Rhiannon (12 page)

Before dawn, while he waited for the women to come out of
Aber, the curse struck Madog again. This onslaught was so fierce that his
shaking hands could barely unstopper the horn that held his remedy. When he did
manage to swallow some, however, it fortified him so well that he was not
stricken with sickness and trembling even when Rhiannon passed into the forest
no more than a spear’s throw from him. He followed, closing the distance slowly
but steadily, until he was sure that no sound would be heard back in Aber. Then
he struck.

Rhiannon’s reaction was so violent that, in spite of his
greater strength, Madog could barely hold her. Too late he realized that to
muffle a man’s mouth and stick a knife in him is one thing—a knifing is swift,
usually finished before the shock of being seized is over. It is quite another
thing to hold, gag, and subdue a strong woman fighting with the ferocity of a
wildcat. Madog could do no more than keep his hold on Rhiannon’s mouth and
around her waist. It was Rhiannon’s own struggle that defeated her.

Twisting and turning and lunging ahead to free herself while
totally blinded, Rhiannon slipped on the uneven floor of the forest and her
foot struck a rock with great force. The pain was so excruciating that her
knees buckled. Her final convulsive effort to save herself only resulted in
twisting severely the ankle of the foot she had already hurt. Rhiannon fell
forward heavily with Madog atop her. The impact of Madog’s weight upon her
knocked the breath out of Rhiannon and rendered her nearly unconscious. The
heavy cloth covering her head and mouth prevented her from drawing in air
freely. Rhiannon swirled down into a smothering blackness in which nothing was
of importance except expanding her lungs. She was no longer aware of Madog’s
grip, and although she twisted her head feebly in an attempt to free her mouth,
she could make no other effort.

The fall had not been completely an accident. Madog was
quite strong enough to hold Rhiannon upright when she stumbled, but he was also
experienced enough as a fighter to know what would happen if she fell. Thus, he
thrust her forward and threw his full weight upon her while bracing himself for
the impact. Her limpness worried him a little. If she had taken serious hurt,
would that mean he had caused her death? The curse, however, did not strike and
Madog took heart. He drew a thong out of his belt where several hung ready and
drew it around her head between her teeth in no time. This gagged her even more
effectively than Madog’s hand and fixed the cloth immovably.

The rest was easy. There was no way Rhiannon could do
anything at all while Madog was kneeling with his full weight on her back. As
it was, the pain and pressure, which further impeded her breathing, rendered
her totally unconscious. Madog wrenched her arms behind her, bound them, and
then bound her feet. Assured that Rhiannon was now helpless, he looked around
for Mallt and ground his teeth in fury when he realized she had escaped him.
Mallt had to die, too, since she could connect him with Rhiannon’s
disappearance. She might not intend to betray him, but when the questions
started, her courage might easily fail. Madog had intended to thrust a knife
into Mallt right here and leave her. If she were found stabbed after Rhiannon
was missed, some enemy or band of outlaws skulking in the woods would be blamed
for the crimes.

Then he remembered that Mallt had not come out of Aber with
Rhiannon. That had puzzled him, but he could not worry about it. He would get
to Mallt later in the day.

As he swung Rhiannon over his shoulder, however, he realized
he really did not have much time to attend to Mallt. He would have to get to
her as soon as he returned. Once a hue and cry was raised about Rhiannon, all
the women would stay close inside Aber for many days. This meant he would have
to dispose of Rhiannon quickly, and he reconsidered a possible hiding place,
several miles farther into the forest.

Madog cursed Mallt viciously while his eyes searched the
area immediately around him. There was no hiding place worth the name—only a
few stands of bracken where the trees thinned and where one tree had fallen.
Muttering angrily, he started off in the direction of the safe hide he knew,
but now he kept looking for a suitable spot, and before he had gone a quarter
of a mile, he was rewarded.

Off to the right was a tiny stream. Beside it, a giant tree
had fallen many years before. The combination of extra water and light had
encouraged the growth of a dense thicket. Madog wormed his way in with great
caution, treading on moss that would spring back without recording his
footsteps for longer than a few minutes and lifting branches out of the way so
that they would not break and mark his trail. Sure enough, on the stream side
of the long-dead tree, the earth had been hollowed out.

Madog set Rhiannon down and began to increase the size of
the hollow and deepen it. When he was satisfied with what he had done, he
thrust Rhiannon into the space. Then he packed over her the earth and debris he
had scraped out of the hollow. Madog took considerable care that she should not
smother, for that would be killing her directly. Finally, he restored the outer
area as well as he could to its original condition. When he was sure no casual
search would detect his work, he eased himself backward out of the thicket,
cautiously, erasing the few footprints he had made.

It was only with difficulty that Madog restrained himself
from jumping and skipping with joy on his way back to Aber. As soon as he had
had Rhiannon gagged and helpless, perhaps unconscious, he had felt the curse
lift away from him. He was sure now that he had done the right thing, sure that
as soon as Rhiannon was dead he would be permanently free of her evil
influence. He knew she was not dead yet, for he had felt her breathing while he
carried her and while he was hiding her away. However, he was reasonably sure
she had been severely injured when he fell on her and would die soon; her
breathing had been deep at first but had grown shallower and shallower. Now all
he had to do was find Mallt, lure her back into the woods, and kill her. Then
he would be safe.

As soon as Madog had enveloped Rhiannon’s head, Mallt had
fled away as fast as her feet could carry her. She did not fear Madog, and she
would have liked to see him kill Rhiannon, but her own safety was more
important. She wanted to be sure that Madog could not counter any threat to
betray him she might make—or the actual betrayal, if that became necessary—by
involving her. She had already established the first half of her excuse for
being out that morning. Now she needed to complete it.

She ran back down the path Rhiannon and she had followed
earlier until she came to the edge of the forest. Following this northward,
Mallt came out on a headland above the ocean. When she found a way down to the
rocky beach, she grabbed hastily at whatever seaweed came to hand and quickly
filled the basket she had brought. At the end of the cove, Mallt discovered she
had chosen luckily. She found a broad, easy path to the top of the headland and
a well-defined road leading first to a small village of fishermen and from
there to Aber. She sang aloud as she walked along, swinging her basket of
seaweed. Everything was going just as she had planned, even better than she had
planned. The fisherwomen looking out of their huts and working around them
would remember her and back up her story.

Moved by her general good spirits, Mallt resolved to see if
she could win Madog more gently than by threats. She could begin easily and in
a very flattering way by pretending she admired his courage and resolution in
dealing so promptly with Rhiannon. After all, she would have to live with the
man after she married him. It would be more comfortable if he accepted the
marriage relatively willingly. Also, that would permit her to save her whip for
other occasions.

In a hall used for all the activities of a household, a man
cannot sleep very long no matter how great his need. All too soon after Simon
and Math had adjusted their individual needs into a harmonious whole, the
servants were routed from their pallets to begin the duties of the day. They did
not actually demand that the gentlemen on their cots wake, but there was
sufficient noise made in rolling and storing the pallets, setting up the
trestle tables, and moving benches and other gear that it was soon impossible
to sleep. Groaning and cursing, Simon sat up. This disturbed Math, who
protested raucously but eventually accepted the situation as inevitable and
stalked away to find a quieter place to finish his morning slumbers.

After a cursory washing, made horrible by having to bend
over, Simon slowly put on his clothing and blearily examined the food for
breaking the night fast set out on the tables. His reaction to the coarse bread
and redolent goat cheese—which he usually enjoyed heartily—made him seize a cup
of wine and go as far from the tables as he could. By accident rather than
design, although he was already beginning to feel less like a corpse animated
by magic, Simon found himself near the door opposite the women’s hall. Memory
of the previous morning hastened his recovery. He leaned against the door
frame, sipping his wine slowly and wondering whether Rhiannon would return from
whatever outing she had taken while he was there.

Before he tired of waiting, a page summoned him to Llewelyn.
By the time their talk was finished, Simon found he had recovered from his
overindulgence and he was hungry. There was virtually nothing left on the
tables, but Simon grabbed a heel of bread and some cheese right out of the
hands of a maidservant. He asked if she had seen Rhiannon, but she said she did
not think the lady had returned. This disturbed Simon slightly. Rhiannon had a
good appetite and seldom missed a meal.

Simon grew more and more uneasy as the morning passed. In
the hills, Rhiannon would stay out all day, but she did not do that at Court.
If he had known where to look, Simon would have sought her, even though he knew
she hated to be followed and watched over. As it was, all he could do was idle
around near where he could see the entrance to the women’s hall and yet not be
seen himself. When Rhiannon returned and he was sure she was safe, he could
just slip away before she saw him. Then, at least, his mind would be at ease.

There was no sign of Rhiannon, but Simon noticed that Madog
ap Sior was also idling around the women’s hall. That was a nuisance. Simon
tried to think of some way to be rid of the man, who, he was sure, was also
waiting for Rhiannon. Before he became desperate, however, Mallt came out of
the door. Simon tensed to withdraw. She had made several attempts to approach
him previously, but he had avoided her adroitly enough that Rhiannon had not
noticed. The last thing he needed was to have Madog telling Rhiannon that he
was pursuing Mallt.

To Simon’s intense relief, Madog approached Mallt and asked
her why she had run away. She smiled up at him provocatively and replied, “I
had to gather seaweed this morning. And I knew a man as strong and clever as
you are would have no trouble dealing with the witch.”

Dealing with the witch? What witch, Simon wondered? A wave
of uneasiness passed through him. He had not intended to listen, since he did
not care what Mallt did or to whom she attached herself, but he strained his
ears as Madog hushed her sharply and looked over his shoulder to see whether
anyone had heard her remarks. That gesture worried Simon deeply because it
implied that “the witch” was known and recognized in Llewelyn’s household. Yet
there was no such person.

At that moment Math came out of the women’s hall and hissed
at Madog. Instantly, the man launched a terrific kick at the animal. Simon was
so amazed that he neither spoke nor moved. Math, no matter how annoying, was a
privileged creature because he was Rhiannon’s. Although Math avoided the kick
with contemptuous ease, ran in and clawed Madog so that he howled with pain,
and was away again before Madog could strike, kick, or grasp him.

Simon was puzzled. The attack on Math seemed in some way
connected with “dealing with the witch”—but if that was so, the witch must be
Rhiannon.

Ridiculous, Simon told himself. No one would dare. It must
be some old crone in the fishing village or among the farming folk in the
vicinity. The kick at Math could not mean anything more than that an unpleasant
person had tried to hurt the cat while his mistress was absent and could not
protect him. But Simon did not believe his own reasoning because too many
coincidences were piling up: Rhiannon’s extended absence, Mallt’s involvement,
and the sudden contempt for Math.

With some difficulty Simon restrained himself from leaping
out and grabbing Madog by the throat. He and Mallt would deny what they had
said, and there was no way inside Aber that Simon could squeeze information out
of either of them—no, it was Madog alone he needed. Mallt had run away before…
Simon swallowed and ground his teeth. Before what? How had Madog “dealt with”
the witch? Was Rhiannon dead? Simon put a hand against the wall to steady
himself.

Madog had stopped cursing and rubbing his leg, which showed
spots and streaks of blood where Math’s claws had gone in. Mallt had pressed
her hand over her mouth to keep from laughing at Math’s revenge, but she was
sober when Madog looked at her. She knew a woman did not endear herself to a
man by laughing at him, particularly when he had made a fool of himself.

“I will have to get rid of the familiar, too,” Madog said,
looking after Math.

For an instant the proof that Rhiannon was “the witch” to
whom Mallt had referred—a thing Simon had not completely believed despite his
instinctive fear—froze him. He would have attacked Madog then, except that Madog
said to Mallt that he needed to talk with her privately. Simon stood still and
listened. In a private place, he could seize Madog and wring the truth from him
where no one would ask questions.

Mallt nodded and smiled. She expected that Madog wanted to
warn her to say nothing or perhaps tell her what he had done, and she agreed
wholeheartedly that it would be wise to go where they could both speak freely
without fear of being overheard. Madog was not too clever, and she wished to
make her terms quite clear. Hints and circumlocutions might go right over his
thick head or be too easily misinterpreted.

“I will meet you inside the trees just opposite the eastern
postern,” Madog said and, ignoring Mallt’s angry surprise, walked quickly away
toward the front gate. Since no alarm had been raised about Rhiannon, he still
had the chance to kill Mallt and leave her where the ground had been disturbed
by his capture of Rhiannon, and he had no intention of needing to carry her
body farther than necessary.

Simon cursed under his breath. He could not dash out and
follow Madog directly. Mallt would certainly see him and call to him, which
would warn Madog. He hated to lose sight of the man, but was reasonably sure
Madog would arrive at the place he said he would meet Mallt. Simon glanced at
her and noticed that she seemed both surprised and offended, presumably at
Madog’s sudden departure. She took a few steps toward the eastern postern,
hesitated, and then with a thoughtful expression turned back and went into the
women’s hall.

With a sigh of thanksgiving, Simon took off to the gate as
fast as he could walk. Once through it, he ran like the devil over the cleared
land, praying that Madog would not round the stockade until he was out of
sight. He hoped Mallt had been so offended that she would not come at all. It
would be much easier to deal with Madog if she were not there to screech and
run back to Aber to report what was happening.

In fact, Simon need not have run himself breathless. Mallt
was not yet really afraid of Madog, but she had decided she needed an
additional weapon against him. After all, she believed he had already killed
one woman who threatened him. Admittedly that woman was a witch and to kill her
was no crime. The priests all said,
Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live
.
Still, just to be sure that Madog would not think he could remove her from his
path also, Mallt had stopped to give her friend Catrin a precis of what had
happened and tell her she was meeting Madog in the forest. If she did not
return soon, Catrin should raise an alarm.

Madog was not hurrying to the meeting spot either. He was
more interested in covering his tracks than in arriving early, although he
moved swiftly for fear Mallt would get tired of waiting. For the sake of the
guard at the gate, he walked down the road until the first curve hid him before
he stepped into the trees. As soon as he was out of sight of the road
altogether, he began to run, keeping within the wooded area but heading for the
meeting place as directly as he could.

The caution of both parties gave Simon more than enough time
to find an adequate hiding place in a clump of trees back from the edge of the
woods but near enough to see a broad area that could be considered opposite the
east postern. It was heavily shadowed among the close-growing trunks, and Simon
hoped he would be able either to surprise Madog or, if he were too far away, to
challenge him.

It was disappointing when Mallt appeared outside the
stockade and walked quickly toward the wood. Her presence would complicate
matters. Simon wanted no witnesses to what he would do to Madog, but as his
fear and anger grew, he cared less and less about anything except laying his
hands on the man. Then for a few minutes he thought he would need to silence
Mallt before he could get at Madog. She seemed to be coming directly toward
him; however, she stopped just inside the trees and looked around.

At the edge of the clearing the trees were widely spaced and
the brush had been cut away by Llewelyn’s order to prevent men from concealing
themselves there for a surprise attack. Farther back there was no need to
remove the brush. Little grew where the treetops met, and the ground was deeply
shaded.

Mallt idled on the periphery, watching for Madog across the
open field while Simon tried to decide whether to seize and silence her or not.
Either way she was a nuisance. If he grabbed her, she might cry out and warn
Madog, or if Madog did not see her waiting, he might not come to where Simon
could spot him. If he let her be, she would doubtless run back to Aber
screaming for help, but the latter seemed the least serious. Simon was sure he
could subdue Madog and drag him away somewhere more private before Mallt could
bring assistance.

Because he could not permit himself to think of Rhiannon,
Simon fixed his attention on Mallt and on the southern edge of the stockade
where he expected to see Madog appear at any moment. He had not stopped to put
on his armor, but Madog was not—or had not been—wearing armor either, and he
probably did not own a hauberk of steel. Simon drew his sword and held it naked
in one hand, his knife in the other. Madog would not escape him, armed or not.

Simon’s fixity of purpose nearly undid him. While he stared
in one direction, Madog appeared from the west with the silent stealth of the
Welsh hunter-warrior. In a flash, he seized Mallt by the arm and drew her
backward a few feet. As she began to protest, he stabbed her in the heart.

Simon gasped with outrage and sprang from his concealment.
In any other circumstances his sense of honor would have demanded that he give
Madog a chance to draw his own weapons and defend himself, but a woman-killer
did not merit such courtesy. In fact, if Simon had not needed to learn what
Madog had done with Rhiannon, he would have grabbed him by the hair and cut his
throat, as one slaughters a noxious animal. Besides, a cut throat was too sweet
and easy a death. Simon was sure now that Madog had killed Rhiannon. He planned
a long, very long and painful, excruciatingly painful death for Madog.

When Simon leapt out from behind the trees and charged at
him, Madog was so startled that he screamed like a woman and turned to run. He
was not usually a greater coward than any other man, although he was certainly
no hero, but too many incomprehensible things had happened to him over the past
two days. Terror so unhinged him, however, that he forgot the dead woman at his
feet, and he stumbled over her body and fell. That was the stroke that finished
him. He lay on his face, screaming and whimpering and begging for mercy.

More because he was nauseated by Madog’s behavior than
because he feared the man would try to resist, Simon brought the hilt of his
knife down sharply on Madog’s head. The whimpers and cries stopped abruptly.
Simon pulled Madog’s sword from its sheath and tossed it well away. Then, since
he had not expected to need to restrain anyone, he pulled off Madog’s cross
garters and used one to tie his hands firmly behind his back and the other to
form a noose around his neck. As long as Madog was quiet, the noose would lie
open. The moment he tried to run or resist, it would tighten and choke him.

Simon then stood and began to slap Madog’s face with the
flat of his sword. He was not overcareful of just how he held the weapon, so
now and again the edge cut. However, he had not hit Madog very hard and a few
strokes were enough to bring him fully conscious.

“Where is Lady Rhiannon?” Simon asked quietly.

“I do not know!” Madog wailed, shaking with fear.

Simon smiled. “Would you prefer to lose your right ear or
your left ear first?” he inquired.

“You would not dare,” Madog quavered.

For answer, Simon swiftly put his heel on Madog’s throat,
pinning his chin with the ball of his foot, and in one swift motion sliced off
his right ear. Madog’s first scream was so loud that Simon began to fear a
guard at Aber would hear him, but the solution was simple. Simon merely pulled
the noose so tight that Madog’s screams were strangled. He then tucked his
sword under one arm, grasped the man’s sword belt, and began to drag him behind
the thick clump of trees in which he had hidden, where the sound would be
muffled and distorted. Then he dropped him, inserted his sword under the knot,
and loosened the noose.