The Chosen Queen (29 page)

She looked at the younger woman and saw her flush in vivid lines of scarlet, almost like wounds across her cheeks.

‘It was never what you intended,’ Edyth said carefully.

‘Nor Harold either but he is not so selfish as I.’

‘It is not selfish to want your husband at your side.’

‘Nor for him to want his wife at his, wherever he may have to ride.’

‘No.’ Edyth picked awkwardly at a meadow grass, scattering the seeds to the wind, then her eyes lit up. ‘You should ride to Bosham, Svana. You could be there to meet Harold
when he returns over the narrow sea. He must be very lonely; think how he might need you.’

For a fleeting moment Svana felt like crying out that she did not want to be needed, that it was too much to bear, but she knew how pathetic that was, how weak, and she did not want to be weak.
She looked from the boys, throwing an old pig’s bladder between them, to the girls, busily tying a hair ribbon around a lamb’s neck, and then back to her friend. She could not hide here
forever and she could not leave Harold to face the world alone.

‘I will go,’ she said fiercely but already her very body seemed to jerk against the idea.

That night Svana lay awake, trying to dream of standing on Harold’s beach to welcome him home. She tried to picture the pleasure on his face and the feel of his arms
around her, but her back ached and her head was pounding. She needed sleep if she were to make the journey south but her damned body felt so insistently awake. It was not the babe for she had not
felt it turn all day, but more the womb itself, as if it was giving out heat. And pain.

She heard the cry as if it came from somewhere else – a ewe in the barn perhaps – but there was no doubting the next vicious stab. This was her own pain and she could not silence
it.

‘Mama?’

Through a red haze she saw Hannah and Crysta at the foot of her bed but when she tried to rise to go to them it felt as if someone was sticking a sword into her. She put out a hand but they hung
back, frightened, and then, thank the Lord, Edyth swept in.

‘Fret not, girls,’ she heard her say. ‘You run and fetch Elaine and I’ll watch Mama. Quick now!’

Crysta ran for the door, dragging her little sister after her, and Svana only had time to give thanks that they were safely away before the pain doubled her in on herself. She looked wildly up
at Edyth.

‘Am I losing it?’

Edyth clasped her hands.

‘I know not yet. May I look?’

Svana nodded and forced herself to sit up as Edyth pulled back the sheets. Blood stained the mattress, spreading out from beneath her in a scarlet flood that seemed to pull her whole world
inwards.

‘I
am
losing it!’

‘It seems so.’ Edyth’s voice was calm. ‘I’m sorry, Svana, but we must care for you now. There’s no way we are losing you too.’

Svana stared deep into the scarlet stain. Was that her life-blood soaking away? Was God taking her for obstructing Harold’s duty to his country? Suddenly it all seemed horribly clear.

‘My death would solve a lot of problems,’ she said bitterly but Edyth grabbed her shoulders, holding her tight and forcing her to look into her face.

‘It would solve nothing. Nothing! You are not to speak like that. Crysta and Hannah need you. The boys need you. Harold needs you. Lord have mercy, Svana,
I
need you. Fight for me
at least – promise?’

Svana wanted to promise but a new pain shot through her and she could only cry out against it.

‘There now,’ said a voice – Elaine. ‘This won’t do. Come, Svana, my love, rise. It has to come out. All of it, the afterbirth too. If any lingers in your womb it
will turn to poison. Can you rise? Good. Very good. Now, sit here.’

Svana looked down. At her feet was a pail, its edges padded with soft linen but its gaping hole dark as the mouth of hell itself. She shuddered but her knees were giving way as a new pain came
and she had no choice but to allow herself to be sat upon it.

‘You will need to push, my love,’ Elaine said. ‘You know how to do that, don’t you?’

Svana set her teeth. She did not want to be here. She did not want to do this, to expel Harold’s dear child into a filthy pail. This was no miracle of life. This was pain and loss and fear
and blood – this was a woman’s battlefield.

‘Fight, Svana,’ Edyth urged at her side. ‘Please fight.’

Svana’s whole body tensed, as if squeezing itself downwards. She longed to resist but the force was too great and with a roar of anguish she pushed with it. She heard a sickening rush of
fluid and rocked against the horror of it all. Only Edyth’s hand on her back steadied her, rubbing so fast she felt the heat of it burn her skin.

‘And again, my love,’ came Elaine’s voice, soft and soothing.

Edyth’s hand ceased its motion but Svana felt it against her still, strong and tight, and pushed back against it as, with another sickening gulp and flop, her poor womb emptied itself into
the pail.

‘There,’ Elaine said. ‘There, ’tis done. ’Tis over.’

‘Over,’ Svana repeated, more a wail than a word, and then she collapsed.

She wanted Harold. She wanted his strong arms around her and his soft voice in her ear and the blissful security of his body against her own. She thought of him splashing back onto
England’s shores without anyone there to draw him safely onto land and more pains shuddered through her. She reached out and grabbed for Edyth’s arm.

‘You must go, Edie.’

‘Go?’

‘To Bosham.’

‘What? No. No, Svana, I will stay here. I will stay here with you.’

‘No.’ This sorry night Svana seemed to have lost control of so much, but there was one thing she knew for sure. ‘You must go to meet Harold. I do not want him landing alone. I
do not want him hearing of this alone. He is not good alone.’ She forced herself up, desperate now. ‘Please Edyth, go to Harold for me, as I fought here for you.’

It seemed to take forever for the reply to come but when it did she felt it lift a great weight off her shoulders.

‘I will go, Svana. For you I will go.’

And on that blissful promise Svana surrendered herself to leaden sleep at last.

Bosham, June 1064

T
he winds teased at Harold’s ship like a cat with a helpless prey, sending it lurching crookedly across the water. Edyth stood on
the beachhead and held her breath, the tension winding inside her like wool round a spindle. The sea, churned up by a summer storm, seemed reluctant to finally hand the earl back to English shores
and she crossed her fingers behind her back, willing him onwards.

Steadily the ship grew until she could make out the pulsing figures of the oarsmen battling to direct the craft to the safety of the beach. She watched, fascinated, as the sails were dropped and
the wooden hull scythed through the sand, oars high in the air like insect legs. Once the prow had cleared the greedy edges of the waves, men leaped out to heave the boat to safety above the
waterline and the spray from the sodden ropes splashed against her in a shock of cold. She flinched back but then a dark figure jumped down before her.

‘Harold!’

She ran forward and clasped him. His arms went around her and she felt his fingers dig into her back as if tethering himself to her.

‘Edyth, thank God. It’s so good to see a friendly face.’ He pulled back and scrutinised her. ‘Are you well? Is . . . Svana well?’

‘Quite well, Harold.’ He did not believe her; she owed him the truth. ‘She lost a babe.’

‘A babe? I had no idea she . . .’

‘She only found out a little time before, though it was big enough to give her some trouble coming out.’

Edyth squeezed her eyes shut against the blood and the fear and terrible hopeless plop of a life dropped away into a pail.

‘And Svana . . . ?’

‘Is well, truly, Harold. A little sad but cared for by Elaine. She took no fever and she is hale, the rest of your family too. They are eager to see you.’

‘And I them. It has been a dark time, Edyth.’

A shadow sat itself on his face.

‘Come,’ she said, taking his arm. ‘We have fires lit and wine warming. There is hot stew and fresh bread for all.’

‘You are a good steward, my lady.’

‘Nay – you must thank Joseph for that. I am merely here to carry Svana’s love.’

‘And a little of your own?’

‘Of course.’ She looked aside. ‘You are like a brother to me, Harold. Now, come!’

Later, as the men thawed around the fire, food settling in their stomachs and wine coursing through their veins, Edyth saw them visibly unfold. Their shoulders relaxed, their
backs unbent, their legs stretched out and even, slowly, smiles broke out on their lips as colour seeped back into them. As the evening rolled on only one man remained tight and hunched and Edyth
hated to see it.

‘It has been hard?’ she hazarded.

‘Hard?’ Harold rolled the word around his mouth, testing it, then frowned, finding it wanting. ‘Nay, Edyth, it has been hell itself.’

‘The duke was not, then, welcoming?’

‘Oh no – no the duke was
very
welcoming. He is like melted butter, impossible to grasp and leaving you slicked with his residue. I feel I will never be clean
again.’

‘I could order you a bath . . . ?’

‘No, Edyth, thank you. This dirt is inside me.’

‘He treated you cruelly?’

‘Nay, he treated me like a king. He fed me royally and accommodated me royally and his wife, the Duchess Matilda, offered me every courtesy. They rode me out at their side and showed me
their dukedom all the way to the borders and, indeed, beyond. Matilda’s father is regent of France, you know, along with the boy-king’s mother, Anne of Kiev – sister to
Hardrada’s queen. Forces are gathering all around us, Edyth, wicked forces, and William is the wickedest of them all.’

‘You did not like him?’

Harold sighed.

‘I wish it were that simple,’ he admitted. ‘He is a fascinating man, Edyth – driven and focused and so very astute on the battlefield. We had much in common; mayhap that
is why I was fooled into believing all was well between us. I rode with him into Brittany as a fellow commander and he praised my battle skills as I praised his. I thought we worked well together
but it seems he was just playing me against his enemies and then, right at the end, he tricked me.’

His voice rasped into his cup and he sucked down wine, as if trying to drown the sound.

‘Tricked you?’

‘On the very last night, as if he’d been saving it up for me the whole time, as I’m sure he was. He is a patient man, Edyth – a cold, determined, dangerously patient man.
He knows how to stalk a prey and he knows how to finish it off when the time comes.’

Harold drank again and Avery moved forward to refill his cup. The young squire had filled out into a strong soldier over the last year and something about him reminded Edyth of Lewys. She felt a
pang of sorrow. She had sought news of her dear friends, of the birth of their child, but the borders to Wales had locked down and she had been unable to find out anything. It was almost as if they
had never existed. She looked again at Harold’s steward and saw dark rings of tiredness around his young eyes.

‘Go to bed, Avery,’ Harold said.

‘But my lord . . .’

‘Truly, lad. You have served me well these last months and you deserve your rest. I will retire shortly.’

Avery looked from Harold to Edyth and then bowed low and backed away. Many of the men were setting their pallets now, worn out from their rough trip, and it was as if the whole world was going
to sleep around them. Edyth longed to know what had happened but feared hurting Harold further by dragging the facts from him. She waited, watching quietly, and eventually he looked up again.

‘He made me swear, Edyth.’

‘Swear what?’

‘Swear loyalty – swear to support his claim to the throne, swear him in as King of England.’ His voice cracked and he pounded his fist into the table. ‘Does God hold a
man to such a vow, Edyth? A vow made under duress and against the deepest reaches of his heart?’

Edyth took a deep breath; never had words felt more crucial.

‘I do not believe so, Harold. Men see actions, God sees intentions.’

He looked at her and his eyes cleared, but within moments the shadows crept back.

‘Yet I am sworn, Edyth.’

‘How?’

‘How?! I hardly dare recount it.’

‘I’m sorry. You do not have to. I am too curious – it has ever been thus.’

A smile ghosted across his lips.

‘It has, Edyth, and that is good. There is much to learn of this world, more than I, fool that I am, ever truly realised. I will tell you. Nay, I must tell you for the fact of it is
scratching away inside me like a trapped beast.’

He drew a breath and Edyth leaned in. She blocked out the clattering of the platters as the servants cleared the last of the food and the slam of wood on wood as they took down the trestle
tables to make way for the pallet beds. She blocked out Joseph dismissing the men to bed and the snores of the sleepers and even the occasional whimper that told of haunted dreams brought home like
stowaways from Normandy. She blocked it all and filled her ears with Harold’s words as he tore them from himself and laid them before her.