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thing of no importance. ‘Don’t you understand,’ he said, still gripping my elbow, ‘that this is our best chance!’

      ‘Our best chance of what?’ I asked patiently.

      ‘Of getting rid of him,’ he spoke too vehemently and some folk standing nearby turned to look at us. I said nothing. Of course Æthelwold wanted to be rid of his uncle, but he lacked the courage to strike the blow himself, which is why he was constantly seeking allies like me. He looked up into my face and evidently found no support there, for he let go of my arm. ‘They want to know if you’ve asked Ragnar,’ he said, his voice lower.

      So Æthelwold was still in contact with Sigefrid? That was interesting, but perhaps not surprising. ‘No,’ I said, ‘I haven’t.’

      ‘For God’s sake, why not?’

      ‘Because Bjorn lied,’ I said, ‘and it is not my fate to be king in Mercia.’

      ‘If I ever become king in Wessex,’ Æthelwold said bitterly, ‘then you had better run for your life.’ I smiled at that, then just looked at him with unblinking eyes and, after a while he turned away and muttered something inaudible that was probably an apology. He stared across the church, his face dark. ‘That Danish bitch,’ he said vehemently.

      ‘What Danish bitch?’ I asked, and, for a heartbeat, I thought he meant Gisela.

      ‘That bitch,’ he jerked his head towards Thyra. ‘The one married to the idiot. The pious bitch. The one with her belly stuffed.’

      ‘Thyra?’

      ‘She’s beautiful,’ Æthelwold said vengefully.

      ‘So she is.’

      ‘And she’s married to an old fool!’ he said, staring at Thyra with loathing on his face. ‘When she’s whelped that pup inside her I’m going to put her on her back,’ he said, ‘and show her how a real man ploughs a field.’

      ‘You do know she’s my friend?’ I asked.

      He looked alarmed. He had plainly not known of my long affection for Thyra and now tried to recant. ‘I just think she’s beautiful,’ he said sullenly, ‘that’s all.’

      I smiled and leaned down to his ear. ‘You touch her,’ I whispered, ‘and I’ll put a sword up your arsehole and I’ll rip you open from the crotch to the throat and then feed your entrails to my pigs. Touch her once, Æthelwold, just once, and you’re dead.’

      I walked away. He was a fool and a drunk and a lecher, and I dismissed him as harmless. In which I was wrong, as it turned out. He was, after all, the rightful King of Wessex, but only he and a few other fools truly believed he should be king instead of Alfred. Alfred was everything his nephew was not; he was sober, clever, industrious and serious.

      He was also happy that day. He watched as his daughter married a man he loved almost like a son, and he listened to the monks chanting and he stared at the church he had made with its gilded beams and painted statues, and he knew that by this marriage he was taking control of southern Mercia.

      Which meant that Wessex, like the infants inside Thyra and Gisela, was growing.

      Father Beocca found me outside the church where the wedding guests stood in the sunshine and waited for the summons to the feast inside Alfred’s hall. ‘Too many people were talking in the church!’ Beocca complained. ‘This was a holy day, Uhtred, a sacred day, a celebration of the sacrament, and people were talking as if they were at market!’

      ‘I was one of them,’ I said.

      ‘You were?’ he asked, squinting up at me. ‘Well, you shouldn’t have been talking. It’s just plain bad manners! And insulting to God! I’m astonished at you, Uhtred, I really am! I’m astonished and disappointed.’

      ‘Yes, father,’ I said, smiling. Beocca had been reproving me for years. When I was a child, Beocca was my father’s priest and confessor and, like me, he had fled Northumbria when my uncle had usurped Bebbanburg. Beocca had found a refuge at Alfred’s court where his piety, his learning and his enthusiasm were appreciated by the king. That royal favour went a long way to stop men mocking Beocca, who was, in all truth, as ugly a man as you could have found in all Wessex. He had a club foot, a squint, and a palsied left hand. He was blind in his wandering eye that had gone as white as his hair, for he was now nearly fifty years old. Children jeered at him in the streets and some folk made the sign of the cross, believing that ugliness was a mark of the devil, but he was as good a Christian as any I have ever known. ‘It is good to see you,’ he said in a dismissive tone, as if he feared I might believe him. ‘You do know the king wishes to speak with you? I suggested you meet him after the feast.’

      ‘I’ll be drunk.’

      He sighed, then reached out with his good hand to hide the amulet of Thor’s hammer that was showing at my neck. He tucked it under my tunic. ‘Try to stay sober,’ he said.

      ‘Tomorrow, perhaps?’

      ‘The king is busy, Uhtred! He doesn’t wait on your convenience!’

      ‘Then he’ll have to talk to me drunk,’ I said.

      ‘And I warn you he wants to know how soon you can take Lundene. That’s why he wishes to speak with you.’ He stopped talking abruptly because Gisela and Thyra were walking towards us, and Beocca’s face was suddenly transformed by happiness. He just stared at Thyra like a man seeing a vision and, when she smiled at him, I thought his heart would burst with pride and devotion. ‘You’re not cold, are you, my dear?’ he asked solicitously. ‘I can fetch you a cloak.’

      ‘I’m not cold.’

      ‘Your blue cloak?’

      ‘I am warm, my dear,’ she said, and put a hand on his arm.

      ‘It will be no trouble!’ Beocca said.

      ‘I am not cold, dearest,’ Thyra said, and again Beocca looked as though he would die of happiness.

      All his life Beocca had dreamed of women. Of fair women. Of a woman who would marry him and give him children, and for all his life his grotesque appearance had made him an object of scorn until, on a hilltop of blood, he had met Thyra and he had banished the demons from her soul. They had been married four years now. To look at them was to be certain that no two people were ever more ill-suited to each other. An old, ugly, meticulous priest and a young, golden-haired Dane, but to be near them was to feel their joy like the warmth of a great fire on a winter’s night. ‘You shouldn’t be standing, my dear,’ he told her, ‘not in your condition. I shall fetch you a stool.’

      ‘I shall be sitting soon, dearest.’

      ‘A stool, I think, or a chair. And are you sure you don’t need a cloak? It would really be no trouble to fetch one!’

      Gisela looked at me and smiled, but Beocca and Thyra were oblivious of us as they fussed over each other. Then Gisela gave the smallest jerk of her head and I looked to see that a young monk was standing nearby and staring at me. He had obviously been waiting to catch my eye, and he was just as obviously nervous. He was thin, not very tall, brown haired and had a pale face that looked remarkably like Alfred’s. There was the same drawn and anxious look, the same serious eyes and thin mouth, and evidently the same piety judging by the monk’s robe. He was a novice, because his hair was untonsured, and he dropped to one knee when I looked at him. ‘Lord Uhtred,’ he said humbly.

      ‘Osferth!’ Beocca said, becoming aware of the young monk’s presence. ‘You should be at your studies! The wedding is over and novices are not invited to the feast.’

      Osferth ignored Beocca. Instead, with his head bowed, he spoke to me. ‘You knew my uncle, lord.’

      ‘I did?’ I asked suspiciously. ‘I have known many men,’ I said, preparing him for the refusal I was sure I would offer to whatever he requested of me.

      ‘Leofric, lord.’

      And

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