The Edge of Light by Joan Wolf

took a hand, there was little that Charles could do,”
    Athulf frowned. “I am surprised the pope acted as he did. It is not the part of the church to encourage young girls to make their own marriages.”
    “Judith was twice a widow,” Alfred said, “Hardly an inexperienced girl.”
    Athulf, whose mouth was full, shrugged.
    Alfred contemplated the thin dark face of his neighbor. Then he raised a single delicately drawn eyebrow. “Judith wrote to me that Baldwin also told the pope that if his marriage was not recognized, he would join with the Vikings. As Baldwin has been one of Charles’s main props against the Danes for the last few years, you can imagine Charles’s reaction to that threat.”
    There was a moment of stunned silence; then Athulf began to laugh.
    “My brother Ethelbald would have done the same,” said Alfred. “I rather think that is why Judith married Baldwin. He sounds very like Ethelbald.”
    “One Ethelbald in the world was quite enough, I think,” said Ethelswith, who had never forgiven her eldest brother for raising a rebellion against her father.
    Alfred unconsciously touched his headband, which style he had adopted shortly after Ethelbald’s death. Then, “There was much that was fine in Ethelbald,” he said to his sister. His voice was contained but there was that in it that caused Athulf to feel he would be wise to change the subject.
    “Well, I am glad that my own marriage is like to go more smoothly,” Athulf said. “I am not one anxious to count the world well lost for love.”
    Ethelswith, who had also heard the warning note in Alfred’s voice, followed Athulf’s lead. “Athulf is to marry the daughter of the Ealdorman of Hwicce in the autumn,” she said to her brother a little too vivaciously,
    “I wish you every joy, my lord,” Alfred said, and both his face and his voice were perfectly pleasant.
    “Thank you. She is a good girl and we suit very well.” Athulf nodded in the direction of a pretty girl seated further down the board. “That is Hild there, the blond girl in the yellow gown.”
    “She is very pretty,” said Alfred.
    Athulf nodded and picked up a leg of spiced chicken from the platter before him.
    “Alfred, you have eaten nothing,” his sister said. “You’re too thin as it is. Eat.”
    “The food looks wonderful, Ethelswith,” he said sincerely, then picked up a piece of bread and began to chew.
    By the time Elswyth got to Alfred’s birthday feast, she was starving. Like the rest of Burgred’s guests, she thought that he would never stop talking; and her already good opinion of the West Saxon prince rose when he spared them a lengthy acceptance speech. As soon as the food was set on the trestle table before her, she filled her plate and then began to empty it.
    “Elswyth,” said Eadburgh beside her, “do not eat like a starving dog. You are a lady.”
    “I am hungry,” Elswyth answered, but she slowed her chewing obediently. Eadburgh was already furious enough with her for going on the hunt. There was little to be gained by annoying her mother further.
    “I like to see a healthy appetite,” said the Ealdorman of the Tomsaetan, who was seated on Elswyth’s other side. He reached over to pat her hand. “The Lady Elswyth is young,” he said to her mother. “The young are always hungry.”
    Elswyth’s narrow hand went rigid under his large puffy fingers. Then she pulled her hand away and cast a look of smoldering resentment at the man seated beside her.
    Ealdorman Edred of the Tomsaetan was a tall, strongly made man of middle years; his hair was dark blond and his eyes were gray. The Tomsaetan were the chief of the Mercian tribes and their territory comprised the heartland of the country: the royal church at Repton, the bishopric at Lichfield, and the main residence at Tamworth. They had ever been administered by their own ealdorman, who, after the king, was the most powerful of all Mercian nobles. Edred had held his position for some ten