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allay Alfred’s doubts, but he did not know how to express his feelings. Then Ethelred said, “Let’s canter,” and Alfred let himself be distracted.
    It was when the brothers were returning once more to Winchester that the first pains began in Alfred’s head. The late afternoon sun was bright, and as their horses slowed to a walk Alfred felt as if the flashes of light glinting off the river were like spears piercing into his eyes.
    “Ethelred,” he said, trying to keep the panic from his voice, “I think that pain is starting again in my head.”
    “Where in your head does it hurt?” Ethelred asked sharply.
    “My eyes. And my forehead.”
    “Give me your reins,” Ethelred said. “I’ll lead the pony. You just close your eyes and sit quietly. We are almost home.”
    Alfred gave up his reins and did as he was bidden. But even behind his closed lids, the pain in his eyes was like fire. Soon the shock of his horse’s hooves hitting the ground at a simple walk was hurting his head.
    “Ethelred,” he said desperately as the walls of Winchester loomed on the horizon, “I think I am going to be sick.”
    “I’ll get you off,” he heard his brother say, and then Ethelred was standing beside his pony. He felt his brother’s big hands on his waist, lifting him effortlessly out of the saddle. As soon as Alfred’s feet were on the ground he doubled up and was sick. Ethelred’s arm came around him in support.
    “I’m sorry,” he whispered when he had finally stopped retching.
    “Don’t be foolish,” Ethelred said. He sounded almost angry, but Alfred understood that it was anger born of fear. Alfred was afraid too. He did not think he could bear that pain again.
    There was a firestorm going on in his head.
    He did not make the hall but was sick again in the courtyard. Then Ethelred lifted him into his arms and carried him into the princes’ hall, into the room they both were sharing. Ethelred laid him on the bed and sent for cold cloths.
    The agony went on and on. Alfred stiffened his body against it, but nothing he could do seemed to help. Hours passed.
    It lifted the way it had lifted the last time, suddenly and absolutely. He looked at his brother and Judith, who had also come to sit by his bed, and said, as he had said once before with the same quiet astonishment, “It’s gone.”
    “Thank God,” said Ethelred.
    Alfred touched his forehead. “Why am I getting these pains?” he asked, his darkened eyes going from one face to the next, his fingers still on his brow. “Is there something wrong inside my head?”
    “No, of course not,” Judith answered emphatically. “There is nothing wrong with your brain, Alfred.”
    “While you were lying here suffering, Alfred, Eahlstan told me that his mother, our grandmother, also had such headaches,” Ethelred said.
    “Our grandmother?” Alfred’s eyes searched his brother’s face. “The same thing?”
    “So Eahlstan says. It seems they may be hereditary.”
    “Did our grandmother die from them?”
    “No!” Ethelred looked grim. “No, Alfred. Our grandmother died of something quite different. And she lived a long life, too. Long enough to have children and grandchildren both.”
    It made Alfred feel a little better to think he was not the only person ever to suffer from such terrible headaches. And what Ethelred had said was true. His grandmother had lived to be an old woman. Her life had been normal enough. No one had ever said anything before about her having headaches.
    “Does this mean that I will go on having them?” Alfred asked, his eyes clinging to Ethelred’s face.
    “Certainly not.” Ethelred reached out to smooth the hair off Alfred’s forehead. “When once we are back to our usual way of life, I’m sure the headaches will go away. It is just that you are upset by Father’s death. As soon as Ethelbald is crowned, you and I will return to Eastdean. You will like that, won’t you?”
    “Yes,” said Alfred, but he sounded