Samuel and her household rejoiced to see her. “You returned,” he said.

“I would stay here forever if I could.” She was surprised herself to hear that. After all, this had been the place of her first captivity. But she had also watched so many children grow here, and seasons revolve. Above all, this was where she had first found Christ, who was always foremost in her mind.

Also, it was not the Court, with its rows of staring warriors and its coal-eyed king.

A week later, she was delighted to see Berthefred arrive, leading a small contingent of warriors. He dismounted and embraced her. “We must talk.”

They went again to the garden behind the villa, to those fragrant rows of herbs. He sat her on a bench, then looked at the ground. “You are to marry the King.”

Radegund sprang to her feet. “No! That cannot be! He is – ”

“He is your master! And mine.” The thought made him scowl. “We can only do what he commands.”

She remembered Ingund’s words: “We are women. We do what men command.” Had Ingund been trying to warn her, to let her know her destiny had been decided? That everything that Chlothar had had done since she came to Athies – making her a Christian, teaching her to read and write, having Ingund teach her wifely duties – all this had been intended from the start to prepare her for this moment? To prepare the child she had been to become a queen?

To prepare the princess of Thuringia to marry the king of Soissons?

She sat back on the bench, sick at heart.

“You will be a queen,” said Berthefred weakly. “The wife of a king.”

“One of several wives! Sinful wives!” She began to cry. “I want to be no man’s wife, Berthefred. I want to give my life to God.” She already felt a wrenching grief at the idea of what she would lose on her wedding night, at the distance that would take her from the Lord.

Berthefred looked away, ashamed, then took her in his arms as he once had on that long ride from Erfurt.

She saw to it that night that the warriors were fed, but had no horse slaughtered. She sat silently at the table, between her brother and Father Elias, praying intently for some way out of what was to come.

After morning Mass, Berthefred and the others prepared to leave. Again, he took her to the garden. “Tonight,” he said softly, “you must escape.”

Her prayers were answered! She felt a rush of exaltation – her brother would help her avoid this marriage!

But at once she stopped. “Where would I go, Berthefred? He rules all this country, and his brothers those beyond it. And how could I travel, a woman alone? If anyone dared to help me, any of my household… Oh Berthefred! Think what he would do to them if they were caught!”

Her first joy collapsed into terror.

Berthefred shook his head. “You are not really to escape, Radegund. It is the old ritual.” Her confusion was plain. “Of course, you were too young to learn many of our ways. When a man takes a wife and he cannot ask her mother or her father for her hand, she must escape and he must capture her, to show he has fairly won her.”

She felt more hopeless with every word. So even this, her freedom, her moment of liberty, was to be ordered for her by others.

That night, Framberta took her out the gate, expressly left open, and down through the woods to the banks of the Ormignon, the narrow stream that ran by Athies. Two men were waiting there, with a round boat of reeds and leather. They all got in with her, carrying wine skins and bags of supplies. One of the men poled the boat away and they began to float down the water through the dark woods.

Framberta had brought cushions for Radegund, who lay back on them as they floated, allowing herself to imagine she was really free. The Moon passed slowly through the silhouettes of branches, frogs gulped along the banks, unseen animals rustled and scurried through the looming woods. The slight plash of water from time to time, the air made soft by the stream, lulled her pleasantly to sleep.

Sun warmed her left shoulder. Slowly opening her eyes, she saw the river was wider now. A few stands of trees broke the bright rays, but most of the countryside was flat, with fields to either side. Deep bands of orange stretched off to her right, the water sparkling up ahead.

“Are we headed south?”

“Yes, my lady. We are now on the Somme.” Green fields framed the gleaming river. Reeds lined the banks.

“We must stop,” she said.

“Ah yes, my lady,” said the boatman, “you need to –”

“We have to pray, you dolt!” snapped Framberta.

Radegund smiled softly. “For both reasons. But soon, before the Sun has come fully up.”

The man poled the boat against the right bank, bending the thick reeds beneath it. Framberta hopped out and reached a hand to Radegund.

The two women squatted by a tree while the men stood on the other side. When all were done, Radegund led them to the bank and raised her hands towards the Sun. The others followed suit. She recited the start of the Mass in Latin – she knew it by heart – then, changing to Frankish, prayed for her companions and the safety of their journey. They all bent their heads and joined her as she said, “Amen”.

“Shall we break our fast?”

Framberta handed her a wine skin and took hard disks of rye bread from a bag for her and the men, handing Radegund a fine white ball of bread. But Radegund split this and gave a piece to each of the others. “I am happy with this,” she said, biting into the crisp rye.

The men savored the fine soft bread of the rich. “I remember,” said one, “when you used to bring us such bread from your table. How good it was!” His companion nodded, his mouth full. She recognized now through their weather-beaten features two of the boys who had once thrown themselves on her scraps. She took a quick swig from her wine skin, then handed it about. She sighed, recalling how freely she had played with the poorer children, what joy it had brought her to give them food. She thought blissfully of those days, grateful that they too remembered them.

As the boat continued on in the morning light, she watched men working the fields, others trimming vines on poles, foals racing with their mothers, lambs following close behind ewes. Framberta sat beside her. Sometimes they would sing songs the two slaves had taught her, or laugh over old stories.

Every few hours, she would excuse herself, close her eyes, and pray. She prayed for this journey to go on forever, to never have to marry the King. She ached to stay as white as those lambs, to glide forever down a stream of prayer and song.

Just before Ham, the Somme split. Berthefred had laid out the route for the men, and so now they went to the right, where this small branch of the river soon ended. Framberta helped her out, then the men pulled the boat onto the banks. “We will stop here for the night.” They shared a chicken baked in sage. Again, she gave the others the better bread, delighting herself in the coarse, crisp rye bread, which took her mind off luxury and the palace.

Radegund slept in the boat; the others simply laid out on the grass. She stared at the stars for a long time before falling asleep, studying their intricate order. As always, she saw the hand of God in their sparkling patterns and fell asleep in the bliss of His Presence.

She woke to hymns somewhere in the distance. So there was a chapel nearby… The others were already up; she led them in prayer.

“The next river is to the south,” the boatman said. A road ran close to the bank. As the sun rose, workers started along this towards the fields. He went to ask them the way.

“Several leagues down the road,” he said when he returned, “there is a stream. It flows into the Oise.”

“But how will we get there?”

“Why, we will walk.” He and the other man lifted the boat, and Framberta joined them under it.

“Follow us, my lady.”

“But I must help,” said Radegund.

“There is no…” But before he could object, she had joined them. The others bent their arms to bear the weight, but she had to reach up high above her head. This was more weight than she had ever held and sometimes she had to step away. But she felt a sturdy satisfaction in knowing she could do her part.

As it was, they did not have to walk for long. A peasant in his wagon came by and nodded admiringly. “You carry quite a burden, friends.”

“One carries what one must,” said the boatman.

“You are going to the stream?”

“Yes.”

“Why, let me help you then.”

Radegund had forgotten how ready the poor were to help each other, always knowing they might themselves be in need. The men set the boat in the back of the wagon and insisted she get up beside it. Then they walked beside the peasant and his oxen, trading gossip and laughter.

When they came to a cluster of reeds, he said, “It starts here.” He took them further down to where the water began to flow freely. As her men set the boat in the water, Radegund handed the farmer a wineskin. “Why thank you, good lady! It is not often a poor man drinks wine.”

They soon reached the Oise. It was not so smooth as the Somme, but pleasant enough to her. When she saw the walls of Noyon in the distance, she recalled her baptism and the sisters singing in perpetual song. Was Bishop Médard still there, she wondered?

Along the way, the land changed little. She began to see that much of Chlothar’s domain was farmland. Sometimes the banks rose slightly, covered with vines. Other boats came towards or past them, often with lines hanging for fish, some laden with goods. Some greeted them, others paid them no mind.

After an hour, she saw walls in the distance, just off the right bank. She began to make out towers around them and the bulk of a church rising inside, on the cluttered slope of a hill.

As she was studying all this, a large boat, wider in the middle, pulled in front of them. Its long narrowing bow ended in the fierce head of a hawk. “What is…” she started to ask. But then she saw Ragingot, stepping to the bow.

She had been captured. Captured by the King.

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