Chapter 2
Two
Queen Emeline
I’ve not slept a wink.
It may be a new day, but this all feels like one nightmare that will never end.
The stables have always been my sanctuary.
As a child, it was here that I learned to be a warrior. And it’s also here where I could be at peace with Skarth.
I sit on the ground amongst the animals. They can sense my despair, as I have a little lamb sitting in my lap, trying to comfort me. But I do not deserve it. By acting out and attempting to hurt Skarth, I only hurt myself.
“Emeline, you are nothing but a fool,” I mutter under my breath.
I cannot cry. Tears escape me, but I deserve to feel pain. I deserve to be lying dead, not my three ladies-in-waiting.
I reach for the crucifix around my throat, for it is nothing but a joke. The Lord is not my Shepherd, for He has forsaken me more times than he has offered me comfort.
What sort of cruel God is He?
“Emeline?”
Catherine appears, nothing but worry etched on her young face.
She is eighteen years of age, and although she’s had many offers of marriage, she’s refused them all. She insists on staying with me and helping to see Northumbria prosper.
She is beautiful with her long black hair and piercing blue eyes, but looks mean nothing to Catherine, for she was wronged in this life, too. Her family was slaughtered, which is how I found her. She was only a young child, but her bravery has always shone.
She is clever and thinks like a future queen should, for I know without a doubt that is what her destiny holds.
“I want to help,” she says, dropping to her knees before me. “Sune and Loki are my family, too.”
And she is right.
I raised all three as if they were my own. And although I never wanted to step into the role of Catherine’s mother because hers was taken by force, she has always seen me as one.
“I do not know where they are, sweetling.” I stroke two fingers across her cheek.
“But you know who can help.”
“Yes, I do. Skarth is their father. He is the only hope I have.”
“I want to come with thee.”
“It is too dangerous.”
But she stubbornly shakes her head. “I have faced worse, and if the Lord decides now is my time, then let it be dying protecting my brothers and you…Mother.”
She scarcely uses this term, so I understand the severity of her request.
“I am faced with a dilemma. I cannot leave Northumbria unguarded. The people cannot know that something is wrong. If word spreads, then the vultures will swoop in, and our kingdom will be overthrown.”
“I have an idea,” Catherine says, her eyes alight. “We ride to East Frankia on the ruse that you will accept Prince Ludwig’s proposal. Your mother can sit on the throne while you are gone, as she once was the queen of Northumbria, was she not?”
Catherine is right.
My mother was queen when my ghastly father was king.
“This will appease the people, as some still believe Northumbria needs a king. We take only our most trusted guards with us, and then…then we find Skarth.”
“Sweetling, you are far too crafty for your own good.”
Catherine smiles. “I learned from the best.”
“This is an excellent plan. I am proud of you for executing it. I think it may work. I cannot sit here and send my men to find Skarth, risking their lives for me. I need to fight this battle on my own.”
“What plagues you?” Catherine reads my regret, one which will weigh heavily on me for the rest of my days.
“I am at fault. I should have known something was amiss.”
“You could not have known. Sune and Loki were in their beds, safe within their home. You were not to know that Lord Rufus is a lying arsehole. I wish for my blade to sever his deceitful head.”
Lord Louis has told Catherine the tale, but I know he has omitted where I was and what I was doing, instead of protecting my children.
“We go inside before Lord Gunter returns for East Frankia and inform him of the joyous news.” She smiles a full-toothed grin, wishing for me to reciprocate.
All I do is groan. “You are right, but having to say those words asserts my failure.”
“It’s not real,” she reminds me. “We are outsmarting them.”
“They are rather thick, so that should not be a difficult deed.”
Gently placing the lamb onto the ground, I stand, stretching overhead. I look a mess. And I smell atrocious. Jethro’s blood is beneath my nails. Or maybe it’s Bianca’s. I don’t know anymore.
So much bloodshed has been spilled within these walls.
Catherine and I make our way toward the palace, and it takes all my strength to put on a brave face. I cannot allow anyone to know the war that wages inside me. I look at everyone with suspicion because they are all guilty until proven otherwise.
I don’t know why my reign has shifted this way. There’s been peace for many years.
So why now?
Who wants to overthrow me? It could be anyone.
The palace is quiet, and the fact that my three ladies-in-waiting are not in tow does not go unnoticed by my court. However, no one says a word.
I enter my chambers and quickly bathe and dress. As I peer at myself in the mirror, I no longer see the young woman who wished to change her beloved Northumbria. I was determined and believed that people were good.
Now, all I see are the eyes of a woman scorned.
I brush my long brown hair, wishing I could cut it off. I did that once and never felt freer. Placing the gold crown onto my head, I sigh, feeling like nothing but a fraud for what I must do.
A knock on my door announces the time has come.
I am wearing my best dress, made of blue silk and embroidered with yellow flowers.
I slip into my role of queen. Beneath my dress, I wear my Mjolnir, needing the strength of the gods now more than ever.
Even though they are not my gods, they are to my sons, and my God seems to have taken a sabbatical.
So I will pray to whoever listens.
Lord Louis is at my door, his eyes filled with nothing but concern. He does not like this plan, but he knows this is the only way.
“I shall escort you, my Queen. Your ladies-in-waiting are tending to your property in York with your sons, are they not?”
I would not survive this without Lord Louis. He’s never let me down. He knows who I am and what I have done, yet he still vows to protect this kingdom and me with his life.
“Yes, that is correct, my lord. I believe there is much to organize come spring.”
The guards at my door don’t stir, and it seems our ruse has been accepted as fact.
They march in front of me, Lord Louis standing close by, ready to strike at the first sign of trouble. I enter my chancery and sit behind the large oak table. Everything I need is here—parchment, ink, and my royal seal, as I have no doubt Lord Gunter will want my agreement in writing.
I know what it means for me to back out. But I will do anything to save my children, and if that means marrying the gnat from East Frankia, then so be it.
Lord Gunter enters with my ealdormen, and it’s apparent by Lord Gunter’s smile that he believes he has won. “How fare ye?”
“Let us be frank, Lord. I have thought over the prince’s offer, and I—” But the words suddenly get caught in my throat because once I say them, I cannot take them back.
I do not want to be chattel once more. I fought so hard, but here I am, once again being used as collateral for political gain.
Lord Louis stands close. I know I would only have to say the word, and he would happily take the heads of those who wrong me. But I think of my children and know what I must do.
“And I accept.”
And just like that, I have condemned my kingdom; the kingdom I worked so hard to change.
Lord Gunter mulls over my comment, his dark mustache twitching as he purses those fat lips. “I did not hear you, my Queen. The echo of the breeze drowned out your words.”
I grip the wooden arms of my chair, wishing it were Lord Gunter’s neck I could squeeze. He heard me. He just wishes for me to repeat myself to humiliate me. But until I find my children, I am at the mercy of those I want to slaughter.
Straightening my spine, I smile, but there is no warmth behind it. “Your hearing fails you already, lord? Or do I speak too quickly for you?”
Lord Louis stifles his laughter because I will not roll over and surrender like the doting little wife they expect of me. If Prince Ludwig insists on this marriage, it shall be on my terms.
Lord Rufus quickly interjects. He is so slender, his appearance is akin to a snake, which seems fitting because his serpent tongue has been hard at work, it seems.
“I have drawn up the agreement. Just in case,” he adds as I narrow my eyes at him.
He steps forward, unrolling the parchment onto my table. I read over the terms of marriage and am sickened to the core. This is what my father did when I was a child—he sold me to a monster for his own personal gain.
The terms are what I’d expect—Prince Ludwig would own me, and I would share my throne with him.
There is no way I can sign this.
Dipping the tip of the quill into the ink pot, I drip blank ink on the page, wishing to sully this agreement to the depths of hell. Instead of signing, I scribble my own two terms beneath Lord Rufus’s.
He peers over my shoulder and grunts.
“We do not have an agreement if my terms are not met.”
“And what terms are they, my Queen?” asks Lord Gunter, unimpressed with my retaliation.
“The marriage can be annulled.” Lord Rufus forgot to add that minor detail in there with intent, no doubt.
Lord Gunter nods, as it appears he believes it will be love at first sight the moment I meet his jelly-belly of a prince.
“And secondly, if I am to face an untimely demise…the throne will be passed to my children—Sune, and Loki, and my children only.”
Lord Rufus’s nostrils flare, angered. Did he think I would be so stupid? “And if God forbid, something were to happen to them?”
“Then the throne will be entrusted to their father. You wish for Northumbria to have a king, well, alas, I grant you your wish.”