Footsteps in Time

by Sarah Woodbury

  “I’m no different from you, Ieuan,” I said. “I’ve lived across the sea, but never traveled beyond the borders of Wales into England until this week.”

  We hugged the border between Scotland and England for safety’s sake, but after an hour turned south and made a run for the Wall.

  “Let me ride ahead to ensure it’s safe,” Ieuan said, once the fort came into sight.

  Aaron and I slowed our horses to a walk while Ieuan spurred Llwyd forward. In order to reach the actual fort, he had to lead Llywd across a half-filled ditch. He entered the fort through an opening in the wall. Five minutes later, he reappeared, waving. Aaron and I followed the path he’d taken.

  “Let’s get the bag,” I said. Though I would have loved to explore the whole area, we didn’t have time. We picked our way to the western side of the fort and entered a little room where Mom had found Sir John de Falkes’ nephew, Thomas, a year ago almost to the day. I shifted some rocks. Her backpack lay underneath, exactly as she’d described. I turned to Aaron. “Are you ready for this?”

  He nodded, his eyes bright, reminding me of Ieuan. I knelt and opened the bag. Sure enough, it was full of Mom’s incredibly useful twenty-first century items, including . . . I pulled out a brown candy wrapper and sniffed. Heaven!! It’s been so long!

  I tipped the bag and dumped three candies into my hand. I held one out to Aaron. “Chocolate,” I said, without explaining what that meant. It would be over three hundred years before another European would taste chocolate, which without sugar would taste more bitter than coffee. I gave a second candy to Ieuan who’d appeared in the doorway of the little room and ate the third one myself.

  “My God,” Ieuan said. “What is this?”

  “Good, huh?” I said. “Let’s keep going. We’ve more things to collect.”

  “Those are your mother’s possessions?” Ieuan said.

  “It’s her pack.” I handed it to him as I passed him.

  He held it up. Its dark blue, artificial fibers were, quite naturally, unfamiliar. But this was Ieuan and he was intuitive and smart. Without asking, he slung it on his back, one strap hanging down unused just like a twenty-first century student.

  I was glad I’d brought him.

  “We’ve further to go,” I said. “The wall passes a small lake somewhere to the east of here. My mother left a larger bag hidden near it.”

  Still carrying the pack, Ieuan mounted Llywd. “Why was your mother so far from Wales? I thought the land of Madoc was west of Wales, across the sea.”

  I was done lying to him. “She flew here in a machine we call an ‘airplane.’”

  Ieuan blinked. “She flew? You mean like a bird?”

  “She was inside a machine much like my chariot, but with wings. The man piloting it landed here, Mom got out, and then he flew off by himself.”

  Ieuan picked up on the last point. “How dare he do such a thing!”

  I laughed. “He obviously cared less for her than we do.”

  “Your mother did just fine on her own,” Aaron said. “Few women could have reached Wales in one piece, as she did.”

  “You helped, Aaron,” I said. “My father and I haven’t forgotten it.”

  Aaron bowed his head, but seemed to shrug his shoulders simultaneously. He still had a hard time taking a compliment, however deserved. He’d lived nearly a year among people who treated him respectfully even though he was a Jew, but that wasn’t enough time to overcome a lifetime of persecution in England.

  We left the fort by the northern exit and again headed east. I watched the sun, trying to guess how long Mom had walked before she reached the fort. From her own description, she’d traveled for several hours, but it was hard to judge how quickly a horse might cover the same distance.

  “There!” Ieuan pointed. I saw it too: a small lake nestled in a little valley, glimmering in the sun.

  Mom had given me what I thought were clear directions, but at first we couldn’t find the rock, the tree, and the specific bush she meant. I sent Aaron to the southern side of the wall to look again, and Ieuan and I walked down the hill to the beautifully clear lake. I picked up a stone and skipped it across the water. One, two, three, four. Ieuan found one for himself. One, two, three, four, five.

  “Hey!” I said. I found another stone. One, two. Ieuan had a handful of stones and each one he sent skipping across the water to the count of five or six.

  “What did Edward say, my lord? Something about putting an ‘upstart Prince’ in his place?” Ieuan couldn’t contain the laughter in his voice.

  “Oh, now. That isn’t fair.” I stepped back from the lake and searched until I found a large rock, more like a boulder. I picked it up, muscled it to the edge of the lake, and threw it, aiming for a spot about a foot from where Ieuan was standing. Thunk. It sent up a huge splash, soaking him from head to toe.

  “Ha!” I said.

  Ieuan, devilry in his eyes, reached into the water and threw a handful of water at me.

  “Over here, my lord!” Aaron interrupted our play.

  Laughing, we pawed our way to the top of the hill, racing to see who could reach it first. When we found Aaron, he had the bag out and open and was staring at Mom’s laptop.

  Wow! I wonder if it still works!

  “It seems the bush was uprooted by an animal which covered over the bag,” he said.

  “That won’t fit in the saddle bags.” Ieuan said.

  “It folds very small,” I said. “We just need to take everything out of it and distribute the contents first.” I bent forward to do just that, but before I could start, Ieuan hissed a warning. I swung around: men on horseback, still dots on the horizon, rode steadily in our direction.

  “Men. Coming,” I said to Aaron. “Stay down. Maybe they haven’t seen us yet.”

  “Are they from the north or south?” Aaron said. Scots or English?

  “The west, from Carlisle,” I said, “and not riding hard, but a company of them, perhaps twenty.”

  “What are we going to do?” Aaron said.

  I made an instant decision. “Aaron, you take all of Mom’s things and ride south, right now, away from here.”

  “What? I can’t leave you, my lord!” he said.

  “Perhaps they aren’t unfriendly,” Ieuan said.

  “We can’t risk the contents of my mother’s pack,” I said.

  “We can’t risk you,” Aaron countered.

  “I note your objections, Aaron, but Bevyn isn’t here to overrule me. Ieuan and I are unmistakably Welshmen and in much more danger here in England that you are, even as a Jew. You may not be welcome everywhere, but we’re not welcome anywhere. You, at least, can get away.”

  “He’s right, Aaron,” Ieuan said. “I can take care of him. Truth be told, we can ride more quickly without the burden of the goods you carry.”

  Aaron gave way. We loaded all of Mom’s things into his saddlebags, folded the duffel tight, and stuffed it in with them. Then I buckled Mom’s backpack to one of the bags and hung a cloak over it.

  “Go, Aaron,” I said. I glanced over my shoulder at the riders. “They’re not close enough to make you out and the sun is in their eyes.”

  Aaron leaned down and put his hand on my shoulder. “Keep safe, my lord,” he said. “I will circle around Carlisle and make for the boat. If I can’t reach it safely, I’ll head south for Wales by land, though I dread the thought of appearing before your father without you.”

  “It’s my decision, Aaron.”

  “Yes, my lord,” he said. He turned his horse away.

  Ieuan had been watching the English the whole time. “They’re coming this way,” Ieuan said. “Do we run?”

  “Can we reach Scotland before they intercept us?”

  Ieuan shook his head.

  “Then we mount and head back to Carlisle on the southern side of the wall. If they’re so anxious to meet us, we’ll let them come to us. We’ve done nothing wrong. We’re merely two businessmen, taking in the sights.”
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  “Except we saw their king die,” Ieuan murmured, under his breath, as he threw a leg over Llywd’s back.

  “And we say nothing about that!”

  Ieuan and I trotted our horses along the old Roman road that followed the wall. Before long, a man shouted. With a rueful look at Ieuan, I slowed Bedwyr. We’d reached a spot on the wall that was little more than a low barrier, some three feet high. The years had filled in the ditch on the northern side. The lead horseman came to a stop ten paces from me. He was shorter than I, older, and dressed well, in a mail hauberk underneath a red and blue surcoat.

  “How goes it, sir?” I said, trying out my English. I’d been practicing the thirteenth century dialect.

  “Who are you?” the man said. “What is your purpose here?” He looked past me to Ieuan, who bowed but didn’t speak. Thank God! He read my mind! They might have run him through and asked questions later.

  “May I know to whom I have the pleasure of speaking?” I said.

  “Sir John de Falkes, castellan of Carlisle Castle and commander of King Edward’s forces in the northwest of England.”

  While my mother and I had discussed the possibility that I might encounter Sir John de Falkes in Lancaster, this meeting defied incredible odds. But as my father once said, coincidences weren’t something he believed in anymore.

  “David of Chester, at your service.” I bowed slightly.

  “And your companion?” Falkes said.

  I turned to Ieuan. “Ieuan ap Cynan, of Twyn y Garth. He doesn’t speak English.”

  Ieuan had started when I spoke his name. I gave him a reassuring smile, and turned back to Falkes, who was now staring at me, his mouth slightly open.

  “Why do I keep encountering the Welsh along this wall?” he said. “What is the attraction?”

  “My lord?” I said.

  “I met a Welshwoman here this time last year. Perhaps she was one of your kinfolk? Her name was Marged ap Bran. You have heard of her?”

  “Yes, of course. Marged is my mother.”

  “Of course she is,” he said. “How could it be otherwise? How goes it with her?”

  “She is well, my lord,” I said. “My companion and I have traveled to Newcastle and I wished to see the wall. It is a pleasure to meet you as well, as you were so kind to her.”

  Falkes, however, narrowed his eyes. His astonishment in abeyance, he reverted to the custodian of the north he was. “I don’t believe you,” he said. He scanned our equipment and gear. “You must come with me to Carlisle.”

  “I was hoping to begin our return journey to Chester by this evening,” I said.

  “You will have to postpone it,” Falkes snapped.

  At a signal from him, his men surrounded us. Fortunately, Falkes didn’t take our swords or search our belongings. Ieuan’s bow always drew my eyes like a magnet, but as Falkes was a soldier, perhaps he thought nothing of it. At the same time, I was glad I’d borrowed Cadwallon’s sword and left mine with him before we left the boat. Mine was far too fine a weapon for the man I was pretending to be. Not that a merchant should have a sword at all, and perhaps that was what made Falkes uneasy.

  “This was part of your plan?” Ieuan asked me in Welsh.

  “We can fit it in,” I said, in the same language.

  “I wish I understood the language better,” Ieuan said. “I recognize words as you speak them, but then they come so fast I can’t keep up.”

  “It doesn’t necessarily help,” I said. “They say words you think you know the meaning to, but then it turns out entirely differently than you’d thought. It’s almost worse to know what they’re saying, because you listen to the words instead of focusing on their actions.”

  “That is my task, then,” said Ieuan.

  The sun had reached its zenith and begun to descend before we approached Carlisle. We crossed the Eden River some distance from the city and then clattered through the east city gate. We wound our way through Carlisle and up to the castle which perched on the hill to the northwest of the city. I looked left and right, trying to get a sense of how the streets were laid out. Falkes noted my attention.

  “You find Carlisle to your liking?” he said.

  “Yes, my lord,” I said. “It’s been years since I have seen such a grand city as this.”

  Falkes seemed pleased enough by my compliment to abandon his watch over me. He rode ahead so he could lead his men through the gate that separated the castle from the city proper. Just before he reached it, however, a rider burst from underneath the gatehouse and nearly collided with Falkes.

  “My lord!” His horse sidled sideways as he tried to control it.

  Falkes reined in his own horse. “What is it?”

  “King Edward is dead!”

  Falkes asked neither when nor how but gestured to the messenger. “Come with me.”

  He urged his horse through the gate, his men surging to follow and shooing us along in front of them. Welsh castles were small, often merely a stone keep surrounded by a single wall. We positioned them on hilltops to augment their strength. Carlisle Castle was nothing like that. It was enormous, built of reddish stone cut in thick square blocks, and was situated in a flat area that was bigger than a football field. I couldn’t begin to guess the number of soldiers it could hold. It had an inner and outer courtyard, both protected by enormous, square gatehouses.

  Veering off before entering the second gate, men herded us to a rough building which squatted against the western curtain wall, directly across from the main gate. The space encompassed by the walls had a variety of buildings in it, including a barracks, stables, and craft-houses. We stopped in front of the blacksmith’s workshop. Two men worked the iron inside and the fireplace in the center of the shop shone bright in the darkness of the interior.

  With swords drawn, the men urged us to dismount. The situation had an ugly feel to it.

  “Why are you doing this?” I said.

  “Put your hands in the air.”

  Ieuan and I obeyed, and though I mentally ran through various techniques to get free, I didn’t implement any of them. Falkes’ soldiers outnumbered us fifty to one. They took our swords and our knives and shoved us through a door to the right of the shop.

  I ducked my head under the frame and into a windowless room attached to the shop. It smelled of urine and horses. Hay lay on the floor in dirty clumps and the pumping of the bellows sounded through the thin wooden wall that separated the room from the workshop. The door closed behind us and the bar dropped. I pushed on the door. Nothing.

  “Why didn’t they just run us through?” Ieuan said. “It would have saved time.”

  “Perhaps Falkes doesn’t know what to do with us,” I said. “We’re neither dangerous enough for the dungeon, important enough for a room in the keep, nor harmless enough for him to let go.”

  “I don’t like it.” Ieaun sounded like Bevyn.

  “The postern gate is set in the wall not far from here.” I had noticed it before we were locked up.

  “I didn’t see it,” Ieuan said, but the knowledge cheered him considerably. “It’s almost as if Falkes wants us to try to escape. Then his men could kill us as we fled.”

  “Falkes has a free hand in the north,” I said. “He answers only to Edward. If Falkes were to throw half of his people into his dungeons, who in England would gainsay him? There’s nobody left.”

  Ieuan lowered himself to the ground and leaned his back against the curtain wall which formed the rear of the room. “I would dearly love to hear that messenger’s report,” he said.

  At that, a scratching sound came from behind me, prompting me to turn and look. A blue eye gazed at me through a knot in the wood.

  “Hello,” I said, in English.

  “Hello,” the voice answered in the same language. It was high and I couldn’t tell if it belonged to a boy or a girl.

  “May I be of service?” I said.

  The eye blinked, then disappeared. It reappeared in a larger knothole, two fe
et higher and to the right of the other one. “I’m Thomas. Your mother saved my life.”

  “So she did,” I said.

  The lone eye inspected me up and down. “You look like I thought you would,” he said. “Will you say a few words of Welsh?”

  “Of course.” And then continued, “Mae’n dda gen i gwrdd â chi.”

  “What does that mean?” Thomas said.

  “I am very pleased to meet you.” I spoke in English again.

  “Ask him to tell us about Edward,” Ieuan said.

  I stepped closer to Thomas. “Is King Edward really dead?”

  “Yes.” Thomas nodded vigorously. “The messenger rode into the castle just before you arrived. Uncle John spoke with him in private and then announced the news to everyone in the hall. They say it was plague but Uncle John doesn’t believe it. I heard them whispering about a traitor among King Edward’s men. He thinks the Welsh are involved. But you aren’t, are you, since your Prince is dead too?”

  “What was that?” I said.

  “They found a boy wearing the red dragon surcoat among the dead. Wouldn’t that be Prince Llywelyn’s son?”

  I quickly translated what Thomas had said. Ieuan whistled through his teeth.

  “We had no hand in the death of your King, Thomas.” I turned back to the boy. “As a Welshman, you must understand that I don’t mourn him, but don’t fear for us in that regard.”

  Thomas surveyed me through three heartbeats. “I must go.” With that, he disappeared. Light shone through the hole, and I put my own eye to it. Thomas ran away from us across the courtyard without looking back.

  “I’d forgotten about that surcoat,” I said. “Edward ripped it from me during the fight and we just left in a corner. All that work to hide our presence and erase any trace of our camp, and I made a foolish mistake like that.”

  “But look how it’s turned out,” Ieuan said. “Falkes will never suspect who you really are now.”