Alvar the Kingmaker Read Online Free Page B

entrance. Inside, the support pillars were decorated in a similarly ornate way, but instead of animal heads, the engravings took on the form of tendrils of ivy, symbols of protection, curling their way round the upright posts. Embroidered cloths, worked with golden threads, covered the lime plaster on three sides of the hall, and at the far end, behind the lord’s chair, curtains embellished with chevrons hung from the beams to the floor, separating the lord’s private chamber beyond. The lord’s chair also boasted elaborate carvings, the high back covered in three-armed spirals and interweaving lines, the indentations coloured with gold. Along with all the other chairs for the high table, it sported cushions covered with the same sumptuous fabric that graced the walls. In this place, warm and yet not overly welcoming, Alfreda had sat every night amongst the guests of her father-in-law, the lord of East Anglia. He was a man so trusted by recent kings, and rewarded with so much land, either in outright gift or given temporarily into his custody, that he was known to all as the Half-king. She smiled, despite her sore body and wounded pride. Did the Half-king ever wonder, as he looked back on a life of power, success and influence, how he managed to beget such a spindle of an eldest son?
    Most had gathered now and among them were the overseas visitors. The Half-king played frequent host to learned men and traders from the continent ; the merchants from Frankia had arrived the previous evening, and sitting with them was the scholar from Germany who had been a guest for the past few months. Alfreda made her way to her seat. She was joined by the only man in the room who was not clothed in bright colours and who displayed no outward sign of wealth, having not even a sword to hang up. Abbot Athelwold sat down beside her and smiled. Despite his drab garb, the abbot’s presence was the warmest attraction in the hall for Alfreda. His eyes, the colour of molten honey, his gentle smile and softly spoken words were always a fillip on evenings such as this. He was retained by the Half-king as tutor to the younger boys, but often he spoke to her of his dreams for reform of the monasteries, plans that he had begun with his friend Abbot Dunstan, but he was concerned to put the nunneries on an equal footing. His talk of holy women, pious ladies and gentle abbesses poured balm into her ears which had so often been burned with screamed insults, where the word woman was synonymous with whore .
    But this evening he seemed not to want to expound his discourse on the development of the monastic houses. Instead, the kindly abbot leaned in close to her and said, “If there is one thing for which I am truly sorry, it is that when I was brought here as teacher to Edgar and the younger boys, it was too late to mete out any wisdom to your husband.”
    Alfreda’s cheeks burned hotter than the hearth-fire. Was there no-one who was unaware of her shame?
    But Abbot Athelwold continued. “It saddens me that at seventeen and wed for a year, you have no keys at your belt, nor have you been given your rightful place at the lords’ bench to pour the drinks, as the lady of the house should do.”
    Surprise drained the heat from her face and she suppressed an impulse to let out a shrill laugh. Still, better that he should think her ill-treatment at Elwood’s hands extended to no more than a slight to her position as highest-born woman in the widowed Half-king’s household. Besides, there was a hidden blessing to her relegation at mealtimes; from her seat on a lower bench, she could hear the conversation at the head table, without feeling obliged, or being expected, to contribute.
    The food was brought in; plates of eels, fresh cheeses and cereal brews flavoured with herbs and spring onions. The smells turned her already tender stomach and Alfreda glanced across at the foreign visitors and contemplated enquiring of them whether Frankish or German men ever