Daughter of the Wolf Read online

  DAUGHTER OF THE WOLF

  Victoria Whitworth

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  About this Book

  About the Author

  Table of Contents

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  About Daughter of the Wolf

  Daughter of the Wolf is set during the Dark Ages, in an England ruled by rival kings. Of the lords who serve them, none is more important than Radmer of Donmouth, known as the King’s Wolf, guardian of the estuary gateway to Northumbria.

  When the king sends Radmer on a mission to Rome, Donmouth is suddenly vulnerable, left in the safekeeping of his only daughter, Elfrun, whose formidable grandmother would force her to take the veil, while across the river, treacherous Tilmon of Illingham wants her for his son.

  This is the story of daughters in a man’s world. The story of Wynn, determined to oust her brother and take over from her father, the smith. Of Saethryth, wilful daughter of the village steward, whose longing for passion will set off a tragic sequence of events and of Auli, whose merchant venturer father plies his trade up and down the coast, spying for the Danes.

  Above all, it is the story of Elfrun, left in charge of Donmouth, uncertain of her father’s fate, not knowing whom she can trust, or whom she can love.

  For Stella, my bright star

  Contents

  Cover

  Welcome Page

  About Daughter of the Wolf

  Dedication

  Part One

  The Chronicle, York Minster Scriptorium

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Part Two

  The Chronicle, York Minster Scriptorium

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Part Three

  The Chronicle, York Minster Scriptorium

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Part Four

  The Chronicle, York Minster Scriptorium

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Part Five

  The Chronicle, York Minster Scriptorium

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Coda: The Chronicle, York Minster Scriptorium

  Historical Note

  Glossary

  About Victoria Whitworth

  An Invitation from the Publisher

  Copyright

  PART ONE

  THE CHRONICLE, YORK MINSTER SCRIPTORIUM

  25 MARCH 859. FEAST OF THE ANNUNCIATION.

  The first day of a new year. Time to look back and take stock. The chronicler was making himself a new quill, splaying the tip and slicing with the lethal blade of his pen-knife: brief, accurate strokes. He eyed the nib approvingly before dipping the sharp, shaped point into the little pot of gall-black ink, letting one or two drops fall back into the tiny midnight pool before drawing his first mark on the fresh sheet of vellum.

  Up at a slant. Down again. Across. Straight up. Downward curve. Gathering speed a little as his hand accustomed itself to the new nib, to the consistency of this batch of ink, to the slightly rough surface of this calfskin.

  AD DCCCLVIII In hoc anno...

  His quill was the flight feather of a wild grey goose, tense and powerful in his hand even in this denuded and reworked state. Late March, and just that morning he had seen the first of the great mournful flocks turning north again, arrowing already across the Northumbrian skies to their unknown summer homes. Today was a day fit for new beginnings. The anniversary of that first separation of darkness from light; and of the day on which Eva’s catastrophe had been reversed by the angel’s Ave to Maria.

  He sighed, looking down at the still almost empty page. In this year... How powerful it was, the desire to make some kind of mark, leave some kind of record, ink patterning vellum like footprints on sand. How long would it be before some little wave, harbinger of the rising tide, broke over this desk, this room, this great church, and washed the marks away?

  He mused over the events of the last year, the news that had come in, brought by legates and royal envoys coming along the old roads; by merchants and sailors putting into the riverside wharves of York, whose cathedral sat like a spider at the heart of its worked net.

  Time to dip his pen again. It hovered, while he hesitated over what might be worthy of record. Some events were easy enough. Tap a superfluous drop from the nib, little serif, strong downward stroke...

  In this year died King Cinaed ap Alpin of the Picts; and also Athelwulf Ecgberhting of the West Saxons. Domnall ap Alpin and Athelbald Athelwulfing succeeded to the kingdoms.

  Clumsy phrasing: he should have drafted it first rather than gone rushing in. The story of his life. Never mind, the meaning was clear enough.

  Also in this year the pagans burned the minster at Tours.

  He wiped the nib on a square of linen, and gazed at the white-plastered wall. There seemed so little that merited the effort of writing down. Who on earth would be interested in the small events that had marked out this last annus domini for him? In this year a girl gave me a flower on the kalends of March. Her face and bosom were freckled, and her eyes were blue. She made me think of a songthrush egg.

  And what about the things that didn’t happen? In this year there was no famine, no murrain of cattle. The pagans were elsewhere. Those were, surely, miracles in themselves.

  He had never been to Tours, and now he would probably never get the chance.

  Small events, unworthy of record. In this year Ingeld was made priest against his better judgement and appointed to the abbacy of Donmouth.

  He stroked the little tuft of remaining feathers that topped the quill against his close-shaven chin and smiled at the softness, lowering his eyelids the better to imagine the bird, high against the sun, heading north into a Hyperborean land of light. What did Northumbria look like to the geese? The estuary that gave the land its name, and the fan of rivers, the hills of chalk and limestone and grit stretching north and west until they ran out into the sea, the northern waters sp
litting the land, the territories of Dumbarton and the Picts. How far to the north had this supple quill carried its previous owner? His imagination lost itself in a dazzle of snow and sun.

  Slowly he opened his eyes again, to the prosaic world of writing-slope and inkhorn, quill and knife and whitewashed wall. How marvellous it would be, to fly with the geese. To see the storms before they hit, to spot where armies were massing, the harbours in which the sea-wolves lurked, to swoop down and hear the treasonous speech men uttered in hall and bower when they thought themselves safe. To have all Northumbria in one’s hand, its hills and waterways no more than the lines and curves that mapped his palm.

  He smiled, and shook his head. That was a dream for the statesmen and the warriors, men like his brother. He would be happier with his eyes on the edge of the world, no care beyond the exquisite thrill of the moment, his wings riding the wind.

  1

  ‘End of the field and back?’ Athulf was out of breath, cheeks pink and eyes bright under his rough-cut fringe. Elfrun thought he looked very like the unkempt ponies whose halters he was holding, hot in their shaggy winter coats and the late Easter sunshine.

  She nodded. ‘Dismount and vault three times, turn at the hawthorn tree, same again’ – she gestured largely – ‘finish here. And I’m riding Mara.’ She glared at her cousin, challenging him for possession of their favourite, noting the beginnings of his frown, how that soft lower lip was already starting to pout.

  ‘Come on!’ Both the other boys who had accepted the challenge were already jostling their own mounts into position a few yards away. She knew one of them vaguely, had seen him before at other spring and harvest meetings, but his father’s lands were in distant Elmet, several days from her own home of Donmouth. The other was a stranger, a tall, quiet-faced lad on a gleaming bay mare. They had come trotting up only moments earlier, just as the race was being planned.

  Would Athulf throw a tantrum, with these strangers as witness? Elfrun braced herself even as she laid a possessive hand on Mara’s halter.

  Her cousin surprised her, however. ‘As you like.’ And he tugged Apple towards him.

  But he was looking neither at her nor at the fat-rumped little pony whose bridle he was gripping. His gaze had gone flickering past her, and a look of calculation was crossing his round face.

  ‘Come on,’ the lad from Elmet shouted again, and all at once Elfrun decided that, whatever Athulf had seen, she didn’t want to know. She tugged Mara round and scrambled on to her back, clapping her heels into the chestnut’s flanks and screaming, ‘Go!’ A crazy headlong dash ensued, with hardly time to swing herself down, find her stride and bounce back on to Mara twice, never mind three times, before swinging round the hawthorn tree in its fresh green leaf. Her plaits were coming free, and though she had kilted her skirts they unknotted themselves, flying out and hampering her. No room in her head for anything but the exultation of the moment, not for her bashed ribs, not for the other riders, not for the clamour of rooks that rose raucous from the stand of elms at the bottom of the field; and certainly not for any of Athulf’s funny faces. Elfrun came in a screaming second, mud-spattered and exhilarated. The tall lad on the bay had won.

  But not by much, and he had noticed. ‘Well ridden!’

  She reined Mara in, narrowly avoiding riding into his horse’s rump, grinning in return, flushed and too breathless to answer.

  She might not have won outright, but she had beaten Athulf. Beating Athulf was harder than it used to be, and the pleasure that much greater. Sweeping a tangled skein of hair out of her eyes Elfrun slithered triumphant down from Mara’s sweaty back.

  Her grandmother stood in front of her.

  Abarhild said nothing.

  She didn’t need to. Her face, framed in its neat white linen, was set even harder than usual, and her bony hands were clamped one over the other on the silver-gilt mount that capped her blackthorn stick. Elfrun eyed the distance between her grandmother and herself: she knew full well how fast and hard Abarhild could strike. And how she would be blamed for Athulf getting into trouble.

  The silence lengthened and deepened. Elfrun could feel the hot blood mounting from somewhere near her heart until it had flooded her already flushed cheeks, her palms moistening where they clutched Mara’s reins, her heart thudding and blocking her breath. One of the horses let out a long, stuttering fart, and Elfrun heard a stifled snigger behind her, but she didn’t dare turn to see whether it came from Athulf or one of the stranger boys.

  Abarhild lifted her staff, and Elfrun braced herself, but her grandmother was only gesturing, not lashing out – not yet. ‘Athulf, take that animal. You’ – she stabbed the staff at Elfrun – ‘come with me.’ She turned and began stumping her way up the field in the direction of the Donmouth tents, whose bright roof-poles and finials were visible above the hedge, never once turning to see whether her orders were being obeyed.

  Elfrun thrust Mara’s reins blindly at Athulf. ‘You knew. You saw her coming.’ Her breath stuck in her throat. ‘You could have said.’

  Her cousin just smirked. She turned, hot and wet-eyed with anger and humiliation, and hurried after Abarhild.

  Her grandmother began speaking as soon as Elfrun fell into step, marking each word with a vicious stab at the turf. ‘You – are – fifteen – years – old.’ She stopped, and turned, the sunlight flickering on the gold crosses embroidered on the border of her veil. The Gallic accent that still buzzed around the edges of her grandmother’s voice, even after fully fifty years in Northumbria, was stronger than ever when Abarhild was angry. ‘Is this sin, or just stupidity?’ Her eyes were watery, pink-rimmed and folded deep in her wrinkled face, but Elfrun knew she missed nothing. ‘I thought you were going to show the world your bare arse.’

  Elfrun clapped her hands defensively to her buttocks. ‘You did not!’

  But her grandmother was shaking her head. ‘You have no idea, do you? Look at you’ – another stab with the gnarled blackthorn – ‘bringing disgrace... Strangers...’ She clamped her mouth and breathed in through her nose. ‘Nearly sixteen. Pro Deo amur – for the love of God, Elfrun, where is your dignity? In your good blue dress, too. And in the field next to the king’s tents. This is absolutely the last time I want to have to say this to you.’

  Abarhild glared at her granddaughter, looking for a sign that her words were getting through to her. Elfrun was a good girl at heart; Abarhild was convinced of that. Never been beaten enough, though, or given the responsibility she needed. Elfrun’s father had always been too easy on his only surviving child, and since the girl’s mother had died... Spoiled, she thought now, looking at the wild hair escaping from what had earlier been neat brown plaits, the spatters of mud across Elfrun’s wide forehead, her cheeks’ hectic flush – a flush begot, Abarhild suspected, by excitement rather than shame; and her mouth tightened again.

  Elfrun bowed her head and bit her lip, doing her best to look remorseful, but there was a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.

  Biting back her anger, Abarhild turned and started walking up the slope again, her stick thumping into the grass and the keys chinking at her belt, and Elfrun hurried to catch up.

  She knew fine well her grandmother would want to see compunction and penitence before any reconciliation or absolution could be offered; and she did feel a scruple of genuine shame. But more, much more, she was angry with Athulf for not giving her some warning. It would have been so easy – a wink, a jerk of the head... She dug her nails into her palms. She would get him, later.

  Abarhild never talked about Athulf’s dignity.

  ‘What was that? Did you say something, girl?’

  ‘Sorry, Grandmother.’

  ‘What?’

  Louder this time. ‘Sorry!’ And somewhere, deep down, against all desire, she had to admit that the world would agree. Abarhild was right; she was getting too old for these games. But admitting it, even to her private self, felt like a betrayal, a little death.

  Abarhild
huffed. ‘I’ll have more to say about this later on. Just now there’s no time. Your father wants you.’ A third, lesser sniff. ‘Clean and well turned-out.’

  ‘Where?’

  And now Abarhild did swing her stick, but it thwacked only into the flesh of Elfrun’s calf, not the bone of her ankle, and she knew from this that the worst of her grandmother’s wrath was on the ebb. ‘He’s on his way to attend on Osberht. You’re to wait with him, until you’re called.’

  ‘The king?’ Elfrun’s eyes went wide. ‘What about?’

  ‘You’ll find out soon enough. Something particularly concerning you.’

  ‘Is there something wrong with the wool? The lambskins?’ Their home of Donmouth was famous for them, their number, their quality, and the way they were processed, both with and without the fleece. Both king and archbishop relied on them, and there was a constant demand from the fine leather-workers in York. The wool, raw, spun or woven, might be Donmouth’s mainstay, but the lambskins were their fame. Under the tutelage first of her mother, and now of Abarhild, Elfrun had been learning not merely the spinning and weaving that every girl started mastering as soon as she was tall enough to hold a spindle, but all the complex economy of wool and parchment, milk and cheese.

  Her mother used to joke that all Donmouth’s glory balanced on the back of a sheep.

  But why would the king ask for her, if all he wanted was to talk about lambskins?

  She opened her mouth again but one look at her grandmother’s face deterred her. By now they were almost back at Donmouth’s little cluster of cheerfully striped canvas. Abarhild’s lips were pursed and her brow drawn tight; and it hit Elfrun that her grandmother was as much in the dark as she was herself.

  2

  Her scalp was smarting from the tugs of her grandmother’s fine-toothed antler comb, her face and hands were glowing and abraded from the coarse linen towel, even her fingertips stung from the gouging Abarhild had been giving her nails. And dressing her down all the while, listing her seemingly endless faults of morals and manners while Elfrun squirmed under her grandmother’s glare and the interested regard of the other members of their party.