Of the Ring of Earls (Conqueror Trilogy Book 1) Read online

  ‘We are all ruled by our wives’ caprices,’ he said. ‘We shall have to find you a bride, Earl Waltheof.’ He passed him a bowl of eels stewed with chopped herbs and onions. ‘This is an excellent dish. I commend it to you.’

  Waltheof took a piece of bread to scoop up the mixture, at the same time remembering how, that last night at home at Ryhall, he had lain with Elfgive and considered taking a wife. But he had never contemplated that it should be other than an English wife.

  The sky had darkened now, the sun obscured behind massive clouds and the wind sharpened increasingly. The Archbishop presently excused himself, and Malet, wishing he had not eaten so much, went off ostensibly with the excuse that he must see how the young Atheling fared.

  William glanced at Waltheof. ‘Come with me, my friend, and we two will stand firm and watch this-storm out, even if every other man turns the colour of that cheese there.’ The rising wind was lashing the sea and the land before them seemed to rise and fall in a manner calculated to affect all but the strongest stomachs. The March air grew colder now that the sun had gone and Waltheof pulled his fur mantle more closely about him, steadying himself with one hand against the mast, William also held to it, the muscles in his arm taut as the ship heaved.

  He shook the water from his face and hair. ‘Tell me, my lord, are the people of the north very different from those of Wessex and the southern shires that I have met so far? Is it fertile land in Northumbria? What crops thrive?’

  Waltheof had learned to expect such questioning from the King who was insatiable when it came to learning about his new realm, and as they stood together, buffeted by the wind and drenched by spray, he thought that perhaps in this very thoroughness lay the secret of William’s success.

  By dusk the wind slackened and the ships were able to make harbour. William went ashore as alert and vigorous as usual accompanied by Waltheof, but it was a very limp and silent company for the most part who followed. However, a night’s sleep at Caudebec restored even Edgar and Earl Morcar who had come from Montgomery’s ship leaning heavily on his brother’s arm.

  News of the King’s landing had spread rapidly throughout the surrounding countryside and people flocked to line the road to Rouen. William was attended by Montgomery, Malet, Roger FitzOsbern and old Walter Giffard who bore the great banner that had been blessed by the Pope for the enterprise; he wore his battle harness and a helm surrounded by a golden coronet and from his shoulders flowed a mantle trimmed with ermine. When they saw him the people went wild with joy, cheering for their mighty Duke, the Conqueror.

  Riding with his own countrymen, Morcar said, 'What is it to them, a land they will never see?’

  Waltheof glanced at the King. ‘If it had been Harold – what would our people have cared what place he had conquered if so be he had done it?’

  Edwin was laughing and waving to a girl in the crowd. ‘Do you never leave thinking of the Godwines, Waltheof? Let them rest, for the love of God, and enjoy the King’s triumph. We are his guests and no doubt many pleasures await us.’

  The girl blew a kiss, and he laughed again, fumbling in his purse for a coin to throw to her.

  Maerlsweyn said, ‘For shame, my lord,’ but Edwin seemed not to hear him.

  Waltheof closed his mouth hard on the angry retort. He wondered if Edwin cared at all for his sister’s widowhood – she had worn the crown with Harold for so short a time. Eventually he said; ‘We may be guests, but I think we are prisoners too.’

  Edwin shrugged. ‘If all I hear of the Bastard’s hospitality is true it will be light enough captivity. Because we may throw it off when the time is ripe is no reason not to accept what Normandy can offer. .The women seem pretty enough for my taste – what say you, brother?’

  Morcar grinned. ‘I’ve had my fill of solemnity. I say let us take our pleasure now.’

  ‘You have not left a wife and children behind,’ Maerlsweyn put in quietly. ‘God knows what will happen to my land while I am gone. The Norman marauders go everywhere.’

  ‘They’ll not dare to touch anything belonging to the King’s guests,’ Edwin answered confidently. ‘Can’t you see he wants us for allies, not foes?’

  ‘I trust you may be right,’ the Sheriff said soberly, but he sounded less sanguine than the Earls.’

  ‘I am to have my lord Robert for a companion,’ Edgar put in, ‘and the King has promised me an Arab horse and a Spanish sword.’

  ‘Toys to keep you happy, child,’ Morcar said, for all as if Edgar had never been King-elect. He glanced at the fair delicate boy. ‘You may thank Almighty God the King does not consider you a rival or you’d be shut up fast in a Norman prison – as poor Ansgar is for having been Harold’s marshal.

  ‘For my part,’ Waltheof caught a bunch of spring blossom thrown to him by a dark-eyed maiden and smiled at her, thus causing her to lose all interest in the young Norman by her side, ‘for my part, I think the King means us well as long as we obey him, but when he will let us go home, I cannot guess.’

  ‘And I do not care,’ Edwin answered lightly. ‘Do you not see we are going to be feted in this land because we are different? We wear our hair longer and grow beards, and our tunics are shorter. We shall have the pick of the girls in Rouen.’

  It seemed that he was right. They all felt the backwash of the King’s triumph as they rode on, so that they waved too and smiled to the crowds and forgot that they were there because William would not leave them free at home.

  Despite the fact that it was Lent still and a cold grey day the city of Rouen was gaily decorated and yellow spring flowers strewn before the feet of the King’s charger. The streets were thronged with people shouting for joy so that the long procession had a hard time passing through to the great stone palace. Everyone stared at the fair young Englishman and all cried out in wonder at the cartloads of mighty treasure that rolled in towards the palace.

  There in the courtyard men dismounted and there was considerable confusion as countless servants rushed to and fro trying to find the important lords and guests who must be housed before the lesser fry.

  In the great hall, awaiting her lord on the dais stood the Duchess of Normandy with her children and the barons who had been left at home in charge of the Duchy. William strode to the dais and swept her into a hardy embrace, regardless of the hundreds of watching eyes.

  Waltheof, remembering King Edward’s detached treatment of Queen Edith, and Harold’s distant courtesy towards Edwin’s sister, blinked at this display of affection. Matilda of Flanders was diminutive beside her tall husband, a dignified lady, but her lively eyes showed an intelligent and animated spirit, and her pride in her husband was obvious for all to see.

  William turned then to greet his eldest son, Robert, a solid fair boy of some fourteen years who very much favoured his mother, and then Richard, darker and delicate; William, a tow-haired ten-year-old, flung his arms about his father’s waist. The King lifted him high, his face alight, before bending to kiss the three little daughters who stood demurely by their mother’s side. It was a warm domestic scene that surprised the Englishmen.

  Immediately afterwards he turned to the prelates gathered there and knelt for the blessing of the aged Maurilius, Archbishop of Rouen. Waltheof searched among the faces and wondered which might be the Abbot of St Stephen’s at Caen, the famous Lanfranc of Pavia. ‘If the Duke takes any man’s advice, it is his,’ Richard of Rules had said. His eyes alighted on one face that caught and held his attention, a thin aesthetic face, with high cheek-bones, and a long aquiline nose. Calm intensely blue eyes surveyed the scene, and Waltheof was certain at once that this and no other was the Abbot Lanfranc. He was all the more convinced when he saw, though he could not hear, the quick confidential converse between him and the King.

  Presently when it came to his turn to be presented to the Duchess, Waltheof bent the knee and kissed her hand, greeting her in Norman so that she smiled and commended him on his command of the language.

  ‘I learned it as a
child, my lady,’ he told her. He saw that she was a beautiful woman still, retaining that charm that had captivated the young Duke so many years ago when he had visited her father’s court at Brussels.

  ‘I think my husband will find it more difficult to master your language,’ she answered. ‘We learn best when we are very young, do we not?’ She turned to present him to her own children, and because he had a way with him, he was soon seated with the little lady Adela on one knee, and young William on the other while they plied him with questions about England. Their astonishing and precocious possessiveness could not but be irritating but he forced himself to smile and answer them. Only later, when he was conducted to the small tower chamber where he was to be lodged with Maerlsweyn and Thorkel, he allowed himself one burst of bitterness.

  ‘Holy Rood, will England ever belong to Englishmen again?’

  Maerlsweyn was wandering about the room, examining the furnishings, the elaborate tapestry on the wall, the silver cups on the table, the rich bedcoverings. A Norman page was busy helping Ulf to put their gear away in chests; the two boys eyed each other suspiciously, only able to communicate by signs, and Maerlsweyn gave them a cursory glance.

  ‘The lad does not seem to speak English. We can talk freely but have a care, my lord, for I fear the King will hear of anything we say that might be treasonable. I’ve no mind to end my days here.’

  Waltheof flung himself down on the rich fur coverlet of .he bed and clasped his hands behind his head. ‘Nor I. Perhaps Edwin has the better way of looking at it.’

  ‘More than forty years I’ve lived, and never thought to see free Englishmen under the Norman heel.’ The Sheriff looked out of the narrow slit window in the courtyard below. ‘God’s wounds, how these Normans do bear themselves! And the servants they keep! I wonder if we will see Wulnoth Godwineson.’

  I spoke with Messire de Rules,’ Thorkel said. ‘He told me that Wulnoth has a Norman wife and is living on her lands, but I expect he will come to Rouen.’

  ‘He will never see England again,’ Waltheof got up and began to wash his face and hands in the water Ulf brought. Outy was unpacking his earl’s robes from a chest and he was glad to shed his travel stained garments.

  A little silence fell and each man knew that the same thought was occupying them all – when would any of them see their own land again?

  A page came presently to summon them to supper and when they reached the vast, banner-hung hall such was William’s hospitality that it was hard, after all, to believe that they were prisoners. The hall was ablaze with candles, the trestles set up the length of it, the rushes on the floor newly gathered and sweet-smelling, and everywhere such rich vessels, cups and dishes of gold and silver, great salt cellars all glistening in the yellow light, together with the fine blue, green and amber glass that William had brought back from England.

  Archbishop Stigand and the Earls were bidden to sit at the King’s table, the Duchess and her ladies exerting themselves to entertain the guests and it was plain that they were all captivated by the handsome strangers.

  Waltheof was at the far end of the long board with Montgomery’s lady on one side and Hesilia, wife of William Malet on the other. He threw off the bitter mood that had seized him earlier and talked to them courteously, answering their questions. He was telling them of London when, glancing across the hall, he saw at the other end of the dais table a girl who was sitting silently by the equally silent Sheriff of Lincoln.

  She was young, not more than sixteen or seventeen years old and her hair was black and shining like silk, falling in two long braids over her breast to her waist. She was wearing a green silk gown over a white sleeved tunic, and green fillets bound her hair. As she looked up and met his gaze, a smile came into her dark eyes, a slow smile proclaiming that, young as she was, she was nevertheless a woman.

  Throughout the sumptuous meal he scarcely noticed what he ate of the rich, spiced dishes that were laid before him. He could not take his eyes from her. The dark silky braids, the deep brown eyes, were so different from the fairer women he was used to seeing at home.

  Who was she, he wondered? She must be of noble birth that she sat at William’s table, and at last, unable to attend to Malet’s lady, he broke into her description of the Abbey at Fécamp where they were to spend Easter, to ask whom the girl might be.

  ‘Which maiden? Ah, that is the lady Judith. She is the Duke’s own niece. See, there is her mother, the lady Adeliza of Champagne, sitting beside your Earl Edwin. Adeliza is our Duke’s true sister, born of the union between Duke Robert and Herleva of Falaise.’ Hesilia gave him an arch smile. ‘Judith is very beautiful, is she not?’

  ‘Very,’ Waltheof answered and made a great play of helping himself to more wine, but his mind was rapidly absorbing all this information. He wanted to know more, but he could not ask the one question that mattered for fear of appearing a foolish boy.

  The lady Hesilia however, answered it for him; she was, he discovered, an inveterate gossip. ‘Judith was betrothed to the eldest son of the Lord of Turie-en-Cingueliz, but he was killed at your great battle, so now the Duke will have to make fresh plans for her. She has turned many a knight’s head.’ She glanced shyly at him. ‘Arnulf of Flanders has offered for her, I believe.’

  At that moment her attention was taken by Walter Giffard who sat on her other side, and Waltheof was free to digest all she had said and to look again at this girl who had so laid hold of his attention. She was talking to Earl Morcar now, but presently she fell silent and looked again towards him. She picked up her cup, gave him her slow smile and then drank. Did he imagine it, or had she raised the cup ever so slightly towards him? He picked up his own silver cup and deliberately lifted it before he drank. Her dark eyes were fixed on his face and then, almost at once, she turned away; the exchange so brief that he was sure none had noticed it but in that moment when she had looked at him a fire seemed to sweep through him. It was as if every day he had ever lived had been leading him towards this moment.

  The banquet proceeded, the talk grew louder, minstrels played and Gallet the jester made the whole company laugh with his jokes and antics, but somehow it was not like a banquet at home for the English guests. For one thing, the Lenten fast restricted the variety of the food, rich as it was, and for another they discovered that the Normans frowned on drunkenness and did not think it became a man to eat to satiety as the Saxons often did. William himself set an example by his abstemiousness, seldom drinking more than one cup of wine at each meal and to Waltheof, who had on occasion got uproaringly drunk at a hall-feast, it seemed a sober way of going on.

  Afterwards the trestles were removed and for a while the Duchess and her ladies sat by the fire talking with their guests. Matilda herself particularly beckoned Waltheof to her chair for his fluent Norman made conversation easier. He tried to keep his eyes from straying to the girl Judith, who stood behind her mother’s stool, but presently Matilda made him known to the lady Adeliza. Like her royal brother she was tall and dignified, a dominating woman he guessed and replied politely to her conventional greeting. She presented her daughter in a stiff, distant manner.

  ‘Come, child, and greet Earl Waltheof.’

  Judith came and he saw grace in every movement, the green silk falling in delicate folds about her body. She gave him her hand, her eyes cast down demurely, and he kissed her fingers. In that moment, holding them in a firm grasp, feeling their warmth, he was sharply conscious of the contact between them, of leaping response that transmitted itself from one to the other. Reluctantly he released her hand.

  She raised her eyes and looked him full in the face. “You are welcome, my lord Earl,’ she said and smiled again, her slow, secret smile, and with it he lost himself utterly to her. Not even Elfgive who had given him her body stirred him as this girl did with one glance from those clear eyes, and he knew then that he wanted her to wife – and none other.

  CHAPTER 2

  The English guests were, as Edwin had surmised, tr
eated with the greatest hospitality. On one day they would be at Beaumont-le-Roger with its lord and his sons, on another at the priory of Bec where Anselm now conducted the school founded by Lanfranc, and yet more days would be spent hawking in the great estates of Walter Giffard, whose fund of anecdotes concerning William’s early life were both revealing as to the nature of his appalling childhood, and a fascinating record of courage and perseverance in the face of odds that would have daunted most men.

  The Earls enjoyed the hospitality and even Maerlsweyn relaxed his grim attitude. The lesser men in their retinues mixed with others of their own standing and Magnus Carlson attached himself to a dark young man with a thin face and a cruel mouth. His name was Ivo of Taillebois and Richard told Waltheof that he had an unsavoury reputation and was known to have beaten at least one page to death. Waltheof commented, ‘Like to like.’