by Headlee, Kim
GARETH RACED ahead to open the doors and followed Gyan from Loth’s council chambers.
In the corridor, she stopped to take her first real measure of this sister-son-by-law. Gareth favored his father and older brother in coloring, with dark brown hair and eyes and a hale complexion. But his lean limbs and boat-size feet promised greater height. Like most boys his age, his freckled face held no trace of guile. The glimmer of intelligence provided a welcome antidote to Loth’s attitude.
“Gareth, can you please show me to my quarters?”
“Aye.” He trotted down the corridor without checking to see whether she kept up. “This way!”
Chuckling softly, she lengthened her stride.
The torchlit passage was deserted, and no sounds emanated from within the rooms they passed. Gyan gave voice to her curiosity.
“This wing is for special guests. You and Uncle Arthur are the only ones at Dunpeldyr right now.”
“Gawain and the rest of our men? Where are they sleeping?”
“With the clan warriors in the Great Hall.” Gyan wondered how they could find space without resting their heads upon one another. As if reading her thoughts, Gareth added, “There’s plenty of room.”
His assurance satisfied her. The last thing she and Arthur needed was discord between their men and Loth’s.
Gareth halted before a door. It yielded to his push, revealing a comfortably large set of rooms. Her saddle packs and Arthur’s slouched between a worktable and a pair of tall-backed chairs. The fire lent its cheery glow. Freshly crushed lavender competed with the piney smoke to sweeten the air.
From beyond the inner door leading to the sleeping chamber, the fur-covered bed seemed to beckon invitingly, making her body feel wearier than ever.
“Can you tell me about your fights?” A hopeful look spread across his face. “Please, Aunt Ganora?”
“It’s Ghee-an-huh-mah-rah.” She grinned. “But only my enemies call me that.” Swatting his shoulder won her a lopsided if embarrassed smile. “Someone as brave as you can call me whatever you like!” Any other time, she’d have been delighted to honor Gareth’s request, but this evening her priorities lay elsewhere. She cast a longing glance at the bed, a much more comfortable elsewhere. “We will talk on the morrow, Gareth.” She nudged him toward the corridor. “Thank you. You have been most helpful.”
His lips twisted into a pout. “Just one story? A short one?”
“I think not, young man.” Gareth turned on the intruder.
In the corridor, hefting a tray laden with bread, cheese, and two steaming mugs, stood his mother. With her free hand, Annamar motioned Gareth out of the way. He obeyed, none too swiftly.
“We shall talk, Gareth.” Gyan raised an open hand. “I promise.”
Visibly happier, the lad scampered down the corridor.
“Please forgive him, Gyanhumara.” Annamar balanced the tray on one hand to close the door. “Men and children don’t understand certain things.”
Wearing that same enigmatic smile as before, she bustled into the room, set the tray on the table, and began checking the shutters for drafts.
Some women didn’t understand, either. Gyan hunted for civil words. “Really, Annamar, you needn’t trouble yourself.”
“No trouble.” Annamar glanced up from her inspection of the floor rushes. “Please try the tisane. It should help you sleep. And my kinfolk call me Anna.”
Gyan reached for one of the mugs as Annamar disappeared into the bedchamber. Pleasant warmth flowed into her palms. She perched on the thickly cushioned couch near the fire, studying Arthur’s elder half sister. Instinct told her Annamar’s welcome wasn’t feigned. Not as the welcome of another sister of Arthur’s might have been.
Suppressing thoughts of Morghe with a mental shudder, Gyan gazed at Annamar’s serenely smiling face as she returned from her tour of the sleeping chamber.
“Mine call me Gyan.” Annamar’s smile deepened, but she remained silent, waiting, Gyan thought, for her to say—what? Gyan pondered her cup. An apple-like fragrance rode the tendrils of steam. She took a sip. The tea tasted hauntingly familiar. “What is in this, Anna?”
Annamar picked up the other mug and joined Gyan on the couch. “Nothing special, just chamomile, rose petals, lady’s mantle. And a dollop of honey, of course. You looked a mite tired, and I thought this might help you feel better.”
The same ingredients Cynda used; no wonder it tasted so familiar. Gyan gave her sister-by-law a questioning glance, but the other woman had set her cup down to stir the fire’s embers.
“The journey has been more tiring than I expected.” A safe enough answer, Gyan hoped.
“I shouldn’t wonder, Gyan, in your condition.”
My condition, indeed! “Excuse me?”
“Come, my dear, let’s not play games.” Annamar laid the poker aside and caught Gyan’s hand. “Don’t try to fool a woman who has four babes of her own.”
Gyan pulled it free. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She couldn’t run the risk of Loth finding out. It would destroy any sliver of credibility she might possess with the man.
“As you wish.” Annamar plucked at her tunic’s neckline. “I ought to look in on my youngest. She should be waking for a feeding soon.”
As Loth’s wife rose and started for the door, another thought occurred to Gyan. What if Annamar told Loth her suspicions anyway? The One God alone knew what Loth’s reaction would be.
Were Gyan to refuse Annamar’s hand of friendship, she might never get another opportunity to forge a bond with a Breatan that went beyond battlefields and bedchambers.
Furthermore, here stood a Breatanach mother not bound by Caledonach strictures. Perhaps Annamar could help.
“Anna, wait. Please. Yes, I am with child.” Annamar again settled herself beside the fire, nodding slowly. “Is it that obvious already? Do you think others might suspect?”
“Oh, no. Certainly no man would guess.” Annamar’s laugh tinkled like silvery bells. “Why, Gyan, you look positively relieved. Haven’t you told Arthur yet?”
Gyan stared at the shimmering depths of the tea before taking another sip, wondering how far to trust this woman.
“He knows. But—” A bigger sip this time. “Anna, it’s too soon.”
Annamar’s slender eyebrows rose in graceful arches. “You’ve been married since July, and you can’t possibly be farther along than that, yet.” The eyebrows lowered to cap her frown. “Arthur doesn’t think the child is his?”
“No, no. Of course he does, and rightly so. I have lain with no other man.” Clutching the mug, Gyan stood and paced across the antechamber. She couldn’t possibly explain everything to this stranger. But to remain silent when so many doubts and—yes, even fears—assailed her heart…surely that would be worse. After setting the mug on the table, she faced Annamar. “I am not ready to be a mother.” Sighing, she dropped her voice to a whisper. “I—I don’t even know if I really want to be one.”
“Ah.” A world of understanding lived in her level gaze.
Annamar retrieved the mug from the table, pressed it into Gyan’s hands, clasped her shoulders, and gently but firmly propelled her back to the couch.
“My dear Gyan, every sane woman questions this. Never mind the pain of childbirth; it’s over quickly enough and soon forgotten, thank God, or mankind would have ceased to walk this earth long ago.” Seriousness overcame Annamar’s mirth. “What I’m talking about is when you give a score of your best years to raising your children, nurturing them, teaching them, shielding them from famine and war only to see them run off one by one to perpetuate the starving and the killing.” Her eyes glistened. “And maybe fall victim to it, too.”
Gyan pondered the words in silence. Preoccupied with what changes motherhood would make in her own life, this aspect had eluded her. Her heart began to throb with shame.
“Anna.” Gyan didn’t look up. “Are you happy as a mother?”
“It’s not all milky sp
ittle and soiled swaddling bands. There will be adjustments in your life, yes. I’d be lying to deny that. But it’s not a prison.”
Gyan felt Annamar’s fingers sweep a stray lock from her forehead. She lifted her head, and Annamar’s hand withdrew. “But are you happy?” Gyan persisted.
Annamar’s sigh sounded wistful, and Gyan wondered what had prompted it. “There is a special joy in watching your children challenge the world in their unique ways and knowing that you’ve had a hand in it. A hand in shaping the future.” She rested her hand lightly on Gyan’s shoulder. “You will know that joy, too, Gyan.”
Annamar bade her good night and left the chamber.
Gyan stared at her hands, rubbing them. Callused from a sword’s hilt, they knew the slick, hot feel of the blood of other women’s sons. These hands already had begun to shape the future. Their way.
Would the motherly joy Annamar had described counterbalance the pain of being denied the chance to pursue the life for which she’d been trained? The life she’d chosen and desired above all else?
ARTHUR AND Loth sat at the table in the council chamber, the deerhide map of Dunpeldyr and surrounding territory stretched between them. Painted with blue ink to mark Brytoni holdings and red for Angli, it depicted the land extending to the north bank of the Fiorth River, west to Senaudon, to the southern border between Brytoni Gododdin and the Angli kingdom of Bernicia, and east to Berwych and the sea. Crimson marked the five obliterated Gododdin villages.
Like a pair of jaws, the Angli forces were pushing east from Dun Eidyn and west from Berwych, devouring all Brytoni land in between.
“In a year or two, the bastards will be at my bloody doorstep.”
A miracle Dunpeldyr hadn’t fallen already. “Hiding soldiers in the villages will slow the advance.” God willing. Arthur took a swallow of the amber uisge, brewed by the monks at Glaschu Monastery at the western end of the Antonine Wall, threescore and ten miles distant. He welcomed the potent barley liquor’s warmth.
“Hmph. If I’m lucky.”
The only luck Arthur believed in took the form of three feet of tempered steel called Caleberyllus. “It will buy me time to move the troops.” Never mind gathering provisions for men and mounts, erecting temporary shelters, workshops, and storage sheds, forging weapons and armor and horseshoes and harness fittings, and the myriad other details that went into implementing a campaign of this magnitude.
“The entire legion?” Hope flared in Loth’s eyes.
Arthur shook his head. “Most of the cavalry. Half the foot—”
“Only half?” A thick fist thumped the tabletop. “How the devil do you expect to defeat the Angli with only half the infantry?”
After Loth’s arrogant verbal posturing, especially toward Gyan, the temptation to bait him was too great to resist. “Have you already forgotten the fierceness of Caledonian horsemen? It’s been only a year and a half since Abar-Gleann.” He took another searing swallow. A quick glance rewarded him with a view of Loth’s surprise. “Of course, as late as you arrived to the battlefield, you missed most of the cavalry action.”
Loth wisely let the jibe pass. He had expressed his disagreement with Arthur’s election to the Pendragonship by withholding support at Abar-Gleann. Afterward, while everyone cheered Arthur’s brilliant win, Loth salvaged his reputation by claiming unanticipated delays in having to skirt Angli territory. Arthur hadn’t believed him but, because he’d felt generous in the wake of his first major victory, he had chosen not to call Loth to account. Not publicly, anyway.
Loth appeared subdued as he pushed from the table and rose to approach the fire. Holding palms to the dying flames, he said quietly, “Are you sure it will be enough?”
“It will have to be. I cannot leave the western garrisons empty, and it takes time to recruit and train men.”
“Hmph. Don’t think about coercing any more of my children into joining you.”
“I do not coerce anyone. Gawain made his choice, passed the enlistment training, and has become an asset to the legion. Anyone else who thinks he can do the same is welcome to try.”
Loth turned toward Arthur, eyes alight. “Then take Dwras.”
“Dwras?”
“Dwras map Gwyn, the farmer lad who survived one of the raids. By God’s holy, bleeding wounds, Arthur, I have never seen such anger in my life. Perhaps you can use that anger against the Angli bastards who destroyed his family.”
“Perhaps.” A man of deep anger, however, seldom made a good soldier. “But it might be hard for him to live at another village.”
“I don’t care what you do with him. He can’t stay here much longer. His temper has gotten him into trouble twice already. I don’t need someone like that haunting my hall, picking fights.”
That Arthur could sympathize with. Drink in hand, he joined Loth at the hearth. “I will speak with him on the morrow.”
Loth stooped to swipe a fistful of rushes from the floor. One by one, he snapped them in half and flung the pieces into the flames. “You didn’t assign yourself or your wife to a village.” Another woody stem flared into oblivion. “You are welcome to winter here, of course.” Two more broken pieces joined their kin. “Both of you.”
Arthur wondered whether the welcome extended to Loth’s firstborn—someone else not assigned to a border village—but that discussion could wait for daylight. He clapped Loth’s shoulder. “I appreciate the offer, but it will depend on what Gyan wants to do.”
Loth chuckled. “The man whose wife rules him begs for trouble.”
“No danger there. I’m only concerned for her happiness.”
He gave Arthur a measuring stare. “You really do love her. I thought it was an arranged match.”
“Of course. I arranged it.” Arthur smiled briefly. “We both did. I never would have challenged Urien if I hadn’t been certain of Gyan’s heart.”
Loth sacrificed the remaining rushes to the fire. “Is she really as good as they say?” Arthur felt his eyebrows lift. With a rueful grin, Loth added, “In battle, I mean.”
“I wouldn’t entrust my life to many people.” The truth smote him with abrupt clarity. “But Gyanhumara of Caledonia is one of them.”
AIDED BY a half-dozing servant, Arthur found the guest quarters. After making a quick survey of the layout, he bade the girl to take the oil lamp with her. He had no wish to disturb his sleeping wife.
While he groped toward the bed, the sound of her peaceful, even breathing greeted him. He stripped off cloak, boots, tunic, and trews and eased under the furs. Gyan lay on her side, facing away. Nestling against her warm back, he slipped his arm across her waist. His hand came to rest against her belly. He wondered when it would begin to show evidence of the child within. Their child.
Her fingertips drifted over his. “Mmm…Artyr?”
“Forgive me, Gyan. I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“Never mind…” She shifted onto her back and reached up to caress his cheek. “Did you and Loth finish?”
“Yes. First Turma will winter here as reinforcements. Fourth and Fifth I’m keeping as escort. The rest of our men have been assigned to border villages, along with some of Loth’s. On the morrow, we gather peasant clothing and—”
“Ha! So Loth liked my idea. He could have admitted it to me. I ought to change Dunpeldyr’s Caledonaiche name from Dùn Pildìrach, Fort of the Turning Ascent”—an apt description of the easily defended approach to the summit, Arthur privately agreed—“to Dùn Pildìoras.”
“And that means the Fort of—?”
“The Fort of He Who Has Turned Stubborn.”
Arthur barked a laugh. But despite all of Loth’s blustering, he could think of no man he’d rather see as an ally in this dangerous corner of Brydein. “Loth isn’t a bad sort, Gyan. And he’s smart enough to recognize good counsel, even if he’s not accustomed to the source.”
He heard the faint, low growl of her dissent and cut off any further disagreement with a long kiss. Her lips were warmly invit
ing. He brushed his fingertips across the swell of her breasts.
She caught his hand. “What about me, Artyr? Do I stay here? Or go back to Caer Lugubalion? And what will you do?”
“Those are two options, of course. You could also winter at one of the Gododdin villages. And…” He kissed the side of her neck lightly, lingeringly. “Arbroch is only a few days away.”
Her sharp intake of breath told him her decision. No surprise. His lips worked around to her throat, and she let out a slow sigh.
“Can you send someone to fetch Cynda?”
“Consider it done.” After another kiss, he added, “Morghe, too.”
“Morghe?” She pushed herself onto her elbows. “Why?”
“She’s a healer, for one thing.”
“Arbroch has healers and midwives aplenty.”
He couldn’t fathom her reluctance but had no patience for ferreting out the answer. It was late, the morrow promised to be quite busy, and he needed to put this matter to rest. He countered with logic to which Gyan surely could relate: “The birth of a Brytoni nobleman’s child must be witnessed by a female member of his family. In the strictest sense, I’m not a nobleman, since the Clan Cwrnwyll elders refuse to waive the illegitimacy of my birth—”
“But you are Chieftainess Ygraine’s son, and the protocol must be observed,” Gyan finished for him. She eased back down. “And Morghe’s knowledge of Caledonaiche makes her the logical choice.”
“Exactly.” As the silence stretched between them, he wished he hadn’t sent the servant away with the light. Into the blackness, he offered, “I’m glad you understand, Gyan.”
She sighed. “I suppose you will be leaving for headquarters.”
Under normal circumstances, yes. A thousand details awaited him regarding the selection, equipping, provisioning, movement, and quartering of the troops to be assigned to the Angli campaign. Details that could be handled quite competently by Cai, Merlin, Marcus, and other officers. He suspected his wife needed him more than they did. Come morning, he’d send a message telling them so.
