The Edge of Light (61 page)

The sun was hiding behind a cloud when the baptismal party issued out of the church. As they stood together near the small cemetery beside the church, waiting for their horses to be brought so they could continue on to Glastonbury, where they were to spend the night, the cloud passed over and the sun came out full strength.

An omen, Erlend thought, lifting his face to the warmth of the sky. He heard his uncle’s deep bellow of laughter and felt an unaccustomed stirring of affection.

The old pirate, he thought. He’s met his match at last, and he has the grace to acknowledge it. One has to admire him.

“You look very noble in your chrism linen, Erlend.” It was Brand’s voice, and Erlend turned to look into the familiar greenish eyes of his friend. Before he could reply, Brand said, “It was good of you to take his name for your own.”

Each of the Danes had had to take a Christian name along with the holy chrism. The name Erlend had chosen was Edgar.

“I miss him,” Erlend said simply.

“We all do.” Brand sighed. “I dread the thought of facing Flavia. She was so fond of him.”

“I know.”

They stood together in silence, each busy with his own thoughts; then there was a stir as the groomsmen who were holding the horses began to bring them up. Within ten minutes the whole party was on the way to Glastonbury.

After passing one night in the guesthouses in Glastonbury, the entire christening party, with the addition of Elswyth and her children, proceeded on to Wedmore to spend the following weeks. The royal manor of Wedmore was situated on the edge of the Somerset marshes, near the foot of the Mendip hills. Its remoteness had saved it from being raided by the Danes during the recent invasion, and now it stood, well-stocked with food by its reeve, ready to play host to the king’s new-baptized guests.

The reeve was not alone in waiting to welcome Alfred and his party. Standing beside the small round man Erlend remembered from a previous visit was a tall thin red-haired thane with a distinctly nervous expression on his face. With a shock of disbelief, Erlend recognized Athelwold.

“Name of the Raven,” he said, “how had he the nerve to show his face here?”

“Alfred sent for him,” came Brand’s laconic reply. “As you can see from the look on his face, it was not Athelwold’s idea,”

Erlend turned to stare at Brand. “What does Alfred mean to do with him?”

Brand shrugged. “He has not confided in me.”

As the two men watched, Athelwold came forward to hold his uncle’s bridle. Alfred spoke to him briefly, dismounted, then turned to lift his wife from her horse.

Erlend looked at Elswyth. Her eyes were on her husband’s nephew, and Erlend shivered at the look he saw in that inimical dark blue stare.

“Athelwold had better keep his distance from Elswyth.” It was Brand, as discerning an observer as Erlend was. “From the look in her eye, she would put a dagger in him as soon as not.”

“She might do even worse,” Erlend said. “She might put him in the path of Flavia and Edward.”

Brand grinned, and shivered dramatically. “I might like to put a knife into Athelwold myself, but I have never been a man for torture,” he said.

Both men laughed and swung down from their saddles.

Athelwold had disappeared into the hall. Elswyth’s voice came clear. “I would like to tear his eyes out!” she was saying to her husband.

Alfred put an arm about her shoulders and began to walk her toward the hall, his head bent to hers, his voice pitched for only her ears to hear.

Erlend sighed with profound satisfaction. He was home.

“He is the son of my brother, Elswyth,” Alfred said to his wife much later that evening when they were alone together in their bedchamber. Elswyth had retired from the feast early, but she was still awake when at last Alfred parted from his guests and came into their room.

“I do not care whose son he is,” Elswyth returned now fiercely. She was sitting up in bed, propped against some pillows. Even by the dim light of a single candle, Alfred could see how her eyes were flashing. “He is a traitor! Were he anyone else, you would have him hanged. You know you would.”

He replied pacifically, “I do not deny that. But he is not anyone else. He is Athelstan’s son, and I cannot harm him.” He was undressing, laying his clothes with his usual methodical neatness in a folded pile on the garment chest.

“He would have harmed you! He would have you killed in the most vile and bloody way—”

“I know. I know. I am not excusing him.” He pulled his tunic over his head, emerging with ruffled flyaway hair. “Nor am I saying I will ever trust him. I am simply saying that I cannot hang him, thirsty though you may be for his blood.”

Her mouth curled downward. “You are making a mistake.”

“Perhaps I am. But I cannot do otherwise. I would never rest easy knowing I had taken the life of my father’s grandson. No matter what he may have done.”

Mutinous silence came from the bed.

He was down to his headband, which he untied and laid carefully on top of the pile of clothes. “If you could get your hands on Ceolwulf, would you hang him?”

“It is not the same thing,” came her impatient reply. “Ceolwulf is not worth the hanging.”

“Neither is Athelwold.”

Elswyth let out an explosive breath. “I hate to argue with you, Alfred! You always turn things about so it seems that you are in the right!”

Alfred grinned. “Guthrum admires you,” he said to change the subject. “He told me he thought you were very beautiful.” He began to walk toward the bed.

Elswyth snorted, not impressed by the Dane’s compliment.

“He also said he’d wager you were good in bed.”

“What!”

“But what impressed him most of all,” Alfred continued, ignoring her seething outrage and climbing in beside her, “was when I told him you had personally trained all the horses we robbed from him at Wilton. He was much taken with the improvement in them when he reannexed them at Wantage.”

“It seems to me you are getting much too friendly with that disreputable Viking,” Elswyth said severely. “Don’t forget, Alfred. That is the man who almost stole your kingdom.”

“I am not like to forget that, my love.”

He held out an arm and she nestled cozily into the hollow of his shoulder. “Do you really think you can trust him this time?” she asked.

The teasing note had quite left his voice when he answered, “I think so, but I promise you I have no intention of relaxing my vigilance. Wessex must be put into a perpetual state of readiness. I doubt we shall see real peace in my lifetime, Elswyth.”

She pressed her cheek against the warm bare skin of his shoulder. “So Guthrum will continue to be King of Mercia and East Anglia,” she said.

His arm around her tightened. “I am sorry, love. There is naught I can do for Mercia now. Our task is to hold out here in Wessex. For the moment we must leave it to Ethelred to lead the Mercian resistance. Ethelred and your brother Athulf. And perhaps someday Edward, who is half Mercian himself, will be able to take a more effective stand than I can.”

A little silence fell as she considered this thought. Then she asked, “What will you do here in Wessex?”

“I will build the fortified burghs we have talked about before. And I must work out a system that will enable me to keep an army in the field at all seasons. This coming and going of the fyrd is disastrous.”

“Mmm.” He felt the tickle of her long lashes as they brushed against his bare skin. He moved his hand up and down her shoulder in a slow, deliberate caress and touched his lips to the satin smoothness of her crown.

He said lazily, “And I must begin to seek out men of learning, teachers who will come to Wessex to help restore the civilization we have lost during these many years of struggle.”

“I knew we would get down to the books eventually,” came Elswyth’s husky voice.

He chuckled. “You know me too well.”

“What will Erlend do now?” she murmured. “Will he return to Denmark?”

He dropped a soft kiss on her hair. “I don’t know what he will do. Poor boy. He said to me the other day that he had been in England for so long that he was like a creature torn between two worlds.”

“I don’t think he would be happy in Denmark,” Elswyth said. “Of all that fierce crew you have had baptized, Erlend is the only one with the soul of a Christian.”

“I know. I invited him to remain in Wessex if he wished.”

“That was nice.”

“Elswyth …”

“Mmm?” She tilted her face up to look at him, and her long hair streamed across his arm like an ebony mantle.

“I told Guthrum you were
very
good in bed,” he said.

Her eyes narrowed to mere slits. Even half-hidden and dimly lit, they still looked blue. “You didn’t,” she returned.

A faint smile came across his eyebrows and eyes. “How do you know?”

“You are only saying that to pay me back for telling you you had bugs in your hair.”

He grinned.

“But I love you anyway,” she said, her voice at its huskiest, her long slim fingers running now over his torso, loving the lean-muscled feel of him, loving the smoothness of his skin, its lovely golden color.

“God, Elswyth. I missed you so much.” He slid down in the bed, carefully drawing her with him, conscious always of the child she carried within.

“I missed you too,” she whispered.

He turned on his side and drew her against him, not wanting to put his weight on her in any way. She wound her arms about his neck and responded with a torrid kiss. He made love to her with his own special mixture of fierceness and gentleness and they went to sleep wrapped in each other’s arms.

For twelve days the Danes remained feasting with Alfred at Wedmore. The king spared no expense to honor his guests. As an Anglo-Saxon, Alfred understood well the heroic dimensions of kingship that would impress the Danes. The king must be generous, a bracelet-giver, a sword-giver, a praise-giver. The king must entertain his followers with hunting by day and feasting and harping in his hall by night. The king’s band of retainers must offer comradeship and faithfulness to the brave and the true of heart.

All these things Alfred understood; indeed, they were as much a part of his heritage as was his Christian faith. So he knew well how to entertain Guthrum and his followers, how to bind the Danes to him with ties of friendship and respect. Alfred did not waste his time or his money during the twelve days he kept the Danes with him at Wedmore.

Such were Erlend’s thoughts as he sat at the supper board on the last night of the Danes’ stay at Wedmore, pretending to listen to one of Guthrum’s jarls reliving the day’s hunt. The serving folk were clearing away the supper dishes and Erlend’s eyes followed a particularly pretty girl as she piled platters on top of each other and then went toward the door. The girl went out and Erlend next turned his eyes toward the high seat, even as he made noises of acknowledgment to the garrulous jarl beside him.

Guthrum and Alfred sat side by side on the high seat this night, as they had on every other night of Guthrum’s stay at Wedmore. Elswyth sat at the trestle table directly to Alfred’s left, having gracefully relinquished her accustomed place to the Dane.

Guthrum and Alfred were talking together. Guthrum’s Saxon had greatly improved during his stay at Wedmore, and the two kings seemed to be conversing with little difficulty.

It amused and somewhat awed Erlend to see his powerful uncle so under the sway of Alfred of Wessex. Guthrum was convinced that the West Saxon king possessed strong magic. Perhaps he did, Erlend thought now. Alfred certainly cast a spell on men. He had cast one on Erlend, that was for certain.

The serving folk had finished with the supper dishes and now the hum of talk in the hall began to die down as Alfred rose to his feet. Erlend looked around the crowded hall, blazingly lit by torches burning every few feet along the tapestry-hung walls, The smell of food still lingered in the air, rising with the smoke toward the smoke hole in the roof. The fire was burning steadily in the central hearth, throwing light from the center of the room to meet with the light from the torches on the walls.

The king began to speak, and Erlend’s eyes swung instantly back toward the high seat.

Alfred began by honoring Guthrum’s prowess in the hunt that day and expressing his belief in the friendship that now bound the two kings together as brothers. A small sound from the door drew Erlend’s attention, and he turned to see the serving girl he had noticed earlier slipping back into the hall to listen to the king, Nor was she alone; a crowd of serving folk had come with her and they all clustered quietly by the door.

She was really very pretty, Erlend thought, noticing the burnished copper of her hair. She had no eyes for him, however. All of her attention was on the king. Slowly Erlend turned his eyes back to Alfred.

“When all is well in the land,” Alfred was saying, “praise for that goes to the king. But no man can show any skill, or exercise or control any power, without tools and materials. I will tell you now what are a king’s materials, the tools with which he must govern. They are a land well-peopled with men of prayer”—here Alfred looked toward his priest—”men of war”— the golden eyes went around the circle of thanes—”and men of work” —now the king looked gravely at the cluster of serving folk at the door. Erlend had thought he was the only one to notice them come in.

The room was perfectly quiet, as it always was when Alfred spoke. The copper-haired serving girl’s face was lit as brightly as one of the torches that flamed on the walls, How was it, Erlend wondered, that no matter how large the group, when you listened to Alfred you always had the distinct feeling that he was speaking directly to you?

“Without these tools,” Alfred was continuing, “no king can do his work. Furthermore, besides these tools, the king must have material. By that I mean he must have provision for the three classes to live on: land, gifts, weapons, meat, ale, clothes, and whatever else they may need. Without these the king cannot preserve the tools, and without the tools he cannot accomplish anything that he ought to do.”

This is why I love him,
Erlend thought as he watched Alfred standing there before his people. Easy to be generous with gifts of gold. All good leaders knew how to do that. Gold was one thing, but sharing fame, sharing credit, that was something else. That was the test of true generosity. And to go so far as to include the lowest minions in the land! Men of work.