“And Genevra.” The words burst from Camelee’s mouth as if they had a mind of their own. Though with a second to think about it, she would blurt it out again. “Please, Your Majesty. She is…” She shook her head slightly and swallowed her insides. Then began again. “She is my mother.”
“Of course!” the king said and proclaimed her “mother’s” protection to all.
She pulled a scene from a play she did in college. “Your gracious king, if I may humble myself before you one more time?”
“Your brother in my kitchen, who is preparing a feast that will be talked about for years to come.”
Camelee smiled. “Yes. That’s him.”
The king shouted his command again, this time to include Alric.
Wolf turned to her and grinned. “You have power over many.”
“And,” the king added, reaching them and hearing Wolf’s words. “She has the affection of the queen.”
“I’m honored to have it.”
He narrowed his eyes on her. “See that you do not take it lightly.”
“Never, Sire.”
Satisfied with her answers, the king promised to see them tonight and left them.
“Whatever you want to say,” Camelee said to Wolf, “can we do it inside? We’re freezing to death out here.”
“Truly?” Wolf asked. “I feel a little warm.”
They laughed as a horse and wagon passed through the yard, heading for the outer court. The wagon was really a large cage filled with people, much to Camelee’s horror. They were filthy and freezing in their tattered rags.
“Mumma!” Hild shouted and then screamed. “Mumma!”
A woman from inside the cage reached her arms through the cage. “Hild! Give me back my baby, you Danish bastards! Hild!” she wailed.
“Wolf,” Camelee cried out. “Is that Hild’s mother? I thought she was mauled by a bear.”
“It must not have been her,” he said. “The body was unrecognizable. Come. Let us stop that cart and speak to her.”
They hurried forward while Hild shouted for her mother. Wolf was able to stop the slave cart. After telling the driver who he was, the man dropped off the driving bench and went with Wolf to the back of the cage to unlock it.
“Good King Cnut said we can sell or trade any slaves we catch,” the driver said.
“Mumma!” Hild shouted again when Camelee passed her mother.
“Give me back my baby!” the woman screamed at her.
Hild’s mother! Hild’s mother was back from the dead. Only, she hadn’t been dead. They had assumed…she had blamed Fin and she was wrong. She had also been wrong to tell a little girl that her mother wasn’t coming back. Hild’s mother. Camelee was losing the child she denied from the day she met her, and now, would have given anything not to lose. “We thought you were killed by a bear,” Camelee told her, shaken to her bones.
“You thought? Did no one bother to be certain, Dane?”
“I’m not a Dane.”
Hild’s mother spat. “Saxon traitor. Even worse.”
“Mumma!” Hild reached for her mother, and Camelee’s heart broke.
Why should it? This kid was no one to her. She’d told Wolf over and over, but he wouldn’t listen. He wanted her to pretend to be Hild’s mother while he pretended to be her father and they would be a nice little pretend family.
She wouldn’t let Hild go into the cart to her mother. “Just a moment. We’re getting you out of there first.” She walked away with Hild kicking and crying over her shoulder. She reached Wolf as he opened the cage door.
