LITMIR.BIZ

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might have chosen any of us. Me, for instance. I may be the youngest, but I’m the prettiest!’

      Her sisters both laughed. ‘I think we can guess who he has in store for you.’ Alfrida fixed Eadburh with a mocking gaze. ‘He’s obviously got the puppy from Powys lined up for you.’

      Eadburh stared at her. ‘Who?’

      ‘Prince Elisedd.’ Alfrida giggled. ‘Why else would he send you off with him to stare at a line of wooden stakes and a thousand men carrying baskets of mud for his wretched rampart when he could have sent one of his surveyors. Marriage is the best way to ensure peace between the kingdoms. He’s told us so often enough.’

      ‘So, if you know so much about it, who has he got in line for you?’ Ethelfled pushed back her stool and stood up suddenly. ‘Has he told you?’

      Alfrida shook her head. ‘He keeps very close counsel, as we all know.’

      ‘Who keeps close counsel?’ Their mother swept into the room, two of her handmaids trailing after her carrying baskets of newly picked herbs. Cynefryth, unlike her daughters who all took their colouring from their father, had dark hair and sallow skin. Her eyes were hazel, and at this moment narrowed as she sent a sharp glance at each of the girls in turn.

      ‘Papa.’ Alfrida met her mother’s eye defiantly. ‘We were discussing our marital fate.’ Her voice carried a touch of bitterness. ‘I presume that was why he allowed Eadburh to go riding with King Cadell’s son this afternoon. At least she gets to lay eyes on her intended husband.’

      ‘I don’t know where you get the idea that Offa intends anyone to marry that young man,’ their mother said curtly. ‘He has mentioned no such thing to me.’

      ‘Thank the Blessed Virgin for that!’ Eadburh said fervently. ‘Can I help you with your herbs, Mama. Sewing bores me.’ She threw down her work. ‘And no doubt if we are all to be queens like you, we don’t need to excel in that particular skill.’ She glared at Alfrida, who loved embroidery.

      Cynefryth suppressed a sigh of exasperation and walked back towards the door. ‘Come along then. These were picked this morning while the moon was still in the sky; I have to see to their steeping while they still hold the life force of the moonlight, and there are salves to make.’ She did not add that there were spells to add and charms to recite, known only to her, which was why she did not leave the task to a local herb-wife.

      In the king’s royal residence when he was in this part of Mercia there was a great hall, the huge oak beams resplendent with carved beasts, and a royal bedchamber and all the space and outbuildings that the king’s vast entourage required. The stillroom, a small reed-thatched building behind the infirmary, was overseen by a local woman, Nesta, not merely a herb-wife, but also a powerful sorceress and a force to be reckoned with, if local gossip was to be believed. Oblivious to Nesta’s haughty stare as she and Eadburh walked in, the queen sent her out of the hut as though she were no more than a servant to gather more plants from her list.

      As soon as they were alone Eadburh turned on her mother. ‘So, is it true? Am I to marry the Prince of Powys?’

      Cynefryth was pushing up her sleeves as she reached into the baskets to sort out the leaves she had already gathered. Betony, meadowsweet, hemp and cinquefoil. The study of plants and leechcraft was one of the queen’s passions and wherever she and the king went as they toured the kingdom it was made clear that the herb rooms of the various palaces they stayed in on their royal progress were her special territory. Her boxes with their stock of bottles and pots were already arranged on the tables, their lids thrown back.

      Cynefryth did not bother to turn to look at her daughter. ‘No, you are not. What would be the point of building the great dyke between our countries if we could buy a secure border with your virginity?’

      ‘But Papa does plan to marry us all off?’

      Her mother sighed. ‘Of course. And soon. But your marriages will be the results of much thought and negotiation. I can promise you that a younger son of one of the British kingdoms would not be worth the trouble. Why would your father want to build his influence over there in a land of mountains and mists and very little else? You are a valuable asset to us. Your brother and your eldest sister will in all probability go to the court of the Franks. You and Alfrida will have glorious matches in kingdoms in Britain your father wants tied in firm alliance.’

      ‘So that much at least is decided?’ Eadburh felt oddly deflated. Was she not valuable enough to have had her destiny chosen yet?

      ‘Nothing is decided,’ her mother gave a tolerant smile, ‘but it won’t be long, child. Your turn will come. And in the meantime, I will teach you all I can of my herbal arts. Neither of your sisters has the application to learn or the interest and my plants have their uses in ways you cannot even dream of.’

      Behind them the door opened and Nesta came back in, a woven willow basket over her arm. She paused as she saw the queen and her daughter standing by the table, her expression inscrutable.

      ‘Come in, woman.’ Cynefryth beckoned her towards them. ‘The sisters of Wyrd must have sent you back at this moment. You can start my daughter’s lessons in the craft this very day.’

      Bea stared at the Saxon worktable, spotlit by a ray of sunlight that streamed in through the doorway onto the wilting herbs and the pile of baskets. In the distance, behind the glare of the sun, she could see the outline of a long low hill rising out of the trees, and in front of it the soaring roof of a vast barnlike building, the mead hall of the king. The stillroom itself appeared to be a simple structure, but built of sturdy beams, the walls of wattle and daub, with tables and shelves stocked with bottles and dishes and jars. Bunches of drying herbs hung from the rafters. There was a fire at one end of the room, over which hung a bronze cauldron. She could smell the exotic scent of the herbs, mixed with the familiar warm aroma of sawn wood and thatch, and she could hear voices shouting in the background, cows bellowing, horses neighing and the sound of hooves, the rattle and bang of hammers, people shouting, dogs baying.

      As she grew more aware of the surroundings and the smells and the warmth of the sunlight, she realised the noises, the voices of women had grown distant, fading as she strained to hear them. Soon there was nothing to hear except the song of a robin from the fruit trees in the orchard. She blinked several times. The bird wasn’t there in the past, it was here, in their own garden, its evening song echoing in through her window. The scene of the royal palace and its inhabitants had gone.

      Gently putting the stone down on the floor in front of her, Bea sat for a long time without moving, deep in thought. She had hoped that, if it worked at all, her meditation with the stone would take her to the past of the cottage on the ridge, to see its origins, the people who had lived there, the scenes of anguish that had led to the loss of Elise, but it had taken her straight back to the story of Offa’s daughters. It had continued where her dream had left off.

      Elise?

      Not a lost pet, not a woman, a man. The puppy from Powys. Eleezeth, they had called him. The name came back to her with sudden clarity, as did the strong angry faces of Offa the king, and Eadburh, his daughter, their eyes locked, their body language combative. Is that what this was all about? A Celtic prince, an Anglo-Saxon princess and a modern day historian who had inadvertently conjured up the past? Hardly able to breathe as the full realisation of what she had seen dawned on her, Bea scrambled to her feet and reached for her notebook. Never trust your memory; memory is the most fallible part of what you do. First impressions and recall are vital. Always write things down. She remembered the words she had learned at her first lecture on psychometry, what her teacher had referred to as time travel. Meditation with the stone she had picked up from Simon’s front garden had taken her to a royal palace on the flatlands near a river, in the shadow of a long low hill. The stone had taken her back to the presence of Offa and his family, into the heart of the nest of vipers.

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