Their third morning in Dolwyddelan, Goronwy strode into the hall, a messenger at his side. “He’s coming,” Gorowny said. Nobody had to ask who ‘he’ was. “He has reached Llansanffraid, hampered only slightly by the weather, but has not attempted to force the Conwy, as it continues to snow even along the coast. He’s halted the majority of his men, but sent his laborers along the path he intends to follow south, clearing the forest and rousting the common folk in his path.”
“Total war,” David said, from his seat on the dais.
“What’s that, my lord?” Math said from his position by the fire.
“Edward seeks to destroy not only our army, but to completely subjugate our people by terrorizing the countryside, hoping to drive men away from their allegiance to Father.”
“It won’t work,” Father said. “It only emboldens us.” He paced in front of the dais. “Edward understands neither me nor my people. We have held on to what is ours since November, and we will not give it up. Not without a fight.”
Struck by Father’s emotion, David threw out the ending of the speech that Patrick Henry had given at the start of the American Revolution and which David had memorized for school. Translated into Welsh, it sounded even more poetic, and his voice rang a bit louder than he intended as he recited the words: “Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!”
Math gazed at David, his eyes bright but Father clenched his fist and banged it on the table. “Yes. That is it exactly. If I cannot have one, I will take the other.” He strode down the hall to the front door and flung it open. “We will watch them.” Father turned back to his men. “And when Edward comes, we will be ready.”
Chapter Nine
Anna
Anna took a deep breath and knocked on Gwenllian’s door. Before she could knock a second time, Mari, Gwenllian’s nanny, whipped the door open. Her color was high. Beyond, Heledd suckled the baby, but it looked like she was squeezing her so tightly it was a wonder that Gwenllian wasn’t crying. Anna had walked in on a fight.
Mari sneered at the sight of her, but at the last second she seemed to remember who Anna was and, if possible, got even redder. She curtsied. “Excuse me, my lady. I’m clearly not wanted here!” Mari brushed past Anna into the hall.
Anna turned to watch her go and then looked back at Heledd.
“I’m sorry, my lady,” Heledd said. “We’ve had a difficult day and, I confess, we missed your help with Gwenllian. The only time she didn’t cry was when she nursed, and Mari believes I should not nurse her as much as I do. She says it spoils her. She says she won’t return until I apologize for disagreeing with her.”
Anna wasn’t really listening to Heledd. She was thinking about how to get the baby and her nurse out of the castle at midnight, when Anna caught the last of Heledd’s words.
“She said she wouldn’t return?” Anna didn’t think the nanny to a princess of Wales could choose to abdicate her responsibilities like that. “Surely not.”
Heledd shrugged. “That’s what she said. I say good riddance. I’m tired of her constant arguments and complaining.”
“Tired enough to bring the baby on an adventure with me?” Anna said.
“What did you say?” Heledd was probably thinking that Anna had mangled her Welsh again.
Anna closed the door, pulled up a stool up next to Heledd, and sat down. “I need you to listen to me and try to keep an open mind. I wasn’t able to take the baby this afternoon because I was riding in the forest. Hywel was with me and we encountered two English soldiers.”
Heledd gasped. “What!” To her the English were the equivalent of the bogeyman. Although she was wet-nurse to a princess, she was very inexperienced in the world. Her baby’s father hadn’t married her, and her baby had died two days before Gwenllian’s mother, which is why Heledd had become the baby’s wet-nurse.
“Listen!” Anna said. “Hywel and I followed them to their camp and I overheard a conversation between two soldiers. They plan to capture the castle through treachery, and take the princess away to a prison in England.”
Heledd held the baby closer, already panicked.
“They can’t! I won’t let them!”
“I won’t let them either, Heledd, but there’s only so much we can do. A traitor inside the castle is going to allow them to take the castle without a fight. Hywel and I have a plan to escape with Gwenllian before the English come. We need you to come too. Will you do that?”
Heledd’s breaths came in gasps. “Leave Castell y Bere? And go where?”
“To Prince Llywelyn at Dolwyddelan,” Anna said. “We need to keep Gwenllian safe and at the same time, warn the prince about the English.”
Heledd looked down at the floor, chewing on her lower lip as she thought. Anna held her breath, hoping she’d agree but didn’t pressure her. She simply sat and waited.
At last Heledd looked up and nodded. She hunched her shoulders, as if already oppressed by cold and fear. “What do you want me to do?”
* * * * *
Shortly after midnight, Heledd and Anna, with baby Gwenllian in her arms, traversed the back stairway, tiptoed through the kitchens, and walked into the frosty night. The sky was full of stars, but the moon hadn’t yet risen. Starlight glinted off patches of snow in the courtyard. Without the prince, his attendants, and soldiers, only a skeleton staff remained at the castle, and most of them were asleep.
Anna led Heledd to the stables, behind which was hidden the postern gate. Hywel, as promised, was ready with warm blankets and provisions for their journey. Heledd carried a few possessions and all four were as bundled as comfort allowed. They were traveling light in an effort to put as much distance as possible between them and Castell y Bere before the English came.
They wanted to reach Hywel’s hut before morning when a general alarm might be raised. Though it made Anna feel guilty, she’d lied to Gwladys, telling her that she was going riding early in the morning. Thus, it could be quite late tomorrow before anyone noticed their absence, especially if the English did come at dawn and put the castle into an uproar. They should have at least eight hours. Surely they could travel ten miles in that time?
Hywel had the foresight to wrap Madoc’s hooves with cloths. The horse made only a muffled clopping sound as Hywel led him out of the back of the stables along the path that descended to the postern gate. Anna lifted the latch and the door opened easily. She raised her eyebrows at Hywel, who grinned. He’d oiled the hinges. The trio filed through the doorway and Anna pulled the gate closed. The latch clicked, and they stood silent, outside of Castell y Bere, gazing west at the valley below.
Hywel put a hand on Anna’s arm. “Do you see the shadow?”
Anna strained to see but couldn’t make anything out.
Hywel watched for another ten seconds. “Perhaps it’s the English. We should hurry.”
Heledd and Anna followed Hywel and Madoc northeast along the outer castle wall until Hywel reached a large bush, through which he and the horse disappeared.
“Hywel?” Anna called, as softly as she could. “Where are you?”
“Here!” He popped his head out from the bush, which turned out to be two bushes that Hywel had pushed between. He held the branches apart for Anna and Heledd to walk between them, and Anna found herself at the start of a narrow, well-worn trail that led down the side of the hill from the castle.
“The lads and I take this path when we go to the swimming hole in the summer,” Hywel said, satisfaction in his voice. “It’s safer for us now. And quicker.”
The terrain away from the castle was very rocky, but grassy paths wound between the boulders and outcroppings, and Hywel led them down to the valley floor as surely as if it were daylight.
“You’ve done this before in the dark, haven’t you?” Anna said.
“Of course,” he said. “Not often in winter, w
ith the ground so snowy and slippery, but my friends and I often slip away late when our duties are done and come to bed after midnight.”
“And the guards?” Anna said, for Castell y Bere usually had the full complement of men in residence.
“They either don’t know or turn a blind eye.” Hywel shrugged. “They were young once too and they remember how it was.”
Shaking her head at all she had to learn about castle life in Wales, Anna hugged Gwenllian closer to her in the sling she’d fashioned from a long strip of cloth. Gwenllian may have been a fussy baby during the day, but she slept at night, and for that the entire castle was grateful. She slept now, her little head resting on Anna’s chest where she could hear her heart beat. Anna was warm enough at present and she hoped that Gwenllian was too.
They’d left the castle through a western door, and the path they’d taken wound to the north. Upon reaching the valley floor, Hywel headed towards the main road. Somewhere ahead Cadair Idris dominated the landscape. They looked back up the hill and saw the castle silhouetted against the stars. In truth, it should be impregnable. All it took to defeat a castle was a traitor within the walls.
They walked, silent and alert, hoping the shadows Hywel had seen from the top were anything but English soldiers on their way to take the castle. Anna had never walked more than five miles at one time, and double that, on snow-covered ground, in a dress, was aggravating and difficult. Hywel appeared confident and she’d long since decided to trust him completely, but he couldn’t shorten the distance they had to travel.
They stopped only twice that night: once, when Hywel boosted Heledd onto Madoc’s back because she was falling asleep on her feet, and a second time when Gwenllian woke with a little cry and needed Heledd to nurse her. Thankfully, this kept the baby happy and she went back to sleep without further fuss.
In the end, they made less than two miles an hour, for the sky was beginning to lighten as Hywel’s hut came into view. He left the women in a stand of trees and went forward alone to determine if it was empty. All five of them, including Madoc, crowded into the hut. They were too exhausted to miss the fire Hywel feared to light and, except for Madoc, they threw themselves onto the hard-packed floor. Using the hood of her cloak as a pillow, Anna slept for the first time in over twenty-four hours.
But she didn’t sleep long because Gwenllian was ready to be awake. She sat up and began demanding attention. Mutely, Heledd handed her to Anna and lay back down. She was asleep instantly and as Anna looked from her to Hywel, she sighed. Both her friends were no less tired than she was, and there was no reason for all of them to be awake. Holding Gwenllian on her hip, Anna rummaged through Hywel’s packs, still on Madoc’s back, for food.
Hywel had done himself proud. He’d procured bread, dried meat, and even, bless his heart, three apples. They were spotty and pitted, and never would have passed muster in a modern grocery store, but they looked good in thirteenth century Wales. Anna took out some bread and one of the apples, and carried them and Gwenllian to a spot on the floor of the hut. Anna sat Gwenllian on her cloak and gave her a hard crust of bread to chew on. She gummed it while Anna ate an apple. Seeing that Gwenllian was temporarily happy, Anna closed her eyes and leaned her head against the wall. It was cold. Anna found she couldn’t care.
Somehow the day passed. The hut was situated more than a mile from the main road. Hywel believed that anyone who wasn’t looking for it wouldn’t find it. In this, he was right, and the companions spent the day uneventfully. Eventually, darkness fell again, though at that time of year it would have been just past four o’clock. Anna woke both Hywel and Heledd, only to find that Heledd was feverish. Hywel and Anna looked at each other in dismay.
“Don’t worry,” Heledd herself said. “I’m well enough to keep going. I’ll ride with Gwenllian on Madoc.”
Neither Hywel nor Anna said anything, but Anna spirits fell further. Hywel helped Heledd onto the horse, and this time she carried Gwenllian too. The baby was awake, and Anna hoped she’d be happy to ride where the motion might lull her to an early bed time. They set out into the snow.
After they’d gone two or three miles, Heledd spoke. “I feel a bit better!” she said. “I can walk now, if you like.”
“No!” Hywel and Anna said together.
“You’re still sick,” Anna said. “Please stay on Madoc.”
“All right,” Heledd said. “But it’s boring just sitting and riding, and Gwenllian is wet.”
“Can you ride and change her at the same time?” Anna said.
Heledd looked at her askance, but dug into her pack and pulled out some clothes for Gwenllian. It was quite an operation, and Anna was glad she wasn’t doing it.
She walked a little ahead to talk to Hywel. “Do you think it’s really thirty miles to Dolwyddelan?”
“At least,” he said. “We should walk without stopping, if we can.”
“If we can,” Anna said. At two miles an hour, it would take fifteen hours if they walked straight through the night.
“If Heledd can make it,” Hywel said.
Anna looked back at her, content now with Gwenllian nursing in her arms. “If Heledd can make it.”
They’d traveled less than half the distance, perhaps twelve miles by Hywel’s reckoning, when Heledd’s fever worsened. The roughness of the terrain had forced them onto the road so at least walking was less difficult; Anna took the once-again-wakeful Gwenllian from her. Shortly thereafter, Heledd rested her head on Madoc’s neck, hung her arms on either side of him, and fell asleep astride, her dress scrunched up around her thighs, exposing her woolen leggings. It was an amazing feat and Anna was envious, having not slept herself for two days.
Looking at Heledd, Anna had to face that their task might well be hopeless. Eighteen more miles could be eighteen hundred for all the difference it would make. Anna was a coddled child of the twenty-first century, deluded in imagining this journey was possible. What did she know of Wales and horses, and travel on foot at night in the middle of winter? Snow is utterly beautiful when one is inside a centrally heated home in Pennsylvania. It’s freezing and awful when one is walking beside a feverish friend on a pony, two days into a trek across medieval Wales.
Clouds hovered near the ground and it was so dark Anna couldn’t even see her feet. Eventually, Hywel took the initiative and led them off the road because Anna was too depressed and exhausted to do it. Within a few paces, he found a shelter of sorts in the craggy rocks. Anna thought of Sam, from The Lord of the Rings, who says: “If this is shelter, then two walls and no roof make a house!” At least the hobbits had Aragorn and Gandalf to lead the way. Here it was only Hywel and her, stumbling about in the dark.
They lifted Heledd off Madoc’s back and huddled together to keep warm as best they could. That Gwenllian was relatively content, Anna took as a small miracle, but they needed a much bigger one as compensation for the terrible state Heledd was in. She burned fiery hot and they couldn’t get her warm, even with her nursing Gwenllian, snuggled between Hywel and Anna.
The next morning, when Hywel and Anna woke, they didn’t have to speak to know the truth, but what could they do but go on? Miserable, cold, and hungry, they set out again, braving the open road and daylight for the relative speed they offered. Heledd hung onto Madoc for dear life. After they’d traveled some hours, the situation began to worsen, if that was even possible. They felt, and then heard, pounding hooves behind them. Hastily, they pulled Madoc off the trail and into the trees. Within minutes, three riders passed at speed. Anna couldn’t believe the English would make their presence so obvious this far into Gwynedd, but then, Castell y Bere had been unprepared for treachery too.
Shortly after the riders disappeared, it began to snow. It started slowly, gradually building to a constant, thick, heavy downpour, coating the companions’ cloaks and hoods. Anna hugged Gwenllian to her, trying to shelter her from the worst of it. They plodded another mile, with the wind picking up with every step.
Then
Heledd spoke. “I’m quite warm now, really.”
Anna whipped around in time to see her begin a slow tumble off the horse. Moving fast, Hywel caught her as she fell, and then laid her on the ground. At first, Anna could only stare at her dumbly. Heledd didn’t move and Anna could hardly comprehend the enormity of the disaster into which she’d led her friends.
My fault, my fault, my fault. The litany rolled on in Anna’s head as she shifted Gwenllian in her sling and knelt to hold Heledd’s hand. It was cold beyond imagining while her forehead was so hot it could have melted snow. Appalled, Anna pulled back Heledd’s cloak and put her ear to Heledd’s chest. She was breathing, but shallowly.
Swallowing hard, Anna tried to marshal her thoughts. Hywel leaned down to speak in Anna’s ear but the rushing in her ears was so loud she couldn’t make out his words, other than that they were urgent. Desperate, Hywel grabbed Anna by the shoulders, hauled her to her feet, and pushed her to one side so he could get to Heledd. He picked her up, staggering under the burden. Anna watched him numbly, hugging Gwenllian to her chest.
And then Anna saw what Hywel had feared: a man on a warhorse, coming at them out of the whirl of snow.
“My lord!” Hywel said. “Please help us!”
Anna blinked and her eyes cleared. The man wasn’t English as she’d feared, but a Welshman, and a knight at that, complete with sword, mail hauberk, cloak, and mighty horse. He was young, with dark hair, dark blue eyes, and the fair skin that revealed his Celtic ancestry. Anna had seen him with David in the few days before the army left for Dolwyddelan and tried to remember his name. Rhys, probably, or another Gruffydd.
The knight approached and leaned forward to scrutinize their faces. “Who are you?”
Anna fumbled for the words, for Welsh always abandoned her when she was stressed. “I’m Anna, with Gwenll—”
Footsteps in Time Page 9