[The Lion of Wales 01.0] Cold My Heart

by Sarah Woodbury

  Myrddin had decided that they shouldn’t seek shelter before they reached the garrison at Caerhun, an old Roman fort that King Arthur had resurrected to watch the Conwy River. Even then, Nell wasn’t sure how she felt about sleeping in a fort among a dozen unfamiliar soldiers. Fear—of men, of the future—had hounded her all the way from Anglesey to St. Asaph. If anything, mile after mile her terror had grown as she replayed in her head the events at the convent—as if she were living them and dreaming them both at the same time.

  But despite what she knew of men, she’d been unprepared for the attack on the road. Without Myrddin, those Saxons would have taken her and killed her. Nell knew it, and her heart caught in her throat every time she allowed her mind to focus on it.

  “Tell me again who you are,” she said, after they’d ridden five miles, retracing both her steps and his. It had taken her that many miles to steady herself and to be able to speak without a hitch in her voice.

  “My name is Myrddin. I serve King Arthur. I escorted the Lord Aelric to St. Asaph and was preparing to return when I came upon you.”

  That sounded reasonable to Nell. Despite her fears about this journey and the notion of having anything to do with any man, she gave in to relief. At last, some of the horror of the attack drained away, and she rested her forehead between Myrddin’s shoulder blades. “Thank you. I haven’t thanked you yet.”

  “Are you much hurt?”

  “I was terrified of the men, panicked beyond all measure, but they didn’t rape me if that’s what you’re asking.”

  The word rape twisted on her lips, and she shuddered into Myrddin’s back, but she was glad she’d said it. They didn’t need to dance around the question now.

  “Praise God,” Myrddin said. “Why were you traveling that road? Alone?”

  “I had a family, once, and sons, although they’re all dead now. I’ve not spent my life behind stone walls. I have no one who depends on me, no husband, and no desire ever to have one again. With nothing to tie me to Anglesey, I saw no reason why I shouldn’t travel where I wished to go.”

  “In the middle of a war,” Myrddin said.

  Nell’s hackles rose at the distrust in his voice. “What do you mean?”

  “What could have possessed you to come so far on your own, unless it was for some nefarious purpose? I saved you from genuine peril, but even spies can find themselves in over their heads when they meet men more devious than they.”

  “What? You can’t mean that.” Nell found laughter mingling with a mixture of incredulity and hysteria. Then again, she too could imagine a scenario in which a woman such as she imparted information about King Arthur’s movements to the men who attacked her, only to have them decide she’d outlived her usefulness.

  “Convince me otherwise,” Myrddin said.

  Nell thought for a moment, sure she couldn’t tell him the whole truth—not about the dreams or that she knew him from them—but she could tell him something. “Our abbess died during the summer, just before the Saxons came. The new one the Archbishop appointed was—” she paused, searching for a word that would convey the truth but wasn’t as stark as ‘an idiot’, “—ineffective.”

  “What was your role?” Myrddin said. “Were you the prioress?”

  “I was the infirmarer.”

  “So you left. All by yourself.”

  “I did,” she said. “And nearly paid for my stupidity with my life.”

  “But why were you at St. Asaph after dark?”

  “That close to so many fortified towns, I thought I’d be safe.”

  “You were safe—from masterless men—but not from Modred’s men.”

  “I intended to seek shelter at the convent at Rhuddlan,” Nell said. “I had another hour to walk, no more.”

  “An hour that proved your undoing,” Myrddin said. “You should have sheltered instead at the convent at Conwy, south of Caerhun.”

  “I couldn’t—” Nell paused, trying to explain what she’d come to understand, though she’d never articulated it to herself. “You misunderstand. I wasn’t going to stay at the convent at Rhuddlan. I can’t go back to that life.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I took vows, I know, but I chose the convent when I was so angry at God I couldn’t bear to live with myself anywhere else.”

  Myrddin barked a laugh. “That doesn’t make sense.”

  “It did to me; it does to me.” She paused again. “It wasn’t God who burned Llanfaes and killed my sisters.”

  “Some would say God allowed it to happ—”

  Nell cut him off. “Don’t be a child. With Llanfaes burned, my sisters dead or worse, not just the Abbey, but my life lies in ashes around my feet. I’ve come to realize that I will not rebuild it again as a nun.”

  “The entire world has turned upside down these last months.” Myrddin nodded. “A clear path is hard for anyone to see.”

  Nell could only agree with that. She lowered her voice, less because she was afraid it would carry than because of the force of the emotion behind it. “I hate the Saxons, so much that I fear I’ll be consumed by it. Yet I’m afraid of them also, and of the future they represent.”

  Myrddin’s hand found hers at his waist, and he squeezed. “It burns through me too.”

  The pair rode through the night, the downpour turning into a gentle rain in the early hours of the morning. Still, the rain had soaked them through, and Nell was glad when, in the murky light that preceded sunrise, Myrddin turned into the entrance of the fort.

  She checked the sky, thinking that if they left Caerhun shortly after noon, they could travel the ten miles to Garth Celyn before darkness fell. Desperation rose within her at the thought of journeying all the way back to a point just shy of the one from which she’d started. And yet, it allowed her a moment of stark clarity: she would never leave Gwynedd now. She would have to ride this war out in Eryri, in the very castle from which King Arthur governed.

  Myrddin brought Cadfarch to a halt. “There’ll be provisions and dry cloaks to borrow here.”

  Nell accepted Myrddin’s help dismounting. Once on the ground, however, she hesitated as she looked toward the central hall, some thirty paces away, and then back at Myrddin.

  “You can wait for me inside.” Myrddin started to lead Cadfarch away.

  “No. No, I can’t.” She strode past him, heading towards the stables.

  “Nell—”

  She ignored him.

  Once inside, Myrddin, still shaking his head at her, unbuckled the saddle bags and lifted Cadfarch’s saddle from the horse’s back. Nell picked up a brush and began to work at the mane. The motion felt good after the long ride, since her muscles were stiffened and sore.

  As she worked, she sensed Myrddin watching her out of the corner of his eye. She could tell he wasn’t sure what to say to her, or if he should say anything at all. Nell decided that since she already knew everything a woman needed to know about what kind of man he was—even without the clarity of her dreams—he knew nothing of her, and she would save him from his perplexity.

  “My mother died at my birth.” She moved the brush to Cadfarch’s legs. The horse whickered, absorbing the treatment Nell was giving him. “My father didn’t marry again nor have other children.” She glanced up at Myrddin, a half-smile on her lips. “He saw no reason why I shouldn’t become familiar with horses.”

  “Where was this?” Myrddin rested his forearm along Cadfarch’s back and leaned on it, watching her face.

  “In Powys,” she said. “My father had a small holding along the Irfon River. We were never wealthy, but lived well for all that.”

  “And your husband? You said you had one.”

  “I married at fifteen. My two sons were born and died before I was twenty. Then my husband was killed in a minor skirmish ten years ago.”

  “So you went into a convent,” Myrddin said.

  “I did.”

  “A common enough decision,” Myrddin said, “but why so far from Powy
s?”

  “My father had died, and the Saxons had confiscated his lands. I’d lived among them for most of my life, but my father supported King Arthur and had taught me to support him too.”

  Myrddin tipped his head, acknowledging her admission of allegiance even if he didn’t necessarily believe it, especially since she’d now confessed that she’d grown up among the Saxons. They finished grooming Cadfarch, still not in accord, and crossed the courtyard to enter the main building through a side door. It led to a hall, forty feet on a side, with long tables for dining or congregating. The smell of cooking wafted through a far doorway, indicating an adjacent cookhouse.

  “Myrddin! You look well!” A stocky man dressed in mail armor much like Myrddin’s appeared and strolled towards them. Also like Myrddin, his broad shoulders told her he’d worn that armor for his entire adult life.

  “I disbelieve you, Rhodri, since I haven’t slept in far too long,” Myrddin replied, by way of a greeting.

  Rhodri laughed.

  Myrddin placed a hand at the small of Nell’s back, pushing her forward with him as he walked towards Rhodri. “We need food and rest and a place to dry our cloaks, if we may. We must return to Garth Celyn before the sun sets.”

  “Done.” Rhodri grinned. “As long as you tell me one piece of news.”

  “That I can do,” Myrddin said.

  Rhodri seated himself at the end of one of the long tables. Nell pushed back the hood of Myrddin’s cloak and went to stand by the fire, her back to the heat. She met Myrddin’s eyes across the distance that separated them and realized he’d been observing her, his lips pursed.

  “And we need dry clothes,” Myrddin said.

  “We’ll start there.” Rhodri looked Myrddin up and down. Myrddin’s surcoat was damp, and the water glistened on the links of the mail he wore beneath it. Rhodri jerked his head in the direction of a side doorway. “Help yourself.”

  Myrddin tipped his head to Nell, and she followed him to a supply room, reached by a narrow hallway. Once inside, she stopped, uncertain, but Myrddin had everything in hand.

  “I’ve been here before.” He lifted up the lid of a trunk, which held a variety of garments. “And been in need before.”

  “I wouldn’t mind hearing that story some day,” Nell said.

  Myrddin shot her a grin and then turned back to the trunk. “This will have to do.” He tossed her an ugly, grey dress.

  Nell caught it, gazing first at it and then at him. He turned to face away from her to give her a measure of privacy, and tears pricked at her eyes at his understanding. Hastily, she wiped them away before stripping off his cloak and the torn dress she’d worn continually since she’d borrowed it from the young novice whose fate Nell couldn’t bear to think on.

  When she’d finished, Myrddin swung around to look at her. He grunted. “I don’t like it. The color doesn’t suit you, and it’s too big. We’ll find you better at Garth Celyn.”

  Nell had regained control over herself by then, and she tipped her head in what she hoped was calm acceptance. “At least it’s in one piece.”

  Then, not entirely sure of herself, Nell moved forward to help him remove his armor. Myrddin accepted her touch with equanimity, even as he studied her with his calm, hazel eyes that revealed nothing of the thoughts behind them. When Nell traced with one finger the long scar that ran the length of his lower left rib, Myrddin shrugged. “An errant knife. A small matter, considering what it could have been.”

  Up close and without his armor, Myrddin proved to be less squat and taller than her first impression, with long rangy limbs, albeit thick shoulders and neck from years of swordplay. For lack of a satchel, Nell wrapped Myrddin’s armor in his wet surcoat. A squire at Garth Celyn would polish the links so they wouldn’t rust. Then, while Myrddin dressed, Nell busied herself in returning the contents of the chest that Myrddin had upended to their place so that she needn’t look at him.

  “Ready?” Myrddin adjusted his sword at his waist.

  Nell looked up and nodded. Myrddin took his armor from her, tucked it under one arm, and led the way back to the dining hall.

  In their absence, the daughter of the garrison captain, a girl just entering womanhood, had put together a meal. Once they were seated, she laid a trencher in front of Nell and Myrddin and set a cup beside it. She assumed they’d share, which was not out of the ordinary, but the action revealed to Nell that both the girl and Rhodri believed that Nell belonged to Myrddin.

  Nell gave Myrddin a quick glance, wondering if he knew it too. He was focused on Rhodri, so he didn’t see her look, and then Nell decided that an explanation to the contrary was not in order. They could think what they liked. She could stand to ride pillion a while longer.

  “I brought Lord Aelric as far as St. Asaph last night,” Myrddin said, oblivious to Nell and her concerns. “The discussions between Modred and King Arthur continue.”

  “So we have a few days’ breathing space.” Rhodri nodded. To Nell, he added, “Modred, when he attacks Eryri, will come through here.”

  Nell had known that. Modred’s intent was to open two fronts in Eryri, splitting King Arthur’s forces and attention. Wulfere would attack from Anglesey, and Modred himself from the east, along the very road on which Nell and Myrddin had traveled. But while the army on Anglesey had been in position for months, Modred had faced resistance all along the border between Mercia and Gwynedd, which had delayed the combined assault.

  And then, at the very moment Modred had been ready to advance across the Conwy River, Archbishop Dafydd had intervened. Loath to have uncle and nephew fighting each other and despoiling Wales between them, he suggested the possibility of a peace settlement. King Arthur and Modred had agreed to try, and they’d been working on it since the middle of October. Lord Aelric had merely delivered the latest missive.

  “Indeed,” Myrddin said. “Archbishop Dafydd has not given up, but I have no news beyond that. We met no Saxons on the road, once we headed west from St. Asaph.”

  “I’ll tell the captain.” Rhodri stood and departed, leaving Nell and Myrddin alone with their simple meal of bread, cheese, boiled onions, and sweet mead. Myrddin ate the fresh food with gusto. Nell, in contrast, picked at hers.

  “Are you all right?” Myrddin asked between mouthfuls.

  Nell pushed the trencher more towards him, having eaten only three or four bites. Over the last two days, it seemed the nervous pit in her stomach had become permanent. It wasn’t going to go away just because she was behind stone walls and ostensibly safe. “I’m more tired than hungry.”

  Myrddin nodded and hurried through the rest of the meal. Rhodri hadn’t returned by the time he finished so, once again, Nell followed Myrddin out of the hall. This time, he led her up a staircase to the sleeping rooms set aside for guests. On the floor of one room lay six pallets, each with a folded blanket on its end.

  “You may sleep here,” Myrddin said.

  Nell took a few hesitant steps into the room and then looked to where Myrddin lounged in the doorway, one shoulder braced against the frame. “What about you?”

  “I’ll bunk in the barracks across the courtyard.” He tipped his head to indicate their general direction.

  “No!” The word burst from Nell, and once said, she didn’t want to take it back.

  Myrddin dropped his hands to his sides and straightened. “What?”

  “I can’t stay here without you. Please don’t leave me alone.”

  Myrddin gaped at her. “You ask the impossible, Nell. I can’t sleep in the same room as you!”

  “Please, Myrddin. I can’t—” Nell choked on the words. Once again, the terrors of the last three days which she’d been holding at bay threatened to overwhelm her, and she buried her face in her hands.

  “All right; all right.” Myrddin held one hand out to her. “I don’t mind. I can sleep anywhere, but you must be certain. Last week you were a nun, and today—” He stopped.

  Nell let the silence stretch between them while
she took several deep breaths to calm herself. “Today I’m not.” She walked to one of the pallets which was set against a far wall and sat down on it, before pointing to a second pallet near where Myrddin stood. “Could you shut the door and move the pallet to block it? If you sleep across it ...?” Her voice trailed off.

  After a final, long look, Myrddin nodded. “I can sleep here,” he said, although his expression told her otherwise. It was as if he was concerned, curious, and amused all at the same time.

  Comforted that he would stay, regardless of what he really thought, Nell lay down, turned her back on Myrddin, and pulled the blanket to her chin.

  * * * * *

  Myrddin breathed in the high moorland air, pungent with the smell of dried grass, juniper, and agrimony, patches of which grew all along the road. They’d reached a point where they were well above the farmlands of the Aber river valley and could see all the way to the Irish Sea. The water showed grey-blue and reflected the clouds that had begun to blow in from the west.

  “It’s so peaceful up here. Not like down below.” Nell removed a hand from Myrddin’s waist and gestured towards the island of Anglesey, which squatted in the distance. “The Saxons plan to conquer Eryri next, and we can’t let them. They will move soon.”

  Myrddin squinted, but to him the island wasn’t anything more than a grey smudge on the horizon. “Do you know that for a fact?”

  “The ferryman at Bangor took me across the Menai Strait on the evening of November 2nd, not long after Wulfere’s men—” Nell swallowed and then continued as if the words weren’t poisoning her heart, “—found my sisters. But he only helped me because he was ferrying himself across. He felt an ill wind blowing and didn’t want to be caught in the middle of it. He didn’t intend to return to the island until it was over.”

  “You speak of Wulfere. Does he still head the Saxon forces?” Myrddin said.

  “Yes,” Nell said. “The people of Anglesey call him ‘the pig’.”