The Dream Weavers by Barbara Erskine (books you have to read txt) 📕

taken her place once more at her husband’s side, dictating letters, signing charters, giving orders. She knew she was more deeply resented than ever for her failure to carry a son to term and she didn’t care. She was queen and she would make sure that every man and woman in the country knew it. Her encounter with her husband’s lover was never mentioned, but she knew him. He was one of the handsome young attendants who flocked to attend the king. Beorhtric lavished gifts on them, gave them jewellery and rich clothes, and sat with them often in the hall in the evenings, to hear the latest music and the poetry and laugh immoderately at the bawdy jokes and antics of the tumblers, and above all to get drunk.

She watched and she waited. She noticed now how Beorhtric could not keep his hands off the young men, how he slapped their backs, and how he embraced and slobbered over some of them. The disapproving glances of the priests, should any be present in the hall, did not escape her, and she saw the way one or two of them turned in her direction as if to see whether she condoned her husband’s behaviour.

Her women sat around her, some openly enjoying the entertainment, some turning aside to occupy themselves with their spindles or their embroidery. She knew how much they still disliked her. She missed Hilde so much. She had sent several messengers to enquire after her and scour western Mercia and even the easternmost parts of Powys, but they returned with no news other than that Hilde had left Offa’s court some weeks after arriving there. Anyone who knew or cared presumed she had returned to Wessex. They also brought news that Cynefryth had retired from her son’s court to take up position as abbess at Cookham, one of the abbeys in her own gift, from where she would have oversight of the church in Bedford where Offa was buried. Eadburh’s brother now ruled unopposed, but, one of the messengers said, it was thought he was ill. He had not appeared in the hall while the messenger was there. There was no word either of Ethelfled’s fate, nor of Alfrida far away in the kingdom of East Anglia. She didn’t care. There was no more she could do and she had no love for her mother or her brother. She had no love left in her heart for anyone save her handsome Welsh prince, ever bright in her memory. She thought of him every day, she dreamt about him, she ached for him in every bone of her body and, in her dreams, he was still alive.

And her daughter? She saw the little girl every day and she tried to care about her, but the small face looked back at her with indifference. The child loved her nurses and her playmates and shrank from Eadburh when she took her on her knee, perhaps sensing the coldness there, a coldness that was emphasised when Eadburh saw in the child’s eyes and features a mirror image of her father.

Her dreams of Elisedd slowly became more and more real to her. When she woke in her empty bed she could feel his arms around her, hear his voice, smell the wild heather sweetness of his hair across her face, and in her dreams she was young again, young and free and happy, with a strong healthy body, unweakened by childbirth and sorrow. Surely he could not be dead, not when his spirit came to her so often and so passionately.

There was still no word from Hilde. Perhaps she was dead. She felt a flash of anger that the woman had failed in the second, so important, part of her mission and suddenly she knew what she must do. She summoned her husband’s most trusted messenger, a man known for his discretion. ‘You will go to King Cadell of Powys, saying I wish to set up diplomatic talks between him and my brother and my husband. As a start, I wish to find out what happened to his son, the Prince Elisedd who headed the delegation to my father some eight years ago.’ Eight years. Was it so long since she had seen him, felt him touch her, felt the warmth of his body, his lips on hers. ‘This matter is of the utmost delicacy and secrecy. There are to be no letters, only your private talk with King Cadell himself, and you will bring his response back to me in person and to me alone. These are the king’s orders.’ That last was an afterthought. ‘No word must escape. I and I alone will take your reply direct to the king.’

She paused, her mind shying away, as it always did, from the memory of her father’s words. You should know. The King of Powys’s son, Elisedd. He met with an accident and died.

But in her dreams, Elisedd wasn’t dead.

The substance of her dreams became more real every day. Supposing her father had lied and Elisedd was trying in her dreams to tell her so. If he had been murdered, there would have been war. No king would allow his son to be killed without redress.

As the man bowed and left the queen’s bower she looked over her shoulder into the body of the chamber. Was she there, the woman who watched her from the shadows? The woman who spied on her, heard her words, perhaps witnessed her very dreams. The woman who might betray her. Before all else, she had to be disposed of.

‘I need spells to rid me of a demon.’ Nesta, back from her plant-collecting in the forest, was sitting with her outside in the autumn sunlight. ‘She haunts me day and night.’

Nesta looked up, her fingers busy with some careful stitching. She had established herb gardens in four of the royal palaces now, at Cheddar, at Corfe, at Wareham and at Winchester. At Eadburh’s command, the woman reluctantly followed