The King's Hounds (The King's Hounds series Book 1) Read online

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Text copyright © 2010 by Martin Jensen and Forlaget Klim

  English translation copyright © 2013 by Tara Chace

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  The King’s Hounds was first published in 2010 as Kongens Hunde. Translated from Danish by Tara Chace. Published in English by AmazonCrossing in 2013.

  Published by AmazonCrossing

  P.O. Box 400818

  Las Vegas, NV 89140

  ISBN-13: 9781477807262

  ISBN-10: 1477807268

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2013903047

  Cover design by Edward Bettison

  Front cover crown illustration created by Edward Bettison

  Floral pattern—From THE ART OF ILLUMINATION—DOVER PICTURA Royalty-Free

  Back cover illustration inspired by public domain images found in the British Library Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts, http://www.bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/reuse.asp

  Contents

  England

  North Sea Empire

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  About the Translator

  Prologue

  The prior had allowed Winston to have his way.

  Winston’s worktable was now pushed all the way up against the wall so the light from the window shone on his station from the left, just as he liked it.

  Brother Theobald, with his white tonsure, had sulked for several days before giving in and instructing the other scribes to defer to Winston, even though he felt that Winston had stolen the seat that should rightly have belonged to him, the senior scribe, the brother who had been in charge of the scriptorium for as long as anyone could remember.

  Winston didn’t care about any of that. They had hired him to create a book, which the abbot and the prior had vigorously stressed was supposed to be unprecedented in quality—standing out even among the one-of-a-kind manuscripts routinely produced by the monastery—and Winston was therefore in a position to demand the very best working conditions, which included having the light fall just right on his worktable.

  Although the idea for the book had originally been the abbot’s, Prior Peter had been the one to send the messenger for Winston. The dark-haired prior with the chiseled face had handled all the contract negotiations, and Winston had only set eyes on the abbot once, on the day he arrived.

  Winston had slid the contract across the table to the abbot and Prior Peter. He had scribbled the document a few evenings earlier over a tankard of ale in a tavern not far from Medeshamstede, in a village so small it was a wonder it even had a tavern. They had each read through it carefully and then, following a nod from his superior, the prior had simply signed it. They had given Winston everything he asked for.

  The brethren valued high-quality work, and they were willing to pay for it. They also knew that they would need to meet Winston’s terms if he was going to do his job to their satisfaction.

  So, on top of his wages, they also agreed to pay for costly lapis lazuli, the best available grade of red lead, and the highest karat of gold leaf.

  And when Winston rejected the first sample pages they showed him—the quality hadn’t been anywhere near his standards—they also agreed to let him mark the lines on the vellum himself. Although Winston supposed laymen such as the abbot and the prior might consider the lines acceptable, to a trained eye, they were plainly crooked. Worse yet, the text was marred by spots where a scribe had obviously tried to correct his mistakes.

  And as Winston pointed out to Brother Theobald and the prior—the former listening with his lips pursed—this was meant to be the most beautiful book the king would ever behold. So Winston crossed out a section of the contract and added a clause giving him the right to approve every individual page, even as Brother Theobald claimed through gritted teeth that that should be his right as the monastery’s senior scribe.

  As the scribes sat hunched, methodically moving their metalpoint styli over their manuscript pages, adding letter to letter, word to word, and line to line, Winston sketched out drafts of his illustrations on pieces of vellum of such poor quality that even Theobald would have thrown them away rather than wait for Winston to make that decision. Winston also spent his time browbeating the three scribes whom Brother Theobald considered talented enough to entrust with coloring the initial letters.

  One of the scribes was actually skilled enough to task with outlining the initials using a graphite pencil, after which he would present them to Winston for approval. Then the scribe would ink over the outlines and hand them on to the other two brethren to apply the color—again, under Winston’s strict, watchful eyes.

  The abbot was deeply shocked to hear the news that Edmund had died and that Cnut Sweynsson now sat on the throne as the sole king of a unified England.

  Although Ely Monastery had been established several centuries earlier, its coffers were limited. But like its founder, the current abbot dreamed of transforming Ely into one of the country’s greatest and wealthiest monasteries.

  Which was how the abbot had come up with the idea of commissioning a precious illuminated book. It would tell the story of their founder—Saint Audrey—in words and pictures, starting with her birth as an East Anglian princess more than three hundred years earlier. The book would feature her two husbands prominently, because there was no way she could have remained a virgin through two marriages without their consideration. Instead of forcing her to rule as queen of Northumbria, her second husband had even granted her leave to enter a convent run by an aunt, the abbess of Coldingham Abbey. The book would not mention that he had almost immediately come to regret this decision—and how his change of heart was what had driven Audrey to flee south to the Isle of Ely, which she had received as a dower gift from her first husband.

  The abbey she founded on Ely grew under both her and her successors’ leadership to become a rich, influential convent, which it remained right up until the Danes burned it to the ground a hundred and fifty years ago.

  Now rebuilt, Ely was once again home to a religious community, this time a monastery of Benedictine monks whose abbot was commissioning this book. The abbot had planned to present the book to King Edmund Ironside as a gift and subtle reminder that the Isle of Ely had been donated to the Church for religious use and that it shoul
d continue to be used for that purpose in perpetuity.

  But then a Danish king defeated Edmund in battle. And then Edmund died.

  And now the brethren didn’t know what to do.

  Vikings had burned the monastery once before. And the English hero Byrhtnoth was buried here. True, he was not a saint—but many Englishmen still made pilgrimages to his grave, wishing to honor the loyal ealdorman who had suffered such a famous defeat after allowing the Viking army to cross the causeway at Maldon and gain enough of a foothold to vanquish the English. Byrhtnoth had lost his head for it.

  Rumor had it that the abbot had even considered having the hero of the Battle of Maldon dug up to appease the country’s new Viking king, but that he thought better of it after he dreamed he saw Byrhtnoth and Cnut piously kneeling before Audrey, each resting a hand in hers as she brought them together.

  Yes, this book would be the perfect way to bridge the monastery’s past and future, and Winston was the man to illuminate it. He was widely reputed to be the best painter and illuminator in all the land.

  And what a timely dream, Winston had thought during the long winter months as he worked beneath that window in the scriptorium. If the hands of the English and Vikings could be joined, it would mean that the work he’d already done on this book, though originally meant for Edmund, wouldn’t go to waste; it could be presented to Cnut instead.

  Winston grew up in a monastery. He had been a pious novice until one day it dawned on him that his abbot always bent the Word of God to suit his own ends. Initially Winston kept this realization to himself, praying that God would allow him to accept that of course God would sooner speak to an abbot than to a novice. And Winston thanked the Lord for surrounding him with examples of the piety and pride that the other monks took in their work.

  But the final straw came shortly before the end of Winston’s novice period. One day, in the presence of witnesses, a freeman farmer said that his only sister should inherit his estate. But after the man’s death the abbot lied, claiming that the farmer had changed his mind and on the following day said that his property should go to the monastery. The abbot won the inheritance case by reminding the man’s sister of the Lord’s own words—how it was easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God—which meant that it was in her own best interest for the court to rule in favor of the monastery.

  A huge argument had erupted between Winston and the abbot, which had resulted in Winston suddenly finding himself outside the monastery walls with nothing but the cowl on his back.

  He prayed for God to smite the abbot with a bolt of vengeful lightning, but to no avail. God remained silent.

  Winston resolved that very day to turn his back on a God who had sent his own Son to advocate for widows and the fatherless while allowing his holy Church to trample on the rights of those very same people.

  Winston had not prayed, set foot in a church or chapel, or taken communion again since, and he had avoided the communal monastic prayer services wherever he worked. With an open heart and a straight back, Winston reassured God every morning that the day He allowed his wrath to rain down upon the abbot back home, Winston would once again dedicate himself to God’s service.

  Neither the abbot nor the Good Lord could take from him the things he had learned during his many years as a novice. He was an illuminator and painter, the best in the land—and not just in his own estimation but also that of the monasteries, noblemen, and bishops who sent for him.

  His services were expensive. Very expensive. If you wanted the best, it would cost you. And the money was all his. That was one advantage of his having been ejected from the monastery.

  The abbot tried to cause trouble, of course. He told everyone that Winston was a lapsed monk and that no one should work with him, but most people didn’t care. A magnificent illumination was more important to them than a broken monastic vow. Especially when Winston told them it was a lie and that he had been kicked out of the monastery before taking his vows.

  And then, many years ago now, the abbot died. Winston hurried home to find out how it had happened and was disappointed to hear that the less-than-pious father had passed away peacefully in bed. No wrathful lightning, no oozing boils, no painful, pus-filled sores. He hadn’t even coughed up any blood.

  Winston continued to paint, filling vellum after vellum with inspiring pictures and dazzling illuminations. And every morning he repeated his pledge to God. If the Almighty would shatter the abbot’s headstone with lightning or cause his body to fly up out of the grave, blackened and infested with suppurating boils, Winston would once again dedicate himself to His service.

  But as far as he knew, the brethren back at the monastery were still tending a tidy, unafflicted grave.

  The light was fading outside, where the air smelled of spring, but Winston could still see well enough to paint.

  He had begun coloring his masterwork ages ago. The image of Saint Audrey with King Cnut and the hero of Maldon kneeling before her filled more than half the page.

  The text was unusually attractive, curling across the page above his inklined illumination. Not a single letter was wrong, each line was as straight as the ruler itself, and the initial letters, adorned with stags’ heads, gleamed in blue and red. Under his hand, the painting in the middle grew day by day in fresh, radiant colors.

  This was the last one. All of the other pages were ready. As soon as he was finished, the binders would take over. He would be out there in the spring air, on his way to a new job. He didn’t know what it would be yet, but experience had taught him that some new opportunity always presented itself.

  In a week at most, Winston would be able to retrieve his mule from the stables where he had been gorging himself full and glossy on the monastery’s good oats. Together they would head off into the war-ravaged countryside, seeking shelter at the first hint of approaching danger. Winston mostly stuck to side roads and forest paths, far off the beaten track traveled by the soldiers, who wanted to get places quickly. After being shut up in this damp monastery for so many months, Winston was rather looking forward to drifting through the spring weather at a leisurely pace.

  There was a sudden gust from the window as the door at the opposite end of the scriptorium opened. However, neither the draft, nor the sound of heavy footsteps crossing the floor—steps not made by sandal-clad monk’s feet—distracted Winston from his work.

  Winston only looked up when Prior Peter cleared his throat.

  A redheaded Saxon warrior, well dressed and adorned with silver with clean skin and freshly washed braids, stood next to the prior.

  “Winston, this is Alric. He has a message for you.”

  The illuminator picked up a rag from the edge of his table and carefully wiped off his marten-hair brush before turning his attention to the warrior. “For me?”

  The warrior nodded. “The Lady Ælfgifu requests your services.”

  “Ælfgifu? The Mistress of Northampton?”

  Another nod.

  Ælfgifu was King Cnut’s consort. This could prove to be a major assignment.

  Chapter 1

  Luckily they didn’t have any hounds with them.

  From my perch lying on my belly on the branch, I could see them advancing through the woods, spread out in a line: grim-looking men bearing spears, swords girded at their sides, their eyes scanning the bluebells that blanketed the forest floor.

  But they never looked up, not even once.

  My brother, the ever-smiling Harding, had taught me that trick: men rarely look up when they’re hunting. As a boy, I had followed him around loyally, the way a dog follows its master. When he and my father had gone off to fight for the king, Harding had promised to win me an estate.

  Now his body was feeding the worms down in East Anglia, and I never did get that estate. Just the opposite—I lost the one my father had held. But I still remembered what Harding had taught me.

  The leaves weren’t as thick on t
he tree now as they would be in a few weeks, but it was old, with thick branches and plenty of twigs. As long as I kept my eyes hidden, I felt safe.

  That was another thing Harding taught me: If you hide the gleam of your eyes, you hide yourself.

  The branch I was on was so wide that no one would be able to see my body from below. So the moment I spotted the search party approaching, I calmly rolled over and stared up into the oak leaves above me.

  I should have stopped at the bread. Even a Danish nobleman as tenacious as my pursed-lip pursuer down there wouldn’t have bothered chasing down a bread thief. But this was the second day in a row that he and his men had been searching for me.

  Oh, but the girl had been so pretty with her blonde braids, her wide, inviting mouth, and those curves beneath her dress, which she’d so willingly let me fondle.

  Yes, willingly. I’ve never had to take a woman by force, and this girl had certainly been no exception.

  I had made it out unhindered through the palisade that enclosed the estate.

  The manor was large and prosperous, making it very clear that one of the Danish victors lived here. Someone who didn’t fear his neighbors and who could afford to let anyone enter—tradesmen, wandering craftsmen, pilgrims, landless men in search of a place they could call their own, or even just a roof over their heads in exchange for some backbreaking toil for the lord of the manor.

  There were warriors in the courtyard. Of course. This nobleman was confident, not stupid. The warriors were watching me, and I had made it halfway to the hall when three of them approached me.

  I asked if there was any work to be had and got the same answer as everywhere else: a shake of the head. The victors were eager enough to expand their farmlands, but they had no use for a single man.

  A man who showed up accompanied by a woman with a baby at her breast and several kids clinging to her skirts would receive a stick hut in exchange for the privilege of slaving away for the new master. A man with a family can be controlled. But no one has leverage over a single man.

  One of the warriors—brawny, with a bare chest and ash-blond braids down to his belt—pointed silently back toward the gate. I turned around and took a few steps, then paused and went back.