‘A desperate fool,’ Osferth added, ‘but a fool who knows this is his last chance to gain the throne.’
‘He’ll not have my help,’ I promised Hild.
‘Just bring her back,’ Hild said, and we rode to do just that.
A small army went westwards. At its heart was Steapa and the king’s bodyguard, and every warrior in Wintanceaster who possessed a horse joined in. It was a bright day, the sky clearing of the clouds that had brought so much rain. Our route took us across the wild lands of southern Wessex where the deer and wild ponies ranged across forest and moor and where the hoof-prints of ?thelwold’s band were easy to follow because the ground was so damp. Edward rode a little behind the vanguard, and with him was a standard-bearer flying the white dragon banner. Edward’s priest, Father Coenwulf, his black skirts draped on his horse’s rump, kept pace with the king, as did two ealdormen, ?thelnoth and ?thelhelm. ?thelred came too, he could hardly avoid an expedition to rescue his wife, but he and his followers stayed with the rearguard, well away from where Edward and I rode, and I remember thinking that we were too many, that a half-dozen men were enough to cope with a fool like ?thelwold.
Other men joined us, leaving their halls to follow the king’s standard, and by the time we left the moorland we must have numbered over three hundred horsemen. Steapa had sent scouts ahead, but they sent no news back, which suggested ?thelwold was waiting behind his hall’s palisade. At one point I spurred my horse off the road and up a low hill to look ahead and Edward pointedly joined me, leaving his guard behind. ‘My father,’ he said, ‘told me I can trust you.’
‘Do you doubt his word, lord King?’ I asked.
‘While my mother says you can’t be trusted.’
I laughed at that. ?lswith, Alfred’s wife, had always hated me, and it was a mutual feeling. ‘Your mother has never approved of me,’ I said mildly.
‘And Beocca tells me you want to kill my children,’ he spoke resentfully.
‘That isn’t my decision, lord King,’ I said, and he looked surprised. ‘Your father,’ I explained, ‘should have slit ?thelwold’s throat twenty years ago, but he didn’t. Your worst enemies, lord King, aren’t the Danes. They’re the men closest to you who want your crown. Your illegitimate children will be a problem for your legitimate sons, but it isn’t my problem. It’s yours.’
He shook his head. This was our first moment alone together since his father’s death. I knew he liked me, but he was also nervous of me. He had only ever known me as a warrior and, unlike his sister, he had never been close to me as a child. He said nothing for a while, but watched the small army file westwards beneath us, its banners bright in the sun. The land gleamed from all the rain. ‘They’re not illegitimate,’ he finally spoke softly. ‘I married Ecgwynn. I married her in a church, before God.’
‘Your father disagreed,’ I said.
Edward shuddered, ‘He was angry. So was my mother.’
‘And Ealdorman ?thelhelm, lord King?’ I asked. ‘He can’t be happy that his daughter’s children won’t be the eldest.’
His jaw tightened. ‘He was assured I didn’t marry,’ he said distantly.
So Edward had surrendered to his parents’ anger. He had agreed to the fiction that his children by Lady Ecgwynn were bastards, but it was apparent that he was unhappy with that surrender. ‘Lord,’ I said, ‘you’re king now. You can raise the twins as your legitimate children. You’re king.’
‘I offend ?thelhelm,’ he asked plaintively, ‘and how long do I stay king?’ ?thelhelm was the wealthiest of Wessex’s nobles, the most powerful voice in the Witan, and a man much liked in the kingdom. ‘My father always insisted that the Witan could make or unmake a king,’ Edward said, ‘and my mother insists I listen to their advice.’
‘You’re the eldest son,’ I said, ‘so you’re king.’
‘Not if ?thelhelm and Plegmund refuse to support me,’ Edward said.
‘True,’ I agreed grudgingly.
‘So the twins must be treated as though they’re illegitimate,’ he said, still unhappy, ‘and stay bastards until I have the power to decree otherwise. And till then they must be kept safe, so they’re going to my sister’s care.’
‘To my care,’ I said flatly.
‘Yes,’ he said. He looked at me searchingly. ‘So long as you promise not to kill them.’
I laughed. ‘I don’t kill babies, lord King. I wait till they grow up.’
‘They must grow up,’ he said, then frowned. ‘You don’t condemn me for sin, do you?’
‘Me! I’m your pagan, lord,’ I said, ‘what do I care about sin?’
‘Then care for my children,’ he said.
‘I will, lord King,’ I promised.
‘And tell me what I do about ?thelred,’ he said.
I stared down at my cousin’s troops, who rode together as the rearguard. ‘He wants to be King of Mercia,’ I said, ‘but he knows he needs Wessex’s support if he’s to survive, so he won’t take the throne without your permission, and you won’t give that.’
‘I won’t,’ Edward said. ‘But my mother insists I need his support too.’
That wretched woman, I thought. She had always liked ?thelred and disapproved of her daughter. Yet what she said was partly true. ?thelred could bring at least a thousand men to a battlefield, and if Wessex were ever to strike against the powerful Danish lords to the north, then those men would be invaluable, but as I had told Alfred a hundred times, it was always best to reckon that ?thelred would find a thousand excuses to keep his warriors at home. ‘So what is ?thelred asking of you?’
Edward did not answer directly. Instead he looked up at the sky, then westwards again. ‘He hates you.’
‘And your sister,’ I said flatly.
He nodded. ‘He wants ?thelflaed returned to…’ he began, but then stopped speaking because a horn sounded.
‘He wants ?thelflaed in his hall or else locked away in a convent,’ I said.
‘Yes,’ Edward said, ‘that’s what he wants.’ He stared down at the road from where the horn had sounded a second time. ‘But they want me,’ he said, looking to where Father Coenwulf waved towards us. I could see a couple of Steapa’s men galloping towards the vanguard. Edward dug in his spurs and we cantered to the head of the column where we discovered the two scouts had brought in a priest who half fell from his saddle to kneel before the king.
‘Lord, lord King!’ the priest gasped. He was out of breath.
‘Who are you?’ Edward asked.
‘Father Edmund, lord.’
He had come from Wimburnan where he was the priest and he told how ?thelwold had raised his banner in the town and declared himself King of Wessex.
‘He did what?’ Edward asked.
‘He made me read a proclamation, lord, outside Saint Cuthberga’s.’
‘He’s calling himself king?’
‘He says he’s King of Wessex, lord. He’s demanding that men come and swear allegiance to him.’
‘How many men were there when you left?’ I asked.
‘I don’t know, lord,’ Father Edmund said.
‘Did you see a woman?’ Edward asked. ‘My sister?’
‘The Lady ?thelflaed? Yes, lord, she was with him.’
‘Does he have twenty men?’ I asked. ‘Or two hundred?’
‘I don’t know, lord. A lot.’
‘He sent messengers to other lords?’ I asked.
‘To his thegns, lord. He sent me. I’m supposed to bring him men.’
‘And you found me instead,’ Edward said warmly.
‘He’s raising an army,’ I said.
‘The fyrd,’ Steapa said scornfully.
?thelwold was doing what he thought wise, but he had no wisdom. He had inherited wide estates from his father, and Alfred had been foolish enough to leave those estates untouched, and now ?thelwold was demanding that his tenants come with weapons to make an army that he presumably believed would march on Wintanceaster.
