CHAPTER 42Fate was unkind to me. It did not allow me even to absorb the situation little by little, by degrees that might have provided warning enough to ease the whole just a little. Instead, the picture was complete in the first glance.
The gloriously rumpled bed, with sheets and furs and odd pieces of bright clothing scattered higgledy-piggedly; the two people upon it, naked, kneeling, their profiles quite clear and recognizable.
Hereward, betraying sweat still glistening on his broad, rippling back, a silver cup in one teasing hand, was drizzling blood-red wine on to her n*****s, sipping from there with smiling lips because he had thus two pleasures at once.
And Aelfryth, head thrown back, eyes closed in languorous, sensual ecstasy, was holding his golden head in her hands, running
