horse clasp pinning his cloak.
'My daughter-in-law,' Ulf said sharply as he saw Rolf's scrutiny. 'And my son is a proud and jealous man.'
'If I was staring, it was because she reminded me of someone close to my heart,' Rolf said and immediately dropped his gaze.
Ulf grunted. 'I said that your accent was not south Saxon, but still, you speak the language well for a foreigner.'
'Sometimes words will unlock a door where a sword will only snap off in the keyhole,' Rolf said, and thought of the times that he and Ailith had sat before the hearth, each learning the other's language, exasperated and delighted by turns.
'Aye, I suppose it is more diplomatic to oil a lock with a long tongue than it is to thrust a sword in it, but I have no trust in empty words. Rather the truth of the sword than a larding of falsehood.'
'Amen to that. I bring good silver with which to trade.'
Ulf sucked his teeth and nodded slowly. 'You are either a very brave or a very foolish man. We are not dullards or cowards to be duped or frightened into giving you what you desire. It may be that you will not leave here alive.'
'I have felt so much in my gut,' Rolf agreed. 'But you have given me the protection of this house by offering me food and drink. The laws of hospitality are sacred. And I judge to look at this place that you are not only Ulf the Horse-trader, but Ulf the Thegn, the leader of this village. Your people will do as you bid them.'
Amusement glinted in the deep-set eyes. 'You are wily, Norman,' Ulf conceded. 'It will be a pleasure to bargain with you over the animals you desire to buy, but you should temper your confidence. My leg is broken, and for the moment my son Beorn wears the mantle of leadership.'
The woman returned with a woven basket containing flat loaves and a shallow wooden bowl holding fatty slices carved from a bacon flitch. Her daughter bore a pitcher of ale with laborious care, and the boy carried yet another container that held a collection of drinking cups, their wood still dark and damp from having been recently washed. With lowered eyes, the woman set about serving the men. Rolf studiously avoided looking at her, but he was aware of her presence nevertheless. Ulf eyed him. 'My son fought the Norwegians at Stamford Bridge, and he fought the Normans far to the south,' he said.
'He was one of the fortunate ones, he managed to escape in the confusion at dusk when King Harold fell. I am told that we have a Norman overlord now, but we have never seen him. As far as we are concerned, the north is still free.'
Rolf made the sign of the Cross over the bread in an absent-minded fashion born of automatic habit, accepted a sprinkle of coarse salt as he broke the crust, and returned Ulf's piercing glance. 'Your son Beorn, he greeted our party in full battle-kit?'
Ulf's expression was suddenly cautious. 'What of it?'
'He must have been dressed that way before we came. There was no time for him to arm up between the swineherd crying the alarm and our arrival. Surely he does not keep order in the village by wearing a mail coat and brandishing a battle axe?'
'My son thinks you are a spy from the Norman army. We hear that one has crossed the Humber.'
'Indeed it has. I travelled with it for protection along the way.' Rolf tried to sound nonchalant as he helped himself to a chunk of the greasy bacon. It tasted much better than it looked.
'You need have no fear,' he added with a brief glance at the woman, who had stiffened and drawn her children into her arms. 'They will not approach this village. Indeed, their commander told me that I was mad to leave the beaten track and seek you out.'
'He was probably right,' Ulf said grimly, 'but he is no less mad himself to venture into these parts. You asked me why my son wears his battle-kit? I say that it is no business of yours. Only be thankful that you are not still travelling with the Norman soldiers. Now, eat and drink, and we will talk of trade.'
CHAPTER 25
Spring bulbs were pushing blunt green shoots through the black soil beds in Ulverton's kitchen garden. Some of the more precocious plants were in bloom. Ailith regarded with pleasure this sign that the dark winter season was ending. The months following Yule were always the most difficult to bear.
Tancred had arrived from Normandy yester eve with messages for Rolf and a delivery of some yearling mares. But his lord was still absent. There had been no word of his whereabouts since the New Year when he had ridden north with Robert de Comminges.
Ailith was worried, although she tried to keep her fears to herself. As a child, a native Saxon child, she had always harboured a fear of the northern parts. Fed tales of savage Vikings by her brothers, there had been a time when she had woken screaming every night, certain that a murderous Norseman was going to burst into the sleeping loft and separate her head from her body with a dripping sword.
Ailith could feel Tancred's eyes on her in speculation as they sat down in the hall to break their fast after attending mass in the chapel. Since their first, unfortunate encounter on the shore, she had been unable to fault the man's behaviour. He was unswervingly polite, treating her with a grave courtesy that was so correct she wondered if it was false. His son was of an unsmiling, serious mien, but hard-working and unobtrusive. With his snub nose and wide, grey eyes, he could easily have been mistaken for a Saxon child, and Ailith had accepted him with an easiness that was totally absent in her dealings with his father.
'Perhaps Lord Rolf will be here today,' she said, partly from courtesy, partly to voice her concerns before they exploded within her. 'He knew that you were due before the feast of the Virgin.'
Tancred smiled wryly. 'When Lord Rolf is on a trail, nothing else matters to him. There is no-one as keen- scented as he when it comes to seeking out a good horse. If you showed him a hundred destriers, all looking much alike, and asked him to pick the best, he would know straight away which animal to choose. It is an instinct of the gut, and few men have it.'
'What does his wife say of his long absences?'
Tancred eyed her warily as they sat down before the hearth to eat their griddle cakes. 'She is not pleased, of course, but it is the lot of many Norman women whose husbands are still in Duke William's service over here. She knows that my lord is working to increase his fortune and standing, and that his endeavours can only benefit their daughter when it comes time for her to wed. 'And of course,' he added neutrally, 'Lady Arlette knows that whatever indiscretions her lord may commit, he will always return to her. It has been so since the day they married.
Ailith coloured at his implication and finished her food in hostile silence. She was torn two ways. One direction led to vexation that Tancred should consider her an 'indiscretion' when nothing the least indiscreet had occurred between Rolf and herself. The other led to a surge of jealous insecurity over the information that Rolf always returned to his wife. She stood at a crossroads, torn and aching. Into her mind there came a picture of Goldwin, solid and dependable, his eyes alight with a love that was hers alone to command, and then she saw Benedict as a baby, suckling at her breast, depending on her for his very life. All that lay in the past, her memories both a salvation and a curse.
Irritated with herself, she repaired to the stables and ordered the groom to saddle up the small chestnut mare. Elfa, as Ailith had named her, pricked her ears and whickered through her soft muzzle. The young woman fed her a crust of bread left over from the morning meal and followed it with a wrinkled apple from the store. Elfa crunched the treats greedily and searched for more. When the groom led her out of her stall, Ailith saw with misgiving that the little mare was already too fat. I should ride her more often, she thought. Rolf would be annoyed when he saw her. None of his horses was allowed to carry surplus flesh or lose condition for want of exercise.
The groom held Elfa steady at the mounting block while Ailith gained the saddle. The leather was cold on the bare skin of her upper thighs between her long hose and her loin cloth. She found the stirrups and kicked with her heels. Elfa broke into a reluctant trot. The thrust and fall of the mare's spine set up a tingling between Ailith's thighs and she shifted uncomfortably, disturbed by other memories of herself and Goldwin in the early days of their
