Gareth had almost fought Pedr. He’d been a hair’s-breadth away from it, in fact, and he would have, even if that had then meant he’d have been taken before Lord Morgan in irons. Gwen’s presence and the tensions coiling and twisting in that nave had forced him to reconsider. The nerves of every fighting man in the region had been on edge this autumn, which had led to arguments among friends in the encampment and actual sparring in some cases. Under such circumstances, Pedr’s men might have simply run him through.
As it was, Pedr hadn’t harmed either him or Gwen. He’d even stood at Gareth’s stirrup and presented to Gwen his interlaced fingers to boost her onto Braith’s back behind Gareth. She was riding pillion, which had been Gareth’s choice as well as Pedr’s. Gareth didn’t want to risk being separated from Gwen, and Pedr wanted them tightly contained.
“Can we run?” Gwen asked in a low voice.
“Aren’t you curious as to what this is all about?” Gareth said.
“Of course I am, but not enough to risk your life!” Gwen said.
“Leaving presents as much a risk as staying.” Gareth tipped his head to indicate the man riding just to the right of them. “One shot from that bow, and either you, me, or Braith is dead.”
He felt Gwen nod her understanding into his back.
Two of the men riding behind them held torches that threw out enough light to see the road and the ditches on either side. Gareth couldn’t see anything else, however. The cloud cover over their heads was absolute, hiding the moon and stars. Again, if he were alone, he might have chosen to follow the riskier path, to urge Braith off the road despite the danger of being shot or the fact that he’d be riding blind.
Gwen’s arms were tight and warm around Gareth’s waist, and he patted the back of her hand. “It’s going to be all right.” With the cold and wind—and snow coming before the dawn—this wasn’t the night to take Gwen into the hills unless he had no other choice.
“How do you know?” Gwen said.
“Because it has to be,” he said. “I have done nothing to warrant arrest.”
“What if Morgan’s intent is to sell you to Ranulf?”
“That, to me, is the most likely scenario, but I do not fear death at Ranulf’s hands. He has no more reason to harm me than Morgan does. At worst, I might rot a while in a prison cell.”
“That’s supposed to be comforting?” But then Gwen pressed her cheek into his back, and he felt that she was comforted.
“As you’ve said in the past, it’s a matter of tugging on a loose thread until the whole plot unravels at our feet,” Gareth said. “We have to start somewhere. It might as well be here.”
“I just wish Pedr and his men weren’t so menacing,” Gwen said.
More than anything Gareth wanted to assuage Gwen’s fears and ease the anxiety he felt in her. Whether or not he had any real reason for optimism, Gwen would gain nothing—and jeopardize her ability to think clearly—by allowing those fears to cloud her mind. “Whatever happens, stay close to me.”
Gareth would have expected the village to be deserted now that it was full dark, but a few women poked their heads out of their houses, and the tables in front of the tavern were even busier than they’d been when he and Gwen had arrived. He had to think the conversations would focus as much on their presence—and his subsequent arrest—as on the death of the woman.
Gareth tried to maintain a certain space between Braith and the men who hemmed them in, but it quickly became clear that they slowed as he slowed, and sped up as he did, with hardly a pause. They were a well-trained troop. Their sword sheaths had a sheen to the leather that meant they’d been much handled, and the men closest to him had an aura about them that indicated they would have been perfectly happy had the evening turned out differently and Pedr really had run him through.
All in all, Gareth was pleased to still be alive and upright. Although Pedr had taken his weapons, his hands weren’t bound. As long as that was the case, he could protect Gwen or die trying.
Once through the village, they rode directly south towards the Alyn River, at twice the speed at which they’d ridden through the village. Gareth was very aware of his surroundings: his breath fogging in the air in front of him; the staccato of the horses’ hooves; Gwen’s arms cinched around his waist; and the lights shining from a settlement above them that he guessed to be Morgan’s fort. Father Alun had mentioned that the stronghold overlooked the ford.
The horses slowed as the road dipped down to the river. Even though Gareth could hear the water running over stones, he couldn’t see the river until they were nearly in it.
Pedr headed across the ford, and Braith entered the water right behind him, following where Pedr’s horse had put its feet. The ford was improved with flat stones, which widened the water’s run, but also made it so shallow that they crossed with the water hardly rising past Braith’s hocks. The road then curved to the right and began wending its way up to the settlement a quarter of a mile away on a rise.
Cleverly, the road wound back and forth across the face of the hill, crossing and recrossing in front of the fort’s gatehouse, so the riders were always under the eyes of the soldiers watching from the wall-walk. The cart tracks in which Braith trotted were well worn. People had lived and worked in this region for generations, and Morgan’s family had ruled them from this spot when Wales had belonged only to the Welsh.
Unlike the motte and bailey castle the Normans had built at Mold, Morgan’s fort was more than a military stronghold. The palisade and buildings spread out across a flat area partway up the much higher hill that rose up behind it. Gareth had noticed it in the distance when they’d arrived in Cilcain earlier in the day.
A guard poked his head above the gate to observe them—and then admit them. As they passed through the opening into the courtyard, Gareth felt the eyes of everyone in the place on him and Gwen. The palisade surrounded an inner courtyard which, based purely on its size, provided a home to far more people than Morgan’s immediate family.
Gwen squeezed him hard.
“Just follow my lead.” Gareth swung his right leg over Braith’s head and dropped to the ground.
“I wouldn’t dream of doing anything else,” Gwen said.
The instant Gareth’s feet hit the earth of the courtyard, four of Pedr’s men hemmed him in again, though they did allow him to reach up and help Gwen off Braith’s back.
Upon entering the courtyard, Pedr had been met by an older man in a long robe, of the style stewards had worn before the Normans had come to Wales. While Gareth waited, they spoke urgently with one another, though in an undertone, so Gareth couldn’t make out what they were saying.
Then Pedr turned to Gareth and Gwen. “This way.” He marched off towards the hall after the steward, who led the way.
Like the rest of the fort, the main hall had a well-used look to it, indicating its long service to Morgan’s family. Large and single-roomed, with a hole in the roof to let out the smoke from a central fireplace, its only concession to time was the way additional buildings had been added onto it over the years. Without a chamber for his exclusive use off the back or the side of the main building, a lord had no place to conduct his private business without clearing the hall of onlookers first. With abundant forests within hailing distance, wood was a cheap source of building material, not only for the hall itself but for little huts and craft halls that lined the inner side of the palisade.
Pedr waited on the stoop for Gareth and Gwen to reach the door. Then, Gareth’s elbow in a tight grip, he directed them through it and into the hall. Gareth took Gwen’s hand in his left, in part to stop himself from moving his hand to his hip to rest it on the hilt of a sword that was no longer there.
To compensate for his lack of weapon, he took long strides, almost dragging Pedr with him instead of the other way around. Entering Morgan’s hall as a wanted man and surrounded by angry soldiers was, in equal parts, absurd and humiliating. It had been a long time since Gareth had entered a strange lord’s home with such dismay.
Regardless of how Gareth felt about it, however, he and Gwen were outnumbered fifty to one. A buzz of conversation had emanated from the hall at their arrival, but as Gareth and Gwen passed among them, the people present fell silent, ceasing to eat, drink, or talk. With Gwen’s hand in his, Gareth walked purposefully towards the far end of the building where Morgan’s chair rested. By the time he and Gwen reached the central fireplace, the only sound in the hall came from the flames themselves, where wood that had too much moisture in it crackled and popped.
The steward led them around the fire and then stopped ten paces away from Morgan’s chair. He bent his head. Pedr did the same. Gareth came to a halt when they did, but it wasn’t until the pair parted, one to each side of Morgan’s chair, that Gareth was able to see Morgan’s face clearly. He almost laughed—with relief and surprise—because he knew Morgan, though back when they’d met, Morgan hadn’t been the lord of a stronghold such as this, but hardly more than a boy.
It wasn’t a boy who faced him now.
Although Father Alun had said Morgan and Gareth were of an age, Gareth knew Morgan to be several years younger. The young lord was what the English called ‘black Welsh’: black hair, olive skin, and eyes so brown they were nearly black too.
Gareth never liked to be reminded of the days after Prince Cadwaladr had thrown him out of Aberystwyth. Because of it, he’d lost Gwen and his livelihood. He’d taken to wandering Wales in search of someone who needed a hired sword. He hadn’t cared overmuch, at first anyway, about the tasks he was set, since he hadn’t thought any could be worse than those Cadwaladr had given him. For nine months, Gareth served a lord by the name of Bergam whose son’s escapades had gone far beyond youthful hijinks.
The last time he had seen Lord Morgan, Gareth had been dragging his charge out of the hall at a lord’s fort in northern Powys. The young man in question had drunk too much, which was usual for him, but in so doing had taken it upon himself to proposition Morgan’s sister. Gareth hadn’t known exactly where Morgan was from or the name of his father. Even had he known, he might not have connected the two so many years later.
Gareth decided to take the initiative. “Lord Morgan. We meet again.”
Gwen glanced up at Gareth in surprise, but he kept his eyes fixed on Morgan’s. The hall was completely silent, and Gareth could feel the eyes of every soul in the room boring into his back.
“You remember, then. The circumstances of this meeting appear to be equally inauspicious.” Lord Morgan rose from his chair. “Gareth ap Rhys, I arrest you in the name of King Owain Gwynedd.”
Gareth released an involuntary laugh. “What’s the charge?”
“Treason!”
Initially Gwen’s jaw had dropped at the accusation, but now she said, “Don’t be absurd.”
Gareth was glad to hear the same mocking laughter he felt echoing in her voice, rather than dismay or fear. They were in tune tonight in that regard.
“Gareth and I rode from King Owain’s headquarters a few hours ago. If he had wanted Gareth arrested he would have done it then.”
“He doesn’t know what I know,” Morgan said.
“And what is that, exactly?” Gwen stood with her hands on her hips, glaring at the man.
“Gareth has been conspiring with Earl Ranulf against King Owain!” Morgan said.
“That is a lie.”
Morgan took a step back, clearly taken by surprise by Gwen’s forceful tone. He tried to look stern. “It is common knowledge in the hall—”
“Who accuses him of treason?” Gwen swung around, her eyes searching among the onlookers.
“Gwen—” Gareth would have preferred to confer privately with Morgan, to reason with him and sort out what was clearly a misunderstanding, but Gwen’s color was high, and she was furious.
Years ago, King Owain had made what in retrospect was an absurd accusation against Gareth, and even Prince Hywel had given way before him, accepting what he couldn’t change until he found proof of Gareth’s innocence. Gwen and Gareth had been younger then and less experienced, and that had been in King Owain’s court, not Morgan’s. Gwen might yield to King Owain, but Lord Morgan was another matter entirely.
Morgan put out an appeasing hand to Gwen. “Lady Gwen—”
She actually had the audacity to slap his hand away. “Don’t Lady Gwen me! You are accusing my husband of treason! You have arrested him on what grounds? Rumor!” She glared at Pedr, whose hand had come down on Gareth’s shoulder to prevent him from running.
Pedr appeared unmoved by Gwen’s anger, but Morgan recoiled in the face of her wrath. Gareth could see that it had been with fire in his belly and good intentions that Morgan had sent Pedr to Cilcain to arrest him, but now that Gareth and Gwen were before him, he had to be rethinking that decision. He was definitely over his head with Gwen.
“I challenge whoever has said these things about my husband to come forward and speak them to his face!”
Nobody in the hall moved. No man rose to his feet. Gareth knew as surely as he was a Welshman that Morgan could have no actual proof, of course, but it may not have occurred to Morgan himself until just now.
Gwen realized it too, and she swung back around to Morgan. “How did you know Gareth was in Cilcain?”
That Lord Morgan could answer. “One of my men saw him ride through the village this afternoon with Father Alun. I realized at that point that the good father didn’t know he’d brought a viper into our midst, so it was my duty to remove him.”
During Gwen’s tirade, the steward had moved closer to Lord Morgan and had been subtly trying to attract his lord’s attention without success. Now, he tugged on Morgan’s elbow, and Morgan finally turned to him. “What!”
The steward leaned in to whisper in Morgan’s ear.
At first, Lord Morgan’s face went completely blank, but then he said in a far more moderated tone, “Say that again?”
The steward cleared his throat. “It’s about the body that was found earlier today, my lord.”
Morgan moved his hand impatiently. “What does the dead man have to do with Gareth?”
The steward didn’t retreat. “My lord—” he gestured in Gareth’s direction, “—he looks just like him.”