Gwen didn’t press him further, not feeling the need to question him at all, since he was hardly a suspect. Though, as Gareth mounted, he shook his head. “I feel foolish that you think we’re in any danger, Evan. The poisoner is clearly not one for open confrontation and neither is Robert’s killer. Poison is by nature a coward’s weapon, and Robert was struck down from behind.”
“Then a show of force may be all we need to dissuade him.” Evan grimaced. “Her. Them.”
Once on the road, Gwen and Gareth rode side-by-side, with three guards ahead and three behind. Gwen wasn’t sorry to be moving. For the moment, no more information could be found at the monastery, though Abbot Mathew said he’d let them know if any of the monks came forward with a further thought.
Gareth kept swiveling his head, surveying their surroundings. They were riding through pastureland with few trees to hide behind, however, and there was nobody in sight but them.
She put out a hand to him. “Are you going to tell me about the dream?”
Gareth laughed under his breath. “I was hoping you’d forgotten.”
“Just because I’m pregnant doesn’t mean I’m always foggy,” she said tartly.
Gareth grunted. “You don’t normally ask about battle. Why now?”
“Because whatever happened to you obviously bothers you enough that it’s coming out in your sleep.”
Gareth sighed, and his eyes took on a faraway look. “We are celebrating a victory over the Flemings, who have been a sore in the side of everyone in Deheubarth for years, but that doesn’t mean destroying their settlement didn’t come at a price.”
“Men died. I know,” she said.
Gareth took in another breath. “Once we took Wiston Castle, and Cadell and his allies overcame FitzWizo’s army, we turned on their main village, Gwen. Prince Hywel held his own men back, but the rest of the army didn’t hesitate. Every house and barn was ransacked, and anyone who resisted was struck down.”
Gwen bit her lip, searching for a reply. “I’m sorry,” was all she ended up saying. “I love you.”
“I know you do, but I can hardly love myself for standing by and letting it happen. How does it make me different from the murderer we’re pursuing?”
It was very different, and he knew it, and she said so.
But still Gareth shook his head. “It isn’t even as if we killed Walter FitzWizo himself. He escaped, and it’s probably only a matter of time before he and his men regroup and try to take back what we took from them. I fear that could be what is happening now.”
“You fear the gains will come to nothing?”
“After last night, they may well anyway, without FitzWizo needing to interfere at all.” Then Gareth shook himself. “The victory is to be celebrated, and I am glad to be part of an alliance between Ceredigion and Deheubarth. The last thing Hywel needs is a hostile army on his border.”
“Hywel was quick to forgive Cadell for sending Anselm to St. Asaph and interfering in Gwynedd.” Gwen was glad to see her husband put aside his guilt, at least for the moment. If his dreams were troubled again, she’d ask Prince Hywel or Evan to talk to him. Many men wanted to talk about battle only to other men who shared their experience.
“You think so?” Gareth let out a snort. “Forgiveness had nothing to do with it. You’ll note we have seen neither hide nor hair of our wayward prior. Believe me, the first thing I did when we arrived in Aberystwyth was inquire at St. Padarn’s if Anselm had joined their number. He had not. He is not at St. Dyfi’s either.”
“Cadell assuredly has sent him off to do mischief somewhere else. Better there than here.”
“I can’t decide if that’s something to hope for or not. It all depends on whom he’s making mischief for.” Gareth gave her a rueful smile. “If it wasn’t Cadell’s own household that was poisoned, I would have pegged Anselm for the murderer.”
They’d come to a wide place in the road, and Evan urged his horse to come abreast of Gareth and Gwen. “It might be best if you leave the initial questioning of Alban to me.”
With that statement, Evan had Gwen and Gareth’s full attention. Gwen didn’t know if he’d overheard any of her conversation with Gareth, and she hoped he hadn’t taken offense at Gareth’s description of the battle. After all, it was the Dragons who’d opened the castle for the invading army, which meant he’d killed men too.
“Are you sure about that?” Gwen said. “You already told me how Alban treated you at Wiston.”
Evan nodded. “Badly, I know. But then he tried to smooth it over. He is both wary of me and feels superior to me. That could be a good combination for getting the truth out of him.”
“Was Meicol among the company that entered the keep?” Gwen asked.
“No.” Evan shrugged. “It was an elite force. Meicol was not that trusted.”
“Perhaps young Prince Rhys can tell me more,” Gwen said.
Evan guffawed. “That boy.”
Gwen looked at him, eyebrows raised. “Why do you say it like that? I like him.”
“I do too, but his mind doesn’t work like a normal man’s. He’s too smart by half.”
Gwen nodded to herself. “And that makes him unpredictable, and whether or not you like him, above all you want the throne of Deheubarth to be predictable.” She paused. “Or rather, Prince Hywel does.”
“Not only wants it—needs it,” Gareth said. “Hywel’s rule over Ceredigion is growing more established with every month that passes, but this business with Anselm showed him how two-faced Cadell truly is, and he isn’t the only one. Prince Cadwaladr is an arrow just waiting to be loosed. Who knows where it will land? Cadell would have much preferred Cadwaladr, an enemy he knows, in Aberystwyth than Hywel. Thus, the spying.”
By now they’d passed through Dinefwr’s village in the valley below the castle and reached a side track that followed the course of the River Towy. Both went by the manor house, located approximately three miles from the castle. The valley through which they were riding consisted mostly of stands of trees interspersed with fields and pastureland. This region of south Wales wasn’t as flat as Anglesey, but it was flatter than all but the seashore of Gwynedd, and the river wended its way through the whole of it.
“This way.” Evan jerked his head, and they followed the well-worn track. The ruts were deep, indicating that Robert—or more likely, Alban, as the steward—was not maintaining it properly. He needed to send a work crew with shovels and stone to fill the ruts and smooth the dips. As it was, when it rained again, as it surely would, any cart that attempted to drive along the road would be instantly mired in mud.
Then, up ahead, a woman screamed, and the whole company urged their horses into a gallop. After fifty yards, they came around a bend and into a grassy clearing that fronted the manor house. A large company of men was already milling around on the circular green, where sheep might occasionally graze. They appeared unconcerned about the screaming. As Gwen reined in, she realized why: it was a woman doing the screaming, and she wasn’t hurt or afraid. She was angry, and her ire was directed at Richard de Clare, the heir to the Earldom of Pembroke.
Chapter Twelve
Gareth
Gareth’s feet were on the ground before anyone else’s, despite Gruffydd’s protest that there was no point in guarding a man who refused to be cautious.
“The day I’m in danger from a pregnant woman is the day I hang up my sword.” Gareth strode forward towards the altercation, which appeared just short of coming to blows—and might have but for the arrival of Gareth’s company.
He halted in the circle created by the woman, Caron he presumed, though they hadn’t officially met, young Richard, and Alban, Caron’s husband.
Hands on his hips, Gareth surveyed the trio and said in the voice he normally reserved for recalcitrant men-at-arms. “What seems to be the problem here?”
Richard lifted his chin. “I simply asked her a question, and she started screaming at me.”
As if on command, Richard’s denial set Caro
n off again. “Simply asked a question? You accused my husband of murdering Sir Robert!”
Gareth looked at Alban. “Did you murder Sir Robert?”
Alban huffed out a breath. “It’s ridiculous even to suggest such a thing. Sir Robert has been nothing but good to us.” He put an arm around his wife’s shoulders.
Caron, meanwhile, dabbed at her eyes and cheeks with the hem of her apron, wiping away tears. Her anger had turned to sudden grief. “How could you accuse Alban of such a thing? We loved Uncle Robert!”
In Gareth’s experience, love and hatred were two sides of a single coin. In addition, training men in war made them very good at killing other men. No man reached Alban’s station as second-in-command of the king’s teulu, essentially Evan’s position in Prince Hywel’s company before his transfer to the Dragons, without a skill and familiarity with it. Gareth had it too, but if he ever decided murder was necessary, he wouldn’t be bashing a man on the back of his head and leaving his body to be found.
Richard appeared to give up on Caron and turned to Gareth. “Were you able to speak to Sir Robert last night?”
Gareth shook his head regretfully. “By the time I’d finished examining Meicol’s body, dessert had been served and people were dying. Sir Robert himself had left the hall before I returned, and was dead soon after—though not of poison, of course.”
Richard harrumphed his disappointment and looked back at Alban and Caron. “I don’t see the two of you sick. How did you escape?”
Caron was sobbing too hard to speak, but Alban’s eyes were clear, and he retorted, “How did you?”
For a moment, Richard looked thunderstruck at the lack of courtesy, but then he relaxed and shrugged his shoulders, perhaps thinking they could get more out of the pair with honey than with vinegar. “I was among the men who carried Meicol from the hall and chose not to return afterwards. I didn’t hear of the poisoning until one of my men reported people were dying.”
Gwen arrived at Gareth’s side and gently rubbed elbows with him, not because she wanted attention but to let him know she was there. She was with child—by all appearances a similar length of time along to Caron—and the sight of Gwen reminded him that no good could come of accusing Caron of murder. The idea was absurd. Alban, however, was a different matter.
Which gave him an idea. “Perhaps my wife could assist you inside, Caron. I’m sure both of you could do with sitting down with a warm cup.”
Alban’s expression turned to one of relief, which was the first instance where Gareth felt some sympathy for him. If Caron was often as hotheaded as this, their marriage might be stormier than most.
Caron, for her part, continued to weep, but more quietly, and she tipped her head towards the door. “Of course. If you would follow me, Gwen.”
That left Alban alone with Gareth and Richard, who was a smart enough young man to realize exactly what Gareth had done. Separating the two of them prevented them from colluding on whatever story they were going to tell, if they, in fact, had something to do with Robert’s death.
Alban didn’t look like it, however. As Caron departed, he heaved a sigh, and his expression cleared. “I apologize for my wife’s behavior, Lord Richard. Sir Robert’s death, on top of what has been a difficult pregnancy, has been hard on her.”
“Better them than us, eh?” Richard said.
Alban let out a genuine laugh. “You have the right of it.”
It was the opening Gareth had hoped for to catch Alban when his guard was down. “Tell me about Sir Robert.”
Alban was ready this time with his defense. “I really didn’t kill him.”
Gareth made sure his voice was all patience. “I didn’t say you did. I spoke with him only in passing and didn’t know him at all, but you did. I genuinely want you to tell me about him.”
Alban pressed his lips together, and for a moment Gareth wasn’t sure Alban believed his assurances, but then he nodded. “He was a fine swordsman, as I’m sure you know.” Alban lifted his chin to point at Richard. “So good that King Cadell loaned him to Earl Gilbert.” Then his eyes grew thoughtful. “He was genuinely a good man too. Lonely though, since his wife and child died.”
“When did that happen?”
“Oh—” Alban waved a hand dismissively, “—twenty years ago or more. Robert devoted himself to his work after that.”
“Who inherits his estate? You?”
Alban nodded. “Caron is—was—his niece. That’s why he put me in charge of his manor in the first place. It would make the ultimate transition easier.”
Gareth rubbed his chin. Alban spoke straightforwardly, and Gareth’s initial thought that Alban might have killed his benefactor faded. It would have made no sense to do so when he himself was going to inherit eventually—and already had the benefit of the manor house. Robert was never home, and by the look of the estate—which on second glance was not so much run-down as lived-in—never made demands.
“Where were you last night that you weren’t poisoned?”
Alban made a rueful face. “Caron has been ill nearly continually with this child. She ate nothing during the feast, and though I would have stayed, she asked me to take her home right after she spoke to Evan.”
Gareth glanced at Evan, who was standing in the middle of the green talking to one of Richard’s men, having dispensed with the initial plan to have him speak to Alban and Caron the moment they heard Caron scream. “This was just after Meicol’s death?”
Alban’s lips twisted. “She didn’t know about it when she met Evan in the courtyard. She’d just come from vomiting up the little she did eat. The atmosphere in the hall was not pleasant, not to mention hot and stuffy, so we left before dessert was served.”
“Where did you go?”
“Home. Here. If you want proof, you could speak to the midwife. I sent for her, just to be safe. She was here most of the night.”
That sounded definitive enough for now. “Thank you for talking with me. I’ll let you know if I have further questions.”
Alban bowed and entered the house, leaving Gareth with Richard on the porch. Though Richard’s Welsh counterpart, Prince Rhys, showed knowledge and an ability to analyze beyond his years, it was clear to Gareth that he was still very much a fifteen-year-old who didn’t yet know his place or his limits. Richard, on the other hand, gave every impression of being much older than his seventeen years. He had a shadow in his eyes that belonged to a man who’d seen too much and was no longer surprised by evil. It could be a product of his recent narrow escape from Chepstow Castle with his father or the battle against Walter FitzWizo, but Gareth thought it went deeper than that.
While Rhys had lost both parents at a young age, which couldn’t have been easy—he and Gareth shared that fate—Richard was the son of a hard-driving father and a mother who’d once been the mistress of King Henry I of England. That couldn’t have been an easy household to grow up in either. Richard’s skin was so thick, Gareth could almost see the extra layer surrounding him.
So he took a chance. “You’re not a hothead, my lord. Why did you get into a shouting match with Caron?”
Richard laughed as genuinely as Alban had done earlier. “I was never angry, though I pretended to be. I wanted to catch them out in their wrongdoing.”
Gareth’s eyes narrowed. “You were looking to do my job.”
Richard’s expression turned regretful. “I was simply looking to help the investigation along because I could.”
“How did you know Sir Robert was dead?”
Now Richard’s eyes grew sad, and he looked down at his feet for a moment. “To tell you the truth, I didn’t. I came here looking for Robert. After last night, my men are wary of staying here even another day and are ready to depart. Robert was not with us, however, though I didn’t know why at the time, and nobody had seen him. It was Alban who told me he was dead.”
That gave Gareth a moment’s pause. “How did he know? I have just come directly from the monastery myself.”
“He said a messenger came to tell him. He’d just left when I arrived.” Richard grimaced. “I wanted to accuse them before they had time to prepare a story.”
“If Alban murdered Robert, he surely would have already prepared a story,” Gareth pointed out.
Richard sighed. “In retrospect, I can see how that might be true. I was too upset at the time to consider anything beyond the shock of Robert’s murder.”
Gareth put a hand on his shoulder and shook him a little, conveying sympathy. He hadn’t known Robert himself, but he’d been a man of stature—and one who appeared to inspire loyalty, even in a Norman lord. In Gareth’s experience, Norman lords—especially one as young as Richard—who could admit they didn’t know everything were few and far between.
“No harm done, as far as I know.” But then Gareth frowned. Something about Richard’s story didn’t make sense. “Why didn’t you send one of your men to collect him? Surely that would have been more usual.”
Richard snorted under his breath. “Yes, of course it would, but I also wanted to speak to Robert of Meicol and urge him to speak to you if he hadn’t already.”
Understanding dawned. “You wanted to be with him when he talked to me.”
Richard was completely unembarrassed. “I did, yes. As I told you last night, I have heard many stories about what has gone on at Dinefwr over the years and few of them are good.” He gestured to the manor’s front door, which Alban had closed behind him. “Take these two, for example. I accused Caron and Alban of murdering Robert because they have the most to gain from his death. Robert knew it, and he was not happy about it.”
“Wait. Wait,” Gareth said. “How is that? Alban inherits. He just said so.”
“I heard him.” Richard glared at the closed door, as if he could see right through it to Alban and Caron if he looked hard enough. “But that’s not the whole story. Yesterday Robert told me he was thinking about leaving the estate to the monastery. I don’t know if he’d yet mentioned it to Caron and Alban, but he was going to speak to the abbot about the possibility before we left Dinefwr. I’m thinking he was killed before he could.”
The Worthy Soldier Page 10