her through the darkness, offering advice that she would heed if she were wise. But tonight she was not wise, and the mere sound of his voice drew her to him.

Athelstan, too, she guessed, was weighted with grief.

She had not spoken to him yet of Ecbert’s death, for there had been no opportunity to share a private word. Now, burdened with her own sorrow, she longed just to be near him.

Going to his side, she gazed out toward the rushing, moonlit river, and she drew in a long breath, for her heart ached for both of them.

“I have wanted to tell you before this,” she said, “how much I grieve for the loss of your brother.” That grief was bound up now with her sorrow at the death of her sister, but she would not burden him with that news tonight.

“There is no need for you to speak of it,” he said. “I know what is in your heart.”

She studied his face, the half that she could see just visible in the moonglow. Did he truly know what she felt? His brother Edmund had not believed that she could grieve for Ecbert, and for some time now she had been afraid that Edmund’s distrust of her, like some foul contagion, had spread to Athelstan as well. But in the next moment, when he turned to face her, the look he cast upon her dispelled all doubt.

“I am not Edmund,” he said gently, answering the question she had not spoken.

She looked into eyes filled with such sorrow and longing that she was suddenly frightened. How she wanted to reach for him, to draw him into her arms and console him as a sister might.

Yet she dared not offer him that comfort, for it was not a sister’s love that she carried locked within her heart.

“No,” she said softly. “You are not Edmund. Forgive me for doubting you.”

She very nearly touched him then, nearly placed her hand upon his arm where it lay so close to hers there on the palisade. But she resisted the temptation, turning instead to look out toward the river, knowing that she should go inside as he had urged her, yet unable to bring herself to leave him.

In the darkness she was reminded of another time that they had been alone together—when they had both succumbed to temptation. When desire and passion had overwhelmed wisdom and duty and solemn vows.

She had been shriven of that sin long ago, had promised God that she would sin no more. But the human heart, she had learned, was a thing not easily governed. And although she had thought that tiny bit of her was nothing more than a withered relic locked inside a casket of gold, now she felt it yearning for this man at her side.

After a time it was Athelstan who broke the uneasy silence between them.

“Your son appears to be thriving,” he said, “and my father does not yet mistrust the boy. I envy him that.”

She heard the pain in his voice, sharp as a knife, and she did what little she could to blunt it.

“Edward is too young yet to disturb his father’s peace of mind,” she said. “The king reserves most of his displeasure, I fear, for the son who stands closest to the throne.” She knew what had occurred in the king’s chamber on Easter Eve, for her young spy had dutifully reported the angry words that Æthelred had flung at Athelstan that night.

He gave her a sour smile. “Nothing I do, it seems, will earn for me my father’s good opinion. Since he cannot bear the sight of me, I shall return to London tomorrow. Let him make of that whatever he likes.”

She bit her lip, afraid for him. The king was uneasy on his throne, and because of that the sons of Ælfhelm lay in chains tonight, under heavy guard.