"To be sure I will. Aescendune? I have heard the name: I can't remember
where. Have you horses?"

"No; we were hunting on foot, and expecting to let fly our shafts at
some deer. May I ask, in return, the name of our guest?"

Before the youth could answer, one of the attendants strode forward, and
with an air of importance replied, "You are about to receive the honour
of a visit from the future lord of Britain, Prince Edwy."

"Keep your lips closed till I give you leave to open them, Guthred. You
may leave me to announce myself.

"I shall be only too glad to go with you both; and these two huntsmen
deserve to be left in the forest to the mercy of your wolves."

Somewhat startled to find that they had saved the future Basileus or
King of Britain--the hope of the royal line of Cerdic--the brothers
led their guest through the darkening forest until the distant light of
a clearing appeared in the west, and they emerged from the shadow of the
trees upon the brow of a gentle hill.

Below them lay the castle (if such it should be called) of their father
the Thane of Aescendune. Utterly unlike the castellated buildings which,
at a later period, formed the dwellings of the proud Norman nobility, it
was a low irregular building, the lower parts of which were of stone,
and the upper portions, when there was a second story, of thick timber
from the forest.

A river, from which the evening mist was slowly rising, lay beyond, and