Hywel made a rueful face. “I can’t. I have to see to Mari, and then I must return to the festival grounds. The contest is heating up. I can’t avoid my duties as host.” His regret was obvious, though less that he was hosting the festival than that he couldn’t be in two places at once.
Gareth nodded in acknowledgement. “Then I will question Iolo.” He looked at Gwen, seemingly about to speak, and then transferred his gaze to Prince Rhun. “If you’ll forgive me, Gwen, I think Prince Rhun should be my other pair of eyes in this.”
Gwen wasn’t offended. She’d been silently calculating the length of time it would take to ride to the festival grounds, if that was where Iolo was, question him, and return—and if she felt comfortable leaving Tangwen all that time. She’d already decided that she would have to be excused and was trying to figure out how to tell Gareth. “It’s a relief, actually. I don’t want to go far from Tangwen anyway.”
As Gareth moved towards the door, he trailed a hand down Gwen’s spine. She looked into his face, and he gave her a brief nod, which she returned. They’d spent too many days apart since they’d found each other again three years ago, but she knew him and he knew her. Their life together had changed after Tangwen had come into it, and Gwen couldn’t be as active in these investigations as she used to be, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t help.
At this moment, Gwen interpreted Gareth’s knowing look as a reminder to ask Hywel about the knife, just to get it over with. Since Rhun didn’t know the truth about how King Anarawd died, it was better that he departed with Gareth, so that Gwen could speak to Hywel alone.
Hywel had gone back to surveying the body, bringing a candle closer to peer into the eyes, and then he fixed his gaze on the knife wound.
Gwen took in a breath, taking a chance. “What do you see there?”
Hywel scratched his cheek. “The man was stabbed in the chest.” He glanced at Gwen. “Is there more that I should be noticing?”
“You tell me.” Gwen’s tone was a more combative than she intended, and she softened it. “Gareth saw it too, you know.”
“Saw what exactly?”
Gwen looked at him through narrowed eyes. “That wound should look familiar to you.”
Hywel straightened and took a step back from the body. “You’re going to have to explain more clearly what you mean, Gwen, because I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“My lord, we’ve stood here before, over a man killed in identical fashion to this man, with an identical wound.”
Hywel sucked on his lower lip. “Why would Sioned have killed this man?” Sioned had been one of the culprits back at Aber two years ago during their investigation of the death of Hywel’s cousin. She’d killed a man with a knife to the chest.
“Sioned remains in Gwynedd,” Gwen said. “My lord, I’m talking about Anarawd.”
“What does Anarawd have to do—” Hywel’s jaw dropped. “You think my knife killed this man? Gwen—”
Gwen kept her eyes on Prince Hywel’s face. He stared at her through a few heartbeats. And then he laughed. “Ah, Gwen. I didn’t kill Gryff. I am not lying to you.”
Gwen let out the breath she’d been holding. “All right.”
Hywel’s brow furrowed. “All right? That’s it? You believe me?”
“Why would you lie to me?” Gwen said. “If you did kill him, it would hardly be something I could openly accuse you of. You are the Lord of Ceredigion and a prince of Gwynedd. But it would mean we could stop investigating this death.”
“And you said Gareth noticed the wound too?” Hywel said.
“Yes.”
Hywel ran a hand through his dark hair, mussing it so it stood on end. “I suppose I would have been disappointed if he hadn’t. His skill in these matters is one reason he leads my men.” He gestured to Gryff. “The man didn’t drown. It is murder, but not by my hand. You aren’t wasting your time looking for the killer, I assure you.”
Gwen hadn’t realized how tight the muscles in her shoulders had become out of fear of what Hywel might have done until the tension left her. “Do you understand that I had to ask?”
Hywel barked a laugh. “Oh yes. You could do nothing else. But really, Gwen, do you think I’d be fool enough to kill a man with the same knife I used on Anarawd—especially knowing that both you and Gareth would be among those to investigate the death?”
“You could have been too clever for your own good,” Gwen said.
Hywel scoffed. “I could have been, but I would have known not to try to get rid of a body in the millpond. Dead bodies float. Drowned bodies sink. The killer didn’t know that.”
“I know. I know.” Gwen was feeling much better. “Please forgive me.”
“I most certainly will not,” Hywel said. And when Gwen blinked at him, he added, “There would have been something to forgive if you hadn’t spoken to me of it—if you and Gareth had looked at me sideways for the next few days, wondering all the while if I’d killed another man in cold blood. I will say again that I did not. Believe me, the next man I want dead in secret will be done very, very far from you or Gareth.”
“That’s comforting. I think.” Then Gwen glared at Hywel as she caught the amusement in his face. “You’re mocking me.”
“Just a little bit,” Hywel said. “And just so you know, the knife is no longer in my possession.”
“What do you mean?”
“Before I married Mari, I gave her the knife and told her the truth of what I’d done,” Hywel said.
Gwen stared at him. “You did?”
“She needed to know the whole of the man she was marrying,” he said. “She understands who I am.”
“She forgave you?” Gwen said.
“There was nothing to forgive, Gwen,” Hywel said. “I did what I believed I had to do. That is who I am, and it would have been wrong of Mari to marry me in the expectation that I would change into someone else. I needed to tell her for her sake as much as she needed to know for mine.”
Gwen gazed down at her feet, shaking her head. She hadn’t expected him to tell Mari the truth. And yet, it eased her heart that he had. Mari and Hywel remained well-matched, but it had always niggled at the back of Gwen’s mind that she knew Hywel’s secrets and Mari did not.
“Is the knife here, in Aberystwyth?” Gwen said.
Hywel pursed his lips. “I don’t think so. If it were, it would be in Mari’s room. But Gwen—” he gestured to the wound, “—it wouldn’t have had to be my blade that did this. It could be any old blade.”
“Why do you say that?”
“At the next meal, take the opportunity to study the knives of the diners around you. I predict that a handful of them will have notches in them. People are lazy. They don’t sharpen their knives like they should, and they use old ones because they can’t be bothered to buy new ones or repair those they have. You’ll see.”
Gwen didn’t know why she hadn’t thought of that before. She could have made a study of belt knives over the last three years. She wouldn’t have put it past Hywel to have done so himself. He had the air of a man who knew what he was talking about, and Gwen herself knew enough about blades to know that they became brittle with age, especially ones that had been poorly or cheaply made. In addition, a knife could be sharpened only so many times before it failed.
Hywel’s easy denial also had her acknowledging that while Hywel knew all about murder, this murder was too sloppy to have been his handiwork. Certainly, he would have been foolish to have used the same knife to kill a peasant as he’d used to murder the king of Deheubarth. Prince Hywel was the Lord of Ceredigion. He had the reach and the resources to end the life of any man in his domain if his desire was great enough, and to do it without murdering him in the dead of night and throwing the body into his own millpond.
And Prince Hywel was anything but a fool.
“Meanwhile, I’ll ask Mari about the blade. It may well be safe at home in a trunk at Aber, but if she brought it, I will have her sho
w it to you,” Hywel said.
“And if she brought it, and it isn’t to be found?” Gwen said.
Hywel raised his eyebrows. “Then we do have a problem.” A bell sounded from the tower. “That is the signal for Vespers. I really must go, and you must see to Tangwen. I will ask Prior Pedr for two men to guard the body. I don’t know what more we can learn from him, but I don’t want another body to go missing.”
“We’ve had far too much of that in the past,” Gwen said.
“True,” Hywel said. “But more to the point, if any of us think of something in the short time we have left before he’s put in the ground, I want him to be where I left him.”
“I’ll wait here until the guards arrive,” Gwen said.
“It’ll be only a moment.” Hywel disappeared into the nave but returned a heartbeat later, poking his head through the doorway to the vestibule. “On top of all that, I have an alibi for last night.”
Gwen found a smile lurking around her lips. “Let’s hear it.”
“Gryff has been dead some twelve hours, give or take, correct?” Hywel said.
“Something like that. With the water, it’s hard to pinpoint as surely as we might like, but he died sometime after midnight. We’ll have to learn about his movements yesterday and last night before we know more.”
Hywel waved a hand dismissively. “Regardless, I was with Gruffydd all night.”
Gwen’s brow furrowed. “The baby, you mean?”
“My son, yes. Mari was sleeping solidly for the first time in a week, and I took Gruffydd away to sleep with me in one of the cells that no monk was using. You can ask Prior Pedr. He saw us together when the brothers filed past us for Matins.”
That was the prayer vigil the monks kept in the middle of the night. “I don’t need to ask,” Gwen said. “You would hardly have taken Gruffydd to the millpond after midnight, nor left him alone in a monk’s cell while you murdered a man a half-mile away from the monastery.”
Hywel saluted her. “Such was my thought. I hope I have put your concerns to rest.”
It was with relief that Gwen accepted Hywel’s assertion he hadn’t killed Gryff. Maybe he was lying to her again, but she didn’t think so. They knew each other for who they were by now. Hywel was Lord of Ceredigion. If he wanted a man dead, he could have arranged for it in a hundred better ways. With Hywel cleared, they could begin the real work of finding out who did murder Gryff.
Since Rhun and Gareth had left to track down Gryff’s master, Iolo, that left Gwen to explore some questions closer to home, among them this issue of the notched knife. First, however, she needed to find Tangwen and Elspeth and feed them both. After going to her room to collect a clean dress for Tangwen, Gwen made her way back to the gardens. As she had hoped, Tangwen had spent a happy hour covering herself in dirt. Elspeth’s pinafore was equally filthy, and Gwen sent the older girl away to change for the evening meal while she saw to Tangwen.
Elspeth seemed to have infinite patience for watching Tangwen. Gwen always felt when she was minding Tangwen that she should be doing something in addition to watching her daughter, even if she couldn’t take her eye off the baby for a heartbeat in case Tangwen stumbled into the fire, poked herself with a stick, or swallowed something she shouldn’t. Since she’d brought Elspeth into her household, Gwen had come to realize that there was nothing like having a fourteen-year-old girl to watch a baby for keeping both mother and baby happy.
“Let’s get you cleaned up, shall we?” Gwen helped Tangwen to her feet, brushed her off as best she could, and then carried her towards the brook that ran past the gardens. Tangwen’s dirty bare feet instantly marred Gwen’s apron, but since Gwen had spent the last few hours with a dead body, she would change into clean garments before dinner too. Gwen hadn’t done more than touch Gryff in a few places, but that contact was enough to make her feel unclean all over.
The first warm day after Gwen and Tangwen had arrived at the monastery, the monk in charge of the gardens had showed her a little pool, separated from the rest of the brook by rocks, where she and Tangwen could wade to cool off. Gwen had brought Tangwen there every warm evening since.
Once at the pool, Gwen sat on a rock, pulled up her skirt, and slipped out of her boots. She stripped off Tangwen’s dirty clothes and set them aside, and then, holding Tangwen’s hand tightly, she helped her step into the pool. Tangwen squealed at the cold water and splashed her free hand in it in delight. It was shallow enough that Tangwen could sit on the bottom on a flat rock and still keep her head above water, but Gwen still needed to watch her closely, lest she slide under the surface.
“Do you like the water?” Gwen bent to feel it with the fingers of her free hand. Because the shallow pool had sat in the sun all day and the water flowed in and out of it slowly, it was warmer than the brook that ran beside it. “Is it nice?”
“Nice water.” Tangwen rarely said more than one word at a time, so using two together today was something of a triumph.
Gwen scooped water up in her cupped her hand and poured it over Tangwen’s head, and then she rubbed at her daughter’s dirty cheeks and hands with a wet cloth until they were clean.
“Did you hear about the man found in the millpond?”
The words carried to Gwen from her left. She straightened slightly, continuing to hold onto Tangwen’s wrist to keep her upright, and peered in the direction of the sound. Two monks of an age with Elspeth were just visible through the trees that grew down to the water’s edge. They lifted up their robes and waded in the brook, still talking.
“I saw him!” the second monk said. “Hosteler Adda sent me to bring water to wash him in preparation for burial tomorrow morning. He said the man’s wife came to claim his body. Did you see her?” At the other monk’s shake of his head, the second continued, “She was beautiful, but …” He looked down at the water rushing past his feet.
“But what?” The first monk was trying to walk on the rocks into the middle of the brook. He slipped and fell to one knee, soaking the hem of his robe. He cursed in a very unmonklike fashion and rose to his feet again, balancing with his arms outstretched on either side of him.
“When I brought the water, I looked into the dead man’s face. I’ve never seen a drowned man before.” The second monk shook his head. “The funny thing is that he looks very much like my cousin’s husband. He is named Gryff too. Do you think I ought to tell someone about that?”
The first monk sputtered his surprise at his friend and slipped off his rock.
Gwen swung Tangwen onto her hip and slithered through the mud on the bank to where the two monks had gone into the brook. “I definitely think you need to tell someone about that.”
The two boys swung around, gaping at her. The monk who thought he knew Gryff said, “I didn’t mean for anyone else to hear.”
“Well I did hear, and your instincts are good.” Gwen put out a hand to the boys, trying to put them at their ease. “I am Gwen. Sir Gareth is my husband, and he is investigating Gryff’s death. Please tell me again what you just said about your cousin’s husband.”
Both boys were still standing in the water, staring at her, and it occurred to Gwen that they might be worried about a whole host of things that had nothing to do with Gryff: they’d been chatting with each other, the first monk had sworn like a soldier, and very likely they were shirking whatever duties they should be fulfilling. Vespers, for one.
They could also have been staring in horror at Gwen herself, since her hair was askew, she was shoeless, and she had a naked baby girl on her hip. But Gwen waited, and after another pause, the first monk shook himself. “Tell her, Fychan. This really might be important.”
Fychan still looked wary, but he took a few steps closer to Gwen. “Gryff is the name of the husband. And this man looked like him.” Fychan shrugged. “That’s all.”
“Could you come with me?” Gwen said. “Other men will want to hear what you have to say.”
Fychan blanched. “I really couldn’t.”
“You really must.” Having Tangwen on her hip meant Gwen was somewhat unbalanced, but she took two steps down the bank towards the water.
Her movement seemed to prompt the boy, however, and he nodded, seemingly resigned to his fate. He began to pick his way towards the shore.
“Thank you,” Gwen said. “Let me get my things.”
Gwen returned to the pool where Tangwen had been bathing, swept up her boots and Tangwen’s clothes, and arrived at the path that ran through the gardens at the same time that the two monks appeared at the top of the bank. She took a moment to drop the clean dress over Tangwen’s head and put her own boots back on. The hem of Gwen’s dress was wet, but she hoped it wasn’t too noticeable, and she tried to tame her hair back into its headscarf. The truth was, Prior Pedr intimidated her more than a little. Like Prior Rhys, he seemed to be able to see right through her, but unlike Prior Rhys, they had no shared experience to temper their relationship.
Fychan waited patiently for her to ready herself, and then he followed her back to the cobbled courtyard. Upon reaching it, Gwen hesitated. She didn’t see anyone she knew. Another party of guests had just arrived. The guesthouse was already full to bursting, so perhaps these people were sleeping in the stables. Gwen certainly didn’t want to disturb them with a discussion of the dead body lying in the vestibule.
She turned to the first monk, who’d come with them but whose name she didn’t know. “Can you ask your prior if he will speak to me? It would be better yet if Prior Rhys from St. Kentigern’s is with him.”
The monk ducked his head in acknowledgement of her request and ran off without arguing or questioning her.
Fychan didn’t seem to want to look at her, but by taking a step closer and lowering her voice she forced him to look into her eyes. “If you are right that this is the man you knew, then you have done not only him, but Prince Hywel, a great service.”
The boy’s head came up at that, and his expression lightened, which was what Gwen had hoped for. “I shouldn’t have been at the brook. Dafydd and I missed Vespers.”
The Unlikely Spy Page 6