The Handfasted Wife Read online

‘The gatekeeper is the one we want,’ Wadard shouted at the soldiers. ‘Bring him with us.’

  Brother Francis meekly followed as Wadard hauled Athelstan up to the castle. He had seen violence before but this Wadard was brutal. Brother Francis tried to protest as Wadard ordered two soldiers to hang the old man upside down in the castle bailey. Wadard hissed at him, ‘Say your prayers for his soul, priest.’ When old Athelstan passed out they threw icy water in his face. Wadard prodded him with the point of a knife until he croaked for mercy and cried out the name of the servant who had made ready a boat for a skald called Padar only a few weeks earlier. The servant was in the woods, the old man cried out, and it didn’t matter any more since they would never discover his whereabouts.

  Brother Francis returned to the mint with Wadard and his pack. The soldiers bound Godfrey with rope and dragged the apprentices and servants out into the yard. The monk looked away as they intimidated them, prodding them with swords, threatening them with captivity and worse, but Alfred’s servants knew nothing that Wadard didn’t already know. One soldier smashed his fist into a kitchen boy who smirked at him. Another pushed a maid up against the wall and kicked her in the belly because she spat at them. Brother Francis felt sick to his stomach. The Norman soldiers from the castle were taking their cruelty beyond what was reasonable.

  They began to work on Godfrey. They bound his hands and began circling him, punching him and cutting his arms and legs with their long swords. Godfrey shrieked at Wadard, ‘If you kill me, there will be none to keep order here. I know nothing.’

  ‘Get him to talk,’ Wadard ordered the captain of his guard. ‘He knows.’

  ‘Stop! Let me ask him,’ Brother Francis intervened.

  ‘You? What will he tell you?’ He threw his sword down in a fury. ‘Go on, try.’

  Brother Francis leaned down. ‘Tell us where your master is and all will be well, my son.’

  Godfrey choked on his own blood and sobbed, ‘I have told you. The master has gone to London to get new dies for the coin.’

  Wadard shouted at Brother Francis that his ways were not working. He signalled to his soldiers. But no amount of punching and threatening revealed further secrets. Godfrey said that he just came every morning to work in the mint. He slept at home, not here. Wadard stood in front of the battered, bleeding Godfrey and said icily, ‘You, not Alfred of Oxford, are in charge here now. You will live in his house and you will take your orders directly from the castle. The hall and the mint here belong to us. You bastards are under the castle guard.’ Wadard turned to Brother Francis. ‘You see, Brother Francis, this is how we deal with rebels. We prick them until they die; but this one we’ll save for later.’ He clicked his fingers at the torturers. ‘Unbind him. He knows nothing.’

  Brother Francis pushed through the crowd of shocked servants and out of Alfred’s yard. Wadard yelled at his men to follow. One tugged at a girl’s plaits, grabbed her breasts and said he’d be back. Another deliberately knocked over one of the yard boys and stepped on his hand, crushing it, as the boy sprawled in the muck, howling with pain. That was enough. Brother Francis made an excuse to return to the castle while Wadard and the rest of his soldiers set out to harass their way into houses and inns, to threaten the men, to terrify their women and prod at their children with their sharpened swords.

  Later, Wadard returned to the castle in a buoyant mood. He had met with success. He had continued to the river, where they questioned as many boatmen as they could find. Finally, they had discovered that Alfred’s servant had joined the camps in the woods and had not been seen for weeks, but they knew the direction the skald and the women had set off towards; it was up to the source of the river.

  By sunset Wadard had set guards on Alfred’s house. His soldiers ransacked the hall. They turned coffers out and confiscated goods. Alfred’s cousin would work under guard. They would watch all who came through his gate. The coiner would return and then they would destroy him. Wadard returned to the castle to finish off the gatekeeper.

  Soldiers dragged Athelstan into the castle yard. The old man found courage to stand straight. He pointed his shackled arm and named Wadard the Saxon as a traitor to King Harold. He spat and blasphemed and shouted prophesy, ‘The bastard King William will meet an evil end.’ Another thwack from the back of a sword knocked him down again but he managed to rise onto his knees to groan out the strangled words, ‘He will die hated even by those he calls his own kin.’ Then, he cried, ‘May the House of Normandy be cursed.’

  This was the end for the gatekeeper. Wadard drew his own weapon, ordered two men to hold Athelstan. He cut out the man’s eyes and, as he worked himself into a furious frenzy, he shouted, ‘Silvatii’ and ‘Liar’. Still the gatekeeper screamed obscenities at his torturer. The soldiers then beat Athelstan until he was torn flesh and broken bone, and had fallen into a crumpled heap of guts and blood, his shrieks finally silenced. Brother Francis knelt at what was left of the gatekeeper, praying over him, while Wadard shouted, ‘He is not worth your prayers, brother.’

  After sunset, Wadard ordered the soldiers to throw Athelstan’s bloody remains through the gate to the dogs. Brother Francis hurried away through the town streets and sought out a place to pray. This was all Harold Godwin’s fault. He was responsible for this destruction when he had broken his faith with William of Normandy.

  A few days later a fisherman seeking reward came into the castle, claiming that he had discovered a sunken boat far upriver and several decomposing bodies. The boat was stripped of weapons, he said. The dead men were soldiers from the Slav lands. He had met them once, near Godstow, one morning before Lent. Wadard pieced one and two together and said to Brother Francis, ‘That skald will hang for this.’

  The castle warden sent a troop upriver to examine the sunken boat and collect the remains. He reported back to Wadard, ‘The boat was stolen from the castle fleet before Lent. The Slavs were probably looking for slaves to sell in the East. They had it coming.’

  ‘They were mercenary trash,’ Wadard said to Brother Francis over dinner in the castle hall. ‘Tomorrow we ride upriver and into the hills. We will visit every nunnery and monastery between here and Bristol until we find them.’

  ‘That will be a multitude of monasteries,’ Brother Francis said. He had been sickened by Wadard’s cruelty and now he remembered the cruelty with which the Normans had treated the women and children at Reredfelle, his own flock, when they fired the hall. For this, he blamed Elditha. She had put all their lives in danger on that day. She was the Devil’s own concubine; a curse on the House of Godwin.

  Then Wadard was saying, ‘And there’s a heap of treasure for Normandy in the monasteries. Think of the favour you will earn from that shrew, Queen Edith, when we find the Lady Elditha and her skald.’

  Without a moment’s hesitation, Brother Francis agreed to accompany Wadard.

  ‘So we set out tomorrow?’ he said, gladdened at the thought of escaping the infernal town that was Oxford.

  26

  Forth I go, may I meet with friends.

  An Old English Journey Charm

  Padar and Elditha rode through the hills west of St Margaret’s Priory, following an ancient track that crossed the escarpment. Whenever Homer slowed, a light flick of the whip drew a quick response. The sky was a pale blue, the air clear and Elditha was relieved to be on horseback again and moving.

  Farther along the escarpment, near a place that Padar called Barton Wood, Padar told her they should rest. He slid down from his own horse and then slipped his hand under her stirrup and helped her down. Elditha unstrapped her saddle-bag and produced griddle cakes, cheese and a flask of ale. They sat on their mantles by a stand of chestnut trees and shared the food, looking over the grey ploughed land where bright green crops were pushing through the soil. A pair of magpies strutted across a field, like wooden puppets at a Christmas feast, their heads jerking up and down as they foraged. A blackbird sang in a tree. Sheep grazed on the springy grass by the wood’s edge. I
t was so peaceful, she thought, as if there hadn’t been a new king set on the throne and towns and villages attacked, different to the ruined countryside south of Oxford.

  As if he were reading her thoughts, Padar said, ‘We can avoid the Normans if we stay north of Gloucester. Tomorrow, we must follow the salt road to Tewkesbury.’ When, later, they rode into the monastery at Hailes he looked back at the unguarded opened gate and remarked, ‘The way it was and how it should be. No bolts on doors, no closed gates. I wonder how long this will last here.’

  That night they shared a communal hall, empty of guests excepting a pair of wool merchants from Gloucester. They wore their hair long in the English manner and their beards plaited. Elditha observed that neither was young nor old. The pair talked of King William, of the new coin forged with his image, and they discussed the price of wool. They expected a good return for their merchandise in the Flanders markets, but only if they could drive their wagon of bales north-east of Lincoln and only if they were able to avoid the Norman patrols.

  ‘Have you no guard?’ Padar said.

  ‘It draws attention, brings us into trouble, lucky to get our wool out.’ The merchant then drew his hand across his throat. ‘There are weapons in that wagon and we’ll kill to protect what is ours.’ He went on to say that the new King’s henchmen were already in and out of the old palace of Gloucester. ‘There will be a castle there soon instead of a palace; the bloody bastards.’

  Elditha shuddered, thinking of Gytha and Thea in Exeter. As the merchants exchanged news and talked of changes to come to the borders – castles, soldiers, taxes – she busied herself separating barley from the vegetables in her bowl of pottage.

  She complained in a low voice, ‘The barley is full of grit. I can’t swallow it.’

  The merchants stared at her. The taller of the two remarked, ‘Your woman doesn’t say much, and look at her grumbling and picking; should be glad of food when many an Englishwoman is starving.’

  ‘Not my woman, my friends. She was my thane’s wife. Poor lady lost her husband in the great Battle. Then she lost everything else: her hall, her land, everything. She wouldn’t marry a Norman so they burned her house. We’re travelling to her brother’s farm near Worcester and then I’m off to Wales to fight for the Welsh prince.’

  ‘Good man. Keep the bastards out,’ said one, spitting into the straw.

  ‘I don’t blame her not marrying a Norman. Who wants children raised to speak in a foreign tongue?’ said the other. ‘By St Oswald’s bones, she is right, this is a rotten stew.’ The wool merchant stirred it with his finger, lifted out a gritty lump and threw it on the fire. ‘She’s well rid of the Normans.’ He grunted. ‘Worcester is safe.’ He spat again. ‘That farm, sheep or cattle?’

  Padar chewed a piece of stewed turnip. ‘Her brother sells hawks to noblemen.’

  ‘Hope he finds her a good English husband. She’s got fine green eyes and a lovely head too on that long neck; a beauty, I’d say. I’m looking for a wife,’ the man’s companion remarked. Elditha watched as Padar’s hand automatically strayed to his seax.

  ‘She won’t be looking for a merchant,’ the other said. ‘I’d say that creature is too good for the likes of us.’

  At that, Elditha withdrew to a pallet behind a shabby moth-eaten curtain. She wrapped herself in her cloak and listened to Padar laughing with the merchants. He began to strum his harp. She slept fitfully and was relieved when he whispered that they must be on their way before the sun rose. ‘They’ll suspect us if they see the horses,’ he said, taking her pack and his own. As they rode out, the wool merchants were still snoring and only a couple of monks were crossing the yard. Padar waved and they rode out through the gate.

  Late in the afternoon, Padar guided their horses onto a hill from which they could see the monastery complex of St Mary’s at Deerhurst. Behind the monastery the Severn flowed lazily through a flood plain. This river would take them to the coast.

  ‘My lady, we can lodge in the old hall. There’s only the reeve there. Lord Beorhtric has arranged for a ship from Ireland to come up the river to meet us. We settled on Holy Saturday and by my reckoning there are only three days to wait.’

  ‘And Beorhtric?’

  ‘He should be at Leckhampton. I will ride down to the old hall and find out his whereabouts. There are no Normans around these parts, but we must be cautious. The monastery of St Mary is connected to France.’

  ‘I’ll ride down with you, Padar.’

  ‘No, stay out of sight in the trees.’ And he cantered off.

  She watched until he was swallowed into the landscape, then turned the stallion into the beech trees and dismounted. Homer grazed and she sat on a log. Every now and then he nuzzled her hand and she stroked his great damp nose. Bells rang for Nones. She waited and dozed for a bit, and soon her head was drooping into her arms. The bell for Vespers sounded and she started, wide awake. Padar had not returned. Hours had passed as she slept and now it was chill. She looked towards the west. There a liquid sun was dropping behind the distant monastery. Leading Homer she came out of the trees and peered down the valley. She could just see a helmeted and armed patrol climbing the hill towards her, carrying the Mercian standard, another dragon. This must be Beorhtric and Padar at last.

  As they rode closer she knew all was not right. There were no smiling faces returning her greeting. Moments later the soldiers ringed her in and their commander dismounted and removed his helmet. She stared unbelieving. He had not changed in the half year since they had last encountered each other. His hair gleamed red and he wore it in Norman style, shaved close up the back of his head.

  ‘Not you,’ she managed to say.

  ‘So, Lady Elditha, perhaps you are relieved to see me.’ He smiled. ‘You will come with us.’

  Somehow she found her voice. ‘You order me?’

  ‘As my affianced wife, it is no less than my duty.’ He reached over and touched her arm.

  She moved away. ‘I am never that.’

  ‘My lady, I think so.’

  ‘Where is my servant?’ she said evenly.

  He pointed along the valley towards the monastery. ‘I left him under guard. He murdered two soldiers from our garrison at St Swithun’s Priory. And,’ he added, ‘there may yet be other charges, such as abduction of a royal noblewoman.’

  ‘Not so, Count Alain, not so. I have chosen to travel west and he travels with me. I ordered him to ride with me,’ she said, keeping her tone firm.

  ‘Mount.’ He glared at her, took the reins of her horse. Homer snorted at him and danced a few paces. She tugged the reins back. ‘Homer come here, closer,’ she said.

  Now, she realised with horror that Beorhtric himself had ridden up beside Alain of Brittany, his piebald horse prancing and circling. ‘My lord,’ he said without looking at her, ‘take as many of my men as you need, but I must return to my manor.’

  ‘I have enough of my own, Beorhtric. Odo’s man, Wadard, has brought us reinforcements from Oxford. Your loyalty will be rewarded. Return and enquire exactly what arrangements the skald was making.’

  ‘That we know already,’ said Beorhtric.

  ‘Ah, of course, Saxon, you made the arrangements for him yourself. Well, he travels to London with all his body parts, and make sure that the Norse ship does not land or you could lose yours.’

  ‘You have the lady, Count Alain. Send for the skald when you want.’ Beorhtric of Tewkesbury whipped his horse around and, accompanied by a dozen fighting men, cantered off with his Mercian banner flying before him. Elditha swallowed the outrage she felt at Beorhtric’s betrayal.

  The remaining soldiers gathered closer to their commander. Count Alain offered to help Elditha mount but she declined, preferring to climb up into the saddle from a log where Homer stood still for her. He shrugged. ‘As you will. That horse looks like one of ours, a stallion. Did the bastard skald steal him? We can hang that skald three times over now.’ With that remark, Alain of Brittany turned around and spran
g onto his mount and then manoeuvred the beast closer to her. With soldiers surrounding them, they rode along the track to a crossroads which she had passed with Padar several miles back. There, they turned south on the route to Gloucester.

  The palace at Kingsholm, near Gloucester, had not changed since Elditha had been there several years before. The palace exterior looked as tired and as weathered as ever. It loomed up eerily in the moonlight, a large and rambling place with other halls joining the main hall, creating the impression of a series of crosses. A maze of outer buildings, stables and bowers lay scattered around it, as at the Palace of Westminster. Large groups of soldiers paced the yard, and as they went to and fro, fierce-looking hounds leapt and followed, barking and snapping at their heels. An underfed yard boy took Homer’s reins from Elditha and helped her dismount. She clutched her saddle-bag, half-concealed it under her cloak, and watched the boy struggle with the horse. Homer rose up and nearly overpowered him. Waifs carrying torches came running to help. She felt despair for them and especially for the stallion, as, pulling and dragging, the team of them managed to force her great horse across to a stable block close to the old orchard.

  Count Alain led her into the hall. As they walked towards the long raised hearth, Elditha half-recognised the servants who were setting up trestles; the same people who had worked there in King Edward’s reign. Glancing at her, they quickly turned away again. They had new masters now, she thought sadly. A severe-looking woman – tall, slim and dressed in an elegant long-sleeved gown – came walking from the shadows, holding a candle. She greeted Alain of Brittany and for a moment they conversed in French. Elditha understood the language and gathered that this long-faced person was to be her companion, or her gaoler, though for the moment that remained unsaid.

  Count Alain said, ‘This woman is Alice of Gloucester. She will see to your needs.’ He stooped and wiped mud off his boots with a rag that was lying on the bench and added dismissively, ‘Give Lady Elditha food and drink and see that she is comfortable. Her chamber has a door. Bolt it on the outside.’ He glanced up at Elditha. ‘I would keep you safe.’ Without another word to her he stretched, and began to walk away. She could not work out how he intended to deal with her, other than possibly insist on the marriage.