“Math wanted me to tell you that the men need to be prepared to shoot at the siege engines—or rather, the men working them—when they come against us,” Anna said.
“How soon?” Lili gazed over the wall towards the enemy lines. The fields of barley and wheat, or grass for sheep, had been trampled by Valence’s army. Fallen men, some wounded, some dead, lay every few feet. Windsor’s arrows had held out long enough to kill many, and any attempt to rescue the wounded had been met with more arrows. It was cruel, inhuman even, but Math had insisted that it was necessary. He wanted to sow discontent among Valence’s men and push him towards raising the white flag when they faced more resistance than he was prepared for.
“Not long. Dawn, he thinks,” Anna said. “You need to be aware that Valence will focus first on the towers that defend the sluice gates.” The sluice gates were what diverted the water from the Thames around Windsor. If Valence could close the northwestern gate and open the northeastern one, he could stop the flow of water and clear the moat.
“As he should,” Lili said.
When the captain of the archers had been hit—not killed, but badly injured—somehow it had fallen to Lili to organize the men on her section of the wall. With the destruction of the bridge, Valence’s men had abandoned any attempt to attack the north side of the castle and village, so the defenders had turned their focus elsewhere too. Lili had moved to a section above the postern gate of the castle. This position overlooked the northeastern sluice gate, which made it a doubly weak point in their defenses. She was inside the castle, however, and that made Carew happier.
The two women looked at each other, and then Anna put her arm around Lili’s waist.
“I know I’m not the first to wonder who those men on the other side are,” Lili said. “But … do they fight for Valence because they love him and believe? Or are they following their lord because they must, because they can’t imagine any other life?”
“There’s some of all of that, I’m sure,” Anna said. “And then there are those who are paid. Many may believe that it makes no difference who is king. That’s for noblemen to worry about while common folk struggle to put food on the table.”
“How did I come to be in an English castle, married to the King of England, fighting for a country which up until a year ago was my sworn enemy?” Lili said.
“I don’t know the answer to that any more than you do.” Anna shook her head. “It seems a strange path for all of us to have taken.”
“I want this over and Dafydd home safe,” Lili said.
“When he returns, ask him to take you home to Wales for a time,” Anna said. “He’ll do it gladly.”
“I haven’t wanted to burden him—”
Anna took Lili’s face in her hands. “You are his wife. He won’t know what you need if you don’t ask for it.”
Lili put her head into the hollow of Anna’s shoulder. They stood still a moment, their heads bowed. Then Anna took a breath and stepped back. “I have a sliver of hope that our penicillin paste might be working. We have treated every injured man with it, and so far none of the wounds have suppurated.”
“That is good news!” Lili said.
“That is the best news!” Nicholas de Carew mounted the stairs. “And there’s more.”
“What more?” Lili said.
“I have to show you,” he said.
Lili was reluctant to leave her post, but after a quick word with the five archers who shared her particular stretch of wall, she walked with Carew and Anna around the battlement until they reached the stairway that led to the lower bailey of the castle. Arthur and the other children slept in the castle’s northwest tower, and though part of her longed to go to him, even if he was asleep, she allowed herself to be tugged along, out the gate, and into the town of Windsor.
“Where are we going?” Lili said. “I thought you wanted me to stay in the castle.”
“Some things are worth making an exception for.” Carew smiled. “Have you heard the king say that it is always darkest before the dawn?”
“You’re awfully cheerful for someone who’s found himself in the middle of a war we’re currently losing.” Lili gestured to the sky, which had gone from pitch black to murky while they’d been walking. “Dawn is coming. Anna said that Valence will attack with the rising of the sun.”
“We aren’t going to lose,” Carew said.
“How do you know that—?” Lili cut herself off at the sight of dozens of men—archers, scholars-turned-soldiers, and villagers—crowding onto the southwestern wall-walk above her. They’d reached the exact opposite corner of the town from where she’d been standing earlier.
“Make way for the queen,” Carew said, and everyone did.
Lili climbed the stairs up to the wall-walk and rested her hands on the stones of the crenel, staring southwest through the gap. Valence’s men were there, of course, though fewer than their original two thousand strong. But beyond them, covering the entirety of the hill behind the enemy encampment, torches shone.
Hundreds of them.
As Lili watched, a campfire blazed up, and then a few more, until the whole of the land to the south and west of Windsor was covered with light. “How—?” Lili couldn’t speak more.
A smile split Carew’s face from ear to ear. “They appeared less than half an hour ago, all at once, as if every soldier had lit his torch at the same time, which perhaps they did.”
“How many have come?” Anna pressed between Lili and Carew, drinking in the sight of the oncoming army as eagerly as Lili was.
“From the number of torches, I would have said more than a thousand,” Carew said, “but they keep lighting more—”
“A thousand, did you say?” Anna said. “That’s more like five thousand.”
Roger Bacon wended his way through the crowd. “Valence will have to decide which direction he will attack, and if he will attack. The fact that our force has taken the high ground puts him at a further disadvantage.”
“We’re sure they’re here to fight for us?” Lili said.
Carew pointed. “Look there, at the very top of the hill where there are no trees.”
Lili squinted. The torches shone all around the hill, and many seemed to be directed at its peak. “Is it … is it a flag?”
“I would say so,” Bacon said, squinting too.
“It’s a flag with a dragon on it. How many armies that fight for Valence would carry such a thing, do you think?” Carew said.
“That’s David’s personal banner.” Anna’s brow furrowed. “Normally, it isn’t flown unless David is physically present on the field.”
“Ieuan must be flying it.” Pride in her brother rose in Lili’s chest. He deserved every bit of trust that Dafydd had placed in him.
“Has to be,” Carew said. “Though I have no idea how Lord Ieuan found so many men so quickly.”
A clamor came from below. “There’s a boat coming down the river!”
Archers all along the wall-walk shouted and leveled their bows at the intruders. They had been expecting some renewal of Valence’s assault on this side of the town, and with such a force hemming them in, now would be the time for an attack. The window of opportunity for taking Windsor was closing.
“Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot! We’re friends!”
The color drained from Lili’s face. That was Dafydd’s voice. She knew it like she knew her own face in her looking-glass. But it couldn’t be him; it had to be a trick, and a very cruel one to deceive her in this way.
Anna ran along the wall-walk, screaming at the archers, her skirts pulled up to her knees to free her legs. “Stop! Stop! It’s the King!”
Several archers were so focused on the river, they didn’t hear her. Breathless that Anna could be right, Lili sprinted after her.
Bevyn, who still maintained charge of the northern gatehouse tower, bellowed at the men: “It’s just one boat! Put up, you fools!”
By the time Lili made it down the stairs that led to t
he gate, Bevyn had it ajar. She and a dozen others darted through the opening, making for the narrow wharf, located to the east of where the bridge had been and almost directly under the castle walls.
The wharf was long but not wide, jutting out into the river only the length of a man, but with many indentations, much like the crenellations on a battlement, where boats could tie up. Fortunately, a few men had the foresight to bring torches, and as they raced towards the oncoming boat, Lili could see that it had two men in it. One reached for a rope tied to an iron ring attached to the dock, and as he grasped it, he looked towards the crowd coming from the town.
Lili pulled up short, drinking the sight of Dafydd in. Even after a year of marriage and the birth of their child, he never lost the power to stop her in her tracks. He caught sight of her and lifted a hand; then Bevyn reached down to help him scramble onto the dock. “What are you doing here, my lord?” Bevyn said in Welsh, always the one to get straight the point.
“It seems I was needed.” As he spoke, Dafydd turned in time to catch Lili, who barreled into him, wrapping her arms around his waist and pressing her face into his chest. He hugged her, bending his neck to rest his cheek on the top of her head.
Then her brow furrowed. She pulled back and pressed a hand to his chest, feeling the smooth yet hard armor covering his torso underneath his shirt. It had felt strange to her cheek. “What are you wearing?”
He grasped both of her hands. “It’s not of here, cariad.”
Not of here. That was a code she understood, for Dafydd had used it often, as a way to talk about places and things in that far-off world of his. She swallowed hard. Given that he was here, against all expectation, Lili was willing to wait for an explanation. She nodded, letting him know she understood. Then she looked towards the boat and back to Dafydd. “Where are Cass—?”
Dafydd’s grip tightened on her arms. “I had to leave them. I swear I didn’t want to, but I had no choice.”
A chill grew in Lili, starting deep in her bones. “You mean—?” Lili hadn’t known Cassie long, but she missed her already and didn’t want to think about what she might be doing now, stuck in a foreign land, even if it had once been her land. Cassie wasn’t going to be happy there.
“I believe they’re safe. The three of us went together, but only I could return. Callum was wounded, and I couldn’t bring him home—” Dafydd caught Lili up in a fierce hug, kissed her, and only then turned towards his companion in the boat.
Most of the crowd that had followed Bevyn from the gate had sunk to one knee at the sight of their king, but when Dafydd reached down a hand to haul his companion out of the boat, several scrambled forward to help.
Lili looked at the newcomer curiously. Like Dafydd, he was fair-haired and tall, though less muscular. He wore no armor or cloak, just a simple shirt and breeches, damp now from the river. Like Dafydd, his eyes were bright.
“This is Tom, from Maidenhead. One of many villagers who have come to our aid tonight.” Dafydd looked over Lili’s head to the men behind her. More continued to spill from the gate. “We should get back inside. This isn’t over yet.”
“By God, it won’t be long now.” Bevyn’s mustache quivered. He was more pleased than Lili had ever seen him. “Not with the army you’ve brought.”
“I did very little.” Dafydd strode towards the gate, getting the people to their feet and herding them ahead of him with wide sweeps of his arm.
Lili hurried to catch Dafydd’s hand, and Bevyn hustled along behind her. When Lili had plunged through the crowd to greet Dafydd, Carew and Anna had held back, but they met them at the gate. Dafydd embraced his sister, and then reached out to shake Carew’s hand. “Thank you for being here.”
“I am honored that you requested my presence,” Carew said.
“I never considered asking another,” Dafydd said, proving true what Lili had told Carew. She wondered if Carew would ever discuss with Dafydd how he’d felt mistrusted by him. Probably not. From the way the two men were nodding at each other, Carew’s concerns were long gone.
Dafydd looked down at Lili. “How is Arthur? Not ill at all?”
“He remains well. Sleeping now,” she said.
“Good.”
Lili peered up at her husband, suddenly suspicious. “Is there some reason to worry?”
“That is another matter to discuss with you—Anna, Bronwen, and you—later,” Dafydd said. “For now, I bring word from Ieuan to Math, as I hear he defends Windsor.”
Carew bowed and gestured towards the street which led to the southeastern gatehouse and Math’s headquarters. “This way, my lord.”
When they entered the house that served as Math’s command post, they found Math leaned back in a chair with his feet propped up on the table in front of him. His eyes were closed and remained closed, even amidst the clamor in the room. A group of men were gathered around the table, among them a bandaged Henry Percy, Dafydd’s Uncle Rhodri, and Sir George, the castellan of Windsor. The men were arguing and gesticulating at one another, a fact to which Math appeared oblivious. At the arrival of the newcomers, Sir George recognized Lili. “My queen! Lord Ieuan has come!”
“So I have seen,” she said.
Then at the sight of Dafydd entering the room right behind her, Sir George’s jaw dropped. “B-b-but—”
Dafydd merely held up his hand in greeting.
Anna went to Math and rested her arm on his shoulder. Without opening his eyes, he put an arm around her waist.
Anna leaned down to him. “I brought you someone you’ll want to see.”
“Who is it?” Math didn’t open his eyes.
The other men had given way for Dafydd, as they always did. “Sleeping on the job, are you?” he said in Welsh. “That’s hardly what I pay you for, is it?”
Math’s eyes popped open, but he must really have been tired because it took him a moment to recognize Dafydd standing before the table. Then his feet hit the floor with a thud, and he was upright and coming around the table to embrace his brother-in-law. “Good God! How is it that you are here?”
“That’s the first question everyone has asked me in these last hours, and the one I can’t answer,” Dafydd said. “Brother, you really don’t want to know.”
Math stepped back, his eyes focused on Dafydd’s face. Lili knew Dafydd didn’t want to say more and hoped Math would know exactly what he meant.
“But I want to know.” Carew said.
Dafydd turned to look at the Norman-Welsh lord and then glanced at the onlookers and Lili. She raised her eyebrows and shrugged. She didn’t have any idea what would be the right thing to say. Dafydd’s eyes flashed—with intelligence and a bit of that reckless streak he usually didn’t let show—and then he said, “I meant to go to Ireland but went to Avalon instead.”
The men in the room gasped. While on the wharf, Lili had worked out what had happened, of course, but Anna seemed not to have understood until now how Dafydd had reached Windsor. Her face drained of color. “What?”
“I know, I know.” Dafydd reached for his sister’s hand and clasped it.
“Where are your men? Where are Callum and Cassie?” Anna said.
“Once the storm hit, I lost track of my men,” Dafydd said. “I arrived here tonight as you see, alone and without a guard.”
Anna had her hand to her mouth, staring at her brother and more shocked than Lili might have expected, given the frequency with which time traveling happened to her family. Maybe because Lili had never been to that other world, she was more accepting of it. Usually, she managed to forget about Dafydd’s origins in the daily business of living. Dafydd was her husband, the father of her son, and the King of England. That was all that mattered most of the time.
But that was the crucial word, wasn’t it? Time.
“Callum was wounded. He and Cassie stayed behind,” Dafydd said. “I’ll be going back for them as soon as I can.”
Carew absorbed Dafydd’s news with a pinched look on his face. “How did th
at happen?”
“I cannot tell you how,” Dafydd said, “only that it did. In this, I know little more than you.”
“Tell me something.” Carew clenched his hands into fists and strained forward. “Tell me why.”
“It seems I wasn’t meant to go to Ireland because I was needed here,” Dafydd said.
Those simple words had Carew settling back on his heels. His expression cleared. “That certainly is true.”
Dafydd stepped towards Carew. “Sometimes, against all expectation, good things do happen. I—”
Someone knocked at the door, and Dafydd swallowed down whatever he’d been about to say.
“Enter!” Math said.
The door opened, revealing a messenger standing on the doorstep, sweaty and unkempt. He stuttered a bit, looking from Dafydd to Math, perhaps thinking about whose presence he was in for the first time instead of the news he brought.
Nobody held his appearance against him. “What is it?” Math said.
“My lord!” The man stepped through the doorway. “Lord Valence has raised the white flag!”
Other men murmured thanks be to God! And the Lord has delivered us, but Math pursed his lips and said, “Thank you. Wait outside for my response.”
The man bowed and departed to the street. Everyone else in the room fell silent, looking between Math and Dafydd. “It’s what I wanted—hoped for—but I didn’t expect him to fold his tents this quickly,” Dafydd said.
“It feels too easy,” Anna said.
“What do you intend, my lord?” Carew wasn’t looking at Math, but at Dafydd. While Math was still the commander of Windsor’s forces, and thus had spoken to the messenger, everyone in the room knew that the ultimate decision lay with the king.
“I intend to talk to him, of course,” Dafydd said, “but to take some additional precautions, some which some of you aren’t going to like.”
Carew stood with his hands on his hips, still looking defiant. “We need to capture him. He cannot be allowed to wiggle away this time to incite new mischief elsewhere.”
“Agreed.” Dafydd said.
“What are your orders?” Math said.
Castaways in Time (The After Cilmeri Series) Page 24