The Good Knight

by Sarah Woodbury

  Chapter Eight

  In his wildest imagination, it hadn’t occurred to Gareth that the result of being the one to tell Owain Gwynedd that King Anarawd was dead was that he’d end up here. What if King Owain leaves me here? I’ll rot while Gwen is left to wander the castle alone. The thought of her on her own amongst the garrison was enough to have him punching his fist into the wall again. That it was wooden and not stone was the only thing that saved him from a broken hand. Of course, it also showed how easily he could kick his way out of his rickety prison if he had to. He could take some comfort in that.

  His cell sat at the back of the stables. It was ten feet on a side with knot holes and slits in the wood that allowed him to see through the slats to the curtain wall. This section had already been replaced with stone, indicating that freedom, were he to pursue it on his own, wouldn’t be as immediate as he might hope. The pungent smells of horse and excrement were making him lightheaded in the confined space, and he paced around his cell, trying to stay awake until someone came. Hywel? Gwen? A guard to beat the truth out of him? At the very least, he was looking for someone to talk to him, to come and tell him this was all a mistake.

  Fortunately, the guards hadn’t yet roughed him up. Hell—they weren’t even guards, but friends. Evan had brought him a flask, a crust of bread, and dried meat, with an unspoken apology in his eyes. None of his friends had been happy with their appointed task, but they did it. They did it because their lord ordered it, and it wasn’t their place to question Owain Gwynedd’s orders. If Gareth had learned that lesson sooner, he might have married Gwen. They might have had those three children she’d mentioned.

  After he’d spent an hour alone, a light appeared on the other side of the door. Gareth braced himself—whether for fight or flight he hadn’t yet decided—but it was Hywel who appeared. To his credit, he didn’t bother to apologize for Gareth’s predicament, but stood in the doorway with his hands on his hips and the door open wide behind him.

  “You won’t run, I assume,” he said.

  Gareth eyed the space behind his prince. He could knock Hywel over; maybe even make it out of the stables and through the postern gate before anyone was the wiser. But he didn’t. Instead, Gareth took Hywel’s words as a vote of confidence and as indication that at least Hywel didn’t believe in his guilt.

  “It would set your father further against me, wouldn’t it?” Gareth said.

  “Likely,” Hywel said.

  “Except I don’t even know what I’m supposed to have done.” Gareth felt like punching the wall again. “Is he accusing me of betraying you? Of being in the pay of another master? Does he think I helped kill King Anarawd and two dozen of his guardsmen?”

  “I expect he isn’t accusing you of anything but being in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Hywel said. “But he’ll hang you for it anyway if we can’t find the true culprit.”

  “Christ!” Gareth swung around to kick at a bucket in the corner. It had an inch of stale water in it which he wouldn’t have drunk anyway. God knew what they kept in this room when they weren’t using it as a prison cell. He hoped few men had the pleasure of it before him, though his friends had known without discussion where to take him when they’d hauled him away from King Owain.

  “At least we’re not at Dolbadarn—they’ve dungeons there,” Hywel said.

  “I should thank him for that small favor, should I?”

  Hywel smiled. “I’m sure my father will see to addressing that lack when he rebuilds the hall in stone. In the meantime, you’re safe enough here.”

  “I’m a pig in a pen, waiting for slaughter,” Gareth said.

  Hywel canted his head as he studied Gareth. “Use your anger and frustration to concentrate your mind on what might really have happened. Though they were all abed when you arrived, the barons have gathered at Aber. They came for the wedding, which won’t happen now, but they’ll meet in council anyway as my father intended. If any one of them is guilty of this treachery, they’ll think themselves safer for your confinement. We might catch someone off guard.”

  “Tell that to your father,” Gareth said.

  “I won’t need to,” Hywel said. “By morning he’ll think of it himself, even if he won’t admit it. We can, however, take advantage of his hasty action.”

  “By leaving me in this cage?” Gareth said, not any happier with this idea, even if it was a good one. “I would be more useful on the outside!”

  “We’ll see.” Hywel smirked at Gareth’s outraged expression, and then added, “You’re a bit easier to control in here.” He held up an iron key. “I will lock the door because my father expects it, not because I don’t trust you.”

  Gareth managed to tamp down his temper enough to tip his head at Hywel who, still smirking, closed the door behind him. Personally, Gareth thought Hywel was putting a bit too much faith in his father’s good sense, which Gareth couldn’t quite discern from where he stood. He thought it much more likely that King Owain would hang him, if only to make himself feel better and put some kind of conclusion on this affair—especially if he never found out who’d really ordered King Anarawd’s death.

  Gareth hadn’t managed more than a few more paces around the cell, stewing in his anger and resentment, when a new knock came and then the sound of a key turning in the lock. He strode towards the door, furious that Hywel had come back to mock him some more, but then came to an abrupt halt a foot from the door as it opened. Gwen stood before him with a platter of steaming broth and a jug of mead.

  “I bribed the cook with my recipe for spiced scones,” she said.

  Gareth warred with himself, as she was the last person he wanted to see him so powerless, but the smell of the soup made his stomach growl, and he chose not to fight her—or to sulk. “Come in.” He bowed low, one arm out like a courtier welcoming her to his home instead of a room lined with dirty straw.

  “Hywel made me promise not to free you.”

  “I gave him my word that I’d stay.” Gareth said. “He has some idea that if I’m confined, it will embolden the real villain. Give him confidence that nobody suspects him, which of course we don’t since we have no idea who did this.” The thought made Gareth want to kick something again, but he didn’t. He took in a deep breath and let it out, getting hold of his temper.

  Gwen handed him the tray of food. As he reached for it, he was surprised to see her eyes tearing. “I was that worried. King Owain was so angry.”

  “He’s known for his astute strategizing,” Gareth said, “but it’s not uncommon for him to act first and think later. Look at what happened with your father. They have an argument about something that should have been resolved within half a day—and which King Owain probably doesn’t even remember now—and they don’t speak for six years. Hywel says that King Owain could still hang me for this, were we to fail to uncover the real culprit.”

  “That’s what I fear. I spoke with several of your friends among the garrison. They don’t think you’re good for this, even if you’ve done some things in the past of which you are less than proud.” She paused. “You don’t have to tell me about those things.”

  “We’ve all done things we regret. After Cadwaladr dismissed me, I learned that even what he’d asked me to do were minor offenses compared to what was possible.” He shrugged. “A lord feels much more loyalty to his regular men-at-arms and knights, whose families may have served his family for generations, than to the mercenaries he hires. That’s why a lord always assigns a mercenary the dirtiest work.”

  “Much like Hywel,” Gwen said.

  Gareth looked up from his soup bowl. “What makes you say that?”

  “Wouldn’t you agree?” Gwen said. “Rhun is the heir; Owain Gwynedd has things that need doing that he might not mind doing himself—if he had the time—but is loath to have them sully Rhun’s hands. But Hywel—”

  “Yes,” Gareth said. “I would say that you’re right.”

  “It’s always been that way,” Gwen
said. “I remember the first time. Hywel was only fourteen. One of King Owain’s knights had neglected his duties to the king; he’d refused service and tithes in a strange act of defiance. It was Hywel that King Owain sent to see to him.”

  “And what did Hywel do?”

  “Burned the man’s house and barn to the ground, along with everything in them. The knight escaped with only the clothes on his back.” Gwen glanced at Gareth, her gaze inscrutable. “None died, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

  Gareth nodded. Such was the way of kings. “It could be worse. Hywel could have been born in the time of Gruffydd ap Llywelyn. If the stories of his reign are true, Gruffydd had half the men in his family killed to prevent any chance of them usurping his throne. Someone had to do it; someone had that blood on his hands, even if he was only doing as Gruffydd told him.”

  “King Owain has his hands full enough with his brother.” Gwen poured the mead she’d brought into a cup and handed it to Gareth. He took it but didn’t answer. He should have known she couldn’t be silenced so easily. After another look, she said, “I gather, then, that we aren’t going to talk about Cadwaladr either?”

  “What’s there to say?” Gareth said. “Even after all this time, he spreads lies about me. What I can’t understand is why I’m even in his thoughts. I was a tiny speck on his cloak that he flicked off with one finger all those years ago.”

  Gareth had come to Cadwaladr after the death of his Uncle Goronwy, who’d served King Owain’s elder brother, Cadwallon. Goronwy fell in battle with Cadwallon in 1132, in a war against a king of Powys over something Gareth couldn’t remember now. Land or power, it was all one to Gareth. He’d been a soldier for two years already, though in truth still a boy and fighting on the fringes of the battle. He’d been posted among the archers since they’d been short of men with bows and his shot was better than average.

  Upon Goronwy’s death, Gareth, now orphaned for the second time, had transferred his allegiance to Cadwaladr at King Gruffydd’s request. It was unfortunate for Gareth that this youngest prince hadn’t even half the courage of the eldest.

  “Apparently you weren’t a negligible speck to him,” Gwen said. “Now that you’re among Hywel’s company, Cadwaladr has been reminded of what happened, and how you stood up to him. Perhaps you are one of the few men who ever defied him openly.”

  “The only one, I think,” Gareth said. “Or rather, the only one who lived to speak of it. He’s learned since his dealings with me that it’s not enough to dismiss someone. Better to kill him.”

  Gwen shook her head. “I really don’t want to know that. We’ve sung in his castle at Aberystwyth many times.” She leaned against the wall, her hands behind her back, studying Gareth. “I actually didn’t mean to talk about what happened between you and Cadwaladr, though we can. What I meant to point out is that Prince Cadwaladr is one of the few men in Wales who exactly fills the description of someone who’d want to murder Anarawd.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Because he rules in Ceredigion, on lands adjacent to Anarawd’s. Perhaps he didn’t want King Owain to control them through his daughter, possibly at Cadwaladr’s expense.”

  Gareth scrubbed at his face with both hands. “It’s true he has Irish connections. As do all the royal families in Deheubarth and Gwynedd.”

  “More than that, he lived there as a child,” Gwen said. “Hywel tells me that he only returned to Gwynedd upon the death of Cadwallon because his father felt that the remaining brothers must stand together to defend Gwynedd.”

  “We must keep speculation to a minimum,” Gareth said. “You might as well accuse Hywel, for he shares a similar pedigree—his mother was Irish!”

  “I’m not accusing anyone of anything,” Gwen said. “But speculation is how mysteries are solved. We ask good questions, and we see if any of the answers we find fit our questions.”

  Gareth ran his hand through his hair. “Good questions, you say? I’ve got one for you—when do I get out of here?”