"Not likely; here of all places. I mind what that maiden was in the old days. From all accounts she has but held herself back somewhat here. But had you had aught to do with her, I should have warned you, master." I set my hand on his shoulder. "I know you would. Now you will see the queen tomorrow. Tell me, then, if this is indeed she." "Ay, I shall know her well enough. What I fear is that she may know me!" Grim as his voice was, that made me laugh. "Seeing that you were but a lad when she last set eyes on you--and now you are ten years older than myself, bearded and scarred moreover--I do not fear that for you in the least." "Nor will she have need to scan me," he said. "Of course I need not fear it." Then I asked him if he had more of the second sight. "Naught fresh, master. Only that look on the face of the young king deepens, and ever there is the red line round his neck. I fear for him." So did I, but of that we spoke no more. I tried all I knew to fathom that fear of mine, and the most I could do was to make it seem more and more needless and foolish. And presently, when we sat at the table, and I saw the king speaking with the Mercians, and noted their admiring looks at him, and their eagerness to listen to him, I thought that Sighard was right, and that I was frayed with shadows of my own making. I knew enough of men by this time to see that here was no thought of ill toward Ethelbert. CHAPTER IX. HOW QUENDRITHA THE QUEEN WOVE HER PLOTS. Great was the welcome which Ethelbert of East Anglia had from Offa of Mercia when we reached the great stronghold of Sutton Walls on the next morning, riding there in all state and due array in our best holiday gear, with those Mercian thanes who had met us as escort before and after us. The morning was bright and clear, and I thought I had never seen so fair a procession as this with which the king went to meet his bride. I had heard much of this palace of Offa's from the Mercians and from Ethelbert himself, but it was a far stronger place than I had expected. Seeing that here, on the newly-conquered Welsh border lands, no man could tell when the wild Britons might swarm across the ford, and bring fire and sword in revenge on the lands they had lost, if the king would have a palace here, it must be a very strong hold, and Offa had indeed made one. The Romans had chosen the place long ago, having the same foe to watch and the same ford to keep, and on the low hill, which they saw was best for strength and position alike, they had set a great square camp with high earthen walls and deep moat below them. Once they had had their stone houses within it, but they had gone. The last of them were cleared when Offa drove out the Welsh and set his own place there after our fashion. Then he had repaired the earthworks, and crowned them afresh with a heavy timber stockade, making new gates and bridges across the moat.