“I want to know more about Lee and what he’d been doing the last three months,” Mom said. “What was his overall goal? Why did he set off that bomb?”
“I’ve been wondering that myself,” Dad said.
David had been avoiding thinking about Lee, and with all that had happened, it hadn’t been hard to do. But now he sighed. “In regards to your first question, Mom, I don’t know any more than you. I suspect that MI-5 will be doing quite a bit of backtracking in the coming weeks. But as to why he set off the bomb—did you hear what he said, Dad, there at the end?”
Dad frowned. “Something about you being his ticket? I didn’t understand what he meant.”
“I think Lee misunderstood the nature of our time traveling.” Something oily and unpleasant twisted in David’s stomach, counteracting the very good meal he’d eaten. “He was right that I would time travel if my life was endangered in the explosion, but I’m pretty sure he thought he would travel with me.”
“I can’t be sorry,” Mom said. “I know that’s wrong of me.”
“Lee killed people.” David sighed. “He was mistaken if he thought he wouldn’t have paid for his crimes here too.”
“He thought you were soft,” Dad said. “People should stop underestimating you.”
David shrugged. “I won’t always be a punk kid.”
Mom laughed into her drink. “You weren’t ever a punk kid.”
“That reminds me—” Dad rose to his feet, holding out his goblet before him. “If Lord Math would allow me to impose on his hospitality for a moment, I’d like to propose a toast.”
Math nodded at Hywel, who tinged the little bell that rested on the side table for just this purpose. Anna shot a warning look at Cadell, who stopped running and straightened up. As a child growing up in a medieval hall, he had learned when he was supposed to sit quietly while his elders spoke. With a few snaps of his fingers, he had the rest of the children finding their way to a bench or a friendly lap. Arthur crawled into David’s. At three and a half, he was thrilled to have a younger brother and had already begged his Uncle Math to make the baby a wooden sword so they could play together.
Dad waited until the hall was silent, and then he lifted his glass again. “To my newest grandson and prince of Wales, Alexander Rhodri.”
“Alexander Rhodri ,” murmured everyone in the hall. In solemn silence, they drank, and then Dad sat down and the buzz of talk and laughter started again.
Callum, who was sitting on the other side of David from Dad, put down his glass. “Sire—”
David forestalled him, smiling. “Rhodri Mawr was a great king of Gwynedd, and King Alexander II of Scotland was my supposed great-grandfather. But really, you should know that I’ve named my son for you.”
“But—”
Cassie, who was sitting on the other side of Callum, put her hand on Callum’s arm. “It’s a perfectly good name, and somebody should use it if you won’t.”
David had told Cassie what he planned, wanting to make sure in advance that Callum would accept his choice for the honor it was.
Callum was still looking stunned. “You should not be naming your son after me, my lord. Mathonwy or Ieuan—”
“—are both completely unpronounceable to the English. I’m the King of England. In this, I can do as I like.” David lowered his voice. “Besides, I can’t give him a name that is shared by any of my Welsh or Norman lords. The ones left out would view it as a slight on them—not that I could possibly tolerate a Prince Gilbert or Prince Humphrey anyway.” David shuddered theatrically.
Callum smiled, and David could tell he was truly touched. David could think of few things that could do more to show Callum how much he meant to him than the naming of his son.
Then Callum’s brow furrowed, and he said with an air of suspicion, “Naming your son after a king of Scotland couldn’t have anything to do with the little altercation we witnessed today in Whittington, could it?”
“I’d named him before you arrived, and besides, I mentioned to Cassie before we went to Avalon that I wanted to name my son Alexander. Isn’t that right, Cassie?”
She held up three fingers. “Scout’s honor.”
“But now that you mention it—” David sat back in his chair with a smile of satisfaction on his face, “—I like the message it sends.”
“Everyone will assume your purpose is to remind Balliol and his allies that you have a claim to the Scottish throne should you choose to press the issue,” Callum said.
“They will, won’t they?” David grinned. “And then there’s this business with France.” He looked to where Geoffrey de Geneville sat at a far end of the table, currently speaking to Bronwen, who could charm anyone with her smile—though David was pretty sure she didn’t know it. She had always been one of his secret weapons at court.
“Don’t tell me you’re thinking about going to France to meet King Philip as he asked?” Callum said. “The last time you and I boarded a boat together didn’t turn out too well.”
“It did in the end.” David felt suitably chastened about the time traveling, but he was feeling more than a little satisfied about how his day had turned out. He raised his cup to his friend. “France, here we come.”
The End
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Keep reading for a sample from The Good Knight, the first book in another series set in medieval Wales, currently free at all venues:
The Good Knight
Intrigue, suspicion, and rivalry among the royal princes casts a shadow on the court of Owain, king of north Wales…
The year is 1143 and King Owain seeks to unite his daughter in marriage with an allied king. But when the groom is murdered on the way to his wedding, the bride’s brother tasks his two best detectives—Gareth, a knight, and Gwen, the daughter of the court bard—with bringing the killer to justice.
And once blame for the murder falls on Gareth himself, Gwen must continue her search for the truth alone, finding unlikely allies in foreign lands, and ultimately uncovering a conspiracy that will shake the political foundations of Wales.
Sample: The Good Knight
Chapter One
August, 1143 AD
Gwynedd (North Wales)
“Look at you, girl.”
Gwen’s father, Meilyr, tsked under his breath and brought his borrowed horse closer to her side of the path. He’d been out of sorts since early morning when he’d found his horse lame and King Anarawd and his company of soldiers had left the castle without them, refusing to wait for Meilyr to find a replacement mount. Anarawd’s men-at-arms would have provided Meilyr with the fine escort he coveted.
“You’ll have no cause for complaint once we reach Owain Gwynedd’s court.” A breeze wafted over Gwen’s face and she closed her eyes, letting her pony find his own way for a moment. “I won’t embarrass you at the wedding.”
“If you cared more for your appearance, you would have been married yourself years ago and given me grandchildren long since.”
Gwen opened her eyes, her forehead wrinkling in annoyance. “And whose fault is it that I’m unmarried?” Her fingers flexed about the reins but she forced herself to relax. Her present appearance was her own doing, even if her father found it intolerable. In her bag, she had fine clothes and ribbons to weave through her hair, but saw no point in sullying any of them on the long journey to Aber Castle.
King Owain Gwynedd’s daughter was due to marry King Anarawd in three days’ time. Owain Gwynedd had invited Gwen, her father, and her almost twelve-year-old brother, Gwalchmai, to furnish the entertainment for the event, provided King Owain and her father could bridge the six years of animosity and silence that separated them. Meilyr had sung for King Owain’s father, Gruffydd; he’d p
ractically raised King Owain’s son, Hywel. But six years was six years. No wonder her father’s temper was short.
Even so, she couldn’t let her father’s comments go. Responsibility for the fact that she had no husband rested firmly on his shoulders. “Who refused the contract?”
“Rhys was a rapscallion and a laze-about,” Meilyr said.
And you weren’t about to give up your housekeeper, maidservant, cook, and child-minder to just anyone, were you?
But instead of speaking, Gwen bit her tongue and kept her thoughts to herself. She’d said it once and received a slap to her face. Many nights she’d lain quiet beside her younger brother, regretting that she hadn’t defied her father and stayed with Rhys. They could have eloped; in seven years, their marriage would have been as legal as any other. But her father was right and Gwen wasn’t too proud to admit it: Rhys had been a laze-about. She wouldn’t have been happy with him. Rhys’ father had almost cried when Meilyr had refused Rhys’ offer. It wasn’t only daughters who were sometimes hard to sell.
“Father!” Gwalchmai brought their cart to a halt. “Come look at this!”
“What now?” Meilyr said. “We’ll have to spend the night at Caerhun at present rate. You know how important it is not to keep King Owain waiting.”
“But Father!” Gwalchmai leapt from the cart and ran forward.
“He’s serious.” Gwen urged her pony after him, passing the cart, and then abruptly reined in beside her brother. “Mary, Mother of God…”
A slight rise and sudden dip in the path ahead had hidden the carnage until they were upon it. Twenty men and an equal number of horses lay dead in the road, their bodies contorted and their blood soaking the brown earth. Gwalchmai bent forward and retched into the grass beside the road. Gwen’s stomach threatened to undo her too, but she fought the bile down and dismounted to wrap her arms around her brother.
Meilyr reined in beside his children. “Stay back.”
Gwen glanced at her father and then back to the scene, noticing for the first time a man kneeling among the wreckage, one hand to a dead man’s chest and the other resting on the hilt of his sheathed sword. The man straightened and Gwen’s breath caught in her throat.
Gareth.
He’d cropped his dark brown hair shorter than when she’d known him, but his blue eyes still reached into the core of her. Her heart beat a little faster as she drank him in. Five years ago, Gareth had been a man-at-arms in the service of Prince Cadwaladr, King Owain Gwynedd’s brother. Gareth and Gwen had become friends, and then more than friends, but before he could ask her father for her hand, Gareth had a falling out with Prince Cadwaladr. In the end, Gareth hadn’t been able to persuade Meilyr that he could support her despite his lack of station.
Gwen was so focused on Gareth that she wasn’t aware of the other men among them—live ones—until they approached her family. A half dozen converged on them at the same time. One caught her upper arm in a tight grip. Another grabbed Meilyr’s bridle. “Who are you?” the soldier said.
Meilyr stood in the stirrups and pointed a finger at Gareth. “Tell them who I am!”
Gareth came forward, his eyes flicking from Meilyr to Gwalchmai to Gwen. He was broader in the shoulders, too, than she remembered.
“They are friends,” Gareth said. “Release them.”
And to Gwen’s astonishment, the man-at-arms who held her obeyed Gareth. Could it be that in the years since she’d last seen him, Gareth had regained something of what he’d lost?
Gareth halted by Meilyr’s horse. “I was sent from Aber to meet King Anarawd and escort him through Gwynedd. He wasn’t even due to arrive at Dolwyddelan Castle until today, but …” He gestured to the men on the ground. “Clearly, we were too late.”
Gwen looked past Gareth to the murdered men in the road.
“Turn away, Gwen,” Gareth said.
But Gwen couldn’t. The blood—on the dead men, on the ground, on the knees of Gareth’s breeches—mesmerized her. The men here had been slaughtered. Her skin twitched at the hate in the air. “You mean King Anarawd is—is—is among them?”
“The King is dead,” Gareth said.
________________
The Good Knight is currently free at all venues.
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Guardians of Time Page 27