The Fourth Horseman

by Sarah Woodbury

  Rhun reached Gareth and peered over the wall. “Don’t bother. You’re out of time.”

  Gareth followed Rhun’s gaze just as the murderer tipped back his head to look up at them. The man lifted a hand in salute, unexpectedly grinning, and released the rope. He landed in the brook with a splash.

  “I’ll tell Ranulf to search the river for him,” Rhun said.

  “He’ll be long gone by then,” Gareth said. “That man knows what he’s doing.”

  Rhun leaned out to haul the rope back up the wall. “He was prepared; I can say that for him.”

  Gareth’s brow furrowed. “Surely he was, if he had the foresight to leave himself a way out of the castle, but none of this makes sense.”

  “How so?” Rhun allowed the rope to coil onto the walkway at their feet.

  “I could accept that the murderer prepared his escape route in advance,” Gareth said, “if I could say the same about the murder itself. Who plans to murder a man at mid-morning, in front of two hundred people? And what are the chances that the murderer would drop the body at our feet?”

  Rhun had been fingering his lip, gazing south across the English landscape, but then he came out of his reverie. With a laugh, he clapped Gareth on the shoulder. “Very high, I would think, given that you and Gwen seem to find evil-doers everywhere you go. Another murder for you, Gareth. I’m sure Earl Robert will be delighted that we brought you with us to help catch him.”

  Chapter Three

  Gwen

  As Gareth and Prince Rhun raced up the stairs and into the keep after the assassin, other men surged towards Gwen and the dead man at her feet.

  “Isn’t that just our luck?” Hywel reached Gwen’s side and studied the body, a finger to his chin. “Or rather, yours.”

  Gwen glanced at the prince, a knot forming in her stomach. Other men appeared on her right, jostling her. The prince nodded at Evan, who stepped between the onlookers and the body and began setting up a perimeter around it.

  “Sweet Mary.” Ranulf appeared on the other side of Hywel. “I’ve never seen the like.”

  Hywel met Gwen’s eyes, his own flashing with impatience. Her lord had already assessed Ranulf and found him wanting. Gwen pressed her lips together, hiding amusement and stifling her irritation that Hywel had the capacity to make her laugh, even under these circumstances. Then Hywel canted his head toward the body, a hint of a smile hovering around his lips. Gwen knew what that meant. Prince Hywel didn’t care if she was wearing her finest dress and newly polished boots. Here was a dead man! Let’s have a look at him!

  A growl of disgust rose in Gwen’s throat, but she obeyed Hywel, lifting her skirts to step to the far side of the body and moving in unison with him. A cluster of spring flowers grew against the wall of the keep, and Gwen was careful not to crush them beneath her boots. Hywel crouched on the near side and put a hand to the man’s throat, feeling for his pulse.

  “What are you doing?” Ranulf said.

  “Checking to see if he’s dead,” Hywel said in French, not looking at the Norman lord. “It was a long fall but not impossible that he might have survived it.”

  Ranulf cleared his throat and grunted something in French that Gwen didn’t catch. Unsurprisingly, the fallen man had no pulse. Hywel shot Gwen a look of resignation. Ranulf’s teeth snapped together. His hands, which had been on his hips, dropped to his sides. Then he raised his head and faced the men who’d gathered behind him. Those in the back were clustered six deep, craning their necks to see over the heads and shoulders of their neighbors.

  “This is no place for lay-abouts! See to your duties.” Ranulf said the words first in French and then in English for the benefit of the few craft workers and servants who might not understand the language of their masters. He didn’t speak in Welsh, not that there was any reason for him to know how. All of the Welsh folk Hywel had brought with him understood French, though Gwen probably spoke it the least well of anyone, despite her father’s many attempts to teach her better. Hywel, of course, was fluent.

  The onlookers murmured their dismay at having to leave the scene, but after some hesitation, most of them dispersed. Meanwhile, Hywel and Gwen briefly examined the body. As Ranulf turned back to them and came to stand at the dead man’s head, Hywel rose to his feet and brushed his fingers off on his cloak. “You know him, don’t you?”

  “What makes you say that?” Ranulf said.

  “He fell from the tower of a Norman keep, one that just happens to belong to your father-in-law.” Hywel raised his eyebrows. “Besides, I saw recognition in your eyes.”

  “Surely—surely, you aren’t accusing me of anything!” Ranulf said.

  Gwen glanced up, startled at Ranulf’s defensiveness. Hywel hadn’t been accusing him of anything, but Ranulf’s reaction made her want to ask him what he had done. Hywel, for his part, watched Ranulf steadily.

  Ranulf puffed out his cheeks. “But, yes, he was one of my men.”

  “And now he’s dead,” Hywel said.

  Gwen looked away, too uncomfortable to watch Hywel antagonize a Norman lord in a Norman castle. It was dangerous to speak to such a powerful man in that way. But her head jerked back involuntarily at Hywel’s next words: “One of your men, did you say? That surprises me, since he is a Welshman, one David ap Ianto, who has served my father well for many years. Or so my father has always thought.”

  Ranulf cleared his throat. “Is that so?” His face suffused with blood, turning his cheeks a color approaching purple.

  Hywel’s gaze didn’t move from Ranulf’s face. He didn’t actually accuse Ranulf of using David to spy on King Owain, but if David had served both lords, he couldn’t have been anything but a spy. And not for Hywel’s father. Both men knew it.

  Ranulf didn’t seem to know what to say to Hywel. Instead, he craned his neck to look up at the battlement and changed the subject. “How could he have fallen from there? Only a fool would lean that far over the edge.”

  Gwen blinked. Even if Ranulf hadn’t seen the assassin push the dead man, he had to know that no man could mistakenly fall over a chest-high wall. She glanced at Hywel, who didn’t correct the Norman lord, and then decided she could do it herself. “He didn’t fall on purpose, my lord.”

  Ranulf’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”

  Gwen almost wavered under the earl’s stare. Almost. “Another man pushed him.”

  “Pushed him.” Ranulf had gone from angry and defensive to disturbingly calm.

  She gestured towards the body. “Furthermore, he didn’t die from the fall. When he went over the wall, he was already dead—or dying.”

  Ranulf’s eyes narrowed. “How do you know that?”

  Gwen glanced at Hywel, who lifted his chin, indicating that it was his turn to speak. Gwen was happy to let the prince tell Ranulf the rest of the bad news. “Before he fell, David was stabbed in the back,” Hywel said.

  As they’d been talking, Gwen had been edging away from the body. A pool of blood had formed in the dirt under David’s back and begun trickling towards the flowers that grew against the stones.

  Looking where Gwen pointed, Ranulf snorted his disgust. Then he went down on one knee, reached under the body, and pushed up on David’s left shoulder blade to reveal the entry wound.

  Hywel knelt with him and traced it with one finger. “A slit only, made by a very narrow blade, sharpened to a fine point so it could penetrate his armor.”

  “Fool.” Ranulf jerked away, leaving Hywel to lower the body back to the ground.

  Gwen hadn’t often heard a dead man called a fool, but Ranulf seemed more irritated than saddened by David’s death. “The killer tried to choke him first,” she said.

  Ranulf glanced at the body out of the corner of his eye, nodding when Gwen tugged on David’s collar to reveal the purpling at his neck. He looked away again. Perhaps his thoughts, like Gwen’s, were moving beyond the dead body to its living consequences. Now that he knew the worst, Ranulf seemed anxious to have this ordeal over.
He turned to Amaury, who’d been standing on the steps observing the crowd while Ranulf talked to Hywel and Gwen. “We can’t leave him here,” Ranulf said.

  Hywel made a choking sound, disguising laughter with a cough and narrowly avoiding open mockery of Ranulf. No … not a good idea to leave a dead man in the bailey.

  “I’ll see to it.” Amaury waved a hand at two men who stood together on the bottom step to the keep. “Find a board on which to carry him.”

  “Yes, sir,” one of them said. Both bowed and departed at a quick walk, heading towards the gatehouse and the barracks.

  If Gareth hadn’t already described to Gwen his previous meeting with Amaury, she would hardly have noticed him. He was of average height, slender, and a generally inconspicuous sort of person, except that now that she looked at him more closely, he appeared to hold himself as tightly as a strung bow. She was a little surprised that Amaury hadn’t followed Gareth into the keep as Rhun had, but perhaps Gareth was already by him before he realized what was needed.

  While Ranulf and Amaury were distracted by their preparations to move David’s body, Hywel focused on Gwen. “Did you see the second man clearly?”

  Gwen shook her head, regretting her failure. “I saw him only for an instant. Truthfully, it was David who caught my attention. His eyes were so flat; I knew something was wrong with him before he fell.”

  “I think we’re looking at more than a simple murder.”

  Gareth, accompanied by Prince Rhun, had come up silently behind Gwen. She spun around and sighed, relieved that Gareth had returned, and took the hand he offered her. Some of the tension of the moment eased just because he was beside her.

  “I saw the killer before he threw the body over the wall,” Gareth continued. “I looked in his eyes a second time just now as he hung from a rope over the brook.”

  “We could do nothing to stop him,” Prince Rhun said.

  “What did he say? Did your man lose him?” Ranulf stepped closer, his brow furrowed. They’d been talking in Welsh and now switched to French out of courtesy to Ranulf and Amaury.

  “He did,” Prince Rhun said.

  “Would you recognize him again?” Ranulf said, this time speaking directly to Gareth.

  “Of course,” Gareth said.

  “Perhaps you could draw an image of him, Sir Gareth?” Amaury said, coming to stand beside Ranulf. “You have a fine hand.”

  Ranulf stared at Gareth as if he had suddenly grown three heads. “Is that so?”

  “It is, my lord,” Gareth said.

  Ranulf gave a stiff nod. “That would be very helpful.”

  “Sir Gareth is one of my most trusted captains,” Hywel said, stepping into the conversation. “He has other skills that might be useful to you in finding the killer.”

  Ranulf eyed Gareth suspiciously, but Gwen’s heart warmed at the respect Prince Hywel was showing her husband. Without further ado, Gareth sat down on one of the steps and pulled out a scrap a paper from inside his coat to sketch his drawing in charcoal.

  “My lord, if I may interject?” Prior Rhys said, speaking for the first time. Rhys had aided Gareth last winter in the pursuit of the man who’d tried to murder King Owain. Like Amaury, Gareth thought well of Rhys and was on the way to trusting him.

  “Please.” Ranulf gestured that Prior Rhys should come closer.

  “There was a third man at the top of the tower, along with the two so far mentioned,” Prior Rhys said, “but all I saw was the back of his head, not his face.”

  Gareth looked up at Prior Rhys’s words. “You are sure, Prior? I didn’t notice.”

  Gwen hadn’t noticed him either, but then, the dead man’s expression was still all she could see behind her eyes.

  “Even as the body fell, I saw a shadow against the battlement and a flash of dark hair. I’m sorry that I can’t tell you more. But he was there.”

  Hywel turned to look at David’s body again, muttering under his breath in Welsh and only for Gwen’s ears, “A third man. Just what we need.”

  Ranulf’s mouth worked as if he wanted to spit on the ground but was too polite to do so. “I must speak to Earl Robert immediately to tell him what has transpired. Amaury, stay with our guests until I call for you.”

  “Yes, my lord.” Amaury bowed to Ranulf, though the earl had already turned his back. He stalked up the steps to the great hall, leaving Amaury as the lone Norman among the Welsh visitors. He stood with them in a semi-circle near David’s body: the two princes, Hywel and Rhun; Gareth and Gwen; Gruffydd; Prior Rhys; and Evan.

  Amaury bowed slightly at the waist. “My lords, I don’t know what to say.” He stopped.

  “Unless you killed David, which would have meant being in two places at once, no apology is necessary,” Prince Hywel said.

  Gwen shifted uncomfortably. Hywel was very forthright sometimes. Amaury didn’t seem to know how to respond. Had Hywel just accused him of murder? It was hard to say. His mouth worked, but then he managed a thin smile. “Thank you, my lord. I appreciate your understanding.”

  If they had been home at Aber, Gwen knew what would have happened next: Hywel would have turned to Gareth, and by extension, to Gwen herself, and told them to get on with it. But here, Rhun and Hywel had no authority and hadn’t even spoken to Earl Robert yet. Except for the fact that David had been King Owain’s man, or so Hywel had assumed, the next step might be to return to their tents outside the walls and await events.

  But not yet. The two guardsmen arrived with a board, distracting Amaury and breaking the awkward silence. The men placed the board on the ground and loaded David’s body onto it. “Take him to the chapel,” Amaury said. “He can lie in a room off the vestibule.”

  “My lord, may I attend to him?” Prior Rhys’s eyes flicked from Hywel to Amaury. Hywel nodded, and Amaury said, “Of course.”

  Gareth rose to his feet as Rhys passed him, and the two men nodded at each other. Then Gareth handed his drawing to Amaury. The Norman lord scrutinized it, sucking on his teeth. His expression was noncommittal, but Hywel must have read something in it, because he stepped closer to Amaury and looked at the image over his shoulder.

  “What’s wrong?” Hywel said. “Do you recognize the assassin?”

  “I do.” Amaury puffed out a breath of air. “His name is Alard. And he is my friend.”

  Chapter Four

  Gareth

  “You’re telling me that the dead man, this—” Earl Robert snapped his fingers at Ranulf. “What was his name?”

  Ranulf stepped forward and replied, without informing his father-in-law that he wasn’t a dog, “David, my lord.”

  “Yes. David. You say he was your man?” Robert stood near the dais in the great hall with his legs spread and his hands behind his back. At fifty, he was tall and still slender, without even a slight paunch. His full head of hair was turning grey at the temples, and he wore it swept back from his face.

  “Yes, my lord,” Ranulf said.

  “But you didn’t know he had returned to Newcastle?” Robert said.

  “No, my lord.” Ranulf clenched his hands tightly behind his back. He was not enjoying being questioned by his wife’s father. The set of his shoulders spoke of a man within inches of storming from the room. Then he took in a deep breath and let it out. “I gave him a certain degree of independence in order to complete his tasks. I had not seen him in some time.”

  Ranulf’s red hair stood straight up; he’d worked his hands through it too many times in the past hour since David’s body had fallen at Gwen’s feet. Gareth had heard that Ranulf’s temperament was more volatile than King Owain’s, which was saying something. King Owain was quick to anger and equally quick to cool. But while Owain might forget his ire within moments of the offense, Ranulf was one to bear a grudge.

  “Define ‘some time’,” Hywel said.

  If Ranulf didn’t like being questioned by Robert, he liked it even less from Hywel. Still, he answered civilly enough. “Since the winter.”

 
; Earl Robert turned to Hywel and Rhun. “Meanwhile, your father believed David to be his servant.”

  Rhun dipped his head. “That is so.”

  Earl Robert sighed and smoothed the hair back from his face. He turned towards the dais, paced back and forth along it once, and then halted, his hands on his hips, contemplating each of the men before him in turn. Robert of Gloucester had a reputation as a measured thinker and a steady leader, providing a strong counterpoint to his half-sister, Empress Maud. She was known for her arrogance, mercurial temperament, and capriciousness. Rumor had it that men stayed true to the empress less because of a direct allegiance to her than out of loyalty to her brother, who was her strongest supporter. “And you accuse Alard of murdering him?”

  “Sir Gareth saw him,” Ranulf said. “Alard is a traitor to the empress, of that we can be sure.”

  Earl Robert raised his eyebrows. “Alard has served my sister for many years. How is it that I am only hearing of his treachery now?”

  “His defection to King Stephen’s side is very recent,” Ranulf said.

  Gareth shifted, wishing Gwen was beside him. She could have helped him read the undercurrents in the room. As it was, Gwen, Evan, and Gruffydd had found seats at a table near the front door to the hall. While the anteroom beyond remained full of retainers, Earl Robert had requested that only his Welsh visitors and a few of his own men witness this conversation.

  Up until this moment, Gareth had thought he was primarily interested in bringing David’s murderer to justice for King Owain’s sake. Yes, Alard had murdered a man in broad daylight; yes, David was working for Ranulf and spying on King Owain at the same time, but that meant it was only a matter of time before someone killed him. Now, however, the questions began to pile up in his mind. Chief among them was the nature of Alard’s relationship to David. He’d killed him, after all. One would presume he had a reason.