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Bronwen’s father of his decision. “I must set sail at once. The weather comes bad across the seas.”
    Edgard scowled. “The wedding feast is being prepared in the kitchens. There is yet time for a celebration. Stay longer here, Lothbrok—at least allow your new wife time to eat and refresh herself before the journey.”
    A shiver ran down her spine as Bronwen stood on the steps and watched her new husband in animated discussion with her father. They must be nearly the same age, she surmised. Together, they looked like a pair of old bears, scarred and spent with years of battle.
    As Olaf finished speaking and stomped down the stairs toward the waiting ship, Edgard turned to his elder daughter.
    “Bronwen, the Viking insists he must return to Warbreck at once. He has been sent a message that a village near his holding was burned. Whether it was the work of Normans or Scots he cannot tell, but he fears the coming storm could hold him several days here. You must depart with him at once.”
    “But what of the feast? Has he no respect for our traditions?”
    “Daughter, you must remember that this man’s ways are not our ways. You sail at once.”
    Bronwen ran to her sister’s side and embraced Gildan.
    And so this was how it must be. A wedding. A ship. A new 44
    The Briton
    life far from home and family. Bronwen held her sister for a moment, then pulled away.
    “We must part,” she said. “My love goes with you. Be happy, Gildan.”
    Without a final glance at her beloved home, Bronwen stepped into the biting gale. In the distance, a small boat moved toward the shore. She saw that her chests and trunks were being loaded in another.
    Edgard followed his daughter down the steep hill toward the water’s edge. He took her arm and drew her close. “Do you have the golden key?” he whispered. “And the will box?”
    “Yes, Father. I have them both.” She drew back the mantle that he might see the outline of the box inside her chatelaine purse.
    Edgard nodded with satisfaction. “Keep them with you always lest they fall into the wrong hands. Never let Lothbrok know of the will. He would not understand that in this new world of Norman kings and knights, the written word holds great power. And now, farewell, my beloved daughter. You, who are nearest to my heart, go farthest away. You will dwell with a strange people and an aged husband, but you must never forget that you are a Briton and that Rossall is your true home. When I die, return here and join my lands to those of your husband.”
    Bronwen slipped her arms around her father and held him close for a moment. Then she turned and hurried toward the waiting boat. As she was rowed across the bay toward the snekkar, Bronwen buried her head in the folds of the dark woolen cloak and wept bitter tears.
    When the small boat bumped against the bow of the Viking ship, she looked up to see the head of a dragon rising above her, and higher still, a purple sail painted with a black crow Catherine Palmer
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    billowed in the buffeting wind. But once aboard the snekkar, she turned her face away from the land, away from her father and from her sister and her home. She looked out into the darkening fog and tried to summon her courage. Fate had laid out this path, and she had no choice but to walk it.
    As the snekkar inched its way southward, icy rain began to fall more heavily. Bronwen huddled under the thick mantle and covered her head with the hood that once had concealed the features of a man she must no longer remember. Enit, shivering beside Bronwen on the cold, hard deck, held up a soggy blanket to shield her head from the pelting sleet.
    The sky grew black as heavy fog rolled over them from the Irish Sea. The mouth of the Warbreck River lay only ten or twelve miles south along the coast, but darkness fell before it came into sight. Wind whipped and tore at the sails and sent waves crashing into the seamen who tried to keep the ship upright with their twin rows of countless