The Good Knight

by Sarah Woodbury

  Chapter Six

  Gareth and Gwen had ridden through the dark and now reached the highest point on the road that led across the high, windswept moors of Gwynedd from Caerhun to Aber. The standing stones of Bwlch y Ddeufaen stood stark in the moonlight, looming over them eight feet high on either side of the road that wended among the hills. These stones had guarded the pass from all comers since before the Romans came. At least the fine weather continued, and they weren’t forced to ride these ten miles in the rain.

  “What did my father say about me traveling with you?” Gwen said.

  “This and that,” Gareth said, having no intention of sharing anything about that conversation.

  At first, all Gareth had done when he’d encountered Meilyr standing with his hands on his hips, blocking Gareth’s retreat from the dining hall, was hand him the few coins Madog had set aside for Gwen. Gareth hoped she’d accept them later, even if they made her feel uncomfortable now. Although he didn’t like Meilyr, the man was neither a wastrel nor a miser. He would save them for Gwen.

  “Fine time for you to appear,” Meilyr had said. “You mind telling me what you’ve been up to all these years before I allow my daughter to go off with you?”

  Gareth could read nothing in Meilyr’s face but his usual suspicion, so he ventured to reply. “You heard I was a mercenary?” He asked the question even though he already knew the answer from his earlier conversation with Gwen.

  Meilyr gave him a short nod.

  “Those days are past,” Gareth said.

  “Landed on your feet, then?” Meilyr’s voice remained casual, denying the intensity of his expression.

  Gareth warred with himself as to whether or not to tell Meilyr the truth. If Meilyr was going to give his approval, Gareth preferred he gave it to him because he trusted him, instead of being blinded by an obsession with rank. Still, if he was to have any chance with Gwen, it was better if Meilyr heard it from him.

  “I am a knight.”

  Meilyr grunted. “Are you now?”

  “I understood it to be the requirement,” Gareth said.

  “Left it a bit late.”

  “Is she betrothed?” Gareth’s gut roiled. Gwen hadn’t said as much to him, but she might not, given how awkward that conversation could become.

  Meilyr laughed, but the sound came out more sour than humorous. “Could have been. Just last month I had someone asking for her. Wasn’t thinking of you, of course, but I couldn’t let her go to just anyone, especially not a spoiled child-man like him.”

  Gareth’s heart settled a bit. He still had time. “With your permission, I’d like to speak of this further. For now, I’m afraid I’ve work to do.” He gestured towards the stables where Braith waited. “Aber isn’t getting any closer, and King Owain won’t like to have been kept waiting.”

  “Owain Gwynedd doesn’t like anything that he doesn’t control or foresee,” Meilyr said. “How did you end up under his wing?”

  “I’m not under his, but Hywel’s,” Gareth said.

  Meilyr grunted again, acknowledging the difference.

  “Though it was King Owain’s eldest son, Rhun, who knighted me, and that raised my standing in the king’s eyes,” Gareth said.

  “King Owain knows of your troubled history with his brother, Cadwaladr?”

  “He knows,” Gareth said.

  For the second time that day, he’d had a civil conversation with Meilyr. With that, Gareth hadn’t wanted to tempt his luck any further, not after the traumatic events of the day, and retreated to the stables.

  “What did your father say to you when you demanded to come with me, that is?” He smiled because he had no doubt that’s exactly what Gwen had done.

  Gwen didn’t rise to the bait. “He accepted it, and since the kitchens at Caerhun would be there to prepare his breakfast in the morning, he could dispense with me. He didn’t want to give me his horse, necessarily, but in the end he gave way. What payment did you promise Madog to get him to loan my father a better one?”

  “Gwen—”

  “Don’t try to deny it. I know how these things work.” Gwen matched him smile for smile, as if to indicate that she was comfortable with these kinds of machinations and her own perceived value.

  He wasn’t fooled. “Your father loves you.”

  “Does he?” Gwen said. “Fathers are supposed to love their daughters, but would he miss me if he awoke one morning and I was gone forever?”

  “He loves you enough not to give you to just anyone,” Gareth said, and then bit his tongue because of what that statement gave away.

  Gwen glared at him. “He told you about Rhys?”

  “Not his name,” Gareth said. “But the circumstances.”

  “I’ve had enough of my father’s opinions,” she said. “Don’t make me dislike yours as well.”

  “I know it’s been hard—”

  Gwen cut him off. “I’ve not wasted all these years mourning your absence. I’d hoped we’d have three children by now, and be living on a bit of land somewhere by the sea.” She shrugged. “It wasn’t meant to be. I can accept that we can’t always live the life we imagined.”

  “I’ve paid for my choices, Gwen. I’d prefer not to have to keep paying.” Gareth felt Gwen’s eyes on him, but didn’t know if he should say anything more as she didn’t.

  Cadwaladr had dismissed Gareth the same day he’d intended to ask Meilyr for Gwen’s hand. She’d been only sixteen, he twenty-three and far more sure of himself than he should have been. Cadwaladr had been right to dismiss him, if outright disobedience was grounds for dismissal. But then, Cadwaladr’s insistence that Gareth cut off the hand of an eight-year-old boy who’d stolen a piglet had been one order too many for Gareth. Still, looking at Gwen now, it was hard not to have regrets.

  The lights of Aber shone in the distance and they slowed. “It’s been a long time for you, hasn’t it?” he said.

  “Six years. I cried when we left.” Gwen paused, and then to Gareth’s surprise, added, “I was pleased to work for Hywel again because of those memories. But you can’t go back, not really, even if you follow the same road.”

  Gareth swallowed. Was that comment meant for him? Was she telling him to walk away from her? “I do think Hywel missed you,” he said, instead of asking either of those questions. And then he kicked himself again. What compelled him to mention Hywel’s name every third sentence?

  “Did he?” she said. “He didn’t even seek me out to say goodbye.” Before Gareth could formulate a reply, they reached the walls and Gwen’s mouth fell open at what confronted them. “What are they doing to the castle?”

  King Owain didn’t have the wherewithal to improve the defenses of all his holdings, but Aber was an important seat, his stronghold on the north coast of Gwynedd. He’d ordered the building of a stone wall around the fort, turning what had been little more than a large manor house nearly into a fortress. Many of the English bastions along the border between England and Wales were going up entirely in stone. It was dangerous not to keep up with the times, but the cost was exorbitant.

  “The English are coming,” Gareth said. “Perhaps not this year, but eventually. Hopefully by the time they get their affairs in order, King Owain will be ready.”

  “I’m not so much worried about the English today,” Gwen said. “This ambush of Anarawd indicates that King Owain has a very angry, very dangerous enemy.”

  Gareth took in a breath. “Perhaps it’s time he knew of it.”

  They urged their horses the last yards to the gatehouse. Gareth’s face gained them admission and, in the shelter of the courtyard, they faced off in the darkness. At this hour—nearly midnight by Gareth’s reckoning—most of the torches had been allowed to die, leaving two by the front door to the hall and two by the gate. The bulk of the garrison slept in the barracks, while the peasants and craft workers had settled into their huts and stalls. Dawn came early in August, and they and their animals would be up before it.

&
nbsp; “Should we speak to Hywel first?” Gwen said.

  Gareth glanced towards the great hall, some thirty paces away. The King kept odd hours, but midnight was as late as Gareth had ever seen him leave the hall. If he held true to form, Gareth would have to wake him, which thrilled him not at all. Better to take the cowardly route. He grasped Gwen’s arm and tugged her towards a side entrance to the main building, for which the hall formed the central room, with offices, storerooms, and sleeping quarters leading from it.

  “Hywel’s rooms are along here.” Gareth opened the exterior door and entered a long passageway. Still tugging Gwen with him, he halted in front of a half-closed door and knocked.

  “Come.”

  Gareth pushed through the door, with Gwen at his heels. For once, Hywel was alone, though that wasn’t to say a woman wasn’t lounging on his bed in the room adjacent, waiting for him to return. Hywel’s charm and appearance—black hair, deep blue eyes with long lashes (ridiculously long if Gareth’s female observers could be trusted), and muscular physique—had drawn women to him from before he’d even become a man.

  One of the most treacherous battles Gareth had ever been in was when he’d ended up defending Hywel from a horde of angry farmers, roused by a cuckolded husband. They’d been outnumbered twelve to one, and yet managed to escape by luck and the timely appearance of a priest who told the farmers off. Had he known the reason for their anger, he might have felt differently, but at the time, all he’d seen was peasants confronting a prince.

  As they entered, Hywel looked up from the household accounts on his desk in front of him. A grin split his face. “This is a surprise.” Hywel’s eyes tracked from Gwen to Gareth.

  Gareth gritted his teeth. His lord had a tendency to perception and just now, his relationship with Gwen was not something Gareth wanted acknowledged, or worse, discussed. “My lord.” Gareth put his feet together and gave Hywel a stiff bow. Gwen curtseyed beside him.

  “I hoped to have seen Gwen earlier today—and you not until tomorrow, Gareth,” Hywel said. “How is it that you arrive together, and so late?”

  Gareth and Gwen exchanged a look. Her expression told him that she’d prefer him to speak. Choosing nobility, he plunged on: “We’ve ridden through the night to tell you—and your father—of a terrible event that has transpired. King Anarawd was ambushed by Danes on the road just north of Dolwyddelan. He is dead.”

  “What!” Hywel was on his feet. “By the Saints, say it is not true!”

  “I’m sorry, my lord,” Gwen said. “It is true.”

  “Who, what—tell me more!”

  Gareth and Gwen relayed the story, including their search and the second ambush, taking turns with the parts they knew best. By the end, Hywel had settled into his chair again, a horrified expression on his face. Made worse by his news for them: “You should know that I and some of my men tracked these Danes across Gwynedd today, nearly to the road from Dolwyddelan where you tell me Anarawd died.”

  Gareth took a step forward. “But, then—”

  Hywel shook his head, in what Gareth interpreted to be stunned disbelief. “You know those hills are full of paths. We thought we had them—we followed them for some distance—but lost them when they backtracked west. Or, rather, we thought they went west. By the time we reached the Roman fort, we found no sign of them. Instead, they must have taken a different route north to ambush you.”

  “You heard nothing?”

  “There is a river there, running through a series of falls. The path runs beside it. It would have drowned out any noise of battle. And since the Danes didn’t ever reach the road, or so we thought—”

  “But they did,” Gwen said.

  Hywel sighed. “Why was Anarawd even there? He shouldn’t have been. He wasn’t due until tomorrow.”

  “He was in a hurry to reach his bride, apparently,” Gareth said.

  “Was there any sign, any token, of who could have ordered this?” Hywel said.

  “No,” Gareth said. “Not that we’ve found so far. I’d like to return to the initial site without the feet of fifty other men treading on it.”

  “You’ll have that chance,” Hywel said, “if I have any say in it.”

  “Whoever paid for this crime has incredible power and reach, my lord,” Gwen said. “The Irish connection is critical.”

  Hywel got up and began to pace in front of the open window by his desk. They both knew better than to interrupt his thoughts, but then he halted in front of them. “This news cannot wait. We must wake my father. It will be worse for everyone if even one more hour goes by without him hearing of it.”