The Good Knight (A Gareth and Gwen Medieval Mystery) (25 page)

Despite their blood-curdling reputation, Danes were no different from any other men—which was both good and bad. They were, in fact, no more or less cruel than the men who surrounded him now, but they were also men, and despite the fact that she often seemed to care little for her appearance or what men thought of her, in Gareth’s opinion, she was lovely. And he wasn’t the only one who thought so.

As Goronwy’s answer was the same as before, over the next hour, Hywel moved his force south to higher ground, though still some fifty feet below the elevation of the castle. He planted those men-at-arms and knights who could double as bowman within striking distance of the castle, two hundred yards away, sheltered behind their long shields. He then arrayed the remaining one hundred and fifty men in a ring around the castle, out of arrow range, but within sight of the walls so Goronwy would see what he faced.

Cadwaladr couldn’t have left more than twenty men in the garrison, though if Danes were among them, that number might be doubled. Even so, forty could hardly charge out to attack two hundred with hope of success. And if they did, that would leave the castle empty. Hywel could take it intact in that case, or burn it down empty, just to show Cadwaladr his father’s power.

The men hastily rigged regular arrows with knotted bits of cloth, ready for lighting moments before being loosed. Others scoured the woods for firewood, more easily found in August than at other times of year. Two men went into the village of Aberystwyth to garner oil with which to soak the cloth and make the fire more difficult to put out. The tied cloths would make the arrows wobble in the air, but Hywel wasn’t interested in accuracy, or even in killing anyone. He wanted to burn the wood and thatch that comprised the interior of the castle.

“Loose!”

The first flight of arrows blazed into the sky just as the sun began to set behind the castle. The day had been a bright one and the night promised to be more beautiful still. Some of them fell short, falling to the ground outside the walls, but Hywel didn’t move his men any closer for fear of the archers on the battlements. Still, one of the opposing arrows, surely loosed from a mighty bow, reached their lines and hit an archer in his right shoulder. He screamed and Gareth raced forward to drag him from his place.

“Move! Move!” That was Alun, directing another archer to fill the downed man’s spot.

“Fire at the men on the wall!” Hywel said. “Regular arrows! Force them to keep their heads down!”

Flight after flight arced into the air, with more and more finding targets. Fire blazed over the top of the wall. This was how Owain Gwynedd and Cadwaladr had defeated this very castle in their battle against the Normans six years before, after which Anarawd retook the title of King of Deheubarth. It was how Hywel would take the castle now, and why King Owain had started the process of rebuilding all of his bastions in stone.

“It will soon be done.” Hywel folded his arms across his chest and gazed with satisfaction at what he’d wrought. He turned to Gareth. “Take Evan and some others. Circle around to the north. I want to know what’s happening with the men on the other side.”

“If Cadwaladr’s men flee, should we stop them?”

“Not at the cost of your lives,” Hywel said. “In truth, they have nowhere to run. Between what we accomplish today, and what King Cadell plans in the coming weeks, we’ll deprive Cadwaladr of all his holdings.”

Gareth gathered a half dozen men and led them along the bank of the Ystwyth River. They followed it west, passing between the castle hill and Pen Dinas. Before they reached the beach, they rode upwards towards the plateau on which the castle sat. Now that the sun had fallen into the sea, they’d be safe enough in the growing darkness, and certainly Goronwy and his men would be too busy trying to contain the fires to worry about who and how many were coming against him from the rear.

A moment later, however, they found a downed man-at-arms lying in the grass. He was one of the scouts Hywel had sent to survey the area an hour earlier.

“What happened?” Gareth sprang down from Braith.

“Danes.” The man moaned and held his side as blood seeped through his fingers. “They ran from the postern gate not long ago. Me and some others thought to stop them, even if Prince Hywel said we needn’t.”

“Which way did they go?” This came from one of Gareth’s men.

 “They carried heavy goods towards the beach,” the man said.

“And you couldn’t stop them?” Evan pressed a cloth to the man’s wound before giving way to another soldier who knew more of healing.

“They just kept coming—twenty at least,” he said. “We couldn’t move out of the way fast enough.”

Gareth pointed at a man-at-arms, still mounted on his horse. “Ride to Prince Hywel. Tell him what has happened. For the rest, find our other scouts and see how many more are down. Evan and I will follow the Danes. At a minimum, we can make sure they’re gone for good, back to Dublin as Prince Hywel intends.”

Gareth threw himself on Braith who navigated the descent to the beach far more fluidly than Gareth could have on foot. As they raced down the hill from the plateau, the figures of two dozen Danes coalesced out of the murk. They were already at the water’s edge, loading their goods into two boats. At the sight of Gareth and Evan, several moved to intercept them, giving the remainder time to stow their loot.

A man in one of the boats waved an arm and called something in Danish. The six men broke out of their intimidating stance and returned, climbing awkwardly over the rail since the boats were already pushed back from the shore.

“Wait!” Gareth shouted one of the few words he knew in Danish and spurred Braith faster. “We mean you no harm!”

“Are you out of your mind?” Evan said, trying to keep up.

At Gareth’s call, one of the Danes put up a hand and his rowers stopped pulling on the oars. He stood in the stern, his hands on his hips, defiant. He’d cropped his hair and beard so short he looked less like a Dane than a Saxon. Fortunately, he also spoke some Welsh.

“What do you want?” he said. “Why do I not kill you?”

Gareth reined Braith at the water’s edge. “You sail for Ireland?”

“We did not come to defend a castle without Cadwaladr in it,” the man said. “We take his gold and go home.”

“And the men on the bluff that you harmed?” Gareth said.

The man shrugged. “They were in the way. That is all.”

Gareth nodded, the reply within the realm of the expected. These Danes had no feelings about harming his men one way or the other.
They were in the way
. “I have a message for someone in Dublin.”

The man didn’t reply, just waited, impassive, not promising anything.

“A girl. Her name is Gwen. She’s Welsh. Cadwaladr stole her from Aber. He left our shores with three longboats. The captain who commanded them was larger than average, blond.”

The Dane nodded. “Godfrid, son of Ragnall. My brother.”

“Tell Gwen that Gareth said he will come for her.”

“Tell her yourself. Come with us if you dare.” He grinned and gestured to his ship. “As guest.” He thumped his chest. “I am Brodar, son of Ragnall, and I will take you to Dublin.”

Gareth stared at him. Evan had come up beside him by now and grasped his arm. “What did he say?”

“He challenges me to come with him. To Dublin.”

Gareth gazed out over the water. He desperately wanted to go with Brodar, to see to Gwen’s safety, but his duty lay in Wales, serving his prince. He also, deep inside, feared that if he went to Dublin, he would not return.

“Go.” Evan flicked the reins in a sort of dismissal. “I will explain to Hywel what has happened.”

Evan’s urging was all Gareth needed. He dismounted, threw Braith’s reins to Evan, and then walked into the water that slapped around the stern of Brodar’s longboat. He heaved himself over the rail.

A grin split Brodar’s face. “Brave man.”

Brodar roared at his men, something again in Danish that Gareth didn’t catch, and they picked up the oars again, falling almost instantly into a unified rhythm.

Brodar pushed at Gareth’s shoulder. “Sit there.”

Gareth obeyed, finding a place at the prow. He settled onto a wooden seat and faced east. Evan remained as Gareth had left him, Braith’s reins in his hand and her empty saddle a stark reminder of Gareth’s impulsive choice. Gareth lifted a hand and Evan returned the salutation.

Once out of the bay, the wind rose and the Danes hoisted sail. They’d have two days of hard sailing before they’d reach Dublin. And Gwen. If she still lived.

Chapter Thirty

O
ver the next few days, Godfrid didn’t mention his suggestion that Gwen stay in Dublin. Her lack of answer for him didn’t seem to interfere with the ease with which he spoke with her either. He remained attentive, even springing questions on her about her life in Wales, her family, and her music, which she’d sung to great applause—and apparent surprise—that third evening in Dublin. When she’d walked off the dais, Godfrid had looked at her as if she was a creature he’d created especially himself. It was flattering, if nothing else, but…

She couldn’t delay talking to him about herself, and about them, if such a union would ever work, any longer. Across from him at the evening meal, she touched his hand. “I’ve thought about what you said to me. About what you asked.”

Godfrid had been taking a sip from his cup and now set it down. She had his full attention.

“You’ve offered me something that I’ve wanted since I became a woman: a life that includes a man who cares for me, and children,” she said. “And maybe even more than that, it seems likely you’ve offered me the freedom to be my own person.”

“I meant it so,” Godfrid said. “Yet, I see in your eyes that you do not accept.”

“I cannot,” Gwen said. “Please believe me when I tell you that it’s not because of you.”

“There is another,” Godfrid said, and Gwen could see him thinking it through. “Though not Hywel.”

“Not Hywel. In Wales—” Gwen paused again, trying to think it through herself and explain it in a way that would make sense to him, even if it meant talking around the subject first. She shrugged. “I think it’s much the same here. One’s family confines and constrains you in ways you don’t even understand until you are away from them.”

“It is thus with me and my father.” Godfrid gestured to the front of the hall where Ragnall sat, holding court. Shorter and darker than his son, he projected an aura of power that Gwen couldn’t quite put her finger on or explain. It was enough that when he spoke, the hall quieted, and people walked more softly in the space around him.

“You are a grown man and yet, you do his bidding,” Gwen said.

Godfrid smiled softly. “That is true.” He touched her hand with one finger, mimicking what she’d done to him. “You were not speaking of my father.”

Gwen smiled, shy now that it came to it. “My father has turned down every contract for me that has come his way. I’ve cared for him and my brother, Gwalchmai, since my mother died at Gwalchmai’s birth.”

“He doesn’t want to let you go,” Godfrid said. “He is clever but not wise.”

Gwen tipped her head, acknowledging the distinction. “Part of me wants what you are offering, but I cannot stay here, Godfrid. It’s possible that I could go home and then come back, but I am Welsh and my feet are dug deeply into that soil. I can’t allow Cadwaladr—and all of you—to return to Wales without me.” She gestured to the room at large. “Your coming will not be good for my people.”

Godfrid studied her face for a long moment, and then nodded. “Cadwaladr will want my father and Ottar behind him when he faces Owain Gwynedd.”

“And that is only one of a long list of his mistakes,” Gwen said. “Your presence will have the opposite effect of the one he inten—”

The doors burst open at that instant, cutting Gwen’s sentence short. Cadwaladr strode through them, at the head of a crowd of Danes. A grin split Godfrid’s face and for a moment Gwen feared it was the sight of Cadwaladr that cheered him, but then a man walking just behind the Welsh prince lifted a hand to Godfrid, who waved back. He was a shorter, squatter version of Godfrid himself, so Gwen wasn’t surprised when Godfrid said, “My brother, Brodar, comes.”

Cadwaladr and Brodar were followed by …
Gareth.

Gwen stared, her heart in her throat.
Has he been captured too?
But his hands weren’t tied and his sword still rested at his waist. He walked ahead of some of the Danes as a not-quite-trusted equal rather than a prisoner. His head swiveled this way and that and instinctively she knew he was looking for her. She stood, and then found that her feet had started moving of their own accord. She ran towards him. “Gareth!”

“
Cariad
.”

Gareth caught her and buried his face in her hair. Gwen had her arms around his neck, hanging on for dear life, thankful for how solid he felt. She only had a moment of him, however, before he pulled back, remembering propriety before she could. “You’re all right? You’re not hurt?”

“This is the one?” Godfrid loomed over them both, for though Gareth was a taller man than average, Godfrid dwarfed him.

Gwen clutched Gareth’s hand. “Yes.” A wave of relief swept through her at the admission.
Yes, he is the one.

Godfrid stuck out his hand to Gareth. “She’s in one piece. Keep a better eye on her next time. Don’t let her be fair game for murderers and Danes.”

Gareth eyed Godfrid and then to Gwen’s relief, clasped Godfrid’s offered forearm. “Your brother, Brodar, invited me to your hall, over the objections of Prince Cadwaladr. I am Gareth ap Rhys, a knight in Hywel ap Owain Gwynedd’s company.”

“Welcome,” Godfrid said.

Gwen didn’t even detect a hint of a growl in his throat, which later might be disappointing, but now was pure relief that she wasn’t going to be caught between these two men.

“We must sit and drink,” Godfrid said. “I sense that my father and Ottar will speak to everyone after they’ve conferred.”

“Ottar’s here too?” Gwen said as she and Gareth followed Godfrid back to their table. Gareth’s arm remained firmly around her waist as he steered her across the room.