Here Be Dragons

by Sharon Kay Penman

  With those whom he knew well, Llewelyn could sometimes communicate without need of words, most often with Joanna, occasionally with Ednyved. But he experienced now just such a moment of shared, silent understanding with a virtual stranger. His eyes happened to catch Eustace de Vesci’s; for several seconds the two men looked at one another, and in that brief span they reached an unspoken accord, one to be explored further at a more opportune time.

  There was a sudden commotion at the end of the hall. Llewelyn turned, saw an extraordinary apparition stumbling through the doorway. He was uncommonly tall, so gaunt he looked almost skeletal, clad in a long, ragged gown of unbleached sacking, his feet grimy and bare, his hair drifting about his shoulders like dirty, windblown snow, his beard wild and unkempt. But although he’d obviously reached his biblical threescore years and ten, his face was curiously unlined, untouched by time, and his eyes, a startling shade of blue, were utterly without guile.

  Joanna turned toward her father. “Whoever is that strange old man?”

  “A crazed hermit who has been wandering about Yorkshire for some weeks, prophesying my death. When reports first reached me, I did not pay them any mind. If I concerned myself with every lunatic roaming about the countryside, I’d have time for little else. But this lunatic,” John said dryly, “is beginning to attract crowds.”

  The old man seemed bewildered by his surroundings. He had to be shoved forward by his guards, and when he reached the dais, he stood there, blinking, until one of the men put a hand on his shoulder, directed him to kneel.

  John leaned forward. “Are you the one they call Peter of Wakefield?”

  “Yes, lord.” He did not sound frightened, just confused. He squatted back on his heels, waited patiently for John’s will to be revealed.

  “I was told you’ve been preaching that I’m to lose my crown by Ascension Day. Is that true?”

  “No, lord!” The astonishing blue eyes opened wide. “Not this Ascension Day, lord. The Ascension Day next to come.”

  John gave an abrupt, incredulous laugh, one that did not sound very amused. “God tells you this, I suppose?” he said sarcastically, and the hermit nodded.

  “Yes, lord,” he said, so calmly that John lost all patience.

  “Who put you up to this, old man? Who’s paying you?”

  Peter blinked. “No one, lord. I am an instrument of the Almighty. He has given me second sight.”

  There was something unexpectedly compelling in the utter simplicity of that statement. People murmured among themselves; a few surreptitiously made the sign of the cross. Llewelyn had less than the normal amount of superstition in his makeup, but even he was affected by the old man’s composure, by his eerie certainty, and he was suddenly glad that the hermit’s prophecy was not directed at him. He glanced curiously over at John, but the latter looked more angry than uneasy.

  “You try my patience, old man, in truth you do. Go back to Wakefield, keep your foolish babblings to yourself, and I’ll overlook the trouble you’ve caused me. But you’d best not expect me to be so lenient a second time.”

  “I am sorry, lord; I do not mean to displease you. But I cannot do that. My visions are not my own. They come from Almighty God. He has chosen me to spread His word, and I cannot fail Him.”

  The hall was very still. John stared balefully at the elderly hermit, shabby and emaciated and perplexingly tranquil; he met John’s eyes quite placidly, as if his own fate was a matter of utter indifference to him. He did not flinch, did not react at all as John said grimly, “As you will, old man.” He gestured to the waiting guards. “Take this ‘prophet of God’ to Corfe Castle, confine him there until Ascension Day of next year.”

  They seized the hermit, dragged him to his feet. He offered no resistance. “I shall pray for you, lord, when your time is nigh.”

  John looked about the hall, saw he was suddenly the object of morbid speculation. He did not doubt that many among them would lay grisly wagers on this madman’s prophecy, that they’d count the days till Ascensiontide, 1213, with unholy glee. Few faces showed any sympathy; far more showed covert, cautious amusement. His son-in-law alone was making no attempt to hide his mirth, was openly grinning. John stared at Llewelyn, and for a long moment his brother Will’s life hung in the balance.

  “He amuses you, this pitiful lunatic?”

  “Actually,” Llewelyn said coolly, “I found him to be surprisingly convincing, found myself wondering if he might, indeed, be one of God’s chosen.”

  Joanna was close enough to hear her father’s sharp inhalation of breath. She put her hand imploringly upon his arm, but he shook it off, keeping his eyes on Llewelyn.

  “Sooner or later,” he said, very softly, “you will make a misstep. And when you do, Christ Jesus Himself shall pity your fate.”

  Joanna knelt, hugged in turn her four-year-old half-brother Henry, three-year-old Richard, and her namesake and half-sister Joanna, who was not yet two. None of them had their father’s dark coloring; Henry and Richard were redheads like their grandfather, and little Joanna had inherited Isabelle’s blondeness. They accepted Joanna’s kisses shyly, for she was a stranger to them, then approached the bed to receive goodnight kisses from their mother.

  Isabelle smiled fondly, ruffled Henry’s untidy, bright hair, forbore to scold when her daughter left a dirty little handprint upon the skirt of her gown. But after a few moments, she signaled to the nurses, and the children were shepherded from the chamber.

  The sight of them, the feel and smell of their sturdy little bodies, had stirred up Joanna’s longing for her own children. Never before had she been separated from Davydd and Elen for more than a few days, and she did not understand how Isabelle could be content to see her children so infrequently. Isabelle seemed proud of them, bragged about them often enough, but she reminded Joanna of Elen, who lavished much love upon her dolls, but only when she wanted to play at being a mother.

  As the children departed, Joanna rose, too. “I want to see Papa tonight, think I’d best go ere it gets too late.”

  Isabelle, too, had been a witness to that scene in the great hall. She gave Joanna a wryly sympathetic smile, shook her head. “‘Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.’ That may be true in Heaven, but they get precious little credit here on earth, darling.”

  “What would you have me do, Isabelle? Just stand by, watch and do nothing? What would you do if you were in my place? If you were the one being torn between husband and father?” But even as she asked, Joanna realized the futility of expecting Isabelle to experience another’s pain. She was coming to see that Isabelle’s emotional landscape was an alien world to her, a world in which flowers bloomed upon the surface in generous, dazzling profusion, but nothing was rooted deep.

  Isabelle was frowning; the blue eyes were soft with pity. At last deciding that she could best serve Joanna by helping her to face the realities of her predicament, she said candidly, “I would be as loving a wife and daughter as I could. I would try not to let their hatred for each other poison their love for me. I would try to make each one see that I understood his grievances against the other. Above all, Joanna, I would try to reconcile myself to a bitter truth—that there could be no happy ending.”

  “The hearth fire is almost out, Papa. Shall I fetch a servant to stoke it?”

  “No, do not bother. But you can get me another cup of wine.”

  Joanna obeyed, although she suspected that he’d already had more than enough wine that night. As soon as she’d been given admittance into his chamber, found him sitting all alone in shadowed gloom, she’d abandoned her intention to talk to him about his latest clash with Llewelyn. This was not the time for it.

  “Isabelle tells me that you mean to give Uncle Will custody of Cantebrigge Castle. That’s most generous of you, Papa.”

  “I suppose,” John agreed absently. He was gazing into the dying fire, so absorbed in his own thoughts that Joanna made no further attempts at conversation. W
hen Llewelyn drank too much, he tended to get playful, laughing a lot and making atrociously bad puns and eventually becoming amorous. But John’s drinking had a darker, more disturbing texture to it; she’d never seen him well and truly drunk, knew she did not want to.

  “You do not think he could actually have second sight?”

  “No,” Joanna said hastily, if not entirely truthfully, “of course not! Why would the Almighty bestow so great a gift upon one so unworthy?”

  “Why indeed?” he echoed. The only light came from a single wall cresset; she could not see his face. She rose from her seat, moved toward him. But he rose, too, began to wander aimlessly about the chamber, picking up and discarding items at random.

  “Do you believe in God, Joanna?” he asked suddenly, so shocking her that she was momentarily rendered mute. In all her life she had never heard anyone ask such a question.

  “Yes, I do. Surely you do, too, Papa?”

  He shrugged, again said, “I suppose…”

  Another silence fell. John stopped before the hearth, reached for the fire tongs, and tried to prod the embers back into life.

  “Talk to me, Papa,” Joanna entreated. “Tell me what you’re thinking. I’m here, I want to help, if only you’ll let me.”

  “What makes you think I need help?”

  “Even a blind man could see that you’re troubled! Is it the Pope? His meddling in Wales?”

  John thrust the fire tongs aside, called the Pope an imaginatively obscene name. “You know what he’ll do next, Joanna? He’ll announce to all of Christendom that I am no longer fit to be King of England, anoint that grasping hellspawn Philip to lead a ‘holy crusade’ to depose me. And as Philip’s reward for acting as the papal catspaw, he’ll bestow upon him the crown of England, if he can take it from me. Do you know what that would mean? Every whoreson in England with half a grudge or half a brain would flock to the French banners.”

  “Then come to terms with him, Papa…ere it be too late.”

  “No,” he said. “No, I will not. I’ll not yield, not when I’m in the right.”

  “It seems to me, Papa, that the relevant question is not who’s in the right, but whether this is a war you can win.” Joanna crossed to him, laid a hand on his sleeve. “I fear for you,” she confessed. “Not just for your crown, for your soul, too. If you die excommunicate, you’re damned to Hell for all eternity. What could be worth so great a risk, Papa?”

  “I’m damned whether the Pope absolves me or not. The things I’ve done…”

  Arthur, she thought numbly. She swallowed, said, “What things, Papa?”

  He looked at her, and for a moment she truly thought he was going to answer. But he said only, “Things God could never forgive.”

  “That’s not so, Papa. There is no sin so great that God cannot forgive it.”

  He took her hand in his, raised it to his lips, and then he laughed, backed away. “Do not believe it, lass, not for a moment! There is no forgiveness, either in this world or the next.”

  “You’re wrong, Papa.” Joanna drew a deep breath, said, “I could forgive you any sin.”

  John gave her an odd smile, shook his head. “No, lass,” he said. “You could not.”

  He moved to the table, with an unsteady hand poured himself another cupful of wine. “If that mad old man be right, I’ll have reigned for fourteen years. Passing strange, for it seems longer, much longer.” He turned back to face Joanna, still with that strange smile. “There is but one lesson worth learning, one you must teach your children, Joanna. That nothing in life turns out as we thought it would, nothing…”

  On a cloudy, cool day in late May, the Welsh Princes came to Aber. Llewelyn greeted them in the great hall, but he then led them into his own chamber for the privacy such a volatile gathering required. He had not been entirely sure that they all would come. But he knew that if Maelgwn came, so, too, would his brother, Rhys Gryg. There was no love between them, but they had finally reached a grudging accord, more than a truce, less than an alliance. There was no question in his mind that his cousins Madog and Hywel would come, for he knew neither one was proud of the part he’d played in last summer’s campaign. And Gwenwynwyn would come if the others did, for he had far too suspicious a nature to allow such a council to take place without him.

  “I thought Aber was burned, compliments of your wife’s father.”

  There was mockery in Gwenwynwyn’s smile, but Llewelyn ignored it, said evenly, “I had it rebuilt…on a larger scale.”

  Maelgwn took a seat next to Ednyved, giving him a cool nod; they were brothers by marriage, but not friends. “What of my renegade nephews? Did you not invite them?”

  “Owain and Rhys were unwilling to come,” Llewelyn said regretfully. “Their defeat at John’s hands seems to have left lasting scars upon their souls.” He saw no reason not to come straight to the point. “I expect you’ve guessed why I asked you to Aber, to talk about forming a league of amity. I think it time we put aside our differences, band together against a common enemy, the English King.”

  “You expect us to forget years of bad blood, mistrust, betrayals?” Gwenwynwyn’s voice was scornful. “Nor do I believe you’ve suddenly become such a bloody saint yourself, willing to overlook the part we played in your defeat at Aberconwy.”

  “I’ve no claims to sainthood, but I like to think I’m capable of learning from past mistakes. What about you, Gwenwynwyn? Can you say as much?”

  “You think I could ever trust you? I’d sooner deal with the Devil!”

  Llewelyn shrugged. “You think you could ever trust John?”

  Madog had yet to take a seat. Now he moved toward Llewelyn, stopped in front of him. “Your mother and my father were sister and brother; that makes ours the most significant of bonds, one of blood. It gives me the right to speak plainly. You’re making a great mistake, Cousin. John’s hatred for you is mortal. You move into the Perfeddwlad, and you’ll see an English army in Wales within a fortnight. He’ll take all of Gwynedd this time, Llewelyn, and then he’ll burn every hut, every tree if need be, in order to run you to earth. Need I tell you what befalls a man charged with treason? He’s dragged behind a horse to the gallows, hanged and cut down whilst he still breathes, gelded and disemboweled ere he’s finally—and mercifully—beheaded. And there are even worse deaths. You need only remember Maude de Braose’s fate.”

  Llewelyn had heard enough. “You’re overlooking something, Madog. Whether I keep the truce or not, sooner or later John would find an excuse to move against me. Besides…this time I do not intend to lose.”

  Madog shook his head; there was on his face an expression of genuine regret. “As you will. But I want no part in this. If I must come to terms with the English King in order to hold on to my lands, so be it. I know the limits of my power, would that you did yours.” He walked to the door, paused. “I wish you luck, Cousin. I very much fear you’ll need it.”

  With Madog’s departure, a pall settled over the room. Llewelyn sought to dispel it by saying defiantly, “Of course we can do nothing, can go on as we always have, fighting one another, allowing the English kings to play their sport of divide and conquer. Is that what you want, Maelgwn? You want to wait until John has the time to deal with your rebellion, until you find yourself facing an English army?”

  “You made a mistake in taking Ceredigion,” Maelgwn said coolly. “And then I made one in backing John. I expect that makes us even…at least for now. You do not have to talk me into an alliance. I might not like it any; for certes, I do not like you. But it makes sense.”

  Llewelyn grinned, looked toward the others. “What say the rest of you?”

  Hywel nodded, grinned back. Rhys Gryg glanced over at his brother, then rose to his feet. Maelgwn was by far the more physically impressive of the two. Rhys was balding, freckled, with bloodshot blue eyes and a harsh, rasping voice, the result of a throat injury which had earned him the name Rhys Gryg, Rhys the Hoarse. As Llewelyn thought him to be fully as capabl
e as his brother, although less trustworthy, he waited tensely for the older man’s verdict.

  “It seems to me,” Rhys Gryg said slowly, “that you could act verily as a magnet for disaster, could draw John’s wrath down upon us all. You did not have much luck against John last summer. What makes you think this time it will be different?”

  “I made it easy for John, let him cut me off from my natural allies—other Welshmen. This time he will not be able to play us off against each other. This time we’re not acting as rebels, but at the urging of the Pope. And this time we’ll have allies. I’ve sent envoys to the French court; even now they are negotiating an alliance with Philip.”

  Rhys Gryg looked startled, then impressed. “That alone would sign your death warrant with John,” he said. “I see you’ve been thinking about this for a long while.”

  “I’ve had nine months in which to think of little else. We seem to agree that the English kings have had great success in exploiting our weaknesses. But two can fish in those troubled waters, and John’s enemies are beyond counting. When I was at the English court this Easter, I spoke with some of them. They’re men who hate John even more than they fear him, men who want him dead. If he leads an army into Wales, that will give them the opportunity they’ve been waiting for. If he crosses into Gwynedd, he’ll find that he has as much to fear from his own lords as he does from the Welsh.” Llewelyn paused. “Need I say more?”

  “No,” Rhys Gryg said succinctly, and for the first time he smiled. By common accord, all eyes then turned toward Gwenwynwyn. He looked so perturbed that Llewelyn could not keep from laughing.

  “It’s rather like being asked to choose between dwelling in Sodom or moving to Gomorrah, is it not?” he gibed, and Gwenwynwyn scowled. But when the other men laughed, he, too, managed a very sour smile, a grudging nod.