With Huw on one side and Myrddin on the other, Cedric hobbled across the snowy paddock to the front door. Myrddin lifted the latch and pushed the door open. The smell was the same. Cedric pulled a handkerchief from his scrip and put it to his nose. In a row, they stepped into the main room, angling so they’d all fit through the door, and surveyed the chaos inside.
Two men lay on the lower floor, the first behind the door. It was his body that had kept it from opening all the way. Black boots, smaller than the ones Myrddin himself wore, stuck out, but the rest of the man remained hidden by the door. The second dead man lay in plain sight, leaning against the wall underneath the loft, his legs sprawled in front of him. Someone had skewered him through the gut.
“Check the loft,” Myrddin said to Huw, who obeyed, heading towards a ladder on the right side of the room.
Nell remained in the doorway, hovering on the threshold without entering. “They’re all dead?”
Myrddin turned to her. “Yes. There’s nothing you can do.”
She nodded and stepped outside again, moving out of sight and smell of the dead men in the house.
Huw called down to them. “There’s another one up here.”
“What are the man’s colors?” Cedric said.
“Gold lions on blue,” Huw said. “Same as the others.”
“Christ’s bones,” Cedric blasphemed. “Mine.”
“But who killed them, and why?” Myrddin said.
He left Cedric propped against the door frame and went down on one knee near the dead man behind the door to roll him onto his back. He too wore Cedric’s crest. In his left hand, however, he grasped a piece of torn cloth. Myrddin pulled it from his grip and held up the prize. The emblem on the cloth was the same as that worn by the men at the ford: a crimson dragon on white.
“Gwynedd’s colors again,” Myrddin said.
“Enemies are friends, and friends are enemies,” Cedric said.
Huw now came down the ladder. “This becomes more and more strange.”
“And less and less to my liking.” Cedric’s face was very pale, although Myrddin thought that was less a result of the dead men than from the effort of staying upright. “We must return to Brecon Castle immediately.”
Nodding his agreement, Myrddin threw Cedric’s arm over his shoulder as before and hobbled with him towards the barn and the horses.
With Cedric boosted onto his horse and Nell behind him once again, they left the manor, riding south along the trail to the main road, and then east as they’d intended the day before. Cedric didn’t speak until they were within sight of his castle. Myrddin had left him to himself, not wanting to disrupt his focus on staying upright.
But Cedric had been considering his situation. “When I invited you to retrieve your horse, I could not have predicted the events of yesterday.”
“No, my lord,” Myrddin said.
“I am reconsidering your king’s proposal,” Cedric said.
“He will be pleased to hear it,” Myrddin said.
Cedric shot Myrddin a quick glance. “I cannot meet with him myself at this time, but perhaps a small gesture on my part wouldn’t go amiss.”
“A gesture that doesn’t commit you fully, but indicates to the king your goodwill?” Nell said.
The smile flashed again. “Exactly, my dear.”
“Give a company of your men leave to ride north with us when we depart from Brecon,” Myrddin said. “As you told Modred last month, Edgar of Wigmore—and Agravaine with him—intend to lure King Arthur into a trap near the Cam River. I fear the king will meet them with too few men.”
“That I can do,” Cedric said, satisfaction in his voice.
Myrddin congratulated himself on latching upon the perfect solution. It was a way for Cedric to show support, without showing too much. At worst, if Agravaine accused him of switching sides, Cedric could claim his men had been in the wrong place at the right time and waded in on Arthur’s behalf. Cedric was justified in not wanting to see Arthur, a noble kinsman, struck down, even if he was ostensibly an enemy.
Agravaine might not believe Cedric. Nor might Modred. But they could prove nothing. If Arthur did die in four days, God forbid, Myrddin wouldn’t have Cedric lose everything just because he’d had honor enough to listen to him.
Chapter Twenty-Two
8 December 537 AD
Snow spit arrhythmically against the pane. Nell gazed through the chapel’s unusually large glass window at the accumulation—more than enough for this early in December. It sifted and swirled in the bailey of Brecon Castle. The small chapel was decorated with intricate carvings, stained glass windows with Cedric’s crest, and family tapestries on the walls. All trace of King Arthur, who’d held it for decades, had been erased, not just here but everywhere.
Myrddin walked to stand behind her. He hesitated—she could sense his tentativeness—and then placed a hand on each of her shoulders. She trembled beneath them. “What are we doing here, Myrddin?”
“We’ve come a long way from St. Asaph haven’t we?” His hands rubbed gently on her arms to warm her.
“Do we trust him?”
“Can we trust anyone at this point?” Myrddin said. “But yes, I do. I have no reason not to, and we’re so close to the end now that the price of failure is no worse than that which already faces us.”
“Your dreams consumed the whole of last night,” Nell said.
Myrddin shrugged. “And yours didn’t?”
She canted her head in acknowledgement of his point, though in truth she’d hardly slept. “And what do you see? Is it still the same dream?”
“It’s odd. You’ve told me I’m no longer present in yours, which is something in which I find great comfort, but I’m watching from above in my own dreams now too. It’s disconcerting, frankly, and I find myself trying to force the dream into the long-remembered patterns.”
“But it won’t go,” Nell said.
“No,” Myrddin admitted.
“Shouldn’t that mean we’re doing something right?” Nell said.
“The king still dies, Nell,” Myrddin said. “I can no longer see his face, but the Gwynedd crest is bloody on the ground every time, just like at the ford.”
Nell turned to him, wrapped her arms around his waist, and put her face into his chest. “We’re doing everything we can. If King Arthur goes to meet Edgar, it’s out of our hands.”
“We are so close—not only to saving the king but to winning this war,” Myrddin said. “I refuse to back down now.”
Nell breathed deeply and squeezed Myrddin once more. “It’s time we started for Buellt. How soon can we leave?”
“I would have liked to have left this morning,” Myrddin said. “The last thing I want is to be late to the castle or the church.”
“I share your concern, but you can’t ride today,” Cedric said from behind them.
Myrddin swung around, pulling Nell with him. Cedric stood framed in the doorway to the chapel.
“You shouldn’t be up—” Nell cut herself off. Telling Cedric he shouldn’t be up and around two days after a sword sliced through his leg was just as effective as saying it to Myrddin.
“And why is that?” Myrddin said.
“Because it would do you no good to arrive at Buellt Castle when Edgar is not there. You don’t want to spend two days waiting for him under the eyes of Agravaine.”
“How do you know this?” Myrddin said.
“Edgar has just sent me word that he intends to leave Wigmore tomorrow, at the head of a host of men, break his journey at Buellt, where he will see to the status of the garrison and confer with Agravaine, and then journey on to Brecon after hearing mass on Sunday.”
“And his men?” Nell said. “What of them?” The combined forces of Agravaine and Edgar would be considerable, more than enough to counter the men that King Arthur might be able to collect once he reached Powys.
“Likely, he will leave the majority of them with Agravaine, to bolster his numbers and
prevent King Arthur from besieging Buellt Castle,” Cedric said. “Both sides are wary of each other now. They see the end game and are maneuvering their forces to strike at the most opportune time.”
“As are you,” Nell said.
Cedric canted his head at her, an amused glint in his eye, but he didn’t answer. Instead he turned to Myrddin. “I trust your horse is undamaged from his stint in my stables?”
“Yes, my lord,” Myrddin said. Nell had been there when he’d located Cadfarch, and Myrddin had been very pleased. “He’s an old friend.”
“Always the best kind to have at your back,” Cedric said.
Nell didn’t know how to interpret that, since even if Cedric was their friend (not yet determined), he certainly wasn’t an ‘old’ one. Meanwhile, Cedric turned on his heel and departed.
As he disappeared down the corridor, heading for the stairs, Nell shook her head. “I can’t read him.”
“Neither can I,” Myrddin said. “I wouldn’t want to cross him.”
“Do we know what we’re doing?”
“No,” he said. “We don’t.”
*
Myrddin found Huw in an open space between the stables and the smithy. The wall and buildings sheltered it from the worst of the wind, and the ground, although frozen, was clear of snow. Huw had grown to manhood in this castle after King Arthur’s defeats earlier in the decade. In the last day, he’d fallen into old patterns, willing to take up where he’d left off to the point of holding a dull sword to face down a boy of similar age to him.
Unlike Huw, the boy was not yet a knight. By the look in his eye and the determined set of his jaw, he was ready to put Huw back into the place he thought Huw belonged.
But Huw, for all that he was young, had earned his title and was equally determined to show it. As they fought, Myrddin recalled another castle and a different fight, this one overseen by the captain of Arthur’s guard, a man long dead but much revered. Those first months Myrddin had lived among Arthur’s court, the captain had taken Myrddin under his wing. Even now, he could hear the man’s words:
‘A man is divided into four quarters,’ he’d said, gesturing to Myrddin with the point of his sword. ‘Every attack you make should draw your opponent’s defenses to a new quarter, degrading his ability to counter you. At the same time, your opponent will be trying to attack you in the same way, and you must parry his blows. Remember that, and that we slash, not thrust, unless it is for the final blow when you force the point of your sword through a man’s mail.’
It had been a lesson Myrddin had heeded. Despite Huw’s hesitation at the battle at Garth Celyn, it was one he’d learned well too.
“I will miss the boy.” As was his custom, Cedric had silently come up behind Myrddin in a manner Myrddin found disconcerting. Then again, it seemed to be his way and an extension of his desire to hide what he was thinking and feeling at all times. As a Saxon lord, this ability had undoubtedly stood him in good stead.
“Thank you for giving him leave to find me,” Myrddin said. “It isn’t every lord who would have done so.”
“It was either that or find him gone one day, the imperative of his birth overcoming his allegiance to me,” Cedric said. “It would have cost him more than needful to have refused him.”
Huw parried another blow. Then, in a quick movement, he upended his opponent to pin him to the ground. Watching with Myrddin, Cedric gave a snort of satisfaction. “As I said, I will miss him.”
“I will do my best to ensure that you never find yourselves on opposite sides of a fight,” Myrddin said. “If I can protect him from that, I will.”
“When I was sixteen, I saw my father cut down in front of me. There will be worse things for him in this life than having to fight in a battle not of his choosing.”
Huw left the ring of boys and men, stripping off his tunic as he walked away. Steam rose from his torso. Even in the cold and snow, his young blood ran hot from the fight.
Cedric glanced at him once more and then turned to Myrddin. “Come. I have something to show you.”
Myrddin followed Cedric into the great hall, both walking with identical stiff right legs, though Myrddin told himself his was the more limber, and then up the stairs to Cedric’s office. Like the chapel, it had one window with glass in it, which in this case looked northwest. Snow had built up along the window ledge and ice coated the inside edges of the glass. Black clouds lay ominously low on the horizon, threatening more snow. Cedric’s steward sat at a desk near the fire. Upon Cedric’s entrance, he stood, bowed to Cedric, and left.
Myrddin faced Cedric across his desk, expectant but not expecting anything. Cedric reached up to a shelf above his head and brought down a box. Setting it on his desk, he opened it. Several cloth bundles nestled inside. Cedric chose one and unwrapped it, revealing a gold cross. Myrddin stared at it, speechless, for it was a match to the one he wore.
Wordlessly, Myrddin lifted his own cross over his head and laid it on the table beside the box.
“Your cross fell on your chest during the fight beside the river, and I noted it,” Cedric said. “Where did you get it?”
“From my mother,” Myrddin said. “She died at my birth, under the protection of one Madoc, a household knight of Lord Cai, King Arthur’s half-brother.”
“But Madoc was not your father.”
“No.” Myrddin’s stomach lurched at the thought. “At least, he never claimed me, for all that he allowed me house room until I became a man.” Myrddin paused. “And yours?” He almost didn’t want to know.
“My mother died when I was two. She left this cross for me, her eldest son,” Cedric said.
Myrddin absorbed his news, wondering and uncertain. There was no doubt the crosses were brothers, made by the same goldsmith and likely purchased together.
“There’s more you should know.” Cedric watched Myrddin carefully as he spoke, while Myrddin endeavored to copy him—to give nothing away of what he was thinking. “This cross was a gift to my mother from her sister, Juliana, when Juliana was near death.”
“Juliana had it made?” Myrddin kept his eyes fixed on the matching crosses, recalling what King Arthur had said: that Myrddin’s mother had been a lady-in-waiting to Juliana for a time before Myrddin’s birth.
Cedric shook his head. “Juliana’s husband had it made for her. He gave it to her the Christmas before he died.”
Myrddin’s head came up at that. Together, yet unspeaking, he and Cedric contemplated the import of his words. Juliana’s husband had been Ambrosius, uncle to King Arthur and ruler of Wales after the death of Vortigern.
Myrddin ran his finger along the intricate carvings on the cross. Celtic in appearance, the crosspieces flared at the tips. “How is it that you came to me?”
The cross lay on the table, not answering. Shaking his head at all he didn’t know, about his father and everything else, Myrddin picked it up and hung it around his neck, tucking it under his shirt as usual.
Cedric studied Myrddin’s face and then scanned his clothes, his worn scabbard with its fine sword, and tattered cloak. “Who was your father, Myrddin?”
Myrddin shook his head.
“You really don’t know?” Cedric said.
“No,” Myrddin said. “Once I was grown, it no longer seemed to matter.”
“Has your king ever seen that cross?” Cedric said.
“No,” Myrddin said again. “Not that I’m aware.”
Cedric picked up his own cross. “You might show it to him. Sooner, rather than later.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
10 December 537 AD
Myrddin had Nell tucked against him under their blanket—fully clothed—with Huw sleeping not far away. They’d found shelter halfway to Buellt at a small castle whose owner swore allegiance to Cedric.
The place was primitive in the extreme, but it was warmer than outside. The threatened snow had turned into a whiteout in the higher elevations that rose between Brecon and Buellt. It was the differenc
e of a few hundred feet, but it was enough to turn a snowstorm into a blizzard. Thus, they’d come all of five miles from Brecon in an entire day. They had only eight more miles to go, but it could have been eighty for all the difference it would have made. Nothing could have been more pathetic—or impossible.
Nell had lain quiet against Myrddin a long while, neither of them sleeping, just absorbing each other’s company and their growing closeness. She knew now that if nothing else in the entire world made sense, she was sure of him. She was no longer nervous or afraid that she was risking her heart. Better to risk it than not live the life she’d been given, even if it lasted only one more day.
“We’re going to have to ride on in the morning, no matter what,” she said. “Even if we lash ourselves together with rope.”
“I know,” Myrddin said. “And we’ll be losing Cedric’s men at Penrhiw.”
“I suppose, at the very least, they’re loud and good at plowing snow.” Nell laughed. But then she sobered and turned in Myrddin’s arms so she could see his expression. The small amount of light given off by the candle they’d not yet blown out made his face just visible. “If something goes awry in Buellt, you save yourself.”
Myrddin took her face in his hands and studied it. “Meaning what?”
“There’s so much here we don’t know or understand,” she said. “I’m afraid of what may happen. If you need to flee, you do it, even if it means leaving me behind.”
Myrddin shook his head. “I will not desert you. I’m no longer the unthinking warrior I once was.” Then his voice gentled, and he rested his forehead against hers. “I’m not afraid of dying, Nell. I’ve died in my dreams more times than I can count.”
“And I’ve died with you. As you. I don’t want to live in a world without you in it.” She reached up and stroked a stray hair off Myrddin’s forehead. “We need a place to meet if the worst happens, and we get separated. I need to know where I can find you.”
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