Bedwyr was watching Gwenhwyfar intently, understanding the thoughts that must be gathering and tumbling in her mind. Understanding how her heart must be leaping and juddering. Had he not thought and felt the same? The glorious knowing that what they had assumed to be the truth was not so – and the immediate following of seemingly a thousand racing questions. All beginning with why? And following close behind, the dismay that now she would not be his.
And how would the Supreme Governor react when he heard this news of Arthur? If he heard. Ought he be told? Ought anyone?
Glancing at those in the room, Bedwyr pondered on that. The Abbess would say nothing. Eadric had already proven his worth by holding his tongue until now. No one else knew, save Mathild who was dead and Lady Winifred and Cerdic, who had for their own reasons, whatever they were, held silence. And those people with whom Arthur sheltered. He was standing, chewing a torn nail, worrying on more crowding questions. What to do now? How to react? Who to tell? Who not to? How to let Gwenhwyfar go from him?
Gwenhwyfar must have read his frown. “I have my own mind to set straight before deciding how many others to share this news with.” She moved to his side, placed her hands within his, said, “Even if this is true, and Arthur is alive, there can be no recrimination upon what happened between us. We acted in honour and faith.”
He attempted a grin, did not manage one.
Gwenhwyfar kissed him lightly on his cheek. How hard he must be taking this! How hard were they all? Christ in his mercy, it was as difficult to swallow down this medicine as had been the hearing of Arthur’s death!
“What will you do, Lady?” Eadric summoned courage to ask. He felt nothing but relief now his part was ended. He could return to Cuthwin’s farm, wed with Gundrada, raise a family. Aye, and happen one day tell his grandchilder the story of how it was he who had told of King Arthur’s return from the dead.
“Do?” she said, her fingers twisting, as so often they had these past months, her wedding band. “Do?” She laughed, high, a hint of crazy uncontrolled quivering behind the sound. “I have no idea.”
XXXVIII
The baby, a girl-child, had finished suckling, was drowsing, her mouth a perfect rosebud shape, eyes closed, content, against her mother’s breast. Ragnall did not want to disturb her, this perfect, beautiful little girl, the product of her own womb. The boy, Aurelius Caninus, was playing before the hearth-fire with a set of wooden animal figures carved for him by his father, humming to himself a childish, monotonous tune. Caninus was almost two years old, a sturdy boy with the mischief and spirit of a prized hunting dog. They had called him that, ‘little whelp’, for his grit determination. His father was so proud of the lad. As was his grandsire. Of course, Ragnall loved her son, but her daughter completed the circle, brought her the fulfilment of all possible joys. Her beautiful, golden-haired, blue-eyed angel.
Reluctant, Ragnall lifted the babe, settled her in the cradle while over her shoulder warning Caninus that soon it would be time for his own bed. The boy ignored her, continued setting his animals in line. The baby’s arm jerked in a muscle reaction, slept on. Her mother stroked the fluff of pale hair, covered her carefully, steeled herself to tackle the boy. Always there was a fuss at bedtime. Tears, screams, shouts and flying fists. “Just a few more moments,” she warned, knowing the moments would stretch on too long. Easier to give in, let him have his way, although she knew it was spoiling the child. He would be better as he grew, more manageable.
Eventually, it took over an hour to settle him by which time Ragnall felt exhausted. She considered going to her own bed, but Cadwy had promised he would return this day. It was already dark.
She sat with her sewing, quiet before the crackle of the fire, listening to the gentle sounds of sleep from her children. Slept. A log shifted, startling her awake. Her sewing had dropped to the floor and for a moment she was disorientated, uncertain. Other sounds? What had wakened her?
Sounds beyond the closed door, horses, men’s voices. Ragnall hurried to her feet, ran to the doorway, flung it wide as Cadwy was about to do the same from the far side. They laughed, embraced, each glad to see the other. Five days Cadwy had been gone.
Ordering a slave to fetch fresh wine and hot broth, Ragnall fussed her husband, took his rain-damp cloak, removed his boots, sat him before the fire, added more fuel.
She did not ask what cause had been behind his urgent summoning by Geraint of Durnovaria. Cadwy would tell her in his own good time.
He discussed it much later, after the lamps were growing low, as they lay together in their bed, having celebrated his homecoming as husband and wife should. Ragnall listened, intrigued, astonished. Incredulous. Her first question had been the same as theirs, those men whom Geraint had called together to talk with himself, Bedwyr and Gwenhwyfar. Cadwy, Mabon and Ider.
“But if Arthur is alive,” she said, “why has he not come home?”
“There can be but two reasons.” Cadwy answered, pulling the delight of her naked body closer to his own. “Either he cannot, or he does not wish to.“
“I would go for the first of the two,” Ragnall responded with surety, settling her head comfortable against his chest. “Arthur was a king, he would not abandon us.”
“A defeated king.”
“Huh! One lost battle against all those he had won? Na. I tell you, for some reason he cannot get home. Bad wounded – happen he has lost a limb, a leg or arm. His pride would not let him be seen as a maimed man.”
Cadwy nodded dubious agreement, smoothed his wife’s black hair. She could be right, probably was, but why had Arthur never sent word? He began to drift into sleep, murmured some half-answer to a question Ragnall had put to him, jerked awake as she prodded him with her elbow. “I said, is there no clue as to where he might have gone?”
Cadwy yawned. It had been a long day, a long ride. He wanted to sleep. Closing his eyes, he began to relax, enjoying the sensation of warmth that was creeping through his body. “He was left, assumed dead, with the woman and her child. He may be with the Ladies, with the one called Morgaine.”
Ragnall jerked upright, her hair falling to hide her breasts and the scars on the skin. “Morgaine!” she echoed. “Did you say Morgaine?”
Cadwy’s eyes snapped open. “Aye. A woman with a boy-child.”
“Named Medraut?”
“How should I know?” Irritable, the comfort of drowsing sleep vanishing, Cadwy gathered the bed-furs closer against the cold that her sudden movement had caused. “I doubt they knew the lad’s name. Why? Do you know of her?”
Excited, Ragnall grasped his shoulder. “Aye,” she said, quick, breathless. “If it be the same Morgaine, then aye, I do. So did Arthur!”
Interested, catching her headiness, Cadwy pushed himself up onto one elbow. “Bedwyr said he thought, from her manner and her grief, the woman knew the Pendragon. She was a healer, he said. So who is this Morgaine?”
Ragnall sat with her fingers pressed against her cheeks and nose. “My God,” she breathed, slowly releasing her held breath, “it must be she!” She laced her fingers, rested her lips against them, thinking, rapidly trying to remember. “Morgaine was the Lady, the Priestess of the Lake at Yns Witrin. I talked with her often.” She flashed an apologetic glance of guilt. It had been forbidden to speak with the pagan Priestess, forbidden to enter the realms of the heathen. “She was kind to me.” Even now, even after Cadwy was mending her confidence in herself, Ragnall felt the need to place some defence for actions of the past. Cadwy waved her on, impatient. He had no care for the petty, blinkered rules of a hag-riddled Abbess. “Go on!”
“Morgaine had a son. She bore him at the abbey. A few of the sisters guessed who she was. They kept that knowing well from Abbess Branwen, of course!” Ragnall searched her memory, fought herself back to that time. It was difficult to remember accurately the good things that had happened, so few were they between the many harsh sadnesses. “Morgaine left when the child was but a few days old. She had let me hold the
babe.” Ragnall smiled broadly at that pleasing memory. “He was a fine, healthy boy. Morgaine told me his father would have been proud of him.”
Cadwy snorted. “A bastard brat, aye, I guessed as much.” Ragnall pursed her lips, stern censure crowding her expression. “Aye, a bastard born. With the King as his father, what else would he be?”
Cadwy had only half-listened. “These whores who bed for pleasure, never caring about the consequence of a… Jesu, what was it you said?” He sat up, kneeling, grasped Ragnall’s arms, almost shook her. “The King, his father? Arthur?”
Ragnall nodded.
“You are certain?”
Again, a nod. “She told me so herself.”
“Arthur has a living son?” Cadwy’s voice betrayed doubt.
Patient, Ragnall nodded a third time. Her husband was taking an annoying while to comprehend all this!
“If Morgaine was his mistress, this boy is his son. Jesu and all the Angels in Heaven!” Cadwy’s face grew vigorously animated. “Arthur is more than likely to be with her!” He released Ragnall from his grip, swung his legs from the bed, began hurriedly fumbling for his clothes. “We are closer to finding him – should we decide to search! I must inform my Lady!”
“Hold, husband!”
He ignored her. “Bedwyr need know of this also, and Geraint. We had elected to do nothing as yet – put out a few spies, ask a few discreet questions in Gaul. Geraint was all for writing to that pedantic old letter-scribbler, Apollinaris or his brother-by-law, the one who had ridden with Arthur, but we reckoned if they had any knowing of Arthur being alive they would already have informed us.” He spoke hurriedly, talking fast all on the one, excited breath.
“Husband!” Ragnall’s admonishment pulled him short, his leg halfway into his bracae. “Has it occurred to you this might be the reason for the Pendragon not returning?”
Cadwy stared at her, her face deep-shadowed in the low light. He did not see the disfigurement there any more, not even in the full light of day or bright-lit lamps. No need to see the outer shell when the inner core was enough to give contentment and love. “You mean he may have elected to live with his whore?” He shrugged. “Even if that be so, Gwenhwyfar ought know of it.” He continued dressing. Ragnall sighed.
“You have just returned from Durnovaria. Need you leave again so immediate? ‘Tis the middle of the night.” Coquettishly added, “And it is raining out there.”
Hesitating, Cadwy dutifully repeated he must leave straight away. The pitter-pattering of the rain was loud, rattling heavier on the roof. His bed beckoned, tempting. Ragnall moved, the dim light shape-shifting over her unscarred naked shoulder giving a glimpse of her breast. “Damn it!” he cursed, removing the one boot, his bracae and tunic. “I’ll ride at first light.”
Content, Ragnall pressed against him as he wormed beneath the furs. Tomorrow, she had every intention of riding south with him. Except, as the sun warmed the morning, rain-leaden sky into a more promising shade of mist-wreathed grey, two riders and their clattering retinue of attendants reined in before the doors of Cadwy’s modest Hall.
Ambrosius Aurelianus and Amlawdd. Both rain-damp, chilled, and with a dull aura of bad tidings swirling about their glum, slumped shoulders.
XXXIX
Ambrosius assumed his son’s agitation was due to this unexpected arrival. He seated himself wearily, suppressing the insistent nag of a headache that had been with him since yesterday. God’s truth! What hope was there for the two of them to form a relationship if every visit resulted in flustered embarrassment? And what hope had Cadwy of commanding this stronghold in an emergency? If the arrival of his own father set him into such a twittering, red-faced whirl, what would a horde of spear-waving Saxons beyond his ramparts do?
In contrast, Amlawdd sprawled, legs spread, before the hearth-fire. His was the ease of arrogance. Not for him the detecting of subtle nuances or the noticing of the uneasy glances exchanged between husband and wife.
Both men accepted warmed wine from Ragnall and the offer of food, Amlawdd saying nothing, merely taking and drinking; Ambrosius polite and asking after the health of his grandchildren. Ragnall’s face lit immediately with the animated radiance peculiar to a mother’s pride.
“Your granddaughter is a content, lay-abed babe. She wakes and gurgles for her feed then snuggles again into her cradle like a hedge-pig seeking his winter sleep. Your grandson, mind,” her smile was wide with pride, “has more energy than a colt turned out onto his first spring grass!”
“I have a small gift for him in my saddlebag,” Ambrosius admitted, his face tinged with red for fear he would be construed as spoiling the boy. “Nothing of consequence, a carved animal for his collection.”
Ragnall was delighted. “I will send for his nurse to bring him when you have eaten.”
“The last time I saw the boy, he was overexcited and exceedingly rude to me. He needs discipline, not child’s toys.” Amlawdd spoke gruffly. He had found the indifference he felt for his daughter continued with her children; Amlawdd’s priority was for himself, his own needs and ambition. There was not enough room in his head or heart for the details of others.
Seeing his wife’s lips compress, her eyes narrow, Cadwy intervened by cordially asking how long his father intended to stay, was relieved to hear the answer of only an hour or so, to take refreshment, change horses.
“Amlawdd and I need to ride on.” Ambrosius sounded tired but there was anger behind his weary voice also. “We seek Bedwyr, who is, as I understand, again at Durnovaria.”
Ragnall could not stem the gasp escaping her mouth. Ambrosius did not miss it, but said nothing.
Her father was not so tactful. “What ails you girl? What is that woman-stealing bastard to you?”
Frantically searching for some unobtrusive answer, Ragnall appealed with her eyes to her husband for help. Cadwy had seated himself with his guests. He realised his father guessed there was something amiss here at Caer Badon, for Ambrosius, for all his annoyances, was astute and observant. He must have seen the baggage ready for loading on the ponies, would discover the intended destination. He could think of no rapid lie, decided on the truth. Or near enough to suffice. Calmly he took a sip of the warmed, red wine, said, “By coincidence, I returned but yesterday from Geraint’s Hall.” At his father’s questioning frown, he tossed an indulgent smile at his wife. “My Lady Enid admonished me stoutly for not taking my wife and new daughter. For the sake of peace, I decided to return, fetch them. We were preparing to depart as you arrived.”
Amlawdd scoffed, announced disparagingly. “Women are timewasters. A double ride – and of such distance – merely to show off a puking brat? Wanton foolishness!”
Cadwy spread his arms, arched his eyebrows, helpless, toward the roof. “I agree, but even you must acknowledge there is no arguing with a lady who has set her mind.” To his surprise, his father chuckled.
“If you would indulge a father’s whim and delay an hour, we could ride together. It will make a merrier party having the children with us.” Ambrosius asked this of Ragnall, who generously agreed. What else could she do?
“Caninus thinks much of you, his paternal grandsire. He will enjoy your company.”
“Fah! What nonsense is this, Ambrosius?” Amlawdd swung irritably to his feet. “We go to arrest Bedwyr on suspicion of treason – and you advocate taking a woman and babes with us?” He stalked around the hearth-place, stood, fists bunched on his hips before his Supreme Lord, angry. “God’s justice man, is your head going as soft as your belly?”
Ragnall gasped, her hand going to her mouth at her father’s gross indiscretion. Cadwy leapt to his feet, his hand touching his dagger hilt. “How dare you!” he hissed. “How dare you insult my father at my hearth?”
With a snarl, Amlawdd had his dagger out, instant, into his hand.
Careless, almost offhand, Ambrosius waved the hostility down, ordered both men to sit, put up their weapons. “Leave it be, Cadwy, Amlawdd meant not his words
in the way you heard.” To Amlawdd, said, “We do not go to arrest Bedwyr, merely to ascertain why, yet again, he is not at the fortress I gave him to command.”
Amlawdd grunted, sat, reached for more wine. “We know why. He either goes to bed the lady who ought be my wife, or plots to raise a rebellion against us.” Added with a growl, “Or both.”
Cadwy openly laughed, earning himself a dark, thundercloud look. “I assure you, unless there should come another, greater, leader, Bedwyr remains loyal.” Cadwy spread his hands, emphasising the absurdity of Amlawdd’s claim. “He does, I admit, often ride south to see the Lady Gwenhwyfar.” He cast a challenging glance at Amlawdd. “She did, after all, openly refuse you, is betrothed to him.”
Amlawdd spat into the fire.
“Aye,” Ambrosius said, bringing his cloak tighter around his body. He was cold, close to shivering, and his stomach was paining him again. “Bedwyr rides to see the lady. But I have heard a whisper on the wind that is, as yet, a rustling on a light summer breeze.”
Puzzled, Cadwy swivelled slightly on his stool to look the keener at his father’s tired, drawn face. Ambrosius nodded, just the once. Saw in his son’s eye that Cadwy had heard similar whisper. “It seems the Artoriani might not, as we thought, be ended.”
XL
For a long, heart-thumping moment, Cadwy stared at his father, at his calm, almost indifferent expression and, although he was tired, his almost careless poise. How could he have heard of Arthur being alive? Had rumour spread further than the Saxon Eadric had thought? Careful, Cadwy said, “You take this news with some amount of ease.”
Ambrosius shrugged. “I have always suspected, been prepared. For all that some might have it, I am no fool. Son, I am aware not all those in authority are eager to be my followers. Arthur had as many friends as he had enemies.” He lifted his shoulder a second time, a resignation to the acceptance of the inevitable. “It takes only one spark to set dry kindling crackling.” He gestured his hand at Cadwy. “You have obviously heard these wild whisperings also.”
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