Keeper of the Dream

by Penelope Williamson

  “Why not go to my father? You know that he will give you sanctuary.”

  Kilydd’s tawny eyes blazed at her. “I don’t want sanctuary. Rhos is mine, and treaty or no treaty, I’ll be no vassal of a Norman cur.”

  He twisted around in his saddle and waved, and the carts started forward, their iron-rimmed wheels clattering over the stony road. Another hare darted across their path, but the hawk was long gone. The mist had grown thicker, seeming to boil up from the black ground, like steam from a cauldron. Before long it had almost swallowed the carts.

  Kilydd turned back to her. “Don’t worry, sweetling, you’ll be coming with us. Though I fear our accommodations are not fit as yet for a lady’s presence.”

  The man behind her shifted his weight forward, wrapping a thick arm around her waist, and snatched the reins from her hands. He dug his bare heel into the side of Arianna’s palfrey and the horse darted forward. “No!” she cried, but the sound was muffled as the man tightened his grip, cutting off her breath.

  The man was a poor rider; the hand that held the reins flapped like a chicken’s wing. Arianna seized his wrist and bit down hard, so hard her teeth broke through the hairy skin. He screamed and let go of the reins, just as she rammed her elbow into his chest. Swaying backward, he clawed at her mantle. The material ripped and she twisted around, driving her fist into the man’s face.

  He bellowed again as he slid off the horse’s rump. At last Arianna was free of him, but she was nearly free of the horse as well. She had lost a stirrup and only saved herself from falling by snatching at the horse’s mane. She clung for a moment as the ground rushed past her eyes at an incredible speed. She pulled herself upright again.

  She felt for the loose stirrup with her foot but couldn’t find it. Her hair snapped like a flag and branches whipped her face. Somehow she managed to jerk the horse around so that they were heading away from Kilydd and his men. She heard his angry bellow and then nothing but the blowing of the wind past her ears and the pounding of her horse’s hooves.

  She galloped, clattering through the gorge, and then up ahead of her she saw Sir Odo and the other knights, milling casually about as if they were out for a day’s hunting. They looked surprised to see her, but not pleased.

  “Why aren’t you riding after them?” she cried.

  Sir Odo said nothing. He gave a great gusty sigh and shook his head. “There’ll be men strung out all along that defile, just waiting to ambush us with their cursed longbows should we be such fools as to go charging in after them.”

  One of the knights snarled deep in his throat. “Aye, but then charging in after them, and getting ourselves killed for it, is just what she’d like us to do. Cursed Welsh bitch!”

  The others grunted and nodded in agreement. They stared at her, their thoughts plain in their eyes, and their hatred rolled over her, thick as the mist.

  Arianna slid from the saddle before Rhuddlan’s great hall and pressed her face into the palfrey’s neck. His hide was wet and warm and smelled of horse sweat. She felt movement around her, heard shouts, and she pushed her face deeper into the animal’s flesh, until the pumping of his blood drowned out the world. He will hate me, she thought. Raine will hate me forever.

  She lifted her head and turned, half-expecting to see a black-armored knight on a rearing charger, silhouetted against a slate sky.

  He wasn’t there. Though the entire bailey was certainly crowded with horses and carts and wagons and retainers, all bustling about. She remembered that the manorial high court was to meet on this day. Normally Raine held it in the open air by the river, but he must have moved it inside to the hall because of the foul weather.

  Arianna spotted her younger brother sidling up between the bakehouse and the hen coop. At first she thought he was after the tray of hot cross buns that sat cooling on a stone shelf, but then she realized it was herself and her escort he was interested in. His gaze passed over them and then his mouth curled up into a satisfied smirk, and in that instant she understood it all.

  “Rhodri!”

  The boy spun around, sprinting across the yard, dodging and jumping puddles. Arianna ran after him.

  “Rhodri, damn your cursed hide! Get back here!”

  She caught up with him as he rounded the corner of the farrier. They struggled a moment, Rhodri flailing at her to get away and Arianna just as determined that he would not. The smithy, who was putting a new link into a mailed shirt, paused, his hammer halted in midair and curiosity alive on his face.

  She seized Rhodri by the arm and thrust him ahead of her, toward the mews and away from the blacksmith and his cocked ears.

  Rhodri squirmed. “God’s death, let go, Arianna, afore you wrench my arm out its socket.”

  Arianna gripped him harder. “I ought to wrench your head off your neck.” She swung him around and shoved him up against the wall of the mews, so hard that his head knocked against the boards. The hawks protested this disturbance with a cacophony of shrill cries. “Are you playing traitor with your liege lord?”

  Rhodri spat into the dirt. “The Black Knight is not my liege lord.”

  “Don’t tilt with me, boy. Did you send a message to Kilydd about the grain for St. Asap?”

  “What if I did? Your man is Norman and so ’Tis no dishonor to cheat him when I can.”

  Arianna relaxed her grip and turned to lean beside her brother against the wall. A thick, coppery stink wafted to them from the buckets of raw meat that were to be the hawks’ dinner, but she barely noticed it. She was shaking with useless anger and so filled with despair that she was nauseated by it. Always, always she was being forced to choose between her husband and her family.

  Rhodri started to edge away, but she flung out a hand, stopping him. “You are not to brag about it. Do you hear me, Rhodri? You are not to admit to a soul what you have done.”

  “What does it matter?” His eyes grew wide and he let out a soft whistle. “You want Lord Raine to think that it was you. Why? Because he’ll go easier on you than me? Well, I—”

  “Just do as I say.”

  “Aye, and mayhap you and Lord Raine will wrestle again and you will acquire another black eye.” “He won’t hit me.”

  Rhodri shrugged. “Aye? Well, ’Tis your own wake.”

  He pulled away from her and ran off toward the stables. Arianna stood staring after him a long while, then with dragging feet she made her way to the great hall.

  A sooty haze from a roaring log fire hung over the rafters. The hall was packed with people, some sitting on the cushioned benches that lined the walls, but most milling about in the aisles. Scores of torches burned, adding to the eye-stinging smoke.

  Raine sat on the dais, on a gilded faldstool padded with a folded tapestry. He supported his head on his fist, his long legs stretched out before him, and all the power of his unyielding authority focused on a quaking boy who’d been caught pilfering from an honest villein’s cabbage patch. Arianna hung back, keeping to the shadows cast by the pillars, yet somehow his gaze found her and the stern expression on his face softened just a little.

  A questioning look came into his eyes, for he had not expected her back so soon.

  She tried to smile at him, but could not. Her heart lay in her chest like a big, cold stone. She raised her gaze from his face to the wall above him and saw the banner she had made—the one he had ordered burned—spread in all its glorious colors across the whitewashed wood. He saw where she was looking, and this time he smiled.

  “Oh, Raine …” she whispered.

  “You should order the boy’s ears chopped off, my lord,” she heard the castle chaplain say. An old man with a skull-like visage and palsied limbs, the priest stood on the other side of the high seat. It was his job to administer the oaths, and the silver relic box he now held in his hands shook so hard, the saints’ bones rattled. “Aye, off with his ears and he’ll steal no more.”

  The boy, on hearing the priest’s counsel, fell to his knees and began to wail.

>   “You’ll give me six months’ boon work, boy,” Raine said. “And don’t give me reason to see your face before me again.”

  The boy backed down the hall, sobbing still, though with relief. My husband is a fair and merciful master, Arianna thought. Perhaps he will be fair and merciful with me.

  Yet stealing cabbages was not the same as betraying one’s lord. He would think she had told Kilydd about the grain—he could think naught else, for she could not acquit herself without damning her brother. He had accepted her homage as if she had the honor of a knight, and now he would think she had betrayed him worse than the lowliest churl. He would never forgive her, or trust her again. He would believe her honor worthless.

  But she had not lied to Rhodri when she’d said Raine wouldn’t hit her, even though there was many a man who would kill his wife for less. No, he wouldn’t beat her only because she would tell him about the child—for the sake of the fragile life she carried, she must. She felt a fresh wave of anguish at the thought, because to tell a man he was about to become a father should be a thing of joy, the creation of a sweet memory that was now lost to them forever.

  Arianna leaned against the pillar, waiting, while Raine excused a pregnant villein woman her annual tribute of a Shrovetide hen, and fined a pepperer—who had adulterated his product with ground nutshells—a month’s profits.

  She saw Sir Odo cross the hall and approach the dais.

  The big knight leaned over and spoke in Raine’s ear and even from where she stood Arianna could see the change come over his face. His head snapped around and his cold gaze lashed at her down the length of the hall. She started forward, then she began running. But Sir Odo was there in front of her, blocking her way.

  “I must speak to him.”

  “I am to escort you to your chamber, my lady.”

  “But—”

  “Now, my lady.”

  Head stiff, shoulders back, Arianna turned and walked down the long length of the hall.

  She stood before the window, looking out over the green tilting fields and the silty brown water of the Clwyd. He saw her through a bloodred haze of rage.

  At the sound of the door hitting the wall, she swung around. She wrapped her arms tightly around her waist, as if she physically had to hold herself together. But she looked at him out of calm, sea-foam eyes.

  “You traitorous bitch!”

  He advanced on her, and he expected her to cower or cringe, but she did not. His clenched fists trembled and his chest jerked. “I trusted you.”

  “I know. Oh, Raine, I’m so sorry—”

  His hand lashed out, his fingers spanning her neck, pushing her chin up. He could feel the pulse beating in her throat, hard, fast. “Sorry,” he repeated, his voice raw. “You are profligate with your apologies, Arianna. And you play the innocent so well. You would stab a man in the gut and then pretend not to understand how the knife came to be in your hand.”

  He felt her throat work beneath his hand as she struggled to speak, but then she merely shook her head, her eyes squeezing shut. “I ought to kill you,” he whispered.

  “Raine—”

  He swung away from her and slammed his fist into the wall. “I trusted you. You swore your fealty to me and I believed you. Jesus God, I should have known better.” He laughed harshly, flinging his head back. “But then I deserve no less for thinking with my prick.”

  She lifted her hand, but then she let it fall without touching him. “Oh, Raine, don’t … Whatever else, there is the joy we share in bed together. Don’t destroy that or we will have nothing.”

  He turned back to her. A coldness descended over him, numbing him. He had things in perspective now. She was his wife, his chattel, to use as he willed. To be punished when she disobeyed him and to be kept in her place with a mailed fist. A man didn’t have to trust his wife, he only had to rule her.

  “Aye, we do have that,” he said, his voice flat and cold. “Me hard for you, and you hot and wet for me and loving every bit of it. You are good for only one thing, Arianna, and that is spreading your legs for me.”

  He grabbed her by the arm and hauled her over to the bed, flinging her down on top of it. He stood looking down at her—at her hair spread out on the fur, at her mouth partly open, lips trembling, and at her eyes, dusky and deep, and growing wider and wider as she saw his intent on his face.

  She reared up, but he threw her back down, falling on top of her, pinning her to the bed with his weight. He tangled a fist in her hair, pulling her head back so hard the tendons stood out taut on her neck. She shuddered once and then stilled.

  “Raine, don’t—”

  He slammed his mouth onto hers, so hard their teeth grated, and out of him poured all his rage and all his pain, and his hate. He hated her for betraying him, and he hated himself for believing in her, believing in anyone again when he should have known, had always known that to trust like that was just asking for a kick in the gut.

  She bucked against him, tearing her mouth free. “Not in anger, Raine,” she cried. “Not like this or you will hurt our babe.”

  The words stretched between them, like a drawn bowstring. He froze in place on top of her, one hand still tangled in her hair, his mouth just inches from hers. The room fell so silent, his ragged breathing sounded as loud as ocean breakers and he could feel her breaths harsh and hot against his face. There was a tiny drop of blood on her lip where his teeth had cut her.

  He rolled off her. He lay on his back, staring up at the green damask canopy. She lay beside him, unmoving but for the rapid rise and fall of her chest. She wasn’t crying. She had cried when she’d given him her worthless oath of fealty, but she wasn’t crying now.

  “You’re pregnant,” he finally said.

  “If you don’t believe me, ask Taliesin.”

  A baby. A son. The words finally sank in and for a moment his chest swelled, warm and full of joy … and then he remembered how she had betrayed him.

  He pushed himself off the bed, the interlaced leather springs creaking loudly in the silent room. At the door he paused. The hand that gripped the latch trembled, until he made it quit. “Damn you,” he said softly. “And damn me for a fool.” He wanted to turn around and look at her, but he didn’t think he could stand it. So he just left.

  Taliesin was in the stairwell, playing on his crwth, and at the sight of Raine he burst into song:

  “Lady, take me, body and heart,

  And keep me for your one true love….”

  A snarl of rage tore from Raine’s throat. He grabbed the crwth from the boy’s arms and swung it against the wall. The delicate wood shattered and the strings broke and sprang loose with a grating twang of discordant sound.

  Taliesin stared down at the broken instrument at his feet, then up again at Raine’s retreating back. He knelt and picked up what was left of the fingerboard, and then a piece of the soundbox. Slowly he stood and continued up the stairs to the lord’s chamber.

  The door was partly open. Arianna lay across the bed, her fingers clenching and unclenching in the thick marten fur, her shoulders heaving. “And keep me for your one true love,” he sang in a soft, sad whisper.

  Turning, he leaned against the wall. He looked down at the jagged pieces of wood still clutched in his hands. He let his hands fall and the wood slipped from his fingers to clatter onto the floor, unheard by the girl who lay weeping nearby.

  Raine stood at the edge of the tide, looking out to sea, not thinking. Not even allowing himself to feel. The water slopped and sucked at his boots. From time to time he would pick up a piece of driftwood, white and dry as an old bone, and toss it into the breakers, and then he would watch the sea carry it away. Only when the setting sun began to turn the water into a pool of molten copper did he return to Rhuddlan Castle.

  Sir Odo stood at the top of the steps to the great hall. His head was sunk deep into his shoulders like a toad’s and his eyes watched his lord approach with grim disapproval. Raine felt betrayed all over again, that his b
est man would still take her side in the face of her obvious treachery.

  “Fill your mouth with her name,” Raine snarled as he came abreast of the big knight, “and I’ll put my fist in there with it.”

  Sir Odo’s lips pulled back from his teeth. “The midwife had to be sent for. To tend to the lady whose name you don’t want me to mention.”

  Raine felt his heart stop, but he nodded, saying nothing. He allowed no expression to show on his face, and he made himself walk at a normal pace across the hall toward the stairs that led to his chamber.

  It was dark in the stairwell—the servants had forgotten to fire the rushlights. A shadow loomed up at him out of an embrasure, and with an instinct honed from too many years of fighting just to survive, Raine whipped his knife from its sheathe, nearly taking out the eyes of the figure that wavered ghostlike before him.

  “My lord, don’t! ’Tis I, Rhodri.”

  “God’s love, boy. Don’t ever spring at a man out of the dark like that.”

  Raine put up his knife and the boy materialized out of the shadows again, more slowly this time. In the half-light his face looked pinched and drawn. Tear tracks stained his cheeks.

  He grabbed Raine’s arm. “I was the one who sent the message to Kilydd about the grain, my lord. She always tried to take the blame for us when we were little, because Father wouldn’t whip her near as hard as he would us….” His voice faltered for a moment, and he wiped his nose with his sleeve. “I just thought you should know the truth in case she … well, I just thought you should know.”

  The words seemed to hang in the air, pulsing to the beat of Raine’s heart. Something shifted inside of him. He sucked in a big draught of air, his eyes squeezing shut.