ON THE OTHER SIDE of the busy town square was a large house built in the same manner as every other house Sydney had seen so far, except that this house was taller. There were four chimney holes along the length of the steep roof, all of them bellowing smoke. There were also several doors, each with an armed guard standing beside it.
There were few windows, although they were all open.
The Lord Wulfstan had already moved inside, using one of the doors at the far end of the building. The guard, though, was leading her to a different door. He pushed her through the narrow door and followed her in.
The door was shut behind them, cutting off most of the natural light.
The room she was in seemed to take up the entire bottom floor of the house. There were windows on either side and they were letting in a little light. Most of the light was coming from two fires that burned in the middle of the room. The floor where she was standing was made of wood planks, while the floor beneath the fires looked like dun-colored bricks. Mud bricks, Sydney guessed.
The air in the room was thick and warm. The smoke was all escaping through the holes in the roof above each fire so the air wasn’t unbreathable. There was a lingering aroma that might be unpleasant and over the top of it was sweeter smelling scents that made her think of flowers and herbs.
The guard pushed her forward again, this time leading her past the fires.
Many people stood about the room watching her. All of them were wearing clothing of much better quality than her ripped and stained dress. At this end of the room the watchers were all men, their tunics all ankle length and embroidered in rich colors. Most of them wore leather belts that were knotted in the middle, so that the leftover length hung down the front.
At the front of the room, women gathered in twos and threes. Sydney brushed at the poor fabric over her hip because these women were dressed far more elaborately. They looked…clean. Their veils looked nothing like the simple headdress Sydney wore. They had metal circlets around their heads, holding down very fine veils. Their overdresses were almost as long as their underdresses and made of fabric that didn’t have the bumps and rough weave that hers did. They wore necklaces and earrings that dangled beneath their veils. Some of their sleeves were so wide they nearly touched the ground.
Their belts were complex affairs, with metal studs or embroidery, sometimes wrapped around their waists twice, then knotted so the second loop hung lower than the first. From each belt hung at least one pouch, well-filled.
The women were all watching her with avid curiosity. Some of them looked disgusted or amused.
Sydney kept her chin up.
Wulfstan was standing ahead of her, speaking to someone she couldn’t see. “This is the widow Sunngifu, of whom I spoke, my Lady.” He stepped aside.
The woman he revealed was sitting on an elaborately formed iron chair, with the heads and long bodies of fantastic creatures making up the four legs. There were scrolled cross beams forming an X between the legs and filigree panels on the sides.
The woman who sat upon the chair seemed small and delicate. She was old. How old, Sydney could not begin to guess. Her brows were pale and her face lined. Her skin looked soft, not from care but from age. Jowls were beginning to form on either side of her chin.
Her hair was hidden beneath a white veil that wrapped underneath the mass at the back of her head, then lifted up to fold over the sides of the heavy metal circlet around her head. The veil then dropped down either side.
The woman looked at her expectantly. Unlike the rest of her face, the woman’s blue eyes were sharp with intelligence and very young looking. This, then, must be Aethelfreda, the Lady of Mercia.
That meant Sydney wasn’t in Powys, where Rafe would be. She was on her own.
Sydney didn’t know if she was expected to curtsey or bow. So she lowered her head. “My Lady.”
“Sunngifu,” Aethelfreda said, pronouncing it sung-eva. “Is that a British name?”
“No, my Lady,” Sydney said. “It is quite Saxon.” She didn’t know where that knowledge came from, yet she knew it was true.
“Your coloring is pure Saxon. Perhaps that is just as well,” the Lady said, “as we are to march upon the Britons tomorrow. My Reeve tells me that you have deprived me of one of my strongest soldiers.”
“He is only temporarily unfit for fighting,” Sydney said. “I could have cut his throat, yet I did not.”
Aethelfreda’s brows lifted and she glanced at Wulfstan, who nodded. She turned her attention back to Sydney. “Your husband was a soldier? This is how you learned to fight?”
“He was, my Lady. He taught me much of what he learned from the wars he fought.” Which was perfectly true. Rafe had been a dedicated teacher and Alexander had added self-defense to her repertoire, too. Also, at the top of her mind was the knowledge that her husband in this time had served the Lady’s army until dying in battle two years ago.
“I pay my soldiers well,” Aethelfreda said. “You appear to have fallen upon hard times since his death.”
Sydney didn’t answer. The truth was there for everyone to see, in her plain and stained dress and her simple head cloth.
“You have no children to care for?” the Lady asked.
Sydney swallowed. “We were not blessed with children, my Lady.”
“That may be a blessing in disguise,” Aethelfreda said, her tone dry.
“My Lady?”
“Let me see your knife,” she demanded.
Sydney glanced at Wulfstan, startled. He nodded.
Slowly, she withdrew the long knife and held it out for the Lady to inspect.
“It is almost a sword,” the Lady declared. “Do you know swords at all?” Her keen blue eyes held steady upon her.
“I…er…yes, I do,” Sydney said, feeling that it was also the truth. She remembered the feel of a sword hilt in her hand, even though she knew she had never held one before.
“I’m told that the wives of the Northmen that ravage our lands are all keen fighters,” the Lady said. “They perhaps understand the truth that those without swords can still die upon them.”
“I do not know much about the Northmen,” Sydney told her. “Although I met one, once. He was a physician, not a warrior.”
“Proving that Northmen can be wounded just as any other man and require stitching,” the Lady said. “We march upon the king of Brycheiniog tomorrow.”
“I have heard this.”
“I, of course, will lead my men into battle.”
“You, my Lady?” Sydney asked curiously. “You are skilled with a sword?”
“Skilled enough. However, I fully expect Brycheiniog will call to Powys for support and I do not have skill enough against the might of Powys to defend myself and lead at the same time. You will come with me and stay at my side. When I am attacked, as I fully expect to be, you will defend me.”
Sydney’s heart squeezed. “I have never fought in a battle, my Lady,” she said quickly.
“You fought and won your first battle, this morning,” the Lady told her. “None of my women are also warriors like you. You will be among them, guarding my flank, so that no man suspects I am not as vulnerable as I appear.”
Sydney glanced at the silent women, who were all measuring her with their gazes.
“You want the Powys fighters to attack you?” she asked Aethelfreda.
She smiled. “When they do, as they will, I will be able to measure their true strength for myself.”
“Then you march upon Brycheiniog merely to gauge the strength of Powys?”
Aethelfreda smiled. “The killing of my abbot gives me a reason to cross the dyke without invitation. When Powys joins the fight, I can ride into Powys and see for myself the strength of Mathrafel and the length of their defenses.”
“You consider Powys to be your real enemy?” Sydney asked.
“Very good. You grasp military matters as well as you hold your knife. You may put that away now, until I have need of it once more.”
Sydney put the knife back in the loop on her belt. “Why is Powys the enemy, my Lady?” she asked. “Forgive me, but I would have thought the Northmen, who raid endlessly, would be more of a threat.”
Aethelfreda dismissed the idea with a wave of her hand. “They pillage and burn, yet they do not seek to steal our lands permanently. They are a nuisance, nothing more.”
“While Powys does seek new lands?”
Aethelfreda glanced around the room, at the men standing silently at the other end of it and the women gathered around her. “Everyone, leave me. Wulfstan, stay. Alfwynn…?”
There was a stir and murmur as the room emptied of all except one woman and Wulfstan. The woman, who was young and pretty with a sharp jawline and blue eyes identical to Aethelfreda’s, drew closer to the Lady’s chair. Her circlet was thick although not as heavy as Aethelfreda’s. Her golden hair hung in two braids in front of her shoulders, reaching down past her waist. She stared at Sydney.
“This is my daughter, Alfwynn,” Aethelfreda said, confirming Sydney’s guess. “She and you are of an age in appearance, so you will become her companion, which will create no further gossip. As Alfwynn insists on riding with me tomorrow, she will also benefit from your skills.”
Aethelfreda looked up at her daughter. “Find Sunnefu something more suitable to wear. I don’t want her to be an oddity among the retinue.”
“Yes, mother,” Alfwynn murmured.
“And Wulfstan, find her a sword. A good one.”
“My Lady.” Wulfstan bowed from the waist and backed up two steps, then turned and strode away.
“You may go now,” Aethelfreda told Sydney. “Alfwynn, see if Mave can do something about her cheek. It looks as though it will bruise.”
Alfwynn turned and headed for the nearest door. That would have been the door that Wulfstan had used to come in. Rank had its privileges. Sydney hesitated, wondering if it was expected of her to use the far end door she had come in through.
However, Alfwynn turned at the door and looked at her over her shoulder, one blue eye visible beyond the edge of the veil. “Come along,” she said quietly.
Sydney followed her, only now starting to feel the throb and beat of the bruise on her cheekbone, where Osgar had back-handed her. Aspirin didn’t exist in this century, so she would have to suffer through the ache of it.
She should have cut his throat for him. A nick, at the very least.
* * * * *
Taylor leaned over the two still forms on the bed, until she was close enough to Sydney’s face to see details. She frowned. She was still getting used to the night vision that came with being a vampire. It wasn’t the same as normal vision. She could see large prey in the dark as if they were haloed with neon lights, while minute detail was difficult to focus upon.
Finally, she turned on the bedside lamp and turned it to shed light on Sydney’s still face and closed eyes.
Veris looked up from the book he was reading. For once, he had unbent enough to read an e-copy. The tablet he was reading on looked small in his big hands. Taylor grimaced, then glanced at Alexander where he was studying the Nennius script in the winged chair in the corner of the room.
Veris’ gaze flickered in his direction, too. Then he got silently to his feet and moved over to her side.
Taylor turned Sydney’s head to display the left cheek better. Just under her eye was swollen and there was a bruise forming around the corner of the eye. Across the middle of the swelling was a red scrape.
“Let me see,” Alex said quietly.
Veris glanced at Taylor. She knew what he was thinking—that it would have been better if Alex didn’t get to see this. Now it was too late.
Veris stepped aside.
Alex bent over Sydney and examined the bruise. Then he glanced at Rafe sharply. “Rafe is fine,” he said.
“Yes, he is,” Veris agreed, his voice low.
“Then how did they get through his guard and reach her?” Alex asked. He sat on the side of the bed and brushed Sydney’s hair back. “What has happened?” he breathed and there was pain in his voice.
Veris rested his hand on Alex’s shoulder. “Taylor, an ice pack for the swelling, please. Alex, Ibruprofen will help with the pain and won’t make her sleepy.”
“Yes, of course.” Alex got to his feet again and went over to the multi-drawer medical chest sitting on the bureau and started pulling out drawers, looking for syringes and the medication.
“It’s minor,” Veris said. “It just looks dramatic.”
“That’s your medical opinion, doctor?” Alex asked dryly, as he came back with the syringe. He injected it into the tube of the IV in Sydney’s arm. “If we don’t get the swelling down, it could interfere with her sight. Perhaps she is in dire need of unobstructed vision right now. That’s not minor.”
“All we can do is watch over her,” Taylor told him quietly. “She and Rafe must figure out the rest for themselves.”
Veris looked at her once more. “It’s hard, isn’t it? Sitting here and watching, and wondering what on earth is happening. I remember you lying on the floor bleeding, once.”
Alex glanced at him, and let out a gusty sigh. “And I have watched over both of you. I never thought I would have to do it again.”
Veris gripped his shoulder once more. “The Ibuprofen will help.”
“And I’ll get the ice packs,” Taylor said. She passed the winged chair where Alex had been sitting and glanced down at the sheets of manuscript lying on the floor where he had dropped them.
For a moment she wished she had never brought the book home with her.