Daughter of the Wolf (26 page)

‘I only gather fallen apples, Mother.' He paused, and when he spoke again his voice had softened. ‘Besides, this one's different.'

‘
Fallen apples?
She's still a bride.'

‘She's no innocent.' Still that smile in his voice.

There was a pause, then Abarhild, snappish: ‘That's not what I meant. I know that girl, remember. You're not giving that marriage a chance.'

‘You don't understand. This one's different. Not since Athulf's mother—'

‘I don't want to lose you.' Abarhild voice cracked with emotion. ‘In this world or the next.'

There was silence.

Elfrun could feel her cheeks heating still further. A sudden horror of being caught eavesdropping had her backing away from the threshold, still clutching the now crumpled linen. She turned to find Fredegar contemplating her from the door of the church, his psalter in his hand.

‘Next,' the priest said quietly, ‘my lord abbot will protest how sorry he is, and she will say she's ashamed to have given birth to him and make him promise to stop, and he will tell her he's her good boy.' Fredegar's fastidious tones told Elfrun more than she wanted to know.

‘This happens often.'

‘Let us say I've heard it before.' The priest jerked his head. ‘Come on. Don't worry about him.'

Elfrun flinched at the cold distaste in Fredegar's voice. ‘He'll have to behave better when my father comes home.' Ingeld's words were still ringing in her ears.
This one's different...
Who could the woman be, to have put such a soft edge on her uncle's wry, mocking voice? But she couldn't imagine asking such a question of the sallow, austere man walking at her side.

‘Your father coming home. Would that change the way the abbot behaves?'

She looked at him in surprise. ‘Of course. Everyone always does what my father tells them to.'

Fredegar was silent. They went into the church, and Fredegar lit a candle. She joined him in a brief prayer to St Agatha, on this her feast day, and Elfrun settled herself on the bench that ran along the north wall of the church, looking up at Fredegar expectantly, more than ready for the distraction of Latin verbs. But instead of sitting down beside her and opening the book as usual he stood looking down at her, a frown pulling his dark brows together and making him look more aquiline than ever.

‘What is it, Father? Is it too dark to read? Should we light more candles?' He was silent for a moment; then to her surprise he reached under the collar of his robe and tugged a leather thong over his head. A little bone cross dangled before her eyes. ‘What's that?'

‘You didn't make it?'

‘No.'

‘You haven't seen it before? Are you sure?'

She was indignant. ‘Why are you asking? Where did it come from?'

Fredegar jerked his chin towards the door. ‘Come on.'

‘But it's too cold outside!' Elfrun was confused. ‘The wind's right off the sea this morning.'

‘The wind here is always off the damned sea.' Fredegar was already standing in the open door. ‘I shouldn't go on teaching you, not until we know whether your father would approve.'

‘But—'

‘And I shouldn't be alone with you. Your uncle's reputation taints all Donmouth minster.'

‘Reputation. You mean...?' Elfrun frowned at him. ‘People would never believe that of you!'

He tilted an eyebrow. ‘Of course they would. And you as well. They're probably gossiping already. Don't be childish. You're not a child.'

Elfrun pulled herself up tall. ‘Of course I'm not a child.'

‘Your grandmother has been talking of making you a nun. She has the right of it. Why didn't your father send you to some convent, for safety, before he left?'

‘Because my father wants me to run the hall. This is where I belong.' She shook her head. ‘What do you mean, making me a nun?'

‘Would that be so bad? Leaving you here, in charge of this' – he gestured broadly in the direction of the hall – ‘it's lunacy. What if the sea-wolves attacked?'

‘The sea-wolves haven't attacked our shores for a decade,' she said furiously. ‘And besides—'

‘Not yours perhaps.'

‘Our king is too strong—'

‘You have no idea what you're talking about.' The flat certainty in his voice startled her into silence. ‘Do you think they've gone away? Ask the men of Kent. Ask the traders of Dorestad. Ask the brethren of Redon, or Saint-Florent.' He paused, and then added, ‘Or my own old home of Noyon.'

She felt numb with sudden fear, lips cold and belly tight. ‘What – what happened at Noyon?'

Fredegar closed his eyes. She waited, but in the end, eyes still closed, he just shook his head.

‘It might help you,' she said hesitantly, ‘to unlock...' She was afraid of blundering in, but she couldn't imagine that it was good for him to bar and bolt himself away like that. But she was equally afraid of what he might have to say, if he did decide to tell her about the scenes which she was convinced were playing themselves out behind his eyelids. ‘Father?'

Slowly he opened his eyes. ‘I am sorry, child. I didn't mean to frighten you. But as to why you are still in the house of your father – well, it puzzles me. And until he returns, no more Latin lessons.' He was already at the door. She tried to hide her anger, bred from disappointment. He was Abarhild's servant to command, not hers.

‘But what about the counting, and the record-keeping?'

‘No.'

‘What if I ask my grandmother to chaperone me?'

But he shook his head.

Luda tugged the cloak more tightly around his head and shoulders. He knew he was a distinctive enough figure, with his thick grey curls and his limp, but he had hopes, on this dreich evening, of passing unremarked by curious eyes. There was a whole quarter, in the lee of York's great minster, of craftsmen and artists who served the archbishop, and also the king and the great men of the court. One of them was his cousin, Beonna, a fine leather-worker who could make a beautifully patterned cover for a little gospel-book as easily as shape a gauntlet for a falconer.

Luda had been the lynchpin in cutting a deal for Donmouth that meant Beonna had first claim on the best of their lambskins. A good deal for Radmer; a good one for Beonna; and happy clients who could rely on the quality of raw material and craftsmanship alike. And a very good deal for Luda. For the last several lambing seasons Beonna had been accepting some of the finest of both tanned and tawed skins from Donmouth's flock above the board, and just a few below, with the silver from the latter finding its way into Luda's pouch. A little, thin-voiced, singing-jingling trickle of possibility, getting faintly but steadily sweeter, year on year on year.

But things were different now. Better. The shepherd was bound to him by kinship ties. Radmer had gone away. And the old witch had gone into retirement at the minster, leaving that arrogant snip of a girl in charge. Elfrun, who thought she knew everything that was needed to run hall and estate. Luda snorted. That little trickle could be enticed to run more freely now.

To get to the craftsmen's quarter the path took his feet past the office of the archbishop's own officious steward and, though there was no good reason for anyone to object to him visiting his cousin, Luda pulled his cloak even tighter.

Radmer trusted him, without question. They had been boys together.

Radmer was a fool.

Big, stupid Radmer, who saw enemies everywhere outside his own bounds, and never stopped to think that the people who hated him most might be right under his nose. Radmer, who took his health and his wealth and power for granted.

Luda knew he would never take his silver for granted. Sometimes he lifted his little bag of coins down from the rafters while his household was snoring, and took it out into the chicken run at night to let the little discs flow through his fingers; and nothing in all his forty-odd years had ever given him so much pleasure. He didn't even know exactly what he was going to do with the money. It represented wonderful possibilities, the idea of freedom, a sweet embodiment of his own superiority, his greater cunning.

Freedom. Whatever that meant.

No, he knew. Getting away from being Radmer's enforcer, from the menial round of stewardship. And more: away from the sharp-tongued, grey-faced woman he was married to, and the endless procession of babies. Seventeen years of babies, puking and screaming, and half of them dying, and nothing to look forward to when they did come through but sulky, ungrateful creatures that glowered at him to his face and slacked in their work when they thought he wasn't looking.

Luda knew he had a name for being a heavy father, and he despised the people who criticized him for it. Give them a daughter like Saethryth, and see how they responded.

One possibility would be to go south, to one of the rich monasteries of Lindsey, to Bardney or Louth or Caistor, hand over his purse and retire, much as that old besom Abarhild had done at Donmouth. Nothing to do but sit in the sun or by the fire, depending on the season, rest his ever-painful leg, shuffle through a few services, let someone bring him a bowl of broth morning, noon and night.

The vision had its charms.

But not yet, and certainly not while Radmer was still away.

He had twenty-five silver pennies. Once it would have seemed wealth beyond all dreaming. Now he knew he would not be content until he had fifty.

He ducked down the narrow alleyway that led to his cousin's house and workshop, in the muddy triangle of land between the rivers. Bad for flooding, but good for business, with the ships putting into the low, shelving river foreshore that made a fine trading station. And closely managed by the archbishop's steward, but not closely enough, not for men who knew a thing or two.

Beonna didn't even look up as Luda stooped under the lintel of the workshop that fronted his lodging.

‘Did you bring them?' His lack of teeth slurred his words. The little room was gloomy, smelling of old leather and damp thatch.

‘Yes.' Luda unhooked the satchel and brought out the sheaf of skins.

At that Beonna did turn round, his forehead corrugating. ‘These your best?'

‘Some of them.' He grinned.

‘I thought you weren't coming.' Beonna indicated the rushlights. ‘Too dark to work. I've been hanging on, waiting for you.' He sniffed. ‘Wouldn't have been the first time.'

Been waiting, had he? Then let him wait. Beonna thought he was an important man because king and archbishop sent their servants to him. Let him learn how dependent he was on getting the finest lamb-leather, at a price that meant he could undercut those ever-hungry rivals. A place in the archbishop's quarter always attracted envy. Luda riffled the sheaf of lambskins knowingly. ‘Want to check their quality?'

Beonna just grunted and held out a thick-veined hand. He took his time, running his fingers over hairside and skinside, looking for holes, wrinkles, flexing each sheet and tilting it this way and that in the dim, guttering light.

Let him look. Luda knew these half-dozen skins were flawless. He had done the same himself, and in full daylight.

Beonna sniffed again but he said nothing, and Luda felt a little thrill of satisfaction. His cousin had been longing to find some flaw that would mean he could beat down the price, and he had found nothing.

‘Is this all? I had a dozen from you last year. Of the special ones.' Beonna winked, and Luda grinned back at him.

‘Another twenty of this quality. Around forty almost as good.'

That surprised him. ‘Sixty? Below the board, you mean? So many?'

Luda shrugged. ‘A bad year for the lambs, according to my records. A good year for you and me.'

‘And Radmer gone to Rome.' Beonna sucked his gums and nodded.

‘As you say.' Their eyes met in full understanding.

‘What about the girl?'

‘As simple as her father. She doesn't understand the half I tell her.'

‘And the shepherd married your daughter, I hear.' Beonna's face took on a knowing expression. ‘Keeps him too busy for the flock, does she? I've heard other things, as well.' He dropped a wink.

Luda sat up straighter. ‘What have you heard?'

Beonna raised a hand. ‘Steady! I don't reckon much to idle chatter, you know me too well for that.'

The man did little else, when he wasn't at his bench. But Luda knew he would do better to swallow the lie. ‘You've heard something.'

Another of those crude, lingering winks. ‘We know your shiny new abbot fine well in York, remember.' The next wink was augmented by a toothless smirk. ‘He comes by here often enough. He buys my work. A man of taste. Gloves. Shoes. We all like to hear that he's happy.'

Luda was thinking fast, feeling for what the man was saying in the gaps between his words. He waved a hand, pretending that none of what Beonna was saying was new to him, or interesting. ‘Let's get back to the lambskins.' He reached out a hand. ‘Seen enough?'

Beonna shrugged. ‘I'll take what you can give me.'

‘Price?'

‘Same as last year. I can give you bronze now, or silver later.' Beonna riffled through the skins again.

‘The same?'

‘No. You can have more if you take bronze.'

Luda narrowed his eyes. The handy little bronze coins from the York mint were useful where the rule of Northumbria's king held good, but he knew fine well they were sneered at south of the Humber. ‘Silver. I'll be back in two weeks with the rest.'

‘I hope you've a safe place for all that silver.' Beonna shook his head. ‘What are you going to do with it?'

But two could play at that old game of never giving a straight answer. Luda just shrugged and turned away.

After a winter of the stuff Abarhild was so sick of eating whale.