The Forgotten Kingdom

by Signe Pike

  Eira reached shakily for the jug before Angharad remembered her bound hands and reached quickly to pour ale into the waiting cup.

  “Thank you,” Eira said. They took turns, drinking it down thirstily.

  “Give me your hands. I shall cut the bindings.” Angharad reached for the knife belted at her waist, and Eira’s good eye widened in surprise.

  “Your mother’s blade!” she whispered. “Oh, thank the blessed gods, I’d nearly forgot. Cut it just here, Angharad, we must be able to retie it so they mightn’t notice.” Angharad did as she was told, and they ate in silence, for Eira seemed deep in thought.

  Soon as they had eaten their fill, Eira leaned in. “Would that we could leave now, but there is too much light. I fear we will be caught. We must wait until dark. Tonight, when I tell you, you must run. Fast as you can! No matter what. You must run to the woods, and take cover in the nearest thicket you should find, and bury yourself amongst the leaves. Can you do that?”

  “Yes,” Angharad said.

  “It will be dark, and they will not expect you to stay so close.”

  “And you will be right behind me. You will bury yourself, too.”

  “Yes, I shall be right behind you, and I shall do the same. You must lie still for a long while, ’til they’ve come back from their search, ’til they’ve given up looking. Then I will call to you. When you hear my voice, you may come out. But you must promise me one thing.”

  Eira paused.

  “You must swear to me that no matter what, you will not look back.” Eira’s gaze was fixed to the ground.

  “But you will be right behind me.”

  “Yes. I will be right behind you. But you must swear now.”

  “I swear.”

  “What do you swear?” Eira lifted her eyes, locking them on Angharad’s. “Angharad, you must say it.”

  The hardness in Eira’s voice brought a tremble to her lip, but Angharad repeated the words. “I swear I will not look back.”

  The weight of what they must do felt overwhelming. Fat, silent tears rolled down Angharad’s face, and Eira reached tenderly to draw her near, cradling Angharad to her chest. “Oh, my love,” she murmured.

  “I am so afraid.”

  “Do not be afraid. You will be gone in a blink, and they shall never find you. Think of your mother. Think of your father. You are such a very brave girl. Braver than any I have ever met.”

  Eira bent to kiss her brow, then straightened, a newfound determination in her voice.

  “Now, then,” she said. “Give me your knife.”

  The camp was quiet. Moments stretched, and Angharad’s body began to betray her, remembering a comfort nearly forgotten: a full stomach. As darkness fell beyond the tent, her limbs grew heavy, her eyes dropping in sleep. Music drifted. Laughter. But it was the jeering of men that rattled her awake. She sat upright, blinking.

  A candle burned in an iron holder on the pine table, and on Gwrgi’s trunk, a clay oil lamp had been brought in for light.

  “That’s right, little one. Keep awake if you can. You must be ready when the moment comes.” Eira’s face was etched with pity in the dim.

  Soon the scouting party returned. They waited in the silence of the tent as the men whooped and hollered, their ears straining for the sound of prisoners, but there did not seem to be any. The mood in Gwrgi’s camp was celebratory that eve, and the men drank long into the night. Angharad lay, stomach churning with nerves, her head resting on Eira’s lap. A few times she must have drifted into sleep, for she woke to Eira’s gentle shake and the feeling her nursemaid had allowed more rest than she knew. And then, just as it seemed the night would never end, voices sounded, nearing the tent.

  Angharad did not need waking then. Her blood raced already at the thought of what she must do, and it took all of her might not to burst from the tent like a flushed quail when Gwrgi’s voice came.

  “Take the nursemaid. Keep her away.”

  “Aye, my lord.” The man’s voice sounded hesitant. “But what of the girl’s father?”

  “She’s only a speckled little chick…”

  Angharad did not hear what he said next, for Eira’s whisper was a rush in her ear. “When I strike them, you must run.”

  She nodded as Eira stood and snatched up the oil lamp, pressing flat against the wall of the tent, just beyond the opening.

  Escape seemed impossible.

  But Angharad could not think of that.

  She must only run.

  Cold air gusted in as Gwrgi and his warrior pushed through the tent flaps, their faces lit ghoulish in the low light. Then, in the moment before their eyes adjusted, Eira struck, shattering the clay lamp over the warrior’s head. Oil and shards scattered over the bedding as Angharad scrambled to her feet, and the warrior dropped, senseless and bleeding, to the floor. But Gwrgi was not senseless. He looked at Eira, hunched, ready, holding Angharad’s knife, and raised his dark brows as if this were all a wonderful game. “Your hair is darker,” he said. “And your face fouled from beating, but I do say you remind me of a girl I once knew.”

  Eira’s face hardened and she lunged at him. “Angharad! Go!” she cried. But Gwrgi dodged the stab of her knife and turned to face her, arms barring the opening, eyes lit like a demon in the dark.

  “Nay, little chicky, don’t go,” he said. “It’ll be worse for you if you do.”

  Angharad looked between them, heart hammering. Eira’s eyes strayed to the little pine table where the single candle yet burned. They both moved at the same moment, Eira kicking the table over as Gwrgi lunged for her, knocking her from her feet. Shouts rang out from the camp as the candle toppled onto the sheepskin bedding, fire catching the oil from the shattered lamp.

  “Run!” Eira shouted. Gwrgi was on top of her, wrestling for the knife as she slashed, cutting his face. He struck her and she turned to Angharad, eyes wide with terror. “Angharad, run!”

  Angharad ran.

  Men were rushing toward the tent now, spears lifted and swords drawn, but their limbs were sluggish from drink, and Angharad was a flash in the dark. She did not feel the pain from her blisters. Rhys had taught her to duck and to dive. To feign. And so when a warrior closed in, she threw a feint, and as he lunged, she slipped by him like a river eel, streaking into the woods.

  She raced on, arms pumping, trying not to crash into tree limbs and boulders in the blackness. She knew the thicket when she saw it.

  Here. It gave her its promise.

  The warriors were thundering into the forest behind her, leaves scattering in a storm as Angharad dropped into the thicket, scurrying on her belly into its heart. Rolling hurriedly onto her back, she swept loose leaves over her prone body with outstretched arms, then yanked two of the nearest branches to cover her, fighting to silence her breath.

  Brown as dirt, she thought.

  “Where’s she gone?” someone called out.

  “She can’t have got far.”

  She was certain they would hear her pounding heart. The thicket was scarcely large enough to shelter a deer. Surely they would see her. Surely they would discover her and drag her back to the tent.

  But just then, something sounded in the forest beyond. The sound of a cry that might have belonged to a child.

  “This way,” the warrior barked as they crashed away through the forest.

  Angharad dared not move.

  One summer, not long ago, she and her mother had stumbled upon a fawn curled beneath a shrub in Cadzow’s wood.

  “Mother, look!” she’d exclaimed. The creature looked up at Angharad, long lashes blinking, seemingly unafraid. Its pelt was speckled, its nose smooth as a river stone. Kneeling down, she reached to stroke it.

  “No! Do not touch it,” her mother said quickly. “Your scent will frighten off its mother.”

  “But its mother has left it,” Angharad said, saddened.

  Her mother moved to stand beside her. “A mother never leaves her young. She’s gone foraging so she can provide
milk, but she will not be far. A mother always returns.”

  The memory was too much. Rolling onto her side, Angharad curled tight, hugging her knees to her chest. Her mother would never return, for her mother had not left her. Her mother had given her away.

  And now Angharad had abandoned Eira, the woman who’d become her own family.

  The look of terror on Eira’s face was etched in Angharad’s mind. She heard the sound of Gwrgi’s blow, bone against flesh.

  You’re a coward, Angharad admonished herself.

  But Eira had made her swear. And if she could find her father, she could save her friend.

  The silence of the forest was unnerving. But Angharad should have welcomed it. She knew that now. For the silence did not last.

  She had been listening all the while, praying to the gods that somehow Eira had escaped, that she would come calling as they had planned, but Angharad was some distance from the camp now, or so she thought. It was not until the men returned that she realized how near to the tent she must be.

  The sound of Eira’s screams echoed through the night.

  Angharad could not see the blows, only hear the sounds that issued from Eira as she felt them. The sound of Eira’s suffering stabbed, and Angharad flinched with every cry, beating at her ears as if she could block them from hearing.

  It continued for eternity.

  Then, sometime before dawn, Eira’s cries faded away.

  Angharad did not feel cold, though her body shook. She knew she should make her way through the woods while darkness yet clung, but she could only lie there, eyes swollen, blinking.

  The sun rose. The men whistled, and she smelled a cook fire lit. She heard the early-morning clamor that came with packing up camp.

  She needed to relieve her bladder but dared not stand. It seemed wrong to make water, to be whole and unharmed, when Eira lay in suffering on the very same earth only a short distance away. But Angharad’s body would not be denied. She spread her legs, peeing where she lay. Wetness soaked her thighs, and she felt like a baby.

  By midmorning, Gwrgi’s men were gone.

  CHAPTER 16

  Angharad

  Angharad crawled out from beneath the underbrush and moved her feet—one, then the other. Again.

  Soon she was walking.

  Angharad had no idea where she might be, only that they had traveled some distance. She was nearing the farthest reaches of Gwenddolau’s land, that much was certain. Angharad looked up into the bare-branched trees. She was alone in the wood, but she did not fear wolves or bears or wild boar. Angharad feared only men.

  Birds called. Her feet thudded against leaves. Her stomach grumbled. She did not know which way to go, only that she must go in the direction opposite Gwrgi and his men.

  Up ahead stood a copse of mossy-footed beech trees, their thick silver fingers stretching gracefully toward the sky. The forest floor was covered in mound moss and dead leaves, and Angharad’s footsteps spoke as she shuffled uncertainly into the grove. Shush shush shush.

  The air within it felt peaceful. Welcoming and safe. It lacked scrub for shelter, but there was an abiding stillness here that urged her to rest.

  In the center of the copse she spotted a magnificent old beech with a depression at its base, as if a deer might have bedded there. She would sit, if only for a moment. Perhaps then she might know which way to go. The moss sprouting from the trunk was dry from too little rain, and as she leaned against it, Angharad knew the tree was quite thirsty.

  I have no water, either, she thought.

  She was so accustomed to being held by her mother and father. By Eira or Lailoken. Being held by a tree was different. Its body was unforgiving, where her mother’s was smooth and soft in all the right places, a happy dream. But beneath the bark, the tenderness Angharad felt was a mother’s touch without fingers. It traveled in gentle waves against her back, filling her body with a remedy she could not quite comprehend.

  I am lost, Angharad told the tree, tears rising in her throat.

  Not lost, the tree replied. Just where you need to be.

  “How can you say such a thing?” Her voice was loud in the quiet of the grove.

  It was clear the tree did not understand what had happened. Angharad closed her eyes to share the flashes of violence and gore now trapped within her skull. The death her father and Tutgual had brought with their war. A chill breeze kicked up, rustling the branches of the grove like a sigh.

  Not lost, it repeated. Just where you need to be.

  The old beech was not bothered. It only held her, in its way. The woods always spoke in whispers. Still Angharad did not understand. Should she wait precisely where she was, or continue in the direction she’d been walking?

  Does this way lead to my father? she asked. But the tree had nothing more to say.

  After a while Angharad realized it was early afternoon. Night would soon come, and she needed warmth and shelter. Her body ached, wracked with exhaustion from her night in the cold, and she longed for a draught of her mother’s elderberry and honey drink. No. Safe as she felt, she could not linger any longer. Angharad pressed her cheek against the old beech tree’s trunk. Thank you, she said.

  The dark-haired woman might have tricked her, but trees never lied. Somehow, she was just where she was meant to be.

  There was always a river. Eira had taught her that. She mightn’t know which river she searched for, but if she could find any river at all, surely there would be travelers upon it. Surely there would be someone who’d help send word to her father. The thought was enough to rouse her to her feet.

  Please, she begged. Which way to the river?

  She waited, fearful at first that no sign would come. Then she decided to wait with expectance. After all, the old beech had told her she was just where she needed to be, so why would the woods not show her the way? Then she saw it. A bird alighting on an ash tree beyond the grove. Angharad whispered her thanks and followed.

  There. In the distance, a rusty spray of fern caught her eye. Beyond it, the faint outline of a herd trail. Each time Angharad was in doubt, something came to show the way. A roe deer, as if waiting. Sometimes it was only the encouragement of a gentle wind, or a rustle in a thicket.

  Twilight threatened, yet still no river came in sight. Then, at an oak, the path she had been following suddenly branched. Just as Angharad began to despair, she saw it, half buried in leaves, a few paces from her feet.

  A feather. Angharad burst into tears. “Mama!” she cried. She crouched to grab it before it could blow away, pressing it to her chest as if it could save her, as if it could seal the leaking wound of her heart. Her voice was a whisper in the woods. “Mama.”

  Even though the sight of it pained her, for the first time since striking out that morning, Angharad did not feel so alone. She stood slowly, tucking the feather into her tunic for safekeeping. There must be something up ahead, something that would help her find her way home. And yet she dared not fully believe.

  She followed the path as it twisted through a stand of papery birch. Then she blinked.

  A roundhouse stood at the far side of a clearing. It was reed-roofed, with walls made of wattle and daub. No smoke breathed from the thatching, and the little wooden door seemed to keep watch like a sentinel. Angharad remembered the dead man with staring eyes in their hut. But she was tired and hungry, and the feather was tucked close to her heart. Quickly, she took her torque from her neck, securing it beneath her tunic with her belt. Better to keep it safe. She could always reveal it if need be. Then she hobbled toward the hut, stopping at the door.

  A symbol was marked in charcoal on the wood, a circle sprouting a cross beneath it. Angharad knew the symbol well—her brother Cyan often traced it on slate. It was meant to be the Christ God, pierced upon the cross.

  The hut lay within the confines of her uncle’s kingdom, yet a Christian mark had been made upon the door, and the hut was not in cinders.

  This hut had been spared whilst the others ha
d been burned.

  No sound came from within as Angharad reached for the latch. Swinging open the door, she squinted into the gloom.

  Empty, it seemed. As her eyes grew accustomed to the dim, she made out a hearth pit in the center with an iron cookpot suspended above. A wooden bed covered with a sheepskin blanket sat opposite a table set with one stool, one wooden bowl, an eating knife, and one spoon. Angharad stepped inside.

  The earthen floor was neatly swept, and before the bed lay a simple reed mat.

  All was spare, save one detail. Hung round the room, high and low, secured by tiny iron nails, were dozens upon dozens of carved wooden crosses.

  This was the house of a monk.

  Father Natan at Partick spoke of men who sought Christ in solitude, traveling deep into forests, glens, and mountains to dwell and worship their god. He’d given a name for such men: culdees. Perhaps this hut belonged to such a monk.

  Beside the hearth, she spied a flint and birch shavings for tinder. The pit was stacked with peat, and on the table, a little clay pot of reeds sat to light tapers from the hearth fire.

  Wherever the monk had gone, he’d soon return. Surely he would not turn away a child. She crouched and set to work showering the birch shavings with sparks until they caught. Soon flame licked, catching the peat.

  With the turf burning, the hut seemed warm and almost friendly. Angharad’s stomach kicked with hunger, and she looked round, wondering about food. Everything was ordered; only the reed mat before the bed lay slightly askew. Pushing it aside, she found two short planks set over a hole dug into the ground. Foodstuffs had been squirrelled away: a loaf of barley bread. Flour, oats, and a jar full of honey.

  “Oh,” Angharad breathed, fingers nearly trembling. Food, food! She snatched up the loaf and the sack of oats, carrying them to the table. She had just begun to slice a thick hunk of bread when a voice came from above.

  “Hello.”

  With a shriek, Angharad turned and looked up. A face hovered in the beams over the doorway, glowing orange in the turf light. She spun round to face it, the knife in her hand sending oats from the sack scattering like snow. If the thing fell upon her, she would stab it, then run, she decided.