Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 31, 2025
It was my host of Sedgemoor, Dudda the Collier. And never was face more welcome than his grimy countenance, for now I knew that I had found one who, in an hour, would take Alswythe into paths where none might follow, and that, too, on the nearest road to Glastonbury.
But that was Wulfhere's last fight, for of his wounds he might not recover, though we bore him back and tended him carefully for a month or more. So he lies in God's Acre at Cannington, and is at rest. Then came long years of fighting, and ever I bore the banner, and ever Alswythe set me forth most lovingly, with brave words that should bide with me till I came back to her.
And that last I could not tell them, marvelling myself when it came, and more that it was the only one; but I know I smote flatwise once or twice myself in the heat of fight, so doubtless it was so with others, else would Aldhelm have been in halves or thereabouts. Then I told them of my message to the king, and at that Alswythe rejoiced.
So we found a welcome in that quiet place, and soon the good franklin's wife came out, bustling and pitiful in her care for Alswythe and sorrow for her need to fly from her lost home, for it took but few words to explain what had befallen.
But for me to strike the blow that I had longed for would be to lose Alswythe, and so I must long for the words of sooth to come true, that I might see revenge by other hands than mine.
She had come to England, when she was quite a child, with the first women who came into East Anglia, and already she knew much of Christianity from the Anglian thralls who had tended her. And when she had heard more of late from Etheldreda and Alswythe, she had longed to be of the same faith as these friends of hers, and now rejoiced openly.
Then the dream in a way comforted me, being good to think on, for I would not willingly be at enmity with any man, or living or dead. But that it was only a dream seemed more sure, because in it Matelgar had said he knew of my saving Alswythe. And Wulfhere and I had agreed not to tell him that.
Overhead was the place where Alswythe and her maidens should be, and built against the walls outside were the thralls' quarters, save for a few who slept in the lower room round the great fire. Now, how they treated us it needs not to be told, for it was in the way of a good Somerset franklin, and that is saying much.
They were too far off for me to hear their voices, nor did they make sign or movement that would let me guess that which they spoke of; but presently the old man saluted, and Alswythe went out of the gate. Then my heart leaped within me, for I thought, and rightly, that she sought her bower in the wood.
But now the flashes came and went out instantly, for I was no longer looking down on the ship's decks as then. Well was it that I had seen this before from Quantock heights; for I knew that once again the Danes were landing, and that the peril was close at hand. Then at once I knew the terrible danger of Alswythe, for Matelgar's was the first hall that would be burnt.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking