They were sprawled in the summer grass south of Esferth town, near the river, out of sight of the wooden walls. Had eaten here out of doors, four of them, and were idling in late-morning sunshine before returning to town to watch the preparations for the fair continue.
No one spoke. Birdsong from the beech and oak woods to the west across the stream and the rising and falling drone of bees among the meadow flowers were the only sounds. It was warm in the sun, sleep-inducing. But Hakon, reclining on one elbow, was too aware of Kendra beside him. Her golden hair kept coming free of her hat as she concentrated on interweaving grasses into something or other. Athelbert, king's heir of the Anglcyn, lay beyond his sister, on his back, his own soft cap covering his face. Gareth was reading, of course. He wasn't supposed to take parchments out of the city, but he did.
Hakon, lazily drifting in the light, became belatedly aware that he could be accused of staring at Kendra, and probably would be with Athelbert around. He turned away, abruptly self-conscious. And sat up quickly.
"Jad of the Thunder!" he exclaimed. His father's oath. Not an invocation anyone but Erlings new to the sun god were likely to use.
Gareth snorted but didn't look up from his manuscript. Kendra did, at least, glance at where Hakon was looking, briefly raised both eyebrows, and turned calmly back to her whatever-it-was-going-to-be.
"What?" Athelbert said, evidently awake but not moving, or shifting the hat that covered his eyes.
"Judit," said Kendra. "She's angry."
Athelbert chuckled. "Aha! I know she is."
"You're in trouble," Kendra murmured, placidly plaiting. "Oh, probably," said her older brother, comfortably sprawled in deep grass.
Hakon, wide-eyed, cleared his throat. The approaching figure, moving with grim purpose through the summer meadow, was quite close now. In fact…
"She, ah, has a sword," he ventured, since no one else seemed to be saying it.
Gareth did glance up at that, and then grinned with anticipation as his older sister came towards them. Kendra merely shrugged. On the other hand, Prince Athelbert, son of Aeldred, heir to the throne, heard Hakon's words, and moved.
Extremely swiftly, in point of fact.
As a consequence, the point of the equally swift sword, which would probably have plunged into the earth between his spread legs a little below his groin, stabbed into grass and soil just behind his desperately rolling form.
Hakon closed his eyes for an excruciating moment. An involuntary, protective hand went below his own waist. Couldn't help it. He looked again, saw that Gareth had done the very same thing, and was wincing now, biting his lip. No longer amused.
It wasn't entirely certain the blade, thrust by someone moving fast on uneven ground, would have missed impaling the older prince in an appalling location.
Athelbert rolled two or three more times, and scrambled to his feet, white as a spirit, cap gone, eyes agape.
"Are you crazed?" he screamed.
His sister regarded him, breathing hard, her auburn hair seeming afire in the sunlight, entirely free of any decent restraint.
Restraint was not the word for her at all. She looked murderous.
Judit jerked the sword free of the earth, levelled it, stepped forward. Hakon thought it wisest to scramble aside. Athelbert withdrew rather farther than that.
"Judit…" he began.
She stopped, held up an imperious hand.
A silence in the meadow. Gareth had set down his reading, Kendra her grass-plaiting.
Their red-headed sister said, controlling her breathing with an effort, "I sat up with father, beside Osbert, for part of last night." "I know," said Athelbert quickly. "It was a devout, devoted—" "He is well now. He wishes to see Hakon Ingemarson today." "The god be thanked for mercy," Athelbert said piously, still very white.
Hakon saw Judit glance at him. Ducked his head in an awkward half-bow. Said nothing. He didn't trust his voice.
"I went," said the older daughter of Aeldred the king and his royal wife, Elswith, "back to my own chambers in the middle of the night." She paused. Hakon heard the birds, over by the woods. "It was dark," Judit added. Her self-control, Hakon judged, was precarious.
Among other things, the sword was quivering in her hand. Athelbert backed up another small step. Had probably seen the same thing.
"My women were asleep," his sister said. "I did not wake them." She glanced to one side, regarded Athelbert's bright red cap lying in the grass. Went over to it. Pierced it with the sword, used her free hand to tear the cap raggedly in two along the blade, dropped it back into the grass. A butterfly flitted down, alighted on one fragment, flew away.
"I undressed and went to bed," Judit went on. She paused. Levelled the blade at her brother again. "Jad rot your eyes and heart, Athelbert, there was a dead man's skull in my bed, with the mud still on it!"
"And a rose!" her brother added hastily, backing up again. "He had a rose! In his mouth!"
"I did not," Judit snarled through gritted teeth, "observe that detail until after I had screamed and awakened all three of my women and a guard outside!"
"Most skulls," said Gareth thoughtfully, from where he sat, "belong to dead people. You didn't actually have to say that it was a—"
He stopped, swallowed, as his sister's lethal, green-eyed gaze fell upon him. "Do not even think of being amusing. Were you," she asked, in a voice suddenly so quiet it was frightening, "in any possible way, little brother, a part of this?"
"He wasn't!" said Athelbert quickly, before Gareth could reply. And then made the mistake of essaying a placating smile and gesture.
"Good," said Judit. "I need only kill you."
Kendra held up her grass plaiting. "Tie him up with this, first?" she murmured.
"Be careful, sister," Judit said. "Why did you not awaken when I screamed?"
"I'm used to it?" Kendra said mildly.
Gareth snorted. Unwisely. Tried, urgently, to turn it into a cough. Judit took a step towards both of them.
"I'm a… deep sleeper?" Kendra amended hastily. "And perhaps your courage is such that what seemed a piercing scream to you was really only—"
"I tore my throat raw," her sister said flatly. "It was the middle of the Jad-cursed night. I was exhausted. I lay down upon a cold, hard, muddy skull in my bed. I believe," she added, "the teeth bit me."
Hearing that last, ruminative observation, Hakon suddenly found himself in extreme difficulty. He looked over at Gareth and took comfort in what he saw: the thrashing desperation of the younger prince's suppressed hilarity. Gareth was weeping with the effort of trying not to howl. Hakon found that he was no longer able to stay upright. He sank to his knees. His shoulders were shaking. He felt his nose beginning to run. Whimpering sounds came from his mouth.
"Oh, my, look at those two," said Kendra in a pitying voice. "All right, this is what we will do. Judit, put down the sword." She was displaying, Hakon thought, what was, under the circumstances, an otherworldy composure. "Athelbert, stay exactly where you are. Close your eyes, hands at your sides. That was a craven, despicable, unworthy, extremely amusing thing to do and you must pay a price or Judit will make life intolerable for all of us and I don't feel like suffering for you. Judit, go and hit him as hard as you can, but not with the sword."
"You are judge here, little sister?" Judit said icily.
"Someone has to be. Gareth and Hakon are peeing in their hose," Kendra said. "Father would be displeased if you killed his heir and you'd probably regret it afterwards. A little."
Hakon wiped at his nose. These things did not happen back home. Gareth was flat on his back, making strangled noises. "Teeth!" Hakon thought he heard him moan.