“Marry, son,” interposed the abbot. “Be not wroth with such as he! Thou demeanest thyself.”
“True;” said the harper recovering himself, “what hath Wulfhere to do with a niddering?”
At that term of reproach which no Saxon could hear unmoved, Ælfric sprang forward, his face convulsed with rage, his hand upraised. The gerefa and the abbot seized him before the blow fell.
“Niddering?” he shrieked. “Ælfric niddering! As ye be Saxons let me at him!”
But they would not, and, as they led him away, he called back in a loud voice:
“By all the saints, I swear that Ælfric shall be revenged. As I am now so shall ye be! Look to yourselves, Wulfhere, and thou, daughter of Wulfhere! For every hour spent as theow, ye shall have double. For every task assigned, two shall be your portion. The rod and the lash shall not be wanting. I swear it! Lead on; I have spoken!”
Egwina paled and trembled at the words, but the old man laughed.
“Heed him not,” he said. “Doth not the beast growl when foiled? What harm can befall us if we are in the king’s hand? Come!”
[CHAPTER IV—IN THE HALL OF ALFRED]
Wulfhere and Egwina journeyed slowly northward over Hampshire, into Berkshire, and thence into Wiltshire, so that it was not until the sixth day of the Wolf month that they arrived at Chippenham.