“The last time we were here, it was dark,” Malcolm said. He immediately thought that was an awkward way to begin a conversation, so he added, “Remember?”
Iylaine shrugged and scooted away from him until she leaned back against the wall.
They had not yet sent for Iylaine, but Malcolm thought that she would be likely to hear his voice and come anyway. Indeed, he had scarcely had time to parry a few jokes of the Duke’s before she came in at the far end of the hall and ran halfway across the floor. In that instant she had the face his mother wore when he came home to her. Her smile was all he could see.
Then Murchad, who stood behind him, leaned to the side to get a better view of her, and she stopped beneath the arch as suddenly as if she had run into a wall. Her eyes were wide with surprise for a moment, and then her face went blank.
Hilda peeked into Estrid’s room with a sly smile.
“Hallo, Puss! Eirik wants to see you. Shall I show him in?”
Dunstan already wished he were anywhere else.
The man kept sending awkward glances his way as if he too wished Dunstan would be sent out, and the young woman didn’t look at him at all. She didn’t even look at his father, but only stared at the floor, with her hands spread over her belly as if she hoped to hide the great bulge of it.
“The one with the reddish hair is the girl, and the one with the light hair is the boy,” Brede said softly.
“The one with no hair, you mean,” Leofric said.
Sigefrith was in fact permitted to greet the ladies, and afterwards he stalled as long as he could by taking the time to eat, shave, and check on his horse. But the King was never far behind, and so at last he was obliged to follow him out into the cloistered court to tell of their journey. He felt that he, of the six that had gone, was the least qualified to tell the tale properly, but as always the younger men had left him to deal with the more bothersome consequences of their adventures.
“Why don’t you begin by telling me who or what is Whitehand?” the King said after they had sat. “It is not clear to me even whether it is a person or a place.”
Long after supper, long after most of the inhabitants of the castle had retired to their chambers, Sirs Sigefrith and Brede came into the hall, each accompanied by his young squire. They were still boisterous from their long and hilarious journey—or so they had found it, although it was likely the four young men would have found anything short of torture hilarious as long as they were together and unaccompanied.
“Shall we send for someone?” Sigefrith asked upon finding the hall unoccupied, “or shall we sneak up and surprise them?”
Matilda lay as still as sleep.
Alred’s hand was heavy on her hip, but she could tell he did not sleep either, for his fingers still stroked small circles on her skin from time to time.
Egelric rose awkwardly at the sound of a knock. He was not yet accustomed to manipulating such a large baby. His hands still expected to find the tiny boy he had left.
Just then he was happy enough that he thought he could forgive anything—even Alred for taking him away from Sela and the baby. Later he would come to miss those lost three months, but just then he was happy.
“Are you certain you should be meeting me here when your husband is expected home in a few days?” Leofric asked her, but he did not wait for a reply.
“You heard?” Matilda asked after she had pulled away from his embrace.
“It’s called self-mortification.”
“It’s called fucking insanity.”
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