The sky above London was a pewter vault, low and sodden with the promise of rain.
In Westminster's great hall, King Cnút sat alone at his long table, fingers drumming upon the heavy oaken boards.
The hall was nearly silent. No bards, no raucous laughter of huscarls; only the cautious shuffling of servants who dared not meet his eye.
A scroll lay unrolled before him. Its seal bore the crossed keys of Saint Peter, broken to reveal the stern Latin script within.
The Pope's legate had written with all the icy courtesy of Rome; the kind that could strip a king of sleep more surely than threats.
The message was plain: the Vatican was displeased. Displeased that the White Wolf; the Varangian Captain who had sacked Bobbio, desecrated altars, and left half the Tiber Valley bristling with corpses yet walked free.
More than that; he walked free somewhere under Cnút's own broad dominions, or so they suspected.
