The Reckoning

by Sharon Kay Penman

  He knew when he was nearing the sea, alerted by the soft glow of light that hovered upon the horizon. Reaching the coast road, he drew rein, passed a few moments savoring the view. But as he was about to start south toward Clynnog, he heard the sound of approaching riders. A small group of horsemen were coming from the north, from the direction of Caer yn Arfon. Even at such a distance, Llewelyn could tell that they were well armed and well mounted. Curious, he wheeled his stallion, waited for them.

  It would have been difficult to say which one was the more startled, Llewelyn or Davydd. Davydd was certainly the more pleased. After reining in abruptly at sight of his brother, he did a deliberately comic doubletake, then spurred his stallion forward, laughing. “I rarely see apparitions without a fair helping of wine, but I’d hardly expect to find the Lord Prince of Wales and Eryri loitering on the Clynnog Road—and alone, too, by God! If I had a suspicious mind, Llewelyn, I’d think you must have a tryst planned with some local lass. Of course you could have been waiting patiently by the roadside to bid me a personal, warm welcome, but even I find that far-fetched!”

  It may have been Davydd’s cocky grin. Or that recent ride through Bwlch Mawr Pass, where a lifetime’s conflict with Davydd had begun. Or simply that he was tired, his nerves on edge. But suddenly Llewelyn heard himself saying belligerently, “What are you doing in Llŷn, Davydd? Do you think you can come and go in my domains as you will?”

  Davydd lost his smile in a hurry. “I wrote last month,” he said, “to let you know I’d be coming into Llŷn to see Owain. I thought that would be sufficient. Should I have asked for a safe-conduct?”

  Llewelyn almost lashed back with the obvious retort, that in light of their history, he was the one likely to be in need of a safe-conduct. But he caught himself in time, for he was remembering now that Davydd had indeed written as he claimed. And Davydd’s stiff, prideful tone did not completely camouflage what he’d never admit, that Llewelyn’s angry rebuff had stung.

  “It is my memory that is at fault,” Llewelyn said reluctantly, “not you. I’ve much on my mind, and I forgot about your letter.”

  Had it been anyone but Davydd, Llewelyn would have gone further, offered a genuine apology rather than a hinted one. With Davydd, though, this was the best he could do. It was still more than Davydd had expected, and he nudged his mount closer, his eyes searching Llewelyn’s face.

  “What are you really doing out in the middle of nowhere by yourself, Llewelyn?”

  “I’m sorry to disappoint you, but the explanation is not a sinister one. I was out riding, went farther than I’d meant to, and rather than riding all the way back to Cricieth, I decided to beg a meal and a bed from Einion.”

  Davydd was not buying that, but he let it drop, for the moment. “Is that why you look so careworn…hunger pangs? Lucky for you that I happened along when I did.” Glancing back toward his waiting men, he waved them forward. “We’ll stop here for a while, rest the horses, and eat.”

  Llewelyn started to protest, then stopped. Why not? In truth, he was ravenous, for he’d not had a morsel since yesterday. Davydd’s men were already dismounting, unpacking the food, throwing flasks and insults about with equal abandon. Davydd gave his retainers a lot of leeway, but the only ones who lasted long in his service were those who learned early on that Davydd would overlook a great deal—provided that they were competent and discreet. Now, despite the rowdiness and tomfoolery, they soon found an alder tree, which could usually be relied upon to take root near water. This one was no exception, and, having tethered the horses by the brook, they then withdrew to eat just out of earshot of their lord and his brother.

  Davydd picked up a basket, walked over into the shade cast by the alder. “Will this do?’ he asked innocently, as if unaware of the widespread belief that evil spirits lurked in the shadow of alder trees. Llewelyn knew just how suspect was Davydd’s innocence if any man did, but he accepted the challenge, and joined his brother under the alder. Davydd tossed him a wineskin, tore a loaf of bread in half, and threw that his way, too. Llewelyn was not surprised to find that Davydd had included a vial of salt, even napkins, for Davydd had always liked his comforts, unable to see any virtues in abstinence. “Here,” Davydd said, “catch,” and a leg of roast capon came sailing through the air. Llewelyn caught it just before it splashed into the stream, and then gave Davydd an accusing look.

  “This is chicken,” he said.

  “Yes…so? I’m sure your lordship would rather have venison, but—”

  “It is Wednesday, Davydd,” Llewelyn said impatiently. “You know full well that the Church forbids the eating of meat on Wednesdays.”

  “Wednesday—are you sure?” Davydd’s bluff faltered under Llewelyn’s skeptical gaze, and he said grudgingly, “Aye, I know. But it was a choice between sinning and eating salted herring, and I chose the lesser evil. I do hope you’re not going to lecture me now about my impious eating habits?”

  Llewelyn shook his head. “No… I daresay you’ll have such spectacular sins to answer for on Judgment Day that the question of salted herring will never even come up.”

  Davydd could not help grinning. “Jesú, but I walked right into that thrust, with shield down and sword sheathed!” Lounging back on the grass, he raised his own half-eaten chicken leg, gesturing toward the one Llewelyn held. “Life is full of hard choices, Brother. You can be sated and sinful, or righteous and hungry. Do not keep me in suspense; which will it be?”

  He was being melodramatic, for Llewelyn’s confessor would cheerfully absolve so small a sin with an easy penance. But he’d just given Llewelyn his first real smile of the day. Glancing thoughtfully at the chicken, Llewelyn said, “I could be wrong. It does look like capon. But I suppose it might be barnacle goose.”

  Davydd’s eyes widened. Few myths were as popular as that of the barnacle goose, a wondrously strange beast said to hatch in the sea, for this belief allowed people to eat it in good conscience on fast days. But Llewelyn was the last man Davydd would have expected to put credence in so fishy a fable, and he eyed his brother now in some surprise. “Do you really believe that the barnacle goose is a sort of fish?” he asked, and Llewelyn shrugged.

  “I will if you will,” he said, and Davydd burst out laughing.

  “I took that bait quick enough, never even felt the hook.” Passing Llewelyn the salt, he said, “Well…what shall we talk about? We can always swap family gossip. I’ll tell you what I heard about Rhodri’s English bride if you—”

  “Rhodri got married?”

  “I take it you were not invited to the wedding either. Yes, our little brother snared himself an English heiress, crumbs from Edward’s table. More than crumbs, actually, for Beatrice de Malpas brought Rhodri a manor in Surrey and lands in Cheshire…not to mention the God-given opportunity to live amidst English gentry. I’d wager that in no time at all he’ll be quaffing ale and dining before noon and calling himself Sir Roderick.”

  Llewelyn gave Davydd a curious look. “Do you not think you’re being rather hard on him? The both of us have English wives, too.”

  “Yes…but it is different with Rhodri. He’s the worst sort of fool, Llewelyn, for he lacks the sense to value the only thing he truly has to be proud of—his Welsh blood.”

  Llewelyn had to defer to Davydd on that, for he simply did not know Rhodri well enough to say if Davydd’s scathing assessment was correct or not. “At least that is one charge that can never be lain at your door. Whatever else men might say to you, no one could ever accuse you of not being utterly Welsh!”

  That earned him an amused, faintly sardonic smile. “I assume you mean that I’m fully as contrary and fickle as the English expect us to be. But you ought to have a care, for that almost sounded approving. Llewelyn… I heard about Edward’s latest sleight of hand. There is not a jongleur alive who’d not barter his soul for Edward’s bag of tricks. The best of them can only hope to make a dove disappear, whilst Edward plucks an entire cantref right out of Wales, waves his sce
ptre, and lo, Arwystli is of a sudden located in England. Why did he not spare Christendom all those lives lost striving to free Jerusalem from the infidels? Would it not have been easier had he just declared it to be English, too, like Arwystli?”

  Llewelyn would have sworn that he’d never be able to find any humor in Edward’s Arwystli double-dealing, but as usual, he’d reckoned without Davydd’s sense of the absurd. Laughing, he reached for another piece of chicken. “Simon de Montfort used to contend that serving King Henry put him in mind of an ancient Greek King, the one condemned to push a boulder up a hill for all eternity, only to have it roll down each time he reached the top. Well, we start rolling that damnable rock up the hill again next week, when my attorneys argue my case once more before Edward’s English justices at Montgomery.”

  Davydd could not hide his dismay. “Christ, Llewelyn, you do not still believe you can get justice in Edward’s court, do you?”

  In truth, Llewelyn had never fully believed that, and he’d long ago begun to prepare for the day that his suspicions were borne out; for more than three years, he’d had a secret understanding with Gruffydd ap Gwenwynwyn’s Seneschal. But he was not about to share that with Davydd.

  “No,” he said, “of course I do not believe it, Davydd. That is why I am going to Radnor next week to meet with Roger de Mortimer.”

  “De Mortimer?” Davydd’s surprise was fleeting, giving way almost at once to jubilant comprehension. “Of course—his lands in Maelienydd border upon Arwystli! This is a masterful stratagem, Llewelyn. A seemingly straightforward pact of alliance, right? Ah, but with so much left unsaid, so much left to Gruffydd ap Gwenwynwyn’s fevered imagination. The potential for conspiracy and mischief-making is truly awesome here. Even if you never call upon de Mortimer for battlefield aid, the mere fact that you could is sure to rob men of sleep. I just cannot decide if you’re being forthrightly devious, or overtly underhanded, but whichever, I like it—a lot.”

  Llewelyn grinned. “Yes, I thought you might.”

  “Wait until Gruffydd ap Gwenwynwyn hears about this… By the Rood, how I’d love to be the one to tell him!” Davydd laughed, and Llewelyn wondered if he even remembered just then that he and Gruffydd had once been linked together in a murder plot. “I tell you, Llewelyn, this idea of yours is inspired, is good enough to be mine! With this one pact, you’ll vex Edward beyond measure, rattle Gruffydd down to his very bones, and set tongues wagging from Wales to Westminster. There is even a chance, however remote, that Edward might allow his court to try your case on the actual merits, once he understands that you’re willing to go to war against Gruffydd to hold on to Arwystli. Not that I’d want to wager my life’s last breath on it! Still, though, it is not beyond the realm of possibility.”

  Davydd’s enthusiasm was running away with him, but he seemed to be thoroughly enjoying the ride. “Of course if it does come to war, de Mortimer will expect a portion of the spoils, but you’re more than a match—”

  He stopped so abruptly that Llewelyn glanced up in surprise. “De Mortimer—of course! Cousin Roger is doing double duty here, making ready to sow discord amongst your enemies whilst wreaking havoc in your marriage!” Davydd’s grin was triumphant; he could never abide a mystery, and he was pleased by how quickly he’d solved this one. “That is it? Why you’re out here on your own—”

  “Davydd,” Llewelyn said sharply, warningly.

  “I know I’m right, Llewelyn. It makes perfect sense. Now I may be high up on your wife’s list, but Roger—”

  “What list?”

  “Men she’d like to see end their days as galley slaves. In all modesty, though, I cannot hold a candle to de Mortimer. Ellen likes me not, but she’d thank God fasting for the chance to do old Roger an ill turn. Not that I blame her. Our de Mortimer cousin gets his enemies the honest way; he earns them, each and every one. She’d never embrace de Mortimer as an ally…and I daresay she’s no longer keen on embracing you! Women may not be the most logical of God’s creatures, but they do know how to wield the weapons He gave them—”

  “You are wasting your breath and my time, Davydd. That door is locked and bolted. What happens between my wife and myself is no one else’s concern, least of all, yours.”

  Davydd was unfazed. “If you admit it, then I can help. You’ve already made your first mistake, but—”

  “Have I, indeed?”

  “Yes, you have, for certes. You told her about it!”

  Llewelyn gave his brother an astonished look, then an incredulous laugh. “You cannot be serious? You expect me to believe that if you were in my place, you’d not have told Elizabeth about the pact?”

  “Nary a word.”

  Llewelyn felt the same morbid fascination that drew people to fires and public hangings. “Let’s take this madness a bit further. You make the alliance, and you tell Elizabeth nothing about it. What in God’s Name do you then, when she eventually finds out?”

  “Well, first of all, I’d not worry about it until she did. She might not, after all. But if the worst did happen, I’d trust that I’d come up with something.”

  Llewelyn shook his head. “I will go to my grave,” he said, “never understanding how a man so clever can be so indifferent to consequences.”

  Davydd had begun to root around in the basket again. But he looked up quickly at that. “I’m not indifferent,” he said. “Sometimes consequences just do not turn out as we expected them to…”

  There was an unexpectedly poignant, unfinished quality to that sentence. It seemed to hang in the air between them, fraught with all that had been left unsaid. Their eyes caught, held. And then, by common consent, they let the moment go, too wary to venture further. Davydd was the first to look away. He passed out the last of the chicken, making another jest about barnacle geese, and they moved on to safer ground, back to the familiar banter and verbal sparring, but not quite as barbed as before, not quite as guarded. Some yards away, Davydd’s escort sprawled comfortably in the sun, joking amongst themselves, looking over occasionally toward the alder tree, hearing laughter and marveling that these two men could sound so relaxed with each other, so oddly at ease.

  Einion had been delighted by the unexpected arrival of his nephews. He’d welcomed them joyfully, tactfully concealing his surprise that Llewelyn should turn up without his bodyguards and in Davydd’s company, and they had passed an amicable evening together. Llewelyn was shocked, though, to see how rapidly Einion’s strength was waning. Suffering from “heart-pain” and shortness of breath, he seemed to have aged years in a matter of months. Davydd had confided that Owain, too, was ailing again, stricken by the crippling “joint-evil” that brought such misery to so many. Watching as Einion made a gallant attempt to mask his discomfort, thinking of Owain, Llewelyn and Davydd exchanged glances, sharing the same thought, that death was not to be feared as much as those maladies that left a man alive but enfeebled, a still strong will entrapped within an infirm body.

  Davydd departed early the next morning for Owain’s lands to the south, but Llewelyn lingered, enjoying Einion’s company, not yet ready to face his wife. A night’s sleep had changed nothing, provided no new insights into his dilemma. He’d long known that Ellen had an idealized, visionary view of her father. Hers was the uncritical, adoring devotion of an innocent, for time had frozen for her as well as for Simon on that August day at Evesham. It was easy for Llewelyn to understand, and equally easy to accept—until now, until Roger de Mortimer robbed him of the woman that young girl had become, and he found himself unable to get past the daughter, to reach his wife.

  It was late afternoon when he bade Einion farewell, and with an escort provided by his uncle, began his reluctant journey back to Cricieth. They set an unhurried pace, and were traveling with lit lanterns by the time the castle loomed up against the darkening sky, high above the sea, its towering battlements crowned in mist.

  Trevor darted forward as Llewelyn dismounted, materializing so swiftly that Llewelyn knew he must have been keepi
ng vigil. Llewelyn spared some moments for the boy, for he was well aware that Trevor was convinced he could walk on water if he had a mind to, but all the while his eyes kept straying across the bailey, toward the lights flooding the upper windows of the southwest tower, where Ellen awaited him.

  She was standing by a window as he entered, clad in one of her favorite gowns, a flattering shade of sapphire. But tonight the vivid color only served to accentuate her pallor, to call attention to the shadows smudged under her eyes.

  “I did not know when to expect you,” she said, “for Einion’s messenger said you might not be returning till the morrow. Are you hungry? I can rouse the cooks…”

  “Thank you, but that will not be necessary. We stopped and ate by the roadside.”

  She nodded. “Well, then…are you thirsty? What would you like…?”

  “Mayhap some wine.”

  “Red? White?”

  “Either one will do. Thank you.” He watched as she moved to the door to summon a servant. This was intolerable. Not even beggars seeking alms were as polite as this. But what she wanted to hear, he could not say.

  Ellen returned to the chamber more quickly than he expected, or desired. She hovered nearby while he unbuckled his scabbard, hung it on a chair. As he pulled his dusty, travel-stained tunic over his head, she took it from him, carried it across the chamber, and stuffed it into a sack for their laundress.