I Am the Chosen King (51 page)

Oxford

By the twenty-seventh day of the month of October Edward had removed his court to Oxford, intending to block the advance of the rebellion with the summoning of the fyrd. He had already his personal guard of 800 housecarls and with them the 300 or so of his Earls Harold, Leofwine, Gyrth and Tostig. But the English fyrd did not come. It was a freeman’s duty to serve an agreed number of days at arms, called out by the overlord to whom he paid rent or tax, summoned by the boom of the war horns. Earls Harold, Leofwine and Gyrth, flanked by lesser nobles, thegns and elders, however, refused to entertain what could, so easily, become the nightmare bloodbath of a civil war. The war horns had remained silent. No one, besides Edward and Tostig, cared to set South against North like cocks in the pit.

That it had been Earl Harold who first refused to comply with Edward’s demand to call out the armies of the South was not lost in Tostig’s vitriolic condemnation of his brother. Mistakenly convinced that he was sympathetic to Morkere, Tostig accused him of blatant treason before the assembled Council of southern lords.

“You plot with Eadwine and Morkere—why? To secure their armies at your own back when the time comes to take England’s crown for yourself? Is that what you plan, Harold?”

There were audible gasps of horror at such a vehement accusation. Edward himself cried out, shock on his thin face. Edith too gave a gasp, covered her mouth with her hand, stared, round-eyed and fearful. “Tostig!” she breathed. “Hold your silence, I beg you!”

Tostig did not see, hear or care. Harold had been instructed to negotiate with that plague-tainted rabble and what had he achieved for his own brother? Nothing! That’s what, bloody nothing, aside from allowing them to gather more strength. They were a mile from Oxford, 400 short of 3,000 men against the King’s pathetic few hundred A few hundred that would have been multiplied by five or six times had Harold not countermanded Edward’s order to the fyrd. Aye, Harold had done that—Harold. Was it not obvious why?

“What did you say to those peasants from the North?” he sneered. “Well done? Good work? Well soon have Tostig gone and the King down on his knees. How long, brother, before you lay claim to the crown?” Then, as an afterthought he added, “Is it for yourself you have encouraged this rebellion, or are you securing a future by working in league with Normandy?”

Harold’s face had also drained chalk pale from disbelief and a profound rage at his brother’s foolishness. He had been trying to warn them about Normandy these past months—yet arrogant fools like Tostig and their sister, and those complacent like Edward, had refused to listen. He had no wish to become king unless there came no alternative choice—that honour was for Edgar, the lad who carried the true blood of Wessex. He was not insensitive to the prestige a crown would bring, but he loved his family and his freedom. A king, even one as incompetent as Edward or his father Æthelred, had no independence or respite from responsibility. Royal power was an attractive cloak to wear, but it was one that weighted a man’s shoulders; privately he would be prepared to carry that burden if God decreed it must be so, but publicly he had wholeheartedly declared his support for young Edgar—and had made it abundantly clear that Edgar must rule as his own man, that there would be no toleration of either the Queen or Tostig acting as regent. Could Tostig not realise that it was precisely because of his contemptible rages and poor judgement that Harold could never back him for such a role? Christ Jesu, he had made a midden mess of Northumbria…to let him loose on England with a man such as Duke William watching like a hawk from across the Channel Sea! Harold eased his clenched fists, struggled to retain composure.

“I would remind you, brother, that the matter of the succession is not what concerns us here. We face civil war—brought about by your greed and crass stupidity. I suggest that the subject of who next wears the crown be set aside until God decrees that our present king has no more requirement of it.”

“Set it aside? Ah, no, brother, ’tis top of my agenda.” Tostig stalked around the table, his finger pointing at Harold. All the grievances, the jealousies and petty hatreds that had niggled at his vitals since childhood exploded in his senses, sending judgement and reason into oblivion. Harold had always been the favoured one. The clever one, the successful. Harold had Wessex and wealth, respect and friendship. Why should it all go to him? He, Tostig, was just as capable. Was it his fault that others were not so enthusiastic about suitable punishment of outlaws and thieves? Aye, they all fell on their knees for Harold, the fools. Never looked beyond his charming smile and affable manners. What good was that in a leader? You needed courage and conviction. Morals and purpose. Was it his fault that men were so stupid that they could not see that these lazy good-for-nothing Northerners needed their backsides kicking?

He stepped closer to Harold, his finger poking at his brother’s chest. “You are so like our father, taking and taking, never considering how the rest of us may feel. How we are shoved aside and belittled.” He stabbed his finger again, harder. “Well, I am as good as you, brother, and when Council elects me king instead of this old fool we are saddled with, I shall prove it!”

The entire Council, save for Edward, were on their feet shouting, condemning, their anger unleashed. Harold too. He raised his arm, blocking that stabbing finger and thrusting it aside, clutched at the folds of Tostig’s tunic; gathering them tight around the throat he savagely rammed his brother’s head up and back. “Because of your contempt you have misruled an entire earldom. Have provoked rebellion and now you are advocating a war, a blood-bath of vengeance, for no reason but to salvage your injured pride. Yet you accuse me of treachery?” Harold shook him as a terrier would a captured rat.

Edith cried out with fear for her favourite brother, ran from her chair and began beating at Harold’s back with her fists. “Let him go! Let him go, Harold! Oh, you have always poured scorn on his achievements!”

Without releasing Tostig, Harold turned his head to stare in contempt at his sister. The accumulated years of bitterness had aged her, she was no more than six and thirty years, but appeared ten years older. Harold should have felt pity for her loss of youth, but he felt nothing for her. Nothing except an overwhelming loathing. She and Tostig had always run as a couple, wanting and whining for more and more. He would not, ordinarily, be cruel to any woman, but these self-centred, self-seeking, nest-feathering cuckoos had pushed him too far. “Tostig’s achievements? What achievements would they be, Edith? To insult and offend? To grab and grasp at all he can lay hands on?”

“Enough! Enough! Control yourselves or must I summon in the guard!” Edward was ineffectively fluttering his hands, making calming motions, his face anguished, uncertain what to do. Tostig’s words reverberated in his mind: “when Council elects me king instead of this old fool we are saddled with.” Had Tostig truly said that? Did he mean it? The Devil was surely at work here! He crossed himself, looked pleadingly from one contorted face to the other.

Leofwine and Gyrth came forward; each grasped at a brother, pulling them forcibly apart, Leofwine neatly fielding his sister’s batting hand with his raised arm; Tostig remonstrating furiously with Gyrth who, besides their sister, had always been the closest to him in opinion.

Gyrth released his brother and shook his head. In this, he could not agree with Tostig. “I am sorry, but Harold is right. We cannot start a war over what amounts to personal pride and gain.”

Tostig let his hands fall to his sides, the fight abruptly going out of him. But his anger had not died; took instead a different, more menacing twist. “So, you too are against me. And you, Leofwine?”

Leofwine looked down at his boots before glancing up again, direct into Tostig’s face. “I too. Our father and Harold never treated us with anything but respect and equal love. It swells in your own mind, this twisted hatred. Harold would lay his life down for you, but not at the expense of England and her people.”

A weird grimace distorted Tostig’s mouth. He turned to the King. The room had fallen silent, those present aware that the mood had subtly changed. “And you, my king, what do you say? This man here”—Tostig flicked a disdainful glance at Harold—“has refused to obey your command to call out the fyrd. What do you intend to do about it?”

Edward was trembling, his heart pounding, head thundering. Do? He had no idea what he ought to do.

No one moved or said anything; finally, Edward looked up from studying the rings that sparkled on his fingers. “What can I do Tostig? How can I order any man to war when we are so outnumbered by the opinion of my Council?”

Edith moved to her husband’s side, knelt, clutched his arm. “If you love my brother, Edward, you must help him recover his earldom! It is Harold who disobeys you—remove him from office, give command of your army to Tostig and again summon the fyrd.” She glanced up, swiftly, deliberately, at Harold, her meaning plain. “Either men obey you, Edward, or commit treason.”

Tostig saw her reasoning, moved also to the King’s chair, knelt, his eyes pleading. “I can lead the fyrd, my Lord. I can march against this rabble that is daring to defy you. Every one of them shall be strung from the highest trees! Grant me the authority, find me the men, I shall so do it.”

“Except,” Harold interrupted with cold and precise pronunciation, “that this rabble, as you call them, has not taken arms against their king. They have made that explicitly clear. They seek only justice and their legal rights. Northumbria bends its knee to the King—it but defies you, not Edward.”

Tostig glared at his brother then returned his gaze to Edward, his angry eyes staring into bewilderment. “If you do not do this for me, then how can you love me?”

Edward took Tostig’s hand, held it between his palms. “I regretted you having Northumbria, my dear friend, for you must be gone so long from court. Perhaps”—his breath caught with eagerness, a sudden pounce of hope; his hand tightened around Tostig’s. “Perhaps we can agree some compromise? Let Morkere have the earldom and I can give you something else, something better…something where you could be more often here as my companion.”

Tostig interrupted: “Wessex? Would you give me Wessex?”

There were sharp intakes of breath, an audible hiss of fury from Harold.

Wessex, the richest, most powerful earldom. By the very nature of his wealth, status and given responsibilities, whoever was appointed to rule Wessex could, theoretically at least, become a prime candidate to rule all of England.

For perhaps the first time in his life Edward was forced to admit the truth to himself: that he was a weak and easily influenced king; that it was only through the combined wisdom of his Council, not his own management, that peace had been maintained within this realm; that Harold Godwinesson was a sensible, practical man who cared for England above all else, and wore honour and integrity openly as his badge of office; that Tostig was but a shadow to his brother’s light, with a priority for his own selfish gain.

Despair twisted around Edward’s heart. Was this how his father had felt when he eventually realised how hopeless had been his rule? Or had his mother spoken the truth when she had so callously told him that Æthelred had never recognised contempt, not even when the people of England had hurled it at him in the form of cow dung and pig-shit?

He looked at Tostig, slowly shook his head. “I cannot.”

Tostig erupted into a blaze of anger. He snatched his hand from the King’s touch, his lip curling in repugnance. “So you do not care for me? Will not defend my reputation, nor give me the honour I am entitled to?”

Tears glistened behind Edward’s lashes, his shoulders slumped, his hands fell limp into his lap. “I never wanted to be a king. I was content with exile in Normandy, where I had friends for the sake of friendship alone, not for who or what I was. Where the days were full of peace and the nights sighed quiet. I have tried, once or twice, to be the king you all expect me to be, but have not succeeded. Council does the thing so much better than I.” He stretched out his hand, imploring Tostig to understand. “Even were I to give Wessex to you, I doubt Council or your brother Harold would let you keep it.”

Tostig snatched his hand away, took a long step backward. “You pathetic old fool! This one thing I ask of you, after all these years of suffering your attention, your foul-odoured breath, your pawing and simpering. Of overcoming the disgust that rises like bile within me whenever I am forced to sit beside you?” Tostig shuddered with fury, longing to hit someone, something; to release his disappointment and hurt by flinging it back. “I hope you rot in hell, Edward, with the rest of these ball-less arse-lickers!”

Tostig Godwinesson turned on his heel and stalked from the chamber. Outside, he bellowed for someone to fetch his wife, to bid her take what she could within a saddlebag and for their horses to be saddled. Bewildered, tear-blotched and fearful, Judith left Oxford riding beside her husband with no idea of why, to where they were going, or if ever they would return.

No word, no outcry followed Tostig’s outburst. Men stood, shocked and stunned, staring open-mouthed at the closed door through which he had stormed.

Edith sat slumped among the rushes of the floor, her arms curled around herself, rocking backwards and forwards, tears coursing down her cheeks. Her hopes, her plans all ruined. All shredded into nothing. How would she survive as Queen without Tostig?

No one immediately noticed the King, forlorn, silent and so alone.

Harold went to him, hunkered to his heels before him. “My Lord? My Lord, be you ill?” He took the cold hands within his own, attempted to rub some warmth into them.

Broken and devastated, the pain cramped tighter around Edward’s heart, seared into his chest and shuddered down his left arm.

Westminster

Some whispered that if Tostig Godwinesson had elected to go quietly into exile, prepared to wait for the things said about him to fade from memory and for his elder brother’s anger to calm, then perhaps the King might have found a reason to struggle against the illness that struck at his body and mind. Or perhaps if Tostig had not been so cruel or proud.

That he had ridden straight for Bristol and made sail in a flurry of outraged pique for Flanders did not, at first, cause concern to anyone of the Council except Edith and her husband. By November, they all privately thought either that England was well rid of him, or that he would soon see sense, would settle his bruised feathers—or at least his wife’s father would insist he do so—and would humbly return home begging forgiveness. Count Baldwin, however, was in Paris, had not the opportunity or the inclination to waste time on a son-in-law whom he thought a pompous fool. Tostig himself, too easily influenced by his dignity, was determined to regain his earldom, whatever the cost or consequences. He had endured and defeated exile once before, admittedly with the burden shared by his brothers and father—but who needed the support of deceitful kindred out for their own gain? There would be others he could approach for help. Svein of Denmark, Malcolm of Scotland, Harald Hardrada, King of Norway, and even William of Normandy. As short-sighted as Edward when events tumbled out of control, Tostig was blinded by his indignation, never wondering why, and for what advantage, any prospective ally might agree to support his claim.

The seizure that had gripped Edward at Oxford had left him feeble and ailing. As a wind-driven November rattled into the frosted winter month of December, Edith had him taken by litter to Westminster, for her own convenience more than his spiritual comfort. He was soon nothing but skin-covered bone. His mind wandered, his fingers shook and his body could often not control the natural functions of bladder and bowel.

Christmas Eve fell on the Saturday, but there was to be no merriment in the celebrating of Christ’s birth this year, Edward was ill in the evening, retching profusely, his bowels loose and stinking. He groped his way through Christmas Day, the holy service in the chapel and the banquet in his King’s Hall. Not that he ate, or remembered much of what happened around him. By the Monday he was too weak to leave his bed. As the day progressed he slid from awareness to wandering confusion. He was dying.

For himself, he had no fear of death, for the Kingdom of Heaven was a joyful prospect, but the place he had chosen for burial that he had cherished into being from a wattle-built shack to stone-built glory, was not yet consecrated. Lying helpless, empty and defeated, drifting between consciousness and sleep, the worry tottered in and out of his mind. Until his abbey at Westminster was dedicated to God he could not be laid to rest within its walls—and that he must have! He tried to tell them that he wanted the ceremony to be completed, but none of them would listen. None took a moment to sit patiently and wait for him to form those wretched sounds in the slurred mouth that would not obey his will. How could he be at peace before his abbey was dedicated to God and Saint Peter?

Throughout the Monday and Tuesday, they came and stood at his bedside, tutting and shaking their heads or weeping and wringing their hands. The men of his Council, of his court. He recognised their blurred faces, could hear their words as if they spoke from a great distance—but could not, could not, make them understand!

There was his doctor, Abbot Baldwin of Bury St. Edmunds, who came daily to bleed him, to smell his breath and inspect the waste evacuated from his body. Edward endured the purges and tinctures, took comfort from the prayers and blessings muttered over him by the Abbot and the Archbishops Stigand and Ealdred.

They had all come: abbots, bishops, thegns and shire reeves. His Earls Eadwine and Morkere he did not so easily recognise; Leofwine and Gyrth took his hand, kissed the ring that hung too large on his wasted finger, Harold: his Earl of Wessex sat a long while beside the bed through most of one night, although Edward did not know which. Why did Tostig not come? There was a reason, but he could not remember it. Perhaps he was hunting. They had often hunted together. Once Edward thought he heard the pack, the music of their voices as they found a scent. What would happen to his hounds he wondered, when he was gone? To Hawise, that little brindle bitch who could flush a hare from any meadow, to Shadow, the black and tan with that amazing turn of speed? He so hoped Tostig would look after his hounds.

Edith was attempting to spoon some foul-tasting broth into his puckered mouth. Edith was always there, sitting next to his bed. He wished she would go away, or at least cease her weeping. He was dying; there was nothing they could do about it, for it was God’s will. She ought to accept it. If he did not fear its coming, why should she? He tried to bat the spoon away, succeeded in knocking her arm, sending the stuff splashing over the bed furs. Edith thrust the spoon into the bowl, impatiently handed it to a servant.

“God’s breath, Edward,” she chided as the broth spilt. “You are more exasperating than a child. All I ask is that you eat something. You will never regain your strength unless you do. Then where shall I be once I am alone? Answer me that!”

A slurred mumble left Edward’s lips, trying to say that it was not his strength he wanted but his abbey consecrated. Edith did not pause to listen. “What am I to do when you die? How shall I retain respect and dignity? Who will listen to me, seek my opinion? I am not yet an old woman, I do not want to be shut away in a dreary nunnery or a secluded apartment somewhere as a grieving widow. I want my court and courtiers. My position.” A wail of despair cracked her thin voice. “I want to keep my crown!”

Her world was crumbling around her ears and she had no idea of what to do to stop it. A king, once anointed, was always a king, but a queen remained so only while her husband reigned, or her son as successor took his own wife. She knew now why Emma all those years ago had so desperately clung to her crown. She covered her face with her hands and wept.

Edward closed his eyes, shut out the annoying noise of her sobbing and filled his mind with pictures of his completed abbey. Saw angels flanking the gold altar, light streaming from the heavens through the windows…

The door to the fuggy bedchamber opened and the Countess Gytha quietly slipped through, wrinkling her nose at the stench. Nearing the close of her sixtieth year, she felt of a sudden her full age. Rarely did she leave Bosham, for journeying wearied her and court life held no interest, but how could she have not come to Westminster this Christmastide when so much of importance was occurring, and her offspring, one way or another, at the very heart of it?

She pursed her lips. Would this daughter of hers never pull her senses together and cease this futile weeping? Tears would do nothing except blotch her face and give her an aching head. She crossed the room, peered at Edward and said to Edith in a sharper tone than she had intended, “How fares the King? Does your sniffling not upset him?”

Edith glowered. Who cared if it did. His refusal to stand by Tostig had upset her, yet he had not been concerned by that. “He is being awkward, will not eat. When he dies what is to become of me?”

Gytha said nothing, for she had realised Edward was awake, listening. Taking the broth, she sat on the edge of the bed, scooping a little of the stuff on to the spoon and encouraging him to swallow. “You must eat, my Lord King, we are all so afeared for your well-being.”

Again he tried to speak. The Countess leaned forward, her head cocked, and caught one feeble word.

Edith was paying no attention, she was walking to and fro, twisting a linen square between her fingers, bemoaning a dismal future.

“What is it you are trying to say?” Gytha dipped her ear close to Edward’s lips, ignoring the foulness of his breath. “Edith, do be silent, he is trying to speak. I think it is important.”

Edith’s breath caught in her throat. The succession—was he trying to tell them who should come after him? The Council had asked her several times, had been discussing it discreetly between themselves since Christmas Eve—hah! Before then also! Like scavengers they had descended on Westminster, ghoulish and curious, anxious to curry favour with whomever they were to elect as the next king. Edith closed her eyes. Oh, Tostig ought to be here! He ought to be promoting his cause, demonstrating his worth, his ability, not sitting across the sea somewhere buying ships and planning a war against the very people who could, if persuaded, give her what she wanted.

“Abbey?” Gytha queried, unaware of her daughter’s anguish. “You are concerned about your abbey?”

Edith swore under her breath, a word that her mother would have been shocked to hear had she spoken it aloud. His abbey? Was that all the old dotard could think of?

Tears were beginning to trickle from Edward’s sunken and bruised eyes. His abbey. He had so wanted to be buried in his abbey.

The memories of her own husband dying were all too vivid in Gytha’s mind. How she missed him, even after all these years. It was not loneliness, for she had good-hearted people around her—servants, friends, family. No, it was the little things that she missed: the exchange of a glance that only they understood; the sharing of laughter or tears, of secrets, hopes and fears; the comfort of his strong arms around her; his occasional bursts of flurried temper, and the sheepish appeal for forgiveness.

Edith, poor child, would not miss Edward for any of those things. Without love, what was there to miss? There would be nothing, only the emptiness of what might have been.

“I think, my dear,” she said to her daughter, “that he is concerned for his abbey.”

At first when Gytha had arrived at Westminster, halfway through the month, Edith had been delighted. She so desperately wanted someone to empathise with her bounding fear of the future as a widow. Gytha had sat with her, wept for Tostig’s exile, agreed that Harold ought to have fought harder to help him, but that had only been on the first day and had, Edith soon discovered, been to calm her down. None of those words had been true, not after Gytha had spoken to Harold and heard his power-grubbing version of those disastrous events at Oxford. She might have known that their mother would take his side. Harold had always been Gytha’s favourite. These weeks on, she wished her mother would take her meddling interferences and go home.

“What of the damned place? Is my future not more important?”

Gytha bit back an impatient retort, reminding herself, yet again, that distress did so play tricks upon the common sense. “Of course it is, my dear, but has no one thought to reassure him that the consecration is to take place on the morrow?”

Edith hesitated. Had he been told? She tossed her head, irritable; of course he had. The ceremony had been arranged days ago, before Christmas Eve, it was one of the first things Harold had done on reaching Westminster from his manor at Waltham. She remembered, unbidden, her brother’s scathing words: “Could you not take a moment from your own selfish preoccupations to organise the service of consecration for him?”

She had been too busy sorting out her approaching widowhood. There was so much to do and no one reliable to help her! Documents to be read and signed, letters to be written, plans to be made—part of the royal treasury to be discreetly removed to Winchester. Oh, everything had changed from how she had expected it to be! Edward was to have died gloriously and bravely. Swiftly, with none of this lingering that gave men time to conjecture. And Tostig was to have been by his side, to receive the King’s blessing.

Much had angered Harold that day, she now recalled. He had arrived at Westminster in a temper, had imperiously taken command. By what right had he censured any further removal of gold from the treasury? She was Queen, she had every right to do so.

Edith shut her eyes. How her head drummed. Harold had taken control over almost everything, from what was served by the kitchens to what was written on a royal charter. Acting as if he were king in Edward’s place. He was second-in-command, it was true, but second beneath the sovereign. She was Queen, she was sovereign, yet had he consulted her? Damn him, damn his efficiency, his authority, his ability! Damn the fact that he had been right over the matter of the abbey.

To justify her negligence she said, “Edward will not be well enough to attend the service, so I do not see how it matters.”

Sharply Gytha retorted, “It matters a great much to your husband.” Really, the child was insufferable! Gytha again tempted Edward with a small spoonful of broth. He swallowed, a lopsided smile crimping his lips in a grotesque expression of gratitude. Tomorrow she had said. He could manage until tomorrow.

Countess Gytha patted his hand, realising he was trying to thank her.
The pity of old age
, she thought.
Are the ones who die quickly in battle more fortunate than those of us who must wait and endure?

The abbey of Westminster was far from completed. The two western towers stood at half-height and at that end of the nave the roof needed tiling, the windows glazing. The unfinished work, however, was distant from the sanctuary and altar beyond the transept and could be screened. They would have to carry Edward by litter and ensure the ceremony was as brief as possible.

Edward’s head had drooped. A snore reverberated in his nose. Gytha gave the bowl to the servant and bade him take it away. It was cold, anyway, unappetising.

“Have you heard from Tostig?” she asked Edith, automatically wiping the incessant trickle of spittle from Edward’s chin with a linen cloth. The thing was soiled; she tossed it to the floor, demanding something clean be fetched.

“Why would I have heard from Tostig?” her daughter answered with a false bravado that immediately proved that she lied.

“I wondered merely if Judith was well. It must be hard for her, this worry.”

“What has
she
got to worry about?” Edith retorted with indignation. “She is not about to be widowed! She isn’t about to lose everything she has worked for, for twenty years!”