The Summer of the Danes (16 page)

“She
would not do it,” said Cadfael, “in any case. Strange as it may be, she loves
her father as much as she hates him. The one is the reflection of the other.
She hates him because her love is far stronger than any love he has for her,
because he is so ready and willing to give her up, to put her away by any means
possible, so that she may no longer cast a cloud over his reputation and his
advancement. Very clearly she declared herself once, as I remember.”

“As
I remember also,” said Mark.

“Nevertheless,
she will do nothing to harm him. The veil she refused. This marriage she
accepted only for his sake, as the lesser evil. But when chance offered, she
fled that, too, and chose rather to remove herself from blocking his light than
to let others scheme to remove her. She has taken her own life into her own
hands, prepared to face her own risks and pay her own debts, leaving him free.
She will not now go back on that resolve.”

“But
he is not free,” said Mark, putting a finger regretfully on the centre of the
convoluted core of pain in this seemingly simple relationship of sire and
daughter. “He is aware of her now in absence as he never was when she waited on
him dutifully every day, present and visible. He will have no peace until he
knows she is safe.”

“So,”
said Cadfael, “we had better set about finding her.”

Out
on the ride, Cadfael looked back through the screen of trees towards the sparks
of quivering water beyond which lay the Anglesey shore. A slight breeze had
arisen, and fluttered the bright green leaves into a scintillating curtain, but
still the fleeting reflections of water flashed brighter still through the
folds. And something else, something that appeared and vanished as the branches
revealed and hid it again, but remained constant in the same place, only
seeming to rock up and down as if afloat and undulating with a tide. A fragment
of bright colour, vermilion, changing shape with the movement of its frame of
leaves.

“Wait!”
said Cadfael, halting. “What is that?” Not a red that was to be found in
nature, certainly not in the late Spring, when the earth indulges itself only
with delicate tones of pale gold and faint purple and white against the virgin
green. This red had a hard, impenetrable solidity about it. Cadfael dismounted,
and turned back towards it, threading the trees in cover until he came to a
raised spot where he could lie warily invisible himself, but see clear through
the edge of the woodland three hundred paces or more down to the strait. A
green level of pasture and a few fields, one dwelling, no doubt forsaken now,
and then the silver-blue glitter of the water, here almost at its narrowest,
but still half a mile wide. And beyond, the rich, fertile plain of Anglesey,
the cornfield of Wales. The tide was flowing, the stretch of shingle and sand
under the opposite coast half exposed. And riding to anchor, close inshore
below the bank of trees in which Cadfael stood, a long, lean boat,
dragon-headed fore and aft, dipped and rose gently on the tide, central sail
lowered, oars shipped, a cluster of vermilion shields draped along its low
flank. A lithe serpent of a ship, its mast lowered aft from its steppings,
clearing the gaunt body for action, while it swayed gently to its mooring like
a sleeping lizard, graceful and harmless. Two of its crew, big, fair-headed,
one with plaited braids either side his neck, idled on its narrow rear deck,
above the oarsmen’s benches. One, naked, swam lazily in mid-strait. But Cadfael
counted what he took to be oar-ports in the third strake of the hull, twelve of
them in this steerboard side. Twelve pairs of oars, twenty-four rowers, and
more crew beside these three left on guard. The rest could not be far.

Brother
Mark had tethered the horses, and made his way down to Cadfael’s shoulder. He
saw what Cadfael had seen, and asked no questions.

“That,”
said Cadfael, low-voiced, “is a Danish keel from Dublin!”

Chapter Seven

THERE
WAS NOT A WORD MORE SAID BETWEEN THEM. By consent they turned and made their
way back in haste to the horses, and led them away inland by the woodland track,
until they were far enough from the shore to mount and ride. If Heledd, after
her night in the hermitage, had seen the coming of this foraging boat with its
formidable complement of warriors, small wonder she had made haste to remove
herself from their vicinity. And small doubt but she would withdraw inland as
quickly and as far as she could, and once at a sufficient distance she would
make for the shelter of a town. That, at least, was what any girl in her right
senses would do. Here she was midway between Bangor and Carnarvon. Which way
would she take?

“One
ship alone,” said Mark at last, where the path widened and made it possible for
two to ride abreast. “Is that good sense? Might they not be opposed, even
captured?”

“So
they might at this moment,” Cadfael agreed, “but there’s no one here to attempt
it. They came by night past Carnarvon, be sure, and by night they’ll slip out
again. This will be one of the smallest and the fastest in their fleet; with
more than twenty armed rowers aboard there’s nothing we have could keep them in
sight. You saw the building of her, she can be rowed either way, and turn in a
flash. The only risk they take is while the most of the company are ashore,
foraging, and that they’ll do by rushes, fast ashore and fast afloat again.”

“But
why send one small ship out alone? As I have heard tell,” said Mark, “they raid
in force, and take slaves as well as plunder. That they cannot do by risking a
single vessel.”

“This
time,” said Cadfael, considering, “it’s no such matter. If Cadwaladr has
brought them over, then he’s promised them a fat fee for their services.
They’re here to persuade Owain he would be wise to restore his brother to his
lands, and they expect to get well paid for doing it, and if it can be done
cheaply by the threat of their presence, without the loss of a man in battle,
that’s what they’ll prefer, and Cadwaladr will have no objection, provided the
result is the same. Say he gets his way and returns to his lands, he has still
to live beside his brother for the future, why make relations between them
blacker than they need be? No, there’ll be no random burning and killing, and
no call to take bondmen, not unless the bargain turns sour.”

“Then
why this foray by a single ship so far along the strait?” Mark demanded
reasonably.

“The
Danes have to feed their force, and it’s not their way to carry their own
provisions when they’re heading for a land they can just as well live off at no
cost. They know the Welsh well enough by now to know we live light and travel
light, and can shift our families and our stock into the mountains at a few
hours’ notice. Yonder little ship has wasted no time in making inland from
Abermenai as soon as it touched shore, to reach such hamlets as were late in
hearing the news, or slow in rounding up their cattle. They’ll be off back to
their fellows tonight with a load of good carcases amidships, and whatever
store of flour and grain they’ve been able to lay their hands on. And somewhere
along these woods and fields they’re about that very business this moment.”

“And
if they meet with a solitary girl?” Mark challenged. “Would they refrain from
doing unnecessary offence even then?”

“I
would not speak for any man, Dane or Welsh or Norman, in such a case,” Cadfael
admitted. “If she were a princess of Gwynedd, why, she’d be worth far more
intact and well treated than violated or misused. And if Heledd was not born
royal, yet she has a tongue of her own, and can very well make it plain that
she is under Owain’s protection, and they’ll be answerable to him if they do
her offence. But even so…”

They
had reached a place where the woodland track divided, one branch bearing still
inland but inclining to the west, the other bearing more directly east. “We are
nearer Carnarvon than Bangor,” Cadfael reckoned, halting where the roads
divided. “But would she know it? What now, Mark? East or west?”

“We
had best separate,” Mark said, frowning over so blind a decision. “She cannot
be very far. She would have to keep in cover. If the ship must return this
night, she might find a place to hide safely until they are gone. Do you take
one way, and I the other.”

“We
cannot afford to lose touch,” Cadfael warned seriously. “If we part here it
must be only for some hours, and here we must meet again. We are not free to do
altogether as we choose. Go towards Carnarvon, and if you find her, see her
safely there. But if not, make your way back here by dusk, and so will I. And
if I find her by this lefthand way, I’ll get her into shelter wherever I may, if
it means turning back to Bangor. And at Bangor I’ll wait for you, if you fail
of meeting me here by sunset. And if I fail you, follow and find me there.” A
makeshift affair, but the best they could do, with so limited a time, and an
inescapable duty waiting. She had left the cell by the shore only that morning,
she would have had to observe caution and keep within the woodland ways, where
a horse must go slowly. No, she could not be far. And at this distance from the
strait, surely she would keep to a used path, and not wind a laborious way deep
in cover. They might yet find and bring her here by nightfall, or conduct her
into safety somewhere, rendezvous here free of her, and be off thankfully back
to England.

Mark
looked at the light and the slight decline of the sun from the zenith. “We have
four hours or more,” he said, and turned his horse westward briskly, and was
off.

Cadfael’s
track turned east on a level traverse for perhaps half a mile, occasionally
emerging from woodland into open pasture, and affording glimpses of the strait
through the scattered trees below. Then it turned inland and began to climb,
though the gradient here was not great, for this belt of land on the mainland
side partook to some extent of the rich fertility of the island before it
reared aloft into the mountains. He went softly, listening, and halting now and
again to listen more intently, but there was no sign of life but for the birds,
very busy about their spring occupations and undisturbed by the turmoil among
men. The cattle and sheep had been driven up higher into the hills, into
guarded folds; the raiders would find only the few stragglers here, and perhaps
would venture no further along the strait. The news must be ahead of them now
wherever they touched, they would have made their most profitable captures
already. If Heledd had turned this way, she might be safe enough from any
further danger.

He
had crossed an open meadow and entered a higher belt of woodland, bushy and
dappled with sunbeams on his left hand, deepening into forest on his right,
when a grass snake, like a small flash of silver-green lightning, shot across
the path almost under his horse’s hooves to vanish in deeper grass on the other
side, and the beast shied for an instant, and let out a muted bellow of alarm.
Somewhere off to the right, among the trees, and at no great distance, another
horse replied, raising an excited whinny of recognition. Cadfael halted to
listen intently, hoping for another call to allow him to take a more precise
reading of the direction, but the sound was not repeated. Probably whoever was
in refuge there, well aside from the path, had rushed to soothe and cajole his
beast into silence. A horse’s neighing could carry all too far along this
rising hillside.

Cadfael
dismounted, and led his beast in among the trees, taking a winding line towards
where he thought the other voyager must be, and halting at every turn to listen
again, and presently, when he was already deep among thick growth, he caught
the sudden rustling of shaken boughs ahead, quickly stilled. His own movements,
however cautious, had certainly been heard. Someone there in close concealment
was waiting for him in ambush.

“Heledd!”
said Cadfael clearly.

Silence
seemed to become even more silent.

“Heledd?
Here am I, Brother Cadfael. You can be easy, here are no Dublin Danes. Come
forth and show yourself.”

And
forth she came, thrusting through the bushes to meet him, Heledd indeed, with a
naked dagger ready in her hand, though for the moment she might well have
forgotten that she held it. Her gown was creased and soiled a little with the
debris of bushes, one cheek was lightly smeared with green from bedding down in
moss and grasses, and the mane of her hair was loose round her shoulders, here
in shadow quite black, a midnight cloud. But her clear oval face was fiercely
composed, just easing from its roused readiness to do battle, and her eyes,
enormous in shade, were purple-black. Behind her among the trees he heard her
horse shift and stamp, uneasy here in these unknown solitudes.

“It
is you,” she said, and let the hand that held the knife slip down to her side
with a great, gusty sigh. “How did you find me? And where is Deacon Mark? I
thought you would be off home before now.”

“So
we would,” agreed Cadfael, highly relieved to find her in such positive
possession of herself, “but for you running off into the night. Mark is a mile
or more from us on the road to Carnarvon, looking for you. We parted where the
roads forked. It was guesswork which way you would take. We came seeking you at
Nonna’s cell. The priest told us he’d directed you there.”

“Then
you’ve seen the ship,” said Heledd, and hoisted her shoulders in resignation at
the unavoidable. “I should have been well aloft into the hills by now to look
for my mother’s cousins up among the sheep-huts, the ones I hoped to find still
in their lowland homestead, if my horse had not fallen a little lame. I thought
best to get into cover and rest him until nightfall. And now we are two,” she
said, and her smile flashed in shadow with recovering confidence, “three if we
can find your little deacon. And now which way should we make? Come with me
over the hills, and you can find a safe way back to the Dee. For I am not going
back to my father,” she warned, with a formidable flash of her dark eyes. “He’s
rid of me, as he wanted. I mean him no ill, but I have not escaped them all
only to go back and be married off to some man I have never seen, nor to
dwindle away in a nunnery. You may tell him, or leave word with someone else to
let him know, that I am safe with my mother’s kinsmen, and he can be content.”