Crown in Candlelight

by Rosemary Hawley Jarman

  ‘And I’ll be your cup-bearer!’ cried Owen, ‘and serve you even though you keep me my feet all night!’

  The branch caught as he spoke, burning hotly. The Lord smiled at last. ‘Your father bred a fine boy, Owen. What say you, Hywelis?’

  ‘Not a boy.’ She raised her face. ‘A man.’

  ‘I’ll go and tell the bard,’ said Owen. He left with the dead birds over his shoulder, their beaks dropping blood the length of the hall.

  ‘Your face is red, Hywelis,’ said Glyn Dwr.

  ‘It’s the fire.’

  ‘Is it?’ The Lord examined his own hands, watching them tremble slightly They had been steady at Craig-y-Dorth. They had shaken after Grosmont.

  ‘I saw Gruffydd today’ he whispered.

  ‘So did I.’ Hywelis dropped her head on his knee. ‘Not a moment ago, in the smoke.’

  ‘All my sons … save one. And Gruffydd was the dearest, my edling, my heir. And Meredyth seldom comes, though he upholds my name in Deheubarth. We are still rebels, Hywelis.’

  The trembling extended throughout his body. The old dog awoke and whined.

  ‘Margaret came to me, so sorrowful. And Cathryn, and Alice, and Rhys ap Gethin, and I knew not who was dead and who was wandered away.’

  ‘I have wandered from you myself,’ she said sadly.

  ‘But you always return. Diolch I Dduw!’

  ‘From today I promise to stay in hall,’ she said, wild regret striking with her words. She did not give promises lightly. Now she surrendered delight; the dawnlit stealthy ramblings, the stroking of young rabbits too trusting to run, the sight of eagles at play, throwing a heather-root to one another in mid-air. But Glyn Dwr shook his head.

  ‘I would not have you other than you are. Your mother was a hill-woman, a faery-woman, and her spirit became yours at her death. It is not for me to imprison you for loving your wild kingdom.’

  ‘Father, my heart and love is yours, you know it.’

  ‘For ever,’ he said in a queer harsh voice. ‘To be given to none other. Pure as light you are, Hywelis, and your eyes will see what is hidden, so long as you cleave only to me. You are rare. Gentle. Fierce. Though you are not like the women of my generation, who became wild beasts after Bryn Glas, when Mortimer and his army were captured. You were too young to see what they did …’

  ‘They castrated the Saeson prisoners,’ said Hywelis flatly. ‘I remember Megan coming home, blood to the elbows, and laughing.’

  ‘We were desperately provoked. Had I been crowned Prince of Wales and recognized in Westminster; had Grey, God’s curse on him, not—’

  ‘Father, my lord, leave it. It’s done.’

  ‘It is never done!’ he said wildly. ‘And some day, girl, you will point me to another comet. Your sight will show me new victory. So long as you are pure and love me only. For the giant must die when his daughter marries …’

  Suddenly her heart contracted. She said: ‘That’s a legend I do not know.’

  ‘Then,’ said Glyn Dwr rising, suddenly tall and terrible, ‘we will have Owen ap Meredyth ap Tydier tell it to us both.’ The old dog staggered on to its legs. She knew then that the Lord was jealous; it was more than a father’s jealousy, it was a warning, and she was lost in it. ‘I’ll change my clothes,’ he said. ‘This night we’ll be merry. We’ll damn the Saeson, and tell the old tales, and drink to our lovers. I’ll call their souls from Hell to our hearthstone. Girl, tend the fire!’

  Megan, who with her countrywomen had tortured the English prisoners twelve years earlier, now helped Hywelis dress for the Lord’s impromptu revel. Megan was black of hair and eye, stern and wiry. She had been body-servant to the lady Margaret and now acted as a chatelaine and cook, servant and hostess. She was changed, like all others in Glyn Dwr’s meinie, from the sentry on the gate that once welcomed all to the rough ponies in the stable built for the destriers of war. She stripped Hywelis of the bloodstained rags and plunged her into a tub of hot water redolent of gillyflower essence. Hywelis sat fretfully watching her whiteness redden, wrinkling her nose. Megan washed her hair, rubbing it dry as Hywelis stood naked, shivering in the air that blew through the arrow-slits.

  ‘Here.’ Megan tugged with a horn comb. ‘You do it. I’ve not the patience.’

  Hywelis caught their reflections in the burnished silver mirror. She fancied Megan looked sour and sneering, and remembered that she had once loved the Lord with a desperate passion and likely still did.

  ‘Your father says you are to be royally robed tonight;’ said Megan.

  The giant must die when his daughter marries. Was she then to be always the precious vessel of his power? Was there more to it than she knew? She met Megan’s eyes in the silver. Then the woman laughed, the tension fading from her face.

  ‘It’s nothing,’ she said. ‘I was only thinking … how young you are, how beautiful your body. Repining that age has me now, and I kick against it.’

  ‘I’m still the same,’ said Hywelis. ‘Just a dirty, wild, woodland girl.’

  ‘Not dirty now!’ said Megan with emphasis. ‘Here, I’ll find you a gown.’

  A strange spring of excitement started in Hywelis. She looked down at her own body, amazed. Megan, who had no great love for her, had called it beautiful, and she was now determined to make herself as much a thing of beauty as possible. Tonight Owen would sing, and the song would unravel a fresh mystery, plant new signposts … Silk over Megan’s arm, silk the colour of old leaves, laced with tarnished gold. She swirled it into a cave for Hywelis, drew it over her body. Her skin took on amber shadows. There was a narrow gold girdle which snaked twice about her waist and fell in tassels to her knee. Megan lit candles and Hywelis leaned to the mirror. Out of the gloom her face bloomed like a strange milky flower, her eyes reflecting the dress and the dusk. Enormous eyes through which the sad past spoke, yesterday and all the days before it, the mourning of widows, the crying of children; the lament of lovers lost. Even the screams of horses mutilated on the field of battle. The eyes filled and the dolorous images were washed away. All but one; for the hands that now tended her hair were real, and what had those hands once done?

  ‘Did you enjoy it, Megan?’ she heard herself say ‘Did your blade give glory? They were men …’

  ‘They were our enemy,’ said Megan briskly. ‘And it was long ago. Are you ready?’

  Hywelis stood up, slender as a knife, the gold tassels swaying on her thigh.

  ‘Who wore this dress last?’

  ‘The Lord’s daughter Cathryn. She’ll not need it where she is.’ Hywelis bowed before the mirror in mourning and in gratitude; then, casting one last look she saw sadness changed to recklessness, and the dream in bud.

  The Lord was talking with a neighbour on his dais. Another departure, for he seldom invited guests these days. His hair and moustaches were sleek and he wore a gown of soft green wool with a gold collar set with beryls. His bard stood nearby. The bard, whose title was Gruffydd Llwyd ap Dafydd ap Einion Lygliw was neither old nor young, but as he had never in his life had his beard trimmed, it hung unclean and sandy-grey to his waist where it was tucked into the girdle of a soiled purple mantle, and gave him the appearance of great age, He was at present offended, for the Lord had been recalling the art of the late Iolo Goch and the Nightingale of Dyfed, lecherous as a sparrow, thought Gruffydd Llwyd sourly; one would think there had never been any other bards but those two, and doubtless they had been wafted to paradise on sheaves of their peerless couplets and stanzas. Still, this place was a living in hand, with most of the noble households of Wales split or overturned … Then Glyn Dwr turned to him and smiled and before that warmth his rancour fled instantly and he knew he remained at Glyndyfrdwy not for convenience but like all others, through love.

  Hywelis entered, the Lord’s eyes brightened with pleasure, for she was the faery-woman reborn, so fine and fair, and came from his place to take her hands. The bard looked uncertain, wondering for an instant who she was, then saw it was merely Hywe
lis, scrubbed and bedizened, and taking down his little sycamore harp from its nail, he teased a sweet chord from it in her honour.

  ‘You’re beautiful, my daughter,’ said the Lord. ‘Lili’r môr!’

  And it was so long since he had called her this, his lily of the sea, that she felt her eyes grow hot and controlled herself, for here came Owen, who thought her strange. She would be strange no longer; she was fair and a lady. The Lord was holding something out to her, a coil of gold plaited like the water sliding off the rocks just before it reached the basin beneath Eglwyseg Mountain.

  ‘This is the torque my wife Margaret wore,’ he said softly. ‘Welsh gold, mined two centuries ago in Tanat Vale. Take it in memory of the power and the blood we share, Hywelis. With this gift I bind you. Lift up your hair.’

  She lifted the red fall at the nape of her neck and the Lord fastened the torque about it. He kissed her, and she knew that in truth she was his last link with splendour. Through her eyes which had foreseen honourable death for Iolo Goch, he would live again to ride his horses of the wind. So he put his destiny upon her spirit’s sight, and she sighed, feeling the weight of his trust, Then Owen, brilliant of eye and dressed in a sky-blue doublet, fashionable and sleek as a St Valentine’s Day bird, was beside them, ready to sing, and now, if he had his way. She stood between the two of them both looking down at her, one burdening her with his intense love, the other curious, stirred by her new glamour and some secret mischief. An irrepressible light seemed to burn around Owen; he began to talk to the Lord, telling him about the eagle.

  Glyn Dwr frowned. ‘Then the bird was flying low? That’s bad for Wales when the eagles stoop.’

  ‘It was after prey,’ Owen said. ‘Madog, Hywelis’s fox.’

  The Lord was intrigued. ‘A fox? But Madog is a prince’s name. Madog ap Maredudd sired Gwenllian, who became the bride of the mighty Rhys, two hundred years ago …’ He stopped, saying abruptly: ‘Let us begin.’

  A menestr approached with a tray of flagons, its rim hung with drinking-horns, and behind him two boys rolled a kilderkin of strong drink, setting it upright at the top table. With great ceremonial, the like of which had not been seen since Sycharth days, Owen served the Lord and his company. Hywelis drank: the liquid’s surface was luminous with honey, as if a long summer were distilled in it, and the sweetness had an aching bite, like the sting of an angry summer bee.

  ‘Bragod mead,’ said the bard. ‘The best I ever tasted.’

  ‘Megan brewed it,’ said Glyn Dwr, with a bow towards her where she sat at the far end of the table. He raised his horn. ‘Iechyd da, Megan! All cheer, my jewel!’ and her dark face flamed. They ate a vast rabbit pie, savoury roast fowl. Owen stood behind the Lord’s chair, replenishing the horns with a dipper from the barrel, so that Hywelis’s cheeks burned and she found beauty in the sight of her own long fingers clasped about her knife and in the dying sunset as it painted the window recesses with rose. The Lord charmed her with conversation. Not for months had she seen him so uplifted. Then Owen, leaning between them to serve, pressed her thigh lightly but deliberately with his and she jerked upright. His face, the heavy-lidded eyes seriously downcast as he poured the drink, came between her and the Lord’s stark profile. The honey of his touch ran through her. She smiled at the Lord, and longed to say: ‘Father, let Owen sing!’

  Instead, Gruffydd Llwyd rose, and with his little harp wandered to the stool placed in the centre of the hall. Cafall, under the table, growled; he hated music in all forms and would have been pleased to bite the bard. But then, as he could no longer even bite the bone between his paws, he sighed deeply and went to sleep.

  ‘I shall sing extempore,’ announced Gruffydd Llwyd, looking severely in the direction of the growl. ‘About that animal’s wonderful ancestor, King Arthur’s own dog Cafall. There is a mountain in Llanfair-ym-Muallt in Brecon, where Cafall and the king went hunting … there was never such a dog before or since.’

  Hywelis felt so sorry for the ancient descendant that she woke him and fed him a soppet of bread soaked in mead, and he laid his heavy head on her foot in gratitude.

  ‘The dog was so strong that when he touched the mountain top his paw left a deep hollow. King Arthur, in homage, built a cairn over the hollow and placed a stone on top. He named the mountain Cefn Carn Cafall, the ridge of Cafall’s stone. If the stone is moved away, it will always return, and of this I shall sing.’

  And he did.

  The Lord, tapping his old bright hands on the board, gave unaccustomed attention to the bard’s long-drawn phrases with the spills of melody in between. Encouraged, Gruffydd Llwyd prolonged the song-story for an hour, wrenching metaphors from the tale as a thrush drags a worm from the ground. Miraculously the lines scanned and held an undisciplined beauty. He sang of forest and valley, of a ring-dove half-awake on its bough, its hunched wings like the cowl of a monk; of the woodcock like a black Dominican friar; of blackbird and nightingale singing together like two priests. He was proper in his similes and orientated to God, though, carried away towards the end, he did tell of the trees and May bright payment to lovers, florins of green and silver leaves. There was much applause.

  These were the things Hywelis knew best, but in the meadhall they were only words, coloured by the bard’s reedy voice. Her attention wandered to where Megan sat, a look of unutterable sadness on her face. Megan wished for youth again, for beauty and bloodless innocence. Hywelis felt the vibrations of regret, of stifled shame. For to the conqueror, past deeds, however bloody, give glory; to the defeated they are added burdens. The spoiled corpses mount up, saying sadly: We were doubly wasted! You were unworthy, and it was all for nothing!

  She shivered, and just then Owen came to fill her cup. He leaned close, so close that she could see the gold rings of his eyes, and he whispered, his cheeks cleft with a wicked smile: ‘Praise God that’s over! a heron makes a prettier noise, and knows when to stop!’ And he drew his fingers over the nape of her neck under her hair, and whispered again: ‘Hywelis … Hywelis …’ moving on to fill her neighbour’s vessel in the same breath. Only her name but enough to bring heat where there was shivering, and then a void as he went away. Graceful and. tall and young, he went behind the trestle, ministering with his pitcher of enchantment. Then she felt Glyn Dwr’s eyes upon her. She met them nervously. He smiled, and then began talking with his neighbour, a white-haired marcher lord, going over old terrain.

  ‘I thought when the tripartite indenture was signed, our troubles would be ended and I could stand in Wales as true king. My Cathryn brought over Mortimer to that end; a worthy enemy and a better son-in-law. Henry Percy too—all was set fair with his allegiance, but the spears of Shrewsbury field had him …’

  ‘All dead,’ said the old marcher lord. ‘It’s one gate that a man goes through with no returning. No bolts or bars; the gate has vanished, and he with it.’

  ‘Where did we go wrong?’

  ‘Blame the French, who betrayed you, who ran home eight years ago, for all the gold and honours you pledged them to fight against the Saeson. Every one a milain!’ He spat over the trestle.

  ‘What can one expect, with a madman at their head?’ Just then the bard came from refreshing himself, combing bits of meat from his beard.

  ‘Shall I give you more entertainment, Lord?’

  In the same breath the neighbour said, leaning kindly: ‘Your girl is lovely tonight, Owain!’

  The Lord’s deep eyes surveyed her again. Yes, he knew her mind.

  ‘And she would rather have Owen ap Meredyth sing, which he does well,’ he said. Instantly Owen came before him, standing beside the bard, who seemed much put out.

  ‘Did I not please?’ said Gruffydd Llwyd, and Owen answered instead of the Lord; so sweetly that the taunt was almost hidden. ‘It was like some wonderful bird, sir … like the Nightingale of Dyfed …’

  The bard was enraged. ‘Dafydd ap Gwilym was carnal,’ he said. ‘Even I recall the disgrace of his in an English inn—wooing the tap
wenches, falling over stools at midnight, leaping through windows in only his shirt …’

  Owen chuckled, and the Lord held up his hand. ‘You did well, Sir Gruffydd Llwyd, and we love you. As for Dafydd, he sleeps easy at Strata Florida, under the yew tree. You live on. This youth can learn from you. Let him sing. Owen, a tale of the Mabinogion …’

  The bard was appeased. ‘One of the Four Branches, Lord? He could tell of Bran and Branwen.’

  ‘No,’ said the Lord. ‘We will hear of Culhwch and Olwen.’

  Owen took the harp and sat on the little stool directly below Hywelis. His eyes seemed to gather up all the light from the torches and candles, channelling it directly into hers. He struck the first phrase, and Hywelis felt her spirit drawn towards him on the shining ray that linked them and on the thread of his singing.

  He had a peculiar sweet voice with a keen edge, lacking the formal cadences of the bards, and his hands on the harp were sure. There was drama in him, and he limned his characters with care so that they rose from word and note and moved through shadows into the sight of the silent audience.

  ‘Ysbaddaden Chief-Giant was as tall as a tower, as thick round the middle as the boles of twelve oak trees. When he stood upright he blotted out the sun from three counties. His outspread arms would reach to London on the one hand, while with the other he could stir the sea around Ireland. Where he kicked the ground, mountains arose. If he spat in the sea, the water boiled. His hair was like the mane of forty lions, and hung, ungovernable, to his waist; none could dress it. No armies could defeat him; steel crumpled, fire lost heart, kings went mad at sight of his eyes. Ysbaddaden! you were greater than God!

  ‘Then one day came Culhwch, cousin to Arthur. Culhwch was without sin, his armour bright as starlight; he was chaste and noble as a singing mountain. He was fleeter of foot than the magic deer of Powys Fadog, and handsome as the dawn.

  ‘When he was born, a witch prophesied that he would never marry unless he could win the hand of the giant’s daughter. He rode to the court of his cousin the king. His horse was the colour of mother-of-pearl, its head was graceful as the serpent’s. It had hooves like pale-pink shells and wore a gold saddle and bridle. In one hand Culhwch bore two silver spears and in the other a battle-axe, whose blade was the length of a grown man from edge to edge. And he wore the gold sword with a jewelled blade, every jewel mined from a sacred mountain. His weapons could draw blood from the breeze. Not a hair stirred on him as he rode, so light was the horse’s step.’