“This is nonsense,” the queen said. “Olric, you know she’s not a real princess. Why is she here?”
“I wish I had allowed both Ragnor and Kerek to hear me tell all the people at Hawkfell Island that I’m no princess. I have no royal blood. Hear me, Ragnor? Kerek? I am nothing but a simple woman. Release me now.”
“She is a princess in the eyes of the world, madam,” Kerek said. “Didn’t you know that Duke Rollo wants her for his son, William Longsword?”
“He wouldn’t want me now, Kerek.”
“You’re wrong, Princess. You are still the king of Ireland’s daughter, regardless of your true kinship to him.”
“That is something to think about,” the queen said, and drank deeply from a goblet of wine one of the three men placed in front of her. “You didn’t poison this wine, did you?” she said to the king, who was contentedly eating a bowl filled with smashed honeyed pears.
“No, it isn’t poisoned, not unless someone else did it. I didn’t expect you, so the wine is safe. She’ll be a good breeder,” the king said, looking over at Chessa.
“He felt her, Mother, he rubbed his hands on her belly and on her hips. He pressed his mouth against her breasts. She’s to marry me, not him. She let him do it. If I’d demanded to do it she would have killed me.”
“Aye, Ragnor, hold your tongue now.”
The king pointed to a boar steak that teetered just over the edge of the platter on the floor. “I want it,” he said to a concubine, who immediately picked it off the platter, cut it, and popped it into her mouth. Chessa looked away before she could lay the chewed up mess on the king’s tongue. So did the queen.
The queen said as she rose, “Have your hand bandaged, Ragnor. There is blood on the turnips. It is fortunate that I don’t like turnips. Princess, I will see you in the morning. You won’t try to leave the palace.”
She swept from the chamber, the three guards at her heels. The king grunted, then smacked his lips. “Another bite of the roasted boar,” he said to the concubine.
Kerek said, “Princess, I will see you to your chamber.”
The king called after them, “You will come to me before you see the queen. Forget not that I am the king. I rule. Ragnor, see to your hand.”
Chessa drew a deep breath once they’d left the dining chamber. “This is all very strange, Kerek.”
“Aye,” he said. “You see now how badly you’re needed. The Saxon kings will overrun the Danelaw if Ragnor comes to the throne.”
“I hope the Saxons may serve Ragnor’s head up on a platter, just like those boar steaks.”
Kerek looked pained, but he said nothing more. He bid her good night at the door of her chamber, then spoke quietly to the two guards who were outside.
Chessa settled in the box bed, pulled a soft fox fur to her chin, and prepared to think. “Ingurd? Are you still here? You may leave me now.”
The young girl was standing there twisting her hands together. “But Kerek said I wasn’t to leave you. He said I was to be reverent but I was to stay as close as a shadow. He even said that I—”
“Very well, where will you sleep? No, not on the floor. Have a guard bring you a pallet.”
Ingurd’s mouth gaped. A pallet, something soft between her and the floor. She couldn’t begin to imagine such a thing. But her new mistress was a princess, after all. She supposed that anyone so blessed by the gods could give orders as they pleased. When she eased down on the pallet, the first soft bed she’d known in her short life, she decided the princess wasn’t a bitch as she’d heard Prince Ragnor screaming at Kerek.
Chessa moved just a bit, feeling the other knife she’d wrapped into a bathing cloth and tucked beneath her pillow. On the morrow, she would somehow fasten it to her leg.
She pictured Cleve in her mind, his clothes ragged and filthy, his golden hair matted to his head, a scraggly golden beard covering his lean cheeks. He’d smelled very bad. She’d believed him more beautiful than the last time she’d seen him on Hawkfell Island.
She’d decided on the voyage to York that if she found him alive, she would do whatever she must to make him her husband. She decided he shouldn’t have to live his life without her. He simply didn’t realize yet just how lucky he was.
Now she was the one held captive. She had to stop thinking about Cleve and how she would make him happier than he probably deserved. She had to come up with a plan.
She fell asleep with Cleve’s face in her mind. At least Kiri would be all right now. She was with her first papa.
14
THERE WERE THREEguards standing in front of the queen’s chamber. Chessa nodded to them, then waited for one of them to open the door. Once she was well inside, the door was again closed.
The queen had sent for her. Chessa had wanted to come, for the queen’s behavior the previous night had fascinated her, but now that she was here, as commanded, there wasn’t anyone in the large bright chamber. She’d never before seen a chamber so clean, the walls whitewashed so utterly white. There were no smudges, no hints of any dirt at all. There was a small box bed, one chair, a brazier, and a huge trunk sitting at the end of the bed. Nothing else. There were three windows and a narrow door at the back of the chamber. Chessa walked to the door and opened it. It gave onto a small garden closed in by high walls. It was immaculately kept. There were flowers in bloom everywhere. She recognized daffodils and daisies, foxglove, and hyacinth. The water lilies by the small pond in the center of the garden were the most exquisite Chessa had ever seen, white as snowfall in the wilderness, the leaves and pads so green they looked painted. The high stone walls were weathered a soft gray and covered with ivy, pear vines and wild strawberries.
