They went down to the small beach for a time, and then Agravain sat with Lura for a long while, helping her knot the cords of a fishing net. Cai began to suspect that the man was avoiding the hall himself. Though Cai didn’t relish explaining how he knew who the visitors were—or rather, how they knew him—he felt compelled to warn Lura anyway. But from the moment they left the hall to the time for Lura’s lessons, Agravain didn’t leave his daughter’s presence.
So Cai found himself being led to Morgawse’s chambers with his gut in a twist and his ears pricked for signs of ambush. Ignorant of the danger in their midst, Lura and her father stopped before a heavy-looking wooden door and knocked. At the call of the muffled voice on the other side, Lura opened the door.
The scents of the chamber struck Cai’s senses like a maelstrom, bringing on memories of his sister, Mora. Herbs and bark. Mushrooms and moss. Beeswax from her hives, and honey harvested in every season. This chamber boasted a hearth fire with steaming pots, bundles of plants hanging from the beams. Vessels of clay and stone and woven reed, some lidded, others nearly overflowing. The room had more furniture than he’d known other women to possess, and soft-looking textures of wool and cloth were everywhere, signs of wealth and comfort.
Morgawse spoke, and he looked up to find her studying him. After a moment, she flicked a finger sidewise. The lead dragged across Cai’s fur as Lura handed it to her father, and then Agravain was tying the end of it to an iron ring near the door post. Cai’s body went briefly rigid when the man’s hand came to rest on his neck. Agravain’s voice, directed at mother or daughter, vibrated into Cai’s hide. Lura nodded, as did her grandmother, and then the weight of Agravain’s hand was gone. He closed the door behind him as he left.
“Wolf.” Lura held out one hand, flat, then lowered it.
Without thinking, he lay down on the cool stone floor.
Morgawse’s eyebrows rose, and she said something to her granddaughter. Cai allowed himself a huff of admiration for the lass. Her spine was as straight and strong as a good sword. If she wanted to show her mettle to her elders, he would play along. And as this position allowed him to observe the entire chamber, all the better.
“Come sit, and take up your combs,” Morgawse said in Cymrish. “I have a tale to tell you.”
Lura spun on her heel and dropped onto a low stool by the hearth. She drew a small pair of wooden carding combs from a basket. “About the Orcait?”
“No.” Morgawse settled with a soft grunt opposite her granddaughter. Their profiles looked like reflections in a still pond. “About my people—and yours—in Cymru.” She fished her own combs from the basket. “Do you recall your lesson about the traitor, Cai ap Matthias?”
Cai’s entire hide twitched, and he fought to keep his chin on his paws.
Lura scooped up a hank of wool and began to card it. “Of course. He is the older brother of Arthur the Bear. He tried to come between Arthur and his shieldmate.”
His claws curled against the flagstones. Did she know how—
“He told my grand-uncle Uthyr’s hall that he had seen Arthur rutting with a man.”
So she did know. That her father probably did too made Cai want to tunnel under a rock and stay there until he rotted to nothing more than a bad memory.
“And who did that man turn out to be?”
“My cousin Bedwyr.”
“And do we consider them wrong for their bond?”
“No. We believe they’re stronger for it. Like Uncle Gawain and the mercenary Palahmed. And Palahmed’s brother Safir and his man Morien.”
“Aye, very good.” Their combs clacked in rhythm for a few of Cai’s erratic heartbeats. Then Morgawse looked directly at Cai. “But the traitor didn’t stop there.”
Cai held her gaze, unblinking.
“You see, this Cai betrayed Cymru by crossing over to the Saxons. But not as a man.”
Lura’s rhythm faltered to a halt. “What do you mean?”
Morgawse leaned toward her, as if confiding a secret. “First, he shifted into a wolf.”
He would give Lura this: she didn’t flinch. Only watched her grandmother’s face as if she were hearing any fireside tale. But her small knuckles shone pale where she gripped the carding combs. “How?”
“You know how.”
Hold. What?
“The Bear’s brother Cai is a Saxon now? A…Saxon wolf?”
“No, he left their company.”
“Did he go back home to say he was sorry?”
Cai’s chest cramped.
“He did not. He ran away. In fact,” Morgawse said, “he fled north.”
Lura swiped her combs across one another. “How do you know this tale, Grandmother?”
“Can you keep a secret?”
“Aye.”
Morgawse smiled. “Of course you can. I know this tale, and I know it’s true, because our visitors are Saxons.”
Lura’s shoulders jumped at that. “Does Papa know?”
“He does not.”
“We have to tell—”
“Lura. What did you promise to do?”
Lura stared at her grandmother, her small chest rising on quick, shallow breaths. “To keep a secret.”
“A true daughter of the Orcait keeps her promises.”
“But they’re Saxons.”
“They’re potential allies.”
“But they could be lying!”
Cai’s heart sank. There was no reason for Lura to be so invested in the tale of a distant, unknown traitor unless she suspected she’d met him. Had been caring for him.
Her protest was as good as a confession.
“I think that’s enough carding—and lessons—for this afternoon,” Morgawse said. “I have an errand for you.”
Lura dropped her combs in the basket of wool and stood. “I need to take Wolf outside.”
“Wolf will be fine here. In fact, he seems to be trembling.” Morgawse turned that piercing gaze on him again, and then Lura followed, her dark eyes worried. “I’m going to mix a remedy for him and then keep a close eye on his condition. You’ll leave him with me overnight.”
Cai leapt to his feet, and Lura rushed over, slinging one arm around his neck. “But—”
“Lura.”
Her small body went rigid against his shoulder.
“Do you not believe I’ll take care of Wolf?”
“He needs to go outside.”
“Then outside he’ll go. I’ll take him myself.”
Cai saw in his mind’s eye the edge of the bluff, the crash of the surf against the rocky shore below, and the chill of the stone floor made his feet ache.
“Now. Go find Jorri, and tell him I wish to see him. After that, I’d like you to find your uncles. Do you understand?”
“Aye.”
“And you’ll keep our secret?”
A moment’s hesitation, then, “I will, Grandmother.”
Morgawse nodded and went back to combing the wool. “Off with you, then.”
Lura’s arm tightened around his neck. He wouldn’t let her get into trouble on his account, not anymore. He nudged her chin with his nose. Slowly, she let go, her eyes wide and unreadable.
Then she left the chamber without looking back, and he was alone with Morgawse.
The man Jorri arrived not long after. He said something to Morgawse in those blunt northern words, and when she replied, he untied Cai’s lead from the ring.
Morgawse crossed the chamber and looked down at him for the first time since Lura had left. “I know you can understand me. You can follow on your leash, or Jorri can carry you. Your choice. Don’t do anything foolish.”
Then they were leading him out of the chamber and down a corridor, Morgawse in front. They wound through several narrow passageways, though they passed no one, and Cai wondered at this place. How large was it? A man could get lost in it.
Eventually they stopped before a large wooden chest. Jorri pushed it across the ground, its fittings scraping ruts in the earth. Where it had sat was a trap door. Jorri lifted it to reveal a dark rectangular hole with stairs.
Morgawse shook his lead. “Will you descend on four feet or two?”
He stared at her as if he comprehended nothing.
She sighed. “Four it is. Take care, Jorri.”
“Yes, mistress.”
Morgawse stepped into the stairwell first, her lantern raised. As he watched her disappear into the ground, Cai’s bloodbeats marked his chances to escape. Now, when she was halfway in? Now, as the floor overtook her shoulders? Now, as her head dipped out of sight, the light dimming?
But he couldn’t make his feet move. Where would he run? He hadn’t been able to keep their route in his mind. He would surely be lost in no time.
He waited too long, and then Jorri was tugging his lead toward the stairs.
They were steep, cut into the very foundation of the island at a dizzying angle for someone on four legs. A rope ran down beside the steps, fastened to the stone wall by iron rings. Both humans held to it, but Cai would have to depend on careful footsteps alone.
By the time they stepped onto more level ground, his legs were shaking. The passage here was very narrow, scarcely wider than a man’s shoulders. If he’d been in his human form, he would’ve had to duck his head or risk knocking it on the stone ceiling. Morgawse led them through a few more turns, and then they came to a wooden door. She said something that made Jorri wrap Cai’s lead around his fist by another turn, and then she opened the door.
Blood. The scent made his fur rise from his ears to his tail. The smell was old, clammy and mineral with none of the richness of fresh, warm blood. But it was there, beyond the dark doorway.
He set his paws, refusing to enter the chamber. Morgawse had stepped inside, leaving them in the passageway. Jorri jerked on the lead, but Cai scrambled backward. The man growled and pulled harder. He was stronger than he looked, and Cai weaker than he wished, and Jorri dragged him across the threshold.
Morgawse stood in the middle of the rectangular chamber, watching him. After a moment, she said, “You smell it, don’t you?”
He tried not to shudder, but his hide gave him away.
She spoke to Jorri, who pulled him farther into the room. Before Cai knew what was happening, the man had fastened his lead to another iron ring.
“Wolf.”
He flinched and looked at Morgawse.
She lifted her lantern to the long wall behind her. The stone had marks on it, only…they weren’t just marks.
They were figures. Of men.
“Do you see them?” She waited as if he might answer her. “Each was a man. Each came to this chamber. None left it.”
There were ranks of them. Hundreds.
His legs began to shake again. Morgawse approached, her skirts swaying, pushing that smell of old blood into his nostrils.
“I know what you are. I could make you turn, but it would cause you grave injury. So I’ll give you the opportunity to shift on your own. Show yourself.”
He blinked at her. It was the only movement he seemed capable of.
“No? Very well. I have time. How much do you have?” She turned to the figures on the wall, then pointed at the one at the end of the shortest rank. “There’s plenty of room for you, right here. Just a few strokes, and you’ll join their sorry lot. Your decision.”
Then she and Jorri left the chamber, taking all the light with them, and when the door’s bolt was shoved hard into place with a dull thunk, Cai was left with nothing but the sensation of the cold, packed dirt beneath him and the stench of old gore that permeated it.