Wynstan had a different agenda. “With all that to worry about, how much time do you think the king is going to spend deciding who is to be the new ealdorman of Shiring?”
Ragna said nothing.
“Very little,” said Wynstan, answering his own question. “He will look at who is in control of the region and simply ratify that person. The de facto ruler will become the de jure ealdorman.”
If that were true, Ragna thought, you would not be so keen for me to marry Wigelm. But she did not say it, because she had been struck by another thought. What would Wynstan do when she steadfastly refused Wigelm’s proposal? He would cast about for an alternative solution. There might be several options open to him, but one stood out to Ragna.
He could kill her.
CHAPTER 33
August 1002
dgar had now killed two men. The first had been the Viking; the second Stiggy. It might be three, if Bada had died of his broken collarbone. Edgar asked himself whether he was a killer.
Men-at-arms never had to ask themselves that question: killing was their role in life. But Edgar was a builder. Combat did not come naturally to a craftsman. Yet Edgar had defeated men of violence. Perhaps he should have felt proud: Stiggy had been a cold-blooded murderer. All the same Edgar was troubled.
And the death of Stiggy had solved no problems. Garulf had taken control of Outhen, and undoubtedly was even now tightening his grip on the villagers.
When Edgar reached Shiring he went straight to the ealdorman’s compound. He unsaddled Buttress, took her to the pond to drink, then turned her loose in the adjoining pasture with the other horses.
As he approached Ragna’s house he wondered—foolishly, perhaps—whether she would look different now that she was a widow. He had known her for five years, and for all that time she hadbelonged to another man. Would there be a different look in her eye, a new smile on her face, an unaccustomed liberty to the way she walked? She was fond of him, he knew; but would she express that feeling more freely now?
He found her at home. Despite the sunshine she was indoors, sitting on a bench, staring at nothing, brooding. Her three sons and Cat’s two daughters were taking their afternoon nap, supervised by Cat and Agnes. Ragna brightened a little when she saw Edgar, which pleased him. He handed her the leather bag of silver. “Your earnings from the quarry. I thought you might need money.”
“Thank you! Wigelm took my treasury—I was penniless, until now. They want to steal everything from me, including the Vale of Outhen. But the king is responsible for aristocratic widows, and sooner or later he’ll have something to say about what Wigelm and Wynstan have done. And how are you?”
He sat down on the bench next to her and spoke in an undertone so that the servants could not hear. “I was at Outhen. I saw Stiggy murder Seric.”
Her eyes widened. “Stiggy died...”
Edgar nodded.
She mouthed a question soundlessly: “You?”
He nodded again. “But nobody knows,” he whispered.
She squeezed his wrist, as if to thank him silently, and he felt a tingle in the place where her skin touched his. Then she resumed a normal voice. “Garulf is mad with rage.”
“Of course.” Edgar thought of the despondent expression he had seen on her face when he arrived, and he said: “But what about you?”
“Wigelm wants to marry me.”
“God forbid!” Edgar was appalled. He did not want Ragna to marry anyone, but Wigelm was a particularly repellent choice.
“It’s not going to happen,” she added.
“I’m glad to hear it.”
“But what will they do?” Ragna’s face bore a look he had never seen before, of anxiety so desperate that Edgar wanted to take her in his arms and tell her that he would look after her. She went on: “I’m a problem they need to solve, and they aren’t going to leave it to King Ethelred—he doesn’t like them and he may not do what they want.”
“But what can they do?”
“They could kill me.”
Edgar shook his head. “Surely that would cause an international scandal—”
“They would say I fell ill and died suddenly.”
