Daughter of the Wolf (23 page)

‘Is your mother still at her sister's, then?'

Wynn nodded.

‘All right. Hold out your skirt.' As she shovelled handfuls of damp shells into the fold of cloth, Elfrun said, ‘Your brother will be much missed at the forge. Has your father said anything about how he's going to manage without Cudda?'

Wynn contemplated the question, her pointed little face suddenly taut, eyes narrowed. ‘Too soon to say, lady. It's only been a week. You leave us be for a bit.' Her gaze suddenly shifted. ‘Lady...' she said on a panicky in-breath.

Elfrun half turned. And there he was, loping along the edge of the ebb-line, from the south.

‘It's... Don't worry. I know him.' She set down the basket and rake, and raised a hand as he approached.

‘Lady.' He bowed his head, grave and formal. ‘I have kept you waiting, and I ask your pardon.'

She nodded, trying hard to mask her pleasure. How, in a week, had she forgotten his easy, light-footed grace, and the way that the curve of his eyebrow and cheekbone conspired to make his expression so warm and open even when, as now, he was not smiling?

She wanted him to smile.

More than that. Oh God, please, let him smile at
her
. She had been so cold and clenched, and now there was warmth in her veins, a bubble and a fizz and a lightness as though the dreich November had turned into May.

Gradually the world widened out again, and she became aware that Wynn was staring. She picked up her basket again and foraged beneath the layers of wet, sandy shells for the soggy little bundle of sacking. ‘Here.'

Finn nodded and took the bundle from her, and she felt a pang. He shrugged off his pack and set it down on the drier sand of the dune-edge, before turning back and unwrapping her careful little parcel.

‘I've taken good care of it.' How defensive she sounded.

‘I've no fear of that, lady.' He was running his fingertip along the sensuous curve of the red-enamelled pattern, his face remote and thoughtful. Elfrun became aware of Wynn edging closer, her fists still bunching the cloth of her skirt to make a bag for the dragging weight of cockles, but all her attention on the mirror.

Finn glanced at the girl. ‘You want to see?'

She nodded, speechless.

‘Sit down.'

She subsided gracelessly, legs folding under her, her wet lap still heavy with shells, and Finn hunkered down and offered her the handle. Wynn used both her hands to hold the mirror, confident and enquiring; and Elfrun, watching her turn it this way and that, was startled by how much she minded seeing another woman handling it, even such an awkward, childish creature as this. The girl squinted at the polished bronze; and Elfrun was intrigued despite herself to observe that Wynn appeared more interested in the narrow edges than either the broad, engraved and enamelled surface or the burnished one.

She squatted, the better to look over the other girl's shoulder. ‘What are you looking at, Wynn?'

‘Cast handle.' The girl appeared to be talking to herself. ‘But the flat bit is a sheet, beaten. How do you beat it so flat? See how they've fitted the one into the other?' Elfrun hadn't registered how the T-shape of the handle was more than simply beautiful, that it allowed the fragile front and back plates of bronze to be supported and braced. ‘And three rivets... but the back was engraved before they ever riveted it...' Her voice faded away, and she had bent so low over the mirror that both it and her face were hidden by her lank brown hair.

Finn caught Elfrun's eye, and they stood up, leaving Wynn for a moment to her musing.

‘Who is she?' His voice was low.

‘The smith's girl.'

Finn nodded. ‘That makes sense.'

Elfrun swallowed. ‘It was her brother who died, last time – last week – when you—'

‘Ah.' He nodded again. ‘Hard times for Donmouth.' He glanced towards the dunes. ‘Too dark now for visiting, but is tomorrow a better day, lady? Will I find a welcome under your mother and father's roof?'

Tomorrow? She had simply taken it for granted that he would be coming back to the hall with her now. Without realizing, she had clasped her hands tightly, one over the other, and she did her best now to relax them, to breathe, to speak with the ease and command which Abarhild had been trying so hard to teach her. ‘My mother is dead. And my father is from home.' Where had this man come from, that he didn't know that? ‘I am lord in his absence.'

‘You? The lord? I see.' He was silent for a moment. ‘Then, like me, you know about shouldering a burden.' And at last she saw that radiant smile, and she could feel her own face lighting up in response. ‘Has he gone far, your father?'

‘Rome, on a special mission for the king.'

‘And you are proud of him.'

She nodded, pressing her lips together hard and breathing deep through her nostrils. After a moment she said, ‘It's strange with him gone. It's not just him – he's taken a few of his men, his sword-bearer – and so many of the hangings, and the cups, and the cushions... He needs to look good on the journey, and in Rome, to show the world that the legate of Northumbria's king is a man to be reckoned with. But Donmouth feels very' – she groped after the words – ‘small and grey and – and
fragile
without him.' She stopped abruptly. She had never meant to say so much, and such vague, stupid things too.

But he was nodding, not laughing, and his face was interested. She found her breath catching in her chest.

‘How much?' At the sound of Wynn's voice they both turned. Elfrun thought the girl had been asking the price of the mirror, and she bristled. But Wynn hadn't been talking to them. She was still looking hard at the mirror, and her voice sounded angry. ‘How much tin?' She tilted it this way and that, peering at the surface, scowling hard.

‘How would you make such a thing?' Finn went to crouch beside her again.

‘Me?' Incredulity. ‘I couldn't make this. I couldn't coax the metals to make this colour. The warmth of it!' She sounded more furious than ever. ‘And look at it. Just
look
.' She thrust it up towards Elfrun, who peered obediently at the engraving. ‘It's perfect. That pattern.
Perfect
. I could try for a month and not make lines like that. Not a single line.'

‘I've seen a gospel book,' Elfrun said slowly. ‘In St Peter's Minster, in York. My uncle showed me. It had patterns like that.'

‘A
book
.' Wynn's tone was rich with contempt. ‘They say on vellum you can make a picture of anything, and if it goes wrong you can scrape it out and do it again. But this' – she gave the mirror an angry little shake – ‘there's no room for a slip here. It won't forgive. This is a perfect thing. Take it away.' She shoved it, handle first, at Elfrun, who took it tenderly. ‘It hurts me to look at it.'

Elfrun looked helplessly down at the little bronze object. She had thought it beautiful, but she had none of the sense of craftly achievement which was causing Wynn such anguish.

‘You're a maker,' Finn said.

‘I want to be.' The girl had gone sullen, her voice flat. ‘But I'm not.'

‘You can learn, though, can't you? If you truly love it, you can learn.'

A shrug, and a contemptuous glance.

Elfrun's temper flared at the girl's bad manners. ‘Wynn! Show some courtesy to our guest.'

‘Sorry, lady,' and she turned to Finn. ‘Sorry I was rude.' The girl's voice was pure misery, and Elfrun was bitten by remorse.

‘I'm sorry, too. I spoke more harshly than I meant,' she said. ‘Go home now, Wynn. Take the cockles to your father.'

Wynn rose awkwardly to her feet, clutching the damp and sandy folds of her skirt around the sea-fruit. She ducked her head at Elfrun – ‘Lady' – then nodded to Finn – ‘Thank you' – before she turned and dashed away, sprinting up the slope of the dune despite her burden, as though she were some long-legged shore-bird.

‘So,' Finn said.

They were alone, and Elfrun didn't know what to say. She looked down at the mirror, and then held it to out to him. ‘I can't afford it. I should have said before—'

‘You don't know the price.'

‘It doesn't matter.' She was dreadfully embarrassed. ‘You heard what Wynn said. It's a perfect thing. It's fit for the king's wife. You should take it to York, or Driffield, or bring it to the market at the next spring meeting.' She could hear herself babbling, and despised herself.

‘I could do.' He folded his arms, ignoring the proffered mirror. ‘But I don't know where I'll be, come the spring.'

‘Not round here?' The words were startled out of her.

He smiled. ‘Folk like me are like the swallows, Alvrun. Here for a season, but who knows where the winter might take us?'

‘Will you really not come up to the hall now?' He shook his head, and she felt it like a blow. ‘Then you must take this with you.' She held the mirror out to him again. ‘I have to go. I need to take this lot home' – she gestured at the basket with her free hand – ‘they'll be wondering where I've got to.'

‘And where have you got to, Alvrun?' He was ignoring the outstretched hand, looking out at the dull grey water, his hair beaded with wet.

‘What?'

‘You're kind,' he said, ‘which is more than beautiful.' He was hugging himself with his arms, not looking at her, and she turned to follow his gaze, towards the hungry, choppy waves. ‘You said sorry to that child, and you didn't have to. She was rude, and you are her lord. You were well within your rights to rebuke her.'

‘I – She – she's not having an easy time.'

‘That was plain, for those who know where to look.' He sighed thickly. ‘Keep the mirror for me. Keep it for the winter.'

‘But what about tomorrow?' She could hear the anxious keen in her voice and tried to temper it. ‘You'll come up to the hall for food and fire?'

‘If I can.'

She wanted to cry out, to ask what might stop him, but she felt she had trespassed on his patience enough. ‘And if not, you'll be back for it? In the spring?' Oh God, she was like one of Widia's hound-puppies, begging for scraps.

‘I'll try.' He was nodding. ‘Go home. Get dry. Eat your cockles.' He smiled, at last. ‘Warm, with butter.'

She nodded, clinging to the smile and trying to muster one of her own in exchange. She knew she had already been dismissed, but she felt a terrible reluctance to leave him. Just one more smile, one more kind word?

‘Go on,' he said.

‘But—'

‘Go.'

So she went, awkward, balancing the rake on one shoulder and lugging the cockle basket with its sacking-wrapped treasure tucked in safe on top, her wet skirts dragging at her thighs. Every few steps she turned and peered back through the thickening mist and dusk, but he wasn't looking at her, he was gazing out to sea, and he didn't turn or call her back. Before long the high curve of the dunes and the green-grey prickly grasses blocked him from her sight.

‘Who's this, then?'

Athulf pulled his elbows in and stiffened his spine, but one man couldn't hide himself in a group of four, and the others had stepped away from him anyway. They had come in out of the freezing rain after a long and fruitless day trying to net duck in the marshes with the aid of a couple of dogs, and now they were jostling their way to the hearth, the others flinging down their sodden cloaks, talking big and shouting for a cup of ale.

He had been to Illingham a couple of times over the last few weeks, but had never yet been invited into the hall, and now he was trying not to stare. It was longer and higher than Donmouth's, with beams whose carving was fresh-painted; and where Donmouth was sparse and poor with the lack of Radmer's trappings, Illingham was a blaze of colour, with embroidered hangings on the walls and a finely worked cloth draped centrally over the high table. Smoke, and sweet hay crushed underfoot, and something good cooking.

‘Go on, Thancrad. Where are your manners? Who's your new friend?'

A woman no taller than he was himself, round and soft, with black eyes in a doughy face, and a sweet smile. She was offering him a pottery cup, and he took it gratefully, realizing as he did so that the others had not yet been served.

‘Be well, guest.'

He scrabbled after the proper reply. ‘I drink your health, lady.' He raised the cup and sipped. Mead, with a different blend of herbs from the little vats of Donmouth. Sweeter, and very much to his taste.

‘See, Thancrad?' The little woman had turned. ‘Some young men have lovely manners.'

‘Athulf is my name, lady.' This must be Thancrad's mother. Switha of Illingham. He badly wanted her to think well of him.

‘Let's get you out of your wet cloak.' She snapped her fingers and he relinquished the sodden square of wool into friendly hands. ‘We'll hang it by the fire. Now, where are you from, Athulf? Who are your parents?'

‘He's from Donmouth.' It was Addan or Dene speaking, from somewhere behind him. ‘The abbot's son.'

His stomach tightened painfully, waiting for the cutting remark, the cold shoulder.

But her face lit up. ‘Ingeld?' She made it sound as though this was the best news she'd heard all winter. She clasped his elbows and stared intently into his face. ‘You're Ingeld's son? Of course you are! Look at you! How could I ever have missed that? The spirit and image of him. And you're wet through. Come and have a seat. There are some oatcakes, fresh from the stone.'

Confused and flattered, he let her lead him, chattering sweetly all the while, bring a creepie-stool forward with her own hands, refill the cup of mead. He hid his face, leaning forward and fiddling with the wet bindings round his calves, feeling as though all the world was mocking his hot cheeks.