Alred brings up another subject
“Damn!” Alred swore again once they were on the road.
Iylaine looked up at him with wide eyes. “That’s a bad word,” she said solemnly.
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Iylaine hangs back
Alwy met them at the door.
“Egelric!” he crowed. And then, once he had seen Alred, “Your Grace,” bowing shyly.
Alred follows Egelric out
“Not afraid of the Dark Lady, are you?” Alred asked, running up behind Egelric and grabbing his arm as he walked to the stables.
Egelric stopped and turned to him, surprised. “I hope Your Grace didn’t leave early on my account.”
Colban meets his godson
Egelric smiled at the sight of the young Queen standing in the handsome chamber whose construction he had overseen. He liked to know that he had brought beauty into her life beyond even the garden he had made her.
He understood better than most men how some women had a need to be surrounded by pretty things. She was like Elfleda in many ways, he thought—how Elfleda would have been if she had been happy. His gifts and secret services to the Queen almost seemed to serve as small offerings to Elfleda—small offerings of atonement. There were so many things he should have done for her.
Maud waits
Maud stood silhouetted in the window before the setting sun, the tense lines of her body a contrast to the lolling form of the baby who dozed in her arms.
She had seen them ride in, had heard their laughter ringing up from the court only to drift away as they went up into the hall to meet Sigefrith.
Alred meets them going out
Alred was just coming out through the gate of the castle as Egelric and his cousins were riding in across the bridge, trailing a band of peasant children behind them.
“Well, Bacchus,” he cried, turning the head of the skittish son of Jupiter back into the gate, “Looks like it’s right back to the stables with you!”
After the guards had scattered the children and sent them squawking and flailing back onto the road like a flock of disappointed geese, the horsemen were allowed to enter, and they found Alred waiting for them in the forecourt.
Maud watches
Maud had spent many hours in this way, over many days, standing in the west window and looking out onto the road and the land beyond. She could have told the daily habits of half the kingdom by now, as they came and went by the road and by the gate.
She knew that Alred went out almost every dawn for a gallop over the bronze and green of the downs. She saw Cenwulf riding up in the morning to see Sigefrith, who awaited him in the chamber next to this, and then would hear his deep voice rumbling behind the door, accompanied by Sigefrith’s baritone.
The Baron comes down from the hills
“Well met, cousin.”
Githa paled. It was Theobald’s brother, Gifmund—no, he was Baron now. And he seemed to be amused by her discomposure.
Sigefrith enters without knocking
King Sigefrith smiled a little sadly as he heard Maud begin to sing softly behind the door. She had such a lovely voice—it was a shame he could rarely convince her to sing for him these days. But she still sang for her children.
It was painful to be jealous of one’s own children. Colburga had finally admitted that some women forgot they were wives when they became mothers. None of the other wives he knew had forgotten—it seemed a little unfair. But then the wives he knew had married willingly.
Alred says too much
“Look who’s coming!” Alred said to his little girl.
Gunnilda came running. “Gwynn!”
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ChaptersEven he, eternal optimist, knew how unsteady the crown of happiness could be. How many times had he already picked it up and shoved it back down over his head, battered and dusty as it was from falling off even so many times but one?
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