by Jean Gill
‘My lord Rhys,’ Estela said. ‘Please tell Lady Mair that all men flinch when a dagger comes at them and if she does so, she will surely move and die. This is not a matter for trial, it is inevitable. Tell her she must shut her eyes when I hold up my hand and keep them shut until I touch her and the trial is over.’
Although she did not understand the Frankish, the Welshwoman had reacted to her own name with the title ‘Lady’ in front. She was gazing wide-eyed at Estela. Maybe it was the first time anybody had so addressed her, this bedraggled woodland wench, lucky enough to bed a lord for a few months. What if? wondered Estela. What if Dragonetz had bedded her and left her? Who and what would she be?
The words came of their own accord, from deep within the source of her songs and her music. ‘Tell the Lady Mair,’ she emphasised the words as she spoke to Lord Rhys of Deheubarth, ‘that we shall make a story here today of the courage of women, that shall be sung in Welsh halls for all time.’
Rhys spoke and Estela could only hope he translated her words true. Maybe it was hope that fooled her eyes but Estela thought Mair stood straighter and stiller against the door.
Then, there was just the mental preparation. Estela could not pace the distance. Too bad! she thought. Gilles would say she could not pace out the distance in battle. She tried not to think that killing would not matter too much in battle. She thought only of her grip, of the swing of her arm, imagining the movement and the moment to loose. She saw the arc in her mind’s eye, the point in the door where she wanted the knife to stick, just above the parting in the short black curls. She felt the balance of her weight between front and back leg, the twist of her core that would follow through with the throw.
She raised her left arm and Mair shut her eyes.
The Hall was silent.
And then Estela threw.
Chapter 17
The whoosh of air, and thunk as the dagger hit its target, were the only sounds. Then Mair crumpled to the ground and mayhem broke out. The men nearest Estela grabbed her arms but she made no attempt to escape. She knew she didn’t need to, and she turned to smile triumphantly at Dragonetz. She knew the sound of a point hitting wood, hard and true.
Rhys strode through the Hall to the door at the back, leaned over the woman’s body to inspect the dagger lodged firmly in the solid oak. ‘It is pointing slightly downwards,’ he observed critically, reporting to the enthralled audience. ‘There’s a hair attached but I see no blood.’
Then he bent down to study the woman, who was stirring, struggling to sit up. Rhys grunted, muttered something to those nearest him, who passed him a full jug of water. He threw it in Mair’s face and her shriek made it clear that she was recovering fast.
Wasting no more time on her, Rhys turned and gave judgement. ‘I’ve never seen a finer throw.’ General agreement was as enthusiastic about Estela’s skills as it had been dismissive earlier.
Rhys continued, ‘God has spoken. Estela de Matin –’ he paused. He had learned her name, thought Estela. More observant than he wished to appear. ‘–has proved herself.’ Not exactly declared innocent then! ‘And in reparation for the assault upon her person while she was our guest, I make this provision for her and her alone, that she may bear her weapon, even in our court, so she promise to use it only in our defence and her own. Do you so swear?’
Estela shook off the restraining hands, went to Rhys and knelt. She made the required oath and waited, only too aware of the hatred burning in the living, breathing, Welshwoman so close beside her.
Without looking once at Mair, Rhys completed his judgement. ‘The woman who broke our laws of hospitality is given to Lord Dragonetz, to punish as he sees fit.’
Estela sought Dragonetz’ eyes across the Hall, pleaded mutely.
‘I think my Lady has earned that right,’ he said. ‘Although the Usatges of Barcelone offer wise guidance in such matters and perhaps my Lords would be interested in this modern work...’ He must have sensed the daggers in Estela’s look for he finished quickly, ‘...at a more suitable time.’ Trust Dragonetz to bring up Ramon’s precious Usatges whenever he could!
Estela thought of women hauling ropes at the well, hefting sacks of corn from the carts to the kitchens, sweating over the cookfire, and still finding the energy to beautify as best they could before the men returned. She’d seen them rub sand over rough skin; clean their teeth as she did, with rosemary; shine their hair with cooking oil.
She was a woman and she would not give up. ‘I ask a boon,’ she said to Rhys, once again. ‘The Lady Mair and I have made a story here today, of love and passion, of the courage of women and of the wise judgement of the lords of Deheubarth.’
It would be politic to include Maredudd. She continued, ‘If I write this song, it will be sung in halls throughout my realm, where my name has worth. This song should be heard first in your halls, Lord Maredudd, and Lord Rhys. If you give your consent, it will be, for I shall sing it.’
She was not going to give the option of Dragonetz singing. Not after what she’d been through just to sing in front of these dung-pigs of barbarians! Partly to hide the anger she knew was sparking in her eyes, she reached down to Mair, to raise her to her feet. Bravely, the woman stood, waiting her fate.
Rhys laughed, said something to Maredudd in Welsh that made the other men laugh too.
Maredudd said, ‘We must tell you more about our mother, for there has never been a woman like her. You,’ he spoke to Estela, ‘may carry your dagger and sing in our Hall when we return to Dinefwr, our home. Meanwhile you can write your song. She,’ he indicated Mair, ‘is your responsibility. My brother has more important matters to think about. If you wish her maimed or turned off, tell him and it shall be done.’
He then spoke curtly to Mair, who bowed her head, whether in acceptance or in simmering fury, Estela could not tell. What was certain was that Rhys would take another to his bed that night and he was already choosing as the jugs were cleared and the Hall made ready for play and for sleep.
Estela and Dragonetz chose sleep, which was slow to come. The music of the Welsh court in the dark filled Estela’s imagination, as she sought the melody of her song-to-be. Heartbeats played tambour while muffled sobs of passion and of pain plucked strings. Breathing finally settled to the even rhythm of sleep, and Estela’s last remembered thought was of Gwenllian, the warrior princess, mother to the princes of Deheubarth. Why couldn’t Estela learn sword-fighting too? After all, she’d persuaded the brothers to let her sing at their court.
SUNDAY PROMISED FAIR and Estela and Dragonetz found themselves at liberty in every sense of the word, for the first time since their capture. They gazed out from the battlements to the land that was misty but visible across the rippling sea.
‘Normandie?’ asked Estela, with a rush of hiraeth. So near and yet so far.
Dragonetz shook his head. ‘Probably England,’ he told her.
Down below them, the tide was out, but the sound of ebb and flow carried on the breeze, along with seagulls mewing. Dry purplish seaweed outlined the pattern made by receding waves, and still glistened where it emerged from the white breakers.
‘Let’s go down,’ Dragonetz suggested, taking her hand.
Apparently, they had earned some measure of trust and there was no objection to them walking out past the guards, through the gate as if they were two ordinary cottagers off to look for driftwood on the beach.
The September sun was a gift to treasure and although, from habit, Estela covered her head and neck with a cotton scarf, she thought it would not matter too much if she risked browning. Among all the dangers of travel and her current lifestyle, protecting her skin seemed unimportant. She had never been able to whiten her olive tones whatever she tried. If she must work like a peasant, she might as well have fun like one.
The short path down to the beach had been well-trodden and was easy underfoot, if a little muddy. Tufts of dune grasses marked the switch from earth to sand, and walking became more difficult, her bo
ots sinking.
Dragonetz was already removing his footwear and he was bare-legged like the Welshmen, his hose packed away for more formal times. Estela needed no encouragement to take off her boots and tie them round her neck, as she’d done when a child, playing by the river.
She looked back up the hill at the castle but was too far away to identify any of the human shapes on the battlements, and the stone walls with their blank-eyed arrow-slits made no judgement on her hoydenish behaviour. There was nobody else on the beach.
The breeze stirred her hair, the sand was warm and grainy between her toes, and she suddenly felt light, careless. On a holy day by the sea. She picked up her skirts and started running across the sand, following the curve of coast away from the river mouth, out to open sea.
Dragonetz caught her easily, tagging her as he ran past, as if they were children playing together. He stopped, just a little way ahead, teasing her. She darted towards him but he was too quick for her. Every time he stopped, just out of reach, she thought she could catch him and tag him back, but he ducked her touch and ran on again.
When she conceded defeat, calling, ‘Enough!’ they’d rounded the headland, the castle no longer in sight but above the rocks somewhere. She bent over, feigned a stitch and he came back to her, only to be tagged and left standing as she danced away. She hid behind a jagged pile of rocks so he could not get to her.
‘You cheat,’ he complained.
‘I win,’ she told him, cheeks red with exertion and sunshine.
‘You win,’ he told her, ‘always.’ And suddenly his voice wanted a more adult game. Behind the rocks was a cave. ‘Come here,’ he bade her and she obeyed, taking his hand, allowing herself to be led into the cave, into privacy such as they’d not known for weeks.
‘I’ll get sand on my gown,’ she objected.
‘No, you won’t,’ he replied, showing her with gentle hands exactly why not.
Then she stopped worrying about the sand and became one with the tide that ebbed and flowed, made its own rhythm, broke in waves and carried all life out to sea, the pounding heartbeat of life itself.
In the peace of a Welsh cove, time stopped for long enough to heal some of the damage caused by constant anxiety and sleepless nights. Estela allowed herself to relax. And then to pick up the burden of their mission, for it was no longer Dragonetz’ mission. She was as deeply immersed in the Deheubarth court as he was.
Privacy allowed them to talk without fear of being overheard and they shared what knowledge they’d gleaned.
‘Rhys gave me my sword, asked if I knew how to use it. He wants me to ride with them tomorrow,’ Dragonetz told her. ‘We go to take a castle: Tenby.’
Estela had known it would come but that didn’t make it easier to bear. But, like the other women, she would bear it, and beautify for his home-coming. And hope he was among those who came home.
‘And Maredudd?’ she asked. ‘Is he happy for you to ride with them?’
‘I think so. They are uncommonly close. Wyn says there were six brothers and now there are only three. That Cadell was attacked and changed, so that he wished only to go on a pilgrimage and serve God, so he left for Rome in the spring, naming Rhys and Maredudd rulers in his stead.’
‘Regents?’
‘It seems not. According to Wyn, Cadell escaped with his life but lost all spirit. Nobody expects him to rule again, even if he returns.’
Estela frowned. ‘There will be a falling-out at some time? Between Maredudd and Rhys, as to who rules? Maredudd is older but weaker. What is the custom for inheritance here?’
‘From Wyn’s stories, it seems that a realm is split between a man’s sons, whoever their mothers, and, yes, there is usually maiming and murder until the strongest who are left hold their territory. There is usually no love between brothers, who grow up each in another lord’s house, for apprenticeship. And where there is no love, and much competition, blinding and gelding are alternatives to murder.’
Estela winced. ‘Do you really think Maredudd and Rhys are any different? Are you going to woo both for Henri or back the one who’ll win?’
‘Both.’ Dragonetz thought. ‘But it is easier to connect with Rhys, somehow.’
‘Then I must win Maredudd.’
‘Good God, and have another Welshwoman trying to kill you for stealing her man?’
Estela laughed. ‘No, I have learned that lesson! But I have an idea that won’t make other women jealous. I shall tell you if it works! And, speaking of other women, what shall we do with Mair?’
‘Lady’s maid? Translator? Or would you rather she were birched and put in the stocks?’
‘I don’t know...’ began Estela, then corrected herself. ‘No, of course I don’t want her punished physically, but she needs employment, and she needs something to take her mind off losing Rhys. I’ll think of something.’
Dragonetz had picked up a stick and was drawing an initial in the sand, while he listened to her. A curly letter E.
When he’d finished Estela held out her hand for the stick and enclosed the letter E in a letter D. She had to lean over to avoid smearing their work with her footprints but she was pleased with her work and reluctant to pass the stick back to her lover but he insisted. He added a tail to the D, a crude dragon head breathing flame.
‘Txamusca,’ he told her, ‘part of us.’
Musca, the baby she’d named in defiance, to make his fatherhood plain to anybody who thought what Txamusca meant, a breath of fire.
‘Will we see him again?’ she asked.
‘Surely,’ he said, and she was reassured, despite knowing that Inshallah was the true reply.
‘As long as we go back now!’ Dragonetz pointed to the incoming waves, already lapping at their intertwined initials. Estela realised that not only had the tide turned but it would soon cut them off, trapping them in the cave. How quickly a sanctuary could become a death-trap!
There is only one answer to dangers, she thought, laughing and tagging Dragonetz lightly. Run fast and dance among the waves, for as long as you can. She grabbed her skirts and suited action to thought.
Back at the castle, Estela forced Wyn to stay with her and Mair long enough to explain to the Welshwoman that she was to help Estela with her work duties and her Welsh, so she would need to learn Frankish.
The woman nodded, expressionless. Then she picked a bit of seaweed off the bottom of Estela’s gown.
She said what sounded like, ‘Larver.’
Estela held the bit of seaweed. ‘Larver,’ she repeated.
‘Bara lafwr,’ Mair informed her.
Estela already knew that ‘bara’ meant bread so she guessed that somehow the seaweed could be turned into something edible. Wyn had slipped away the moment her attention was distracted so the conversation continued in sign language and pointing, with a visit to the kitchen for buckets.
Another visit to the beach resulted in two bucketfuls of the purplish lafwr, which Mair boiled down for hours to green pulp. While Dragonetz rode out on his first campaign with the Welshmen, Estela was rolling seaweed in oats and frying it.
‘Bara lafwr,’ she told the other women proudly and they smiled back at her.
‘Bara lafwr,’ they agreed.
Estela sang the words softly, felt the music in them, and then embroidered a lyric in her own Occitan around the Welsh phrase. She sang as she worked, incorporating the Welsh words she knew. Some of the women hummed as the repeating melody caught them.
When Estela paused, the woman who’d said she was a singer, Blodwen, made up a verse of her own, and then others joined in. Soon there was a kitchen-full of work-song. Women’s song, thought Estela, listening to the ebb and flow of the voices, waves breaking, which she could hear but not understand.
When several of the women sang together, there was a moment Estela heard a way of singing she’d never heard before. Then it was gone and there were only women’s voices singing in unison, each with her own sound. She shook her head to clear the fanc
ies away.
Heavenly music indeed! And yet, if she should ever hear that sound again, she must speak to Dragonetz. If anybody knew of heavenly music, borne of dreams, he was the one. But she would not raise his hopes only to be dashed again. He had enough on his mind.
A hand on her arm distracted her and Mair claimed her attention. The women stopped singing. Estela sought her dagger-hilt, just in case. Holding her gaze, Mair sang and pointed. What Estela understood, was, ‘Bara lafwr... you... me... all women... no men... no Rhys...’
Estela could do singing and pointing too. So she did, managing, ‘Cofiwch,’ the Welsh for ‘remember’ with some made-up word from ‘ferch’, ‘daughter’, that made them all laugh as she tried to sing ‘Remember the women and forget the men!’
Stupid language that couldn’t make a difference between ‘daughters’ and ‘women’! Even when you tried to forget the men, you couldn’t.
Pray God they came back safely.
Chapter 18
Dragonetz felt naked, and yet he was still wearing more protection than the Welshmen who rode with him. Most wore only peasant tunics and loose hose, bare-headed and often barefoot, quivers slung round their hips, bows and spears over their shoulders. A handful, including, Rhys and Maredudd, wore helms, hauberks and swords, like Dragonetz.
He’d been offered a bow and arrows but he was no archer. He accepted an axe instead. His pony was no Sadeek but reminded him of Damascan mares and battle tactics; steady-footed and fast on rough ground, built for ‘rush and run’ attacks, or for raining arrows from a distance, then disappearing into the landscape like mist.
They lacked the strength needed to carry a knight in full armour and would never have the fire that a destrier like Sadeek could bring to war, biting and stamping his own rage on a battlefield. There was, however, a good chance that this mount would take rabbit-holes and forest tracks in her stride, and get him back to Llansteffan safely. If the Franks of Tenby didn’t kill him.
