“So condescending!”

“—and together we will ask the king to appoint us to rule Shiring. I was hoping that by now you might have seen the sense of accepting my proposal.”

“No, I haven’t.”

“You won’t get a better one.” He grasped her upper arm with a strong hand. “Come, now, you can’t pretend to find me unattractive.”

“Pretend? Let go of me.”

“I promise you, after one shag with me you’ll be begging for more.”

She wrenched her arm from his grasp and stood up. “Never!”

To Ragna’s surprise he went to the door and tapped on it, then turned back to her. “Never is a long time,” he said. The guard opened the door and Wigelm went out.

“Thank God,” said Ragna as the door closed.

“A lucky escape,” said Cat. She returned to the bench and sat beside Ragna.

Ragna said: “He doesn’t usually give up that easily.”

“You’re still worried.”

“Actually, I think Wigelm is worried. Why do you think he’s so keen to marry me?”

“Who wouldn’t be?”

Ragna shook her head. “He doesn’t really want me for a wife. I’m too much trouble. He’d rather sleep with someone who will never stand up to him.”

“What, then?”

“They’re worried about the king. They’ve got control of Shiring, and of me, for now, but they’ve done a lot to antagonize Ethelred in the process, and the time may come when he decides to teach them who rules England.”

“Or it may not,” said Cat. “Kings like a quiet life.”

“True. But Wynstan and Wigelm can’t predict which way Ethelred will jump. However, they’d have a better chance of getting the result they want if I married Wigelm. And that’s why they keep trying.”

The door opened, and Wigelm came back in.

This time he was accompanied by four men-at-arms whom Ragna did not recognize. He must have brought them with him. They looked like ruffians.

Cat screamed.

Two men grabbed each woman, threw them to the floor, and held them down.

All the children cried.

Wigelm grasped the neckline of Ragna’s dress and ripped if off, leaving her spread-eagled naked, held by her ankles and wrists.

One of the men said: “Now, there’s a pair of plump pigeons, by the gods!”

“They’re not for you,” Wigelm said, lifting the skirt of his tunic. “When I’ve finished you can fuck the maid, but not this one. She’s going to be my wife.”

There was a cold wind coming off the sea, and Wynstan walked gratefully into the warm, smoky atmosphere of Mags’s house in Combe, with Wigelm behind him. Mags saw him at once and threw her arms around him. “My favorite priest!” she exulted.

Wynstan kissed her. “Mags, you sweet thing, how are you?”

She looked over his shoulder. “And your equally handsome younger brother,” she said, and embraced Wigelm.

“Every rich man is handsome to you,” Wigelm said sourly.

She ignored that. “Sit down, dear friends, and have a cup of mead. It’s newly brewed. Selethryth!” She snapped her fingers, and a flagon and cups were brought by a middle-aged woman—undoubtedly a former prostitute now considered too old for the work, Wynstan thought.