Chapter Twenty-Nine
“Gareth will take care of you,” Alice said to the handful of boy in Gareth’s arms, surprising Gareth with her vote of confidence. “Just don’t pepper him with too many questions.”
She turned away, back to Hywel, and Gareth whispered, “That means you can ask some.”
Gareth boosted the boy, Cadfan, onto Braith’s back and made sure he held the reins tightly. Braith wasn’t a warhorse as Alice’s Norman ancestors understood them, but was still far too big for Cadfan.
“Where’s my father?” Cadfan said—probably the toughest question he could have chosen to ask.
“I don’t know,” Gareth said. “Maybe Ireland.”
“Why’d he go there?”
“You’ve heard of something called ‘politics’?” Gareth said.
Cadfan nodded.
“That’s why,” Gareth said. “Best left well enough alone by both you and me.”
For her part, Alice perched on Hywel’s horse, her hands in her lap. Normally, Hywel’s horse was more nervy than this, but he seemed to understand that prancing was not allowed today. Sedately, with Gareth and Hywel walking and leading their charges, they made their way back down the hill to where Hywel had left the rest of the men.
“You truly mean to take my castle?” Alice gazed back up the hill where it squatted, as yet undamaged.
“Yes, aunt,” Hywel said. “I have no choice.”
“We always have a choice,” she said, tartly.
“Tell that to Cadwaladr,” Hywel said. “And ask Anarawd how he felt about it.”
That silenced her—and everyone else.
Hywel pulled Gareth aside. “I didn’t expect her to be pregnant. What do I do with her?”
“Ask her,” Gareth said. “If any woman knows her own mind, she does.”
Hywel glanced again at Alice, who glared at him. “I would go to my mother but her home is too far for me to travel in my condition,” she said, having evidently overheard their exchange. “A convent lies just north of the castle. I can stay there until the baby is born. My midwife lives in the village, and she will help me.”
“When is the baby due?”
“Not for two months.”
That eased Hywel’s concern and, with a few terse orders, he had three of his men escorting Alice and Cadfan back across the ford of the Ystwyth River, and then north towards the village.
Cadfan, now seated behind one of the men-at-arms assigned to him, twisted in his seat to look back at Gareth. “Goodbye, sir knight.”
Gareth saluted and bowed, “Young sir.” Once the two were out of earshot, he turned to Hywel. “She was prepared to defend the castle herself. She could still be a threat.”
“But not today, I think,” Hywel said. “Her men remain in the castle and. unless she incites the village against us, I find it unlikely we’ll hear from her again. At least not soon.”
“Your father may hear from her,” Gareth said.
Hywel laughed. “No doubt. Nonetheless, my men will see her safe and then guard the Abbey until I deem such precaution unnecessary. What I don’t want is for her to send a message to a nearby ally who might interrupt my plans.”
“And what are those plans, my lord?” Gareth said.
Hywel jerked his head to indicate Gareth should follow and walked under the trees to where his other captains gathered. His two hundred men and horses had scattered among the woods along the river, mingling to some degree, but mostly coordinated according to which lord they served. Soon, ten men—the leaders among them—gathered around Hywel.
“My father does not want a long siege,” Hywel said. “I will speak with Cadwaladr’s captain one more time, and if his response is the same as before, we’ll burn the castle to the ground today.”
“Today, my lord?” one of the men, Maelgwyn of Rhos, said.
Hywel stepped out from under the trees and checked the sky. “We’ve a few hours until sunset. Plenty of time.”
“But surely such a move is—” Maelgwyn stopped speaking at Hywel’s hard look.
“Tell me you weren’t going to say, without honor?” Hywel said.
“Of course not, my prince.” Maelgwyn accompanied the denial with a slight bow. “Although I have to admit that I am uncomfortable with our task.”
Hywel studied the man, eyes piercing, but Maelgwyn’s reservations had the other lords murmuring among themselves.
“Have you forgotten what Cadwaladr did?” King Cadell said, his voice quiet, but loud enough so that they all heard him.
Maelgwyn looked down. “No, my lord.”
“Cadwaladr is a prince, but he murdered a king—one with whom he himself was allied, and whom Owain Gwynedd planned to bring into his family as a son,” Cadell said. “If Cadwaladr could do it to Anarawd, he could do it to anyone. Anyone of you.”
This discussion was making Gareth impatient and he stirred beside Hywel, thinking to speak. Maelgwyn cleared his throat as if to say something more as well, but Hywel gave neither of them the chance.
“Get your men ready. The time for action is now. I will accept the surrender of the garrison, should they choose to surrender, but I will not back down.” And then he paused to look into the face of each man in turn. “It is not I who orders this, but my father.”
Maelgwyn straightened his shoulders, seemingly putting aside his doubts. “Yes, my lord.”
“If there are Danes in that fort, my lord,” said Alun, who’d come as Prince Rhun’s representative, “they will have already left by the postern gate. We should have sent men to the beach to stop them.”
“Alice did have Danes among her men,” Gareth said, “though that they were Danes didn’t register until now. Alun is right.”
“I saw them too,” Hywel said. “I deliberately let them go.”
“Why is that?” Color rose in Cadell’s cheeks. “They are bloodthirsty killers; they’ll go back to Ireland, get reinforcements, and continue to plague our shores.”
“The only good Dane is a dead one,” Maelgwyn said.
“That’s what the English say about the Welsh.” Hywel’s eyes narrowed. “You may recall that I have Danish blood, Maelgwyn.”
Maelgwyn paled. “Yes, my lord.” This wasn’t turning out to be a good day for him.
“We cannot kill every Dane in Ireland,” Hywel said, his voice full of patience. “I am letting them go because I want to encourage Cadwaladr’s return to Wales. The sooner my father confronts him in person, the better. The Danes will tell Cadwaladr that I’ve taken Aberystwyth. It will anger him.”
“I don’t understand—”
Hywel cut Maelgwyn off. “Obviously. This move is part of a greater whole, which I hadn’t realized I had to explain to you. My father wants his brother back in Wales, under his control, not inciting animosity and wreaking havoc among our Danish allies. If I let these Danes go, they’ll tell my uncle what has happened here at home. He won’t be able to resist doing something about it.”
A few of the men nodded.
“Regardless,” Hywel said. “As Alun pointed out, they’ve probably already gone, and there’s nothing we can do about it. I don’t care if the entire garrison of Cadwaladr’s Welsh men-at-arms departs and disperses, though I would rather deliver them to my father as we did the men from Aberffraw. But if we spare all of them and yet take the castle, my father will consider this endeavor a victory. We will send a message to Cadwaladr that he must pay for his actions. I want that castle!” He punctuated this last sentence with a fist into his palm.
“Besides,” Gareth said as the men dispersed to their appointed tasks, even Maelgwyn, “Cadwaladr still has Gwen, and I want her back. If he doesn’t bring her home, I may never see her again.”
“I haven’t forgotten Gwen, Gareth,” Hywel said.
Gareth bit his tongue, holding back the words he wanted to say. As with the villagers whose deaths Cadwaladr had ordered—at the hands of his own men—the loss of Gwen was not a matter that King Owain
could allow to trouble him. If pressed, he might say that it was an unfortunate happenstance, but to wager a kingdom on one girl? No, Gwen’s well-being was Gareth’s responsibility. And so far, he hadn’t done his job in seeing to it.
For now, however, his duty to his lord forced Gareth to push the thought of Gwen, along with the image of her wearing a slave collar around her throat, to the back of his mind where it had sat and festered all this last week. That her captors thought she was pregnant with Hywel’s child was a life-saving grace, but how long could that last before they discovered it was a lie? And what would happen to her when they did?
Despite their blood-curdling reputation, Danes were no different from any other men—which was both good and bad. They were, in fact, no more or less cruel than the men who surrounded him now, but they were also men and, despite the fact that she often seemed to care little for her appearance or what men thought of her, in Gareth’s opinion, she was lovely. And he wasn’t the only one who thought so.
As Goronwy’s answer was the same as before, over the next hour, Hywel moved his force south to higher ground, though still some fifty feet below the elevation of the castle. He planted those men-at-arms and knights who could double as bowmen within striking distance of the castle, two hundred yards away, sheltered behind their long shields. He then arrayed the remaining one hundred and fifty men in a ring around the castle, out of arrow range, but within sight of the walls, so Goronwy would see what he faced.
Cadwaladr couldn’t have left more than twenty men in the garrison, though if Danes were among them, that number might be doubled. Even so, forty could hardly charge out to attack two hundred with hope of success. And if they did, that would leave the castle empty. Hywel could take it intact in that case, or burn it down empty, just to show Cadwaladr his father’s power.
The men hastily rigged regular arrows with knotted bits of cloth, ready for lighting moments before being loosed. Others scoured the woods for firewood, more easily found in August than at other times of the year. Two men went into the village of Aberystwyth to garner oil with which to soak the cloth and make the fire more difficult to put out. The tied cloths would make the arrows wobble in the air, but Hywel wasn’t interested in accuracy, or even in killing anyone. He wanted to burn the wood and thatch that comprised the interior of the castle.
“Loose!”
The first flight of arrows blazed into the sky just as the sun began to set behind the castle. The day had been a bright one, and the night promised to be more beautiful still. Some of them fell short, falling to the ground outside the walls, but Hywel didn’t move his men any closer for fear of the archers on the battlements. Still, one of the opposing arrows, surely loosed from a mighty bow, reached their lines and hit an archer in his right shoulder. He screamed, and Gareth raced forward to drag him from his place.
“Move! Move!” That was Alun, directing another archer to fill the downed man’s spot.
“Fire at the men on the wall!” Hywel said. “Regular arrows! Force them to keep their heads down!”
Flight after flight arced into the air, with more and more finding targets. Fire blazed over the top of the wall. This was how Owain Gwynedd and Cadwaladr had defeated this very castle in their battle against the Normans six years before, after which Anarawd retook the title of King of Deheubarth. It was how Hywel would take the castle now, and why King Owain had started the process of rebuilding all of his bastions in stone.
“It will soon be done.” Hywel folded his arms across his chest and gazed with satisfaction at what he’d wrought. He turned to Gareth. “Take Evan and some others. Circle around to the north. I want to know what’s happening with the men on the other side.”
“If Cadwaladr’s men flee, should we stop them?”
“Not at the cost of your lives,” Hywel said. “In truth, they have nowhere to run. Between what we accomplish today, and what King Cadell plans in the coming weeks, we’ll deprive Cadwaladr of all his holdings.”
Gareth gathered a half-dozen men and led them along the bank of the Ystwyth River. They followed it west, passing between the castle hill and Pen Dinas. Before they reached the beach, they rode upwards towards the plateau on which the castle sat. Now that the sun had fallen into the sea, they’d be safe enough in the growing darkness, and certainly Goronwy and his men would be too busy trying to contain the fires to worry about who and how many were coming against them from the rear.
A moment later, however, they found a downed man-at-arms lying in the grass. He was one of the scouts Hywel had sent to survey the area an hour earlier.
“What happened?” Gareth sprang down from Braith.
“Danes.” The man moaned and held his side as blood seeped through his fingers. “They ran from the postern gate not long ago. Me and some others thought to stop them, even if Prince Hywel said we needn’t.”
“Which way did they go?” This came from one of Gareth’s men.
“They carried heavy goods towards the beach,” the man said.
“And you couldn’t stop them?” Evan pressed a cloth to the man’s wound before giving way to another soldier who knew more of healing.
“They just kept coming—twenty at least,” he said. “We couldn’t move out of the way fast enough.”
Gareth pointed at a man-at-arms, still mounted on his horse. “Ride to Prince Hywel. Tell him what has happened. For the rest, find our other scouts and see how many more are down. Evan and I will follow the Danes. At a minimum, we can make sure they’re gone for good, back to Dublin as Prince Hywel intends.”
Gareth threw himself on Braith, who navigated the descent to the beach far more fluidly than Gareth could have on foot. As they raced down the hill from the plateau, the figures of two dozen Danes coalesced out of the murk. They were already at the water’s edge, loading their goods into two boats. At the sight of Gareth and Evan, several moved to intercept them, giving the remainder time to stow their loot.
A man in one of the boats waved an arm and called something in Danish. The six men broke out of their intimidating stance and returned, climbing awkwardly over the rail since the boats were already pushed back from the shore.
“Wait!” Gareth shouted one of the few words he knew in Danish and spurred Braith faster. “We mean you no harm!”
“Are you out of your mind?” Evan said, trying to keep up.
At Gareth’s call, one of the Danes put up a hand, and his rowers stopped pulling on the oars. He stood in the stern, his hands on his hips, defiant. He’d cropped his hair and beard so short he looked less like a Dane than a Saxon. Fortunately, he also spoke some Welsh.
“What do you want?” he said. “Why do I not kill you?”
Gareth reined Braith at the water’s edge. “You sail for Ireland?”
“We did not come to defend a castle without Cadwaladr in it,” the man said. “We take his gold and go home.”
“And the men on the bluff that you harmed?” Gareth said.
The man shrugged. “They were in the way. That is all.”
Gareth nodded, the reply within the realm of the expected. These Danes had no feelings about harming his men one way or the other. They were in the way. “I have a message for someone in Dublin.”
The man didn’t reply, just waited, impassive, not promising anything.
“A girl. Her name is Gwen. She’s Welsh. Cadwaladr stole her from Aber. He left our shores with three longboats. The captain who commanded them was larger than average, blond.”
The Dane nodded. “Godfrid. My brother.”
“Tell Gwen that Gareth said he will come for her.”
“Tell her yourself. Come with us if you dare.” He grinned and gestured to his ship. “As guest.” He thumped his chest. “I am Brodar, and I will take you to Dublin.”
Gareth stared at him. Evan had come up beside him by now and grasped his arm. “What did he say?”
“He challenges me to come with him. To Dublin.”
Gareth gazed out over the w
ater. He desperately wanted to go with Brodar, to see to Gwen’s safety, but his duty lay in Wales, serving his prince. He also, deep inside, feared that if he went to Dublin, he would not return.
“Go.” Evan flicked the reins in a sort of dismissal. “I will explain to Hywel what has happened.”
Evan’s urging was all Gareth needed. He dismounted, threw Braith’s reins to Evan, and then walked into the water that slapped around the stern of Brodar’s longboat. He heaved himself over the rail.
A grin split Brodar’s face. “Brave man.”
Brodar roared at his men, something again in Danish that Gareth didn’t catch, and they picked up the oars again, falling almost instantly into a unified rhythm.
Brodar pushed at Gareth’s shoulder. “Sit there.”
Gareth obeyed, finding a place at the prow. He settled onto a wooden seat and faced east. Evan remained as Gareth had left him, Braith’s reins in his hand and her empty saddle a stark reminder of Gareth’s impulsive choice. Gareth lifted a hand, and Evan returned the salutation.
Once out of the bay, the wind rose and the Danes hoisted sail. They’d have two hard days of sailing before they’d reach Dublin. And Gwen. If she still lived.
The Good Knight Page 31