The Fourth Horseman

by Sarah Woodbury

  Chapter Ten

  Hywel

  “I am glad to be awake,” Prior Rhys said. “It is my understanding that whether or not I would ever wake was an open question.”

  “So it was.” Hywel closed the door behind him. “You were speaking of what happened to you?”

  Prior Rhys nodded. “Do you have an idea as to why someone would want to steal David’s body from the chapel?”

  “We don’t yet know.” Hywel caught Gwen’s eye for a moment but then quickly looked away. He was glad to know she’d stayed silent on the topic of the emerald.

  “Can you think of anyone who might want to hurt you in particular, Prior Rhys?” Gwen said. “The man didn’t cause me any lasting harm, but he almost killed you.”

  “If it was even the same man,” Mari said.

  “I’m not sure it matters,” Hywel said. “If two men were responsible, then they were working in concert. To steal the body, our culprit needed the prior out of the way long enough for him to get inside the chapel and get out with the body, which come to think of it, would have been quite a feat in and of itself. There’s no reason to think he targeted Prior Rhys specifically, other than that he had taken on the task of watching over David.”

  While Hywel was speaking, Gwen had moved closer to Prior Rhys, going so far as to sit on the bed. Something about the way she was looking at the prior made Hywel stop talking. He’d been showing off in front of Mari, making a logical argument because he could. But Hywel trusted Gwen’s instincts, and he realized that he and Mari had jumped into the conversation before Prior Rhys could answer Gwen’s question. Prior Rhys still hadn’t answered it.

  “Prior.” Gwen kept her voice soft. “May I ask you something?”

  The churchman turned his head to look at her and as his gaze sharpened, a wariness came into his face. “Of course, my dear. Anything.”

  “When did you join the monastery in St. Asaph?”

  “Gwen—” Mari leaned forward as if to shush her friend, but Hywel stepped closer and caught her hand.

  “Let her be,” he said, his voice low.

  “It was a long time ago, Gwen,” Prior Rhys said.

  “I’m thinking it wasn’t so long ago as all that. You were a soldier, weren’t you?” Gwen said. “Whom did you serve?”

  Prior Rhys scoffed under his breath and looked down at his hands as they rested on the bedcovers. “Gareth spoke to me of your intelligence. I should have listened.” He took in a breath and let it out. “You have asked the right question, my dear. Empress Maud was my mistress.”

  Mari’s hand gripped Hywel’s, and Hywel found that his feet were fixed to the floor. The silence stretched out for a long count of ten, and then Gwen spoke again. “You’re part of this somehow, aren’t you? You were involved even before we rode through the gates of the castle.”

  “Did you join my retinue because you still work for the empress?” Hywel found himself struggling to push down a rising anger that the prior had kept this from him. He swallowed hard, acknowledging that his anger had less to do with the secrets Prior Rhys had kept than his own hurt pride at not knowing them already.

  “No.” Prior Rhys eased back into the pillows. “As you may recall, it was you who asked me to join your company.”

  “But you said ‘yes,’” Hywel said.

  Prior Rhys’s eyes flashed. “Because you asked.”

  “You weren’t worried that you might meet some of your old compatriots?” Gwen shifted on the bed, easing back from Prior Rhys to give him more space.

  “Years have passed,” Prior Rhys said. “Men die, they move on, and I have changed in appearance and vocation. Besides, even if I did encounter someone I knew before, why would it matter? I swear to you that my involvement with what is happening at Newcastle is as a bystander only.”

  “Someone apparently doesn’t think so,” Hywel said.

  Prior Rhys lifted one shoulder. “I cannot account for that. I have had no contact with any of the empress’s men since I left.”

  “Why did you leave royal service?” Gwen said.

  A flash of a smile. “Leave it to you to wonder that, Gwen. In all these years, the only man who ever asked me why I left was the former prior of the monastery. I put him off with a piece of the truth—that I was aging, that I was tired of war. I didn’t tell him all, not even the man to whom I owe so much.” He contemplated her face. “I wonder that I am considering telling you.”

  Hywel could feel Mari holding her breath beside him. None of them moved or said anything. Prior Rhys looked past Gwen to Hywel, but he didn’t focus on his face. Hywel thought Prior Rhys wasn’t seeing him as much as the ghost of what had driven him to the Church.

  “For many years, I was a warrior,” Rhys said. “I fought in battles. I killed more men than I can count. Their faces hover before my eyes each night when I pray. But even I could not stomach the conflict that I saw coming between Stephen and Maud. From the moment Prince William’s ship went down, war was inevitable.”

  “You didn’t leave then, though,” Mari said.

  “My dear,” Prior Rhys said. “It wasn’t that simple.”

  In response, Mari released Hywel’s hand so she could lean forward and take Prior Rhys’s. Hywel flexed his fingers, missing the warmth of her hand in his.

  “I acted only when my loss of honor weighed on me more heavily than I could bear.” Then Prior Rhys blinked and hitched himself straighter on the bed.

  “Empress Maud must have been none too pleased at your departure,” Hywel said. “I confess I’m having trouble believing that your current circumstance has nothing to do with your past.”

  “Or the way you left,” Gwen said.

  “I thought we agreed that the man disabled me because he wanted to steal David’s body?” Prior Rhys said.

  “Maybe what we should be asking is why you wanted to watch over David.” Hywel’s anger had receded, which meant he was starting to think.

  “Wasn’t it my duty as a servant of God?” Prior Rhys said.

  A second question. If Gareth were here, he would have said that Prior Rhys was trying to deflect Hywel. Hywel leaned forward, a hand on the bedpost. “Then tell me the truth, as a man of God, Rhys.”

  “I have told more truth to you today than I have ever told anybody.”

  “And yet you now evade,” Hywel said. “Was David one of the men you used to know, before you left the empress’s service?”

  “My lord, surely—” Prior Rhys put his fist to his mouth and coughed.

  “Please don’t prevaricate,” Hywel said. “You know what I am asking.”

  Hywel thought he wasn’t going to answer, but then Prior Rhys dropped his hand to the bedcovers in a gesture of resignation. “Yes, I knew him.”

  “You knew him when you served the empress?” Hywel said.

  “Yes.”

  The truth came to Hywel in a flash of understanding, in the time it took for each of them to breathe in and out once. “You were one of them, weren’t you? You were one of the four horsemen.”

  Prior Rhys’s brow furrowed. “The what?”

  Gwen’s hand had gone to her mouth. “Were you? Is Prince Hywel right?”

  Prior Rhys turned his gaze on Gwen. “You know nothing of what you speak.”

  “But you do. You were more than a warrior. You spied for Empress Maud. Tell me I’m wrong.” Hywel had allowed a hint of admiration to creep into his voice, and he glared at Prior Rhys to compensate for it. “We already know some of the story from another source, more than you might think.”

  Prior Rhys looked away, towards the door, as if wishing he could get up and walk through it. Then he nodded. “I would have preferred never to speak of this again because it was never my intent to be a spy or to be involved in the doings of the royal court at all. This legend that Empress Maud has cultivated is … abhorrent. ” Rhys’s regret seemed genuine. “I wish the subterfuge and enmity she fostered had ended with my departure. I tried to make it so, but I failed.”
>
  “Your three fellow horsemen continued in her service up until this very day,” Gwen said. “You should know, however, that David and John died today, and Alard is accused of murdering them both.”

  Prior Rhys shook his head. “I don’t see—” He stopped, lifting his chin and looking straight at Hywel. “I told you the truth when I said that I have had no involvement—no contact—with any of them since I joined the monastery. I knew when I left that it would be hard on all of us, and it would be better to cut all ties. They were my brothers, and I abandoned them when they needed me the most.”

  “You were following your heart,” Mari said.

  “I was a warrior,” Prior Rhys said. “I left my brothers to fend for themselves, and I cannot forgive myself for that.” He pointed at Hywel. “You’ve fought battles; you know what it’s like to depend on other men and trust them.”

  “I do know,” Hywel said, “but it would be a cruel day when I chose to fake my own death rather than serve my liege lord, as you faked yours … Peter.”

  “Ah.” Prior Rhys gave a low, mocking laugh. “You already know about that.”

  “We do,” Hywel said.

  “How could you?” Gwen said.

  Prior Rhys held her gaze. “All I can tell you is that I did what I felt was necessary.”

  “All the more reason to wonder who injured you today and why,” Hywel said.

  “Are you suggesting that one of my former colleagues recognized me in the few minutes we were in the bailey, before David fell, and bore a serious enough grudge against me all this time that he felt it necessary to nearly murder me?” Prior Rhys said.

  “You tell me,” Hywel said.

  “Perhaps someone did,” Rhys said, “but whatever I did was done a long time ago, and you said yourself that John and David are dead. Alard left the castle by rope. My assailant can be none of them.”

  “Would another have a grievance?” Hywel said. “As a spy, you must have made enemies.”

  “Of course,” Rhys said, “but none that I know of who are here today and who would steal David’s body. I swear to you, the reason behind David’s death is a mystery to me.”

  “What if you were to encounter Empress Maud?” Gwen said.

  “She is here?” For the first time in their conversation, Prior Rhys looked genuinely concerned.

  “Gareth has gone off to speak with her, at her request,” Gwen said.

  “Empress Maud is—”Rhys ran a hand through his hair, not finishing the thought.

  “She never forgets or forgives, or so I hear,” Hywel said.

  Prior Rhys waved a hand dismissively. “Even if she learns of my existence, it shouldn’t concern her. Alard was always her favorite. She used me but cared for my well-being only in that I was willing to do her bidding. She sent me to serve Earl Robert in England almost immediately upon my joining her retinue.”

  “If you were associated with Earl Robert, have you been to Newcastle before?” Mari had been silent a long time, but her question was one Hywel himself hadn’t thought to ask. Another reason to be glad she was in the room.

  “Oddly, yes,” Rhys said. “We—the four horsemen, if you must call us that—established our base at a farmhouse on the other side of the Lyme Brook.”

  Hywel’s attention sharpened. “A farmhouse? Is it still there?”

  “I wouldn’t know.”

  “That should have been the first place we looked for Alard.” Hywel turned to Gwen. “Why didn’t Amaury mention it?”

  “Perhaps he doesn’t know of its existence,” Prior Rhys said. “It was ours—we chose it and stocked it for our benefit. Perhaps my former companions continued to keep it a secret to all but a few confidants, of whom Amaury wasn’t one.”

  “You didn’t even tell Earl Robert?” Gwen said.

  “Not specifically.” Prior Rhys glanced at her. “You think that’s odd, don’t you? But he made it clear that he didn’t want to know the details of our activities, and I rarely saw him anyway. It was his spymaster who held my reins, though he drowned before I left, and you would be right to think that I chose to make my departure on the heels of his death.”

  Mari had been picking at the ends of Prior Rhys’s blanket while she listened. She’d appeared less overtly focused on the conversation than Gwen and Hywel, but her head came up at Rhys’s last words. “Say that again? Your spymaster drowned—?”

  “Yes, my dear,” Rhys said.

  “What was his name?” Mari said.

  Prior Rhys’s brow furrowed, but he answered civilly enough. “The man I served, before his untimely death, was Ralph de Lacy.”

  “But how can that be?” Mari swallowed hard. “Ralph de Lacy, if we are speaking of the same man, was my father.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Gareth

  Gareth again rode from the gate with Amaury and his men. This time, instead of continuing down the road to the Lyme Brook, they dismounted before the friary door.

  “Tell me again why the empress isn’t staying at the castle?” Gareth said. “Surely it’s much better fortified against attack.”

  Amaury shot him a wary look. “She has her reasons.”

  “She isn’t concerned that Earl Robert might be wavering in his loyalty, is she?” Gareth said.

  “Not that I am aware,” Amaury said.

  “Then why isn’t she staying at the castle?” Gareth said, pressing him a little. He’d felt from the start that nobody, including Amaury, was telling him the whole truth and was determined to find out what was really going on. If that meant asking a few direct questions and offending a few Normans, so be it.

  “She is a pious woman,” Amaury said. “She likes having a church near.”

  Gareth stared at Amaury, who colored and looked away. He was openly lying now, and they both knew it. What Gareth couldn’t figure out was why. For the first time since he’d arrived at Newcastle, he felt a trickle of fear. Dismounting among the men who had escorted him and Amaury to the friary, he wondered if he’d chosen to ride a different way—back to the Welsh camp, for example—they would have stopped him.

  Amaury gestured Gareth inside without saying anything more. The friary occupied higher ground to the southeast of the castle but was a less elaborate construction. A head-high wall separated the road from the main buildings of the friary.

  They led their horses through the gate and into a cobbled, square courtyard. The chapel, cloister, monks’ dormitory, and meeting hall filled the northern and western side of the square. The stables were to their east, abutting the road, and to the northeast, the courtyard opened onto gardens, a cemetery, and green fields with scattered outbuildings beyond.

  A boy in sandals and a worn robe ran to take their horses, and then Amaury led Gareth through a narrow door into a central dining hall.

  “I must leave you for a short while,” Amaury said. “Please wait for me here.”

  Given the awkwardness of their previous exchange, Gareth didn’t ask for more information and halted in the middle of the floor. Amaury left the room through a far door and closed it behind him. Left alone, Gareth gazed after him, wondering what might come next and feeling slightly better about whether or not he might end the day in chains. The fear had abated, replaced by curiosity and a sense of righteousness. These Normans thought they could intimidate him; he was going to prove them wrong.

  He clasped his hands behind his back, settling into position to wait. Gareth had only stood silent for a single count of twenty, however, when the door behind him opened. He turned to see two young boys dash into the room. The first pulled up short at the sight of Gareth, causing the second to stumble into him.

  The boys recovered quickly, and the first boy said in heavily accented French, “Who are you?”

  Gareth peered at him. If he wasn’t mistaken, the accent came from Gwynedd. “You’re Welsh, aren’t you?” he said in that language. “What are your names?”

  “You first.” The second boy folded his arms across his chest and st
uck out his chin.

  Gareth managed to hide his amusement at the boy’s defiant stance and saw no reason to hide his identity. “I am Gareth ap Rhys, a knight in the company of Prince Hywel of Gwynedd.”

  The boys hesitated, and Gareth wondered if he’d misjudged their origins. Then they both began to speak at once in Welsh.

  “We heard that you—”

  “Our father was a merchant from—”

  Gareth held up his hands to stop the barrage and signaled the boys to come closer. He bent at the waist, his hands resting on his knees, to look into the younger boy’s face. “One at a time. Tell me your name.”

  “I’m Dai, and this is my brother, Llelo,” the first boy said, while his brother nodded. “Our father was a merchant; he traveled through England and Wales, even to London, selling our wool. This was my first trip with him.” Dai stopped, looking all of a sudden like he might cry.

  With a glance at his brother and a gentle hand on his shoulder, Llelo took up the story. “We’d stopped here at the friary for the night. My father and I had stayed with the monks in the past because they bought our wool. We didn’t have wool to sell yet, you understand? We were just collecting orders.”

  Gareth nodded. Sheep outnumbered people in Wales by a large margin, and a good merchant maintained his ties with his customers from year to year. Most shearing occurred in the spring, culminating in festivals in June throughout Wales. “Where is your father?”

  “He died, that first night here, in his sleep.” Llelo imparted this information without emotion or expression.

  Gareth looked at him closely. “I’m sorry to hear that. When was this?”

  “St. Dafydd’s Day,” Dai said.

  “That was over two months ago!” Gareth said. “And your mother?”

  “Run off years ago.” Llelo shrugged, masking his anxiety by renewing his tough façade. Given his height, Gareth guessed him to be a year or two older than his brother. Gareth had acted the same at that age when he’d spoken of his losses.