my lady fights for Mercia,’ I said, ‘she flies her husband’s banner.’
‘Then the prisoners and the plunder belong to Lord Æthelred,’ Eardwulf said.
‘I’m ordered to sell them,’ I said.
‘Are you?’ He laughed. ‘Well now you have new orders. They all belong to Lord Æthelred so you will give them to me.’ He gazed at me, daring me to contradict him. I must have looked belligerent because his men half lowered their spears.
Father Fraomar had reappeared and darted to the side of my horse. ‘No fighting,’ he hissed at me.
‘My Lord Uhtred would not dream of drawing a sword against Lord Æthelred’s household warriors,’ Eardwulf said. He beckoned to his men. ‘Take it all inside,’ he ordered, indicating carts, plunder, Haki, and the slaves, ‘and do thank the Lady Æthelflaed,’ he was looking at me again, ‘for her little contribution to her husband’s treasury.’
I watched his men take the plunder and slaves through the gateway. Eardwulf smiled when it was done, then gave me a mocking smile. ‘And the Lady Æthelflaed,’ he asked, ‘has no desire to attend the Witan?’
‘She’s invited?’ I asked.
‘Of course not, she’s a woman. But she might be curious about the Witan’s decisions.’
He was trying to discover whether Æthelflaed would be in Gleawecestre. I half thought of saying I had no idea what she planned, then decided to tell the truth. ‘She won’t be here,’ I said, ‘because she’s busy. She’s making a burh on the Mærse.’
‘Oh, a burh on the Mærse!’ he repeated, then laughed.
The gates closed behind him.
‘Bastard,’ I said.
‘He had the right,’ Father Fraomar explained, ‘the Lord Æthelred is the husband of the Lady Æthelflaed, so what is hers is his.’
‘Æthelred’s an unwiped pig-sucking bastard,’ I said, staring at the closed gates.
‘He is the Lord of Mercia,’ Father Fraomar said uneasily. He was a supporter of Æthelflaed, but he sensed that her husband’s death would strip her of both power and influence.
‘Whatever the bastard is,’ Sihtric put in, ‘he won’t offer us any ale.’
‘Ale is a good idea,’ I growled.
‘The redhead at the Wheatsheaf, then?’ he asked, then grinned. ‘Unless you’re going to learn more about farming?’
I grinned back. My father had given me a farm north of Cirrenceastre, saying I should learn husbandry. ‘A man should know as much about crops, pasture and cattle as his steward knows,’ my father had growled to me, ‘otherwise the bastard will cheat you blind.’ He had been pleased at the number of days I spent at the estate, though I confess I had learned almost nothing about crops, pasture or cattle, but I had learned a great deal about the young widow to whom I had given the farm’s great hall as her home.
‘The Wheatsheaf for now,’ I said and kicked Hearding down the street. And tomorrow, I thought, I would ride to my widow.
The tavern’s sign was a great wooden carving of a wheatsheaf and I rode beneath it into the rain-soaked courtyard and let a servant take the horse. Father Fraomar, I knew, was right. The Lord Æthelred did have the legal right to take whatever belonged to his wife because nothing belonged to her that was not his, yet still Eardwulf’s action had surprised me. Æthelred and Æthelflaed had lived for years in a state of warfare, though it was war without fighting. He had the legal power in Mercia while she had the love of the Mercians. It would have been easy enough for Æthelred to order his wife’s arrest and captivity, but her brother was the King of Wessex, and Mercia only survived because the West Saxons came to its rescue whenever enemies pressed too hard. And so husband and wife hated each other, tolerated each other, and pretended that no feud existed, which was why Æthelflaed took such care to fly her husband’s banner.
I was daydreaming of taking revenge on Eardwulf as I ducked through the tavern’s door. I was dreaming of gutting him or beheading him or listening to his pleas for mercy while I held Raven-Beak at his throat. The bastard, I thought, the snivelling, pompous, grease-haired, arrogant bastard.
‘Earsling,’ a harsh voice challenged me from beside the Wheatsheaf’s hearth. ‘What rancid demon brought you here to spoil my day?’ I stared. And stared. Because the last person I had ever expected to see in Æthelred’s stronghold of Gleawecestre was staring at me. ‘Well, earsling,’ he demanded, ‘what are you doing here?’
It was my father.
My son looked tired and angry. He was wet, covered in mud, his hair was like a damp haystack after a good romp, and one of his boots was slashed. The leather was stained black where a blade had pierced his calf, but he was not limping so I had no need to worry about him, except that he was gaping at me like a moonstruck idiot. ‘Don’t just stare at me, idiot,’ I told him, ‘buy me some ale. Tell the girl you want it from the black barrel. Sihtric, it’s good to see you.’
‘And you, lord,’ Sihtric said.
‘Father!’ my son said, still gaping.
‘Who did you think it was?’ I asked. ‘The holy ghost?’ I made room on the bench. ‘Sit beside me,’ I told Sihtric, ‘and tell me some news. Stop gawping,’ I said to Uhtred, ‘and have one of the girls bring us some ale. From the black barrel!’
‘Why the black barrel, lord?’ Sihtric asked as he sat.
‘It’s brewed from our barley,’ I explained, ‘he keeps it for people he likes.’ I leaned back against the wall. It hurt to bend forward, it hurt even to sit upright, it hurt to breathe. Everything hurt, yet it was a marvel that I lived at all. Cnut Longsword had near killed me with his blade Ice-Spite and it was small consolation that Serpent-Breath had sliced his throat in the same heartbeat that his sword had broken a rib and pierced my lung. ‘Christ Jesus,’ Finan had told me, ‘but the grass was slippery with blood. It looked like a Samhain pig slaughtering, it did.’
But the slipperiness had been Cnut’s blood, and Cnut was dead and his army destroyed. The Danes had been driven from much of northern Mercia and the Saxons gave thanks to their nailed god for that deliverance. Some of them doubtless prayed that they would be delivered from me too, but I lived. They were Christians, I am not, though rumours spread that it was a Christian priest who saved my life. Æthelflaed had me carried in a cart to her home in Cirrenceastre and a priest famed as a healer and bone-setter tended me. Æthelflaed said he pushed a reed through my ribs and a gust of foul air came from the hole. ‘It blew out,’ she told me, ‘and
