The Last Kingdom Series Books 4-6: Sword Song, The Burning Land, Death of Kings. Bernard Cornwell

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      ‘No, no, no!’ Æthelred held up a hand. ‘I wish to hear the indictment. We must be seen to be thorough in our judgment.’

      So the priest began again. Folk shuffled their feet in boredom as he droned on, and it was then that Gisela touched my elbow.

      A woman had just spoken to Gisela who, twitching my tunic, turned and followed the woman through the door at the back of the hall. I went too, hoping that Æthelred was too involved in his pretence of being the perfect judge to see our departure.

      We followed the woman down a corridor that had once been the cloistered side of a courtyard, but at some time the pillars of the open arcade had been filled with screens of wattle and mud. At the corridor’s end a crude wooden door had been hung in a stone frame. Carved vines writhed up the masonry. On the far side was a room with a floor of small tiles that showed some Roman god casting a thunderbolt and beyond that was a sunlit garden where three pear trees cast shade on a patch of grass bright with daisies and buttercups. Æthelflaed waited for us beneath the trees.

      She showed no sign of the distress that had sent her crouching and dry-retching from the hall. Instead she was standing tall, her back straight and with a solemn expression, though that solemnity brightened into a smile when she saw Gisela. They hugged, and I saw Æthelflaed’s eyes close as if she was fighting back tears.

      ‘You’re not ill, lady?’ I asked.

      ‘Just pregnant,’ she said, her eyes still shut, ‘not ill.’

      ‘You looked ill just now,’ I said.

      ‘I wanted to talk with you,’ she said, pulling away from Gisela, ‘and pretending to be ill was the only way to have privacy. He can’t stand it when I’m sick. He leaves me alone when I vomit.’

      ‘Are you often sick?’ Gisela asked.

      ‘Every morning,’ Æthelflaed said, ‘sick like a hound, but isn’t everyone?’

      ‘Not this time,’ Gisela said, and touched her amulet. She wore a small image of Frigg, wife of Odin and Queen of Asgard where the gods live. Frigg is the goddess of pregnancy and childbirth, and the amulet was supposed to give Gisela a safe delivery of the child she carried. The little image had worked well with our first two children and I prayed daily that it would work again with the third.

      ‘I vomit every morning,’ Æthelflaed said, ‘then feel fine for the rest of the day.’ She touched her belly, then stroked Gisela’s stomach that was now distended with her child. ‘You must tell me about childbirth,’ Æthelflaed said anxiously. ‘It’s painful, isn’t it?’

      ‘You forget the pain,’ Gisela said, ‘because it’s swamped by joy.’

      ‘I hate pain.’

      ‘There are herbs,’ Gisela said, trying to sound convincing, ‘and there is so much joy when the child comes.’

      They talked of childbirth and I leaned on the brick wall and stared at the patch of blue sky beyond the pear tree leaves. The woman who had brought us had gone away and we were alone. Somewhere beyond the brick wall a man was shouting at recruits to keep their shields up and I could hear the bang of staves on wood as they practised. I thought of the new city, the Lundene outside the walls where the Saxons had made their town. They wanted me to make a new palisade there, and defend it with my garrison, but I was refusing because Alfred had ordered me to refuse and because, with the new town enclosed by a wall, there would be too many ramparts to protect. I wanted those Saxons to move into the old city. A few had come, wanting the protection of the old Roman wall and my garrison, but most stubbornly stayed in the new town. ‘What are you thinking?’ Æthelflaed suddenly interrupted my thoughts.

      ‘He’s thanking Thor that he’s a man,’ Gisela said, ‘and that he doesn’t have to give birth.’

      ‘True,’ I said, ‘and I was thinking that if people prefer to die in the new town rather than live in the old, then we should let them die.’

      Æthelflaed smiled at that callous statement. She crossed to me. She was barefoot and looked very small. ‘You don’t hit Gisela, do you?’ she asked, gazing up at me.

      I glanced at Gisela and smiled. ‘No, lady,’ I said gently.

      Æthelflaed went on staring at me. She had blue eyes with brown flecks, a slightly snub nose, and her lower lip was larger than her top lip. Her bruises had gone, though a faint dark blush on one cheek showed where she had last been struck. She looked very serious. Wisps of golden hair showed around her bonnet. ‘Why didn’t you warn me, Uhtred?’ she asked.

      ‘Because you didn’t want to be warned,’ I said.

      She thought about that, then nodded abruptly. ‘No, I didn’t, you’re right. I put myself in the cage, didn’t I? Then I locked it.’

      ‘Then unlock it,’ I said brutally.

      ‘Can’t,’ she said curtly.

      ‘No?’ Gisela asked.

      ‘God has the key.’

      I smiled at that. ‘I never did like your god,’ I said.

      ‘No wonder my husband says you’re a bad man,’ Æthelflaed retorted with a smile.

      ‘Does he say that?’

      ‘He says you are wicked, untrustworthy and treacherous.’

      I smiled, said nothing.

      ‘Pig-headed,’ Gisela kept the litany going, ‘simple-minded and brutal.’

      ‘That’s me,’ I said.

      ‘And very kind,’ Gisela finished.

      Æthelflaed still looked up at me. ‘He fears you,’ she said, ‘and Aldhelm hates you,’ she went on. ‘He’ll kill you if he can.’

      ‘He can try,’ I said.

      ‘Aldhelm wants my husband to be king,’ Æthelflaed said.

      ‘And what does your husband think?’ I asked.

      ‘He would like it,’ Æthelflaed said and that did not surprise me. Mercia lacked a king, and Æthelred had a claim, but my cousin was nothing without Alfred’s support and Alfred wanted no man to be called king in Mercia.

      ‘Why doesn’t your father just declare himself King of Mercia?’ I asked Æthelflaed.

      ‘I think he will,’ she said, ‘one day.’

      ‘But not yet?’

      ‘Mercia is a proud country,’ she said, ‘and not every Mercian loves Wessex.’

      ‘And you’re there to make them love Wessex?’

      She touched her belly. ‘Perhaps my father wants his first grandchild to be king in Mercia,’ she suggested. ‘A king with West Saxon blood?’

      ‘And Æthelred’s blood,’ I said sourly.

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