Chapter 9
“Well, well. I wondered when I’d see you here.”
Elain crossed Rhys’s chamber to where he stood at his strategy table. “I didn’t intend to come back.”
“Never? I’d have missed you.”
She’d have missed him too but didn’t feel like saying so.
“No, no. I meant here. In my chambers.”
She stood tall but braced for a fight. “Gwen told me you spoke to her yesterday.”
One dark brow rose. “Spoke? That’s a polite word for extorted.” He rounded the table to stand before her, arms crossed. “I don’t appreciate being lied to. In my hall. To my face.”
“How…”
“How did I know?” Rhys gave her a look of disbelief. “Because young Arthur’s as easy to read as a fucking scroll, and Bedwyr’s attention was on him, not you.”
“Do you think everyone noticed?”
“Only those with eyes.”
His were boring into her, but she made herself hold his gaze again. “I mean it, Uncle. Are they in danger?”
Rhys relented with a slight slump of his shoulders. “I doubt it. Agravain’s got eyes for two things, and your husband and his shieldmate aren’t among them. But admirable of you to ask.”
“I like Bedwyr, and Arthur. They have good hearts.”
“It’s not their hearts I need. They’d best be as good with their swords as I’ve heard.”
“Gwen said Tiro came to fetch her home.”
“Well.” Rhys strode to the far side of the table. “If you ask me, he wasn’t fully committed to hauling her back.”
“No?”
Rhys waved off the notion. “He was here to appease Uthyr’s pride, and a bit of his outrage.”
It’d be stupid to ask if Uthyr had been angry. Of course he had been. “Did Tiro say anything? About Uthyr’s reaction?”
Rhys looked at her, humor softening his features. “Are you wondering if you need to be on guard for your life?”
“No,” she said, then, “Maybe.”
Her uncle heaved a sigh. “Our man Tiro tells a good tale, but this one I believed. Uthyr was livid.”
“That bad?”
“Evidently, he went straight to Arthur’s mother and dragged her from her bed, accusing her of hiding Gwen. Woke the entire village with his shouting.”
“But she didn’t tell him where Gwen is.”
Rhys shook his head. “No, she didn’t. I believe I’d like to meet Mistress Britte someday.”
“What happened?”
“Tiro heard the ruckus and ran to find out what was going on. Britte refused to tell Uthyr where his daughter was, which cost her half her hearth’s crockery, by Tiro’s account. But she said she’d tell Tiro.”
“What happens when Tiro returns with a letter instead of the Pen y Ddraig’s only daughter?”
“Now you discover a conscience? Now you worry if you’ll bring armed men into my home?”
“I’m sorry, Uncle. It was poorly done.”
“By you. Own it.”
“By me. I acted on impulse.”
Rhys gave her a crow’s eye for a long moment, then winked. “Apology accepted. I wrote my own letter to Uthyr. You’re welcome.”
“What did you say?”
“A man’s correspondence is private, niece,” Rhys said archly, but at her pleading look, he said, “I told him his daughter was here, and that I would have a close eye on her. That she would be safe.”
“And he’ll believe you?”
Rhys laughed for the first time, a rich sound that fit his surroundings. “Uthyr and I have known each other since we were lads. Used to catch eels down at the river while our fathers schemed. If I tell him I’ll protect his daughter, he knows I’ll do it.”
“Protect her how, exactly?”
“Give her shelter. Feed her. Keep the men off her.”
Elain gathered her courage. She wasn’t sure she wanted to hear the next bit, but she had to know. “What about the women?”
“What about them?” He was looking at her intently.
“Did you say anything about me?”
“I said you’d arrived as Bedwyr’s wife. That I believed you had agreed to help Gwen follow the lads.”
“Not to run away with me?”
“She arrived with her husband and her brother. Unless you gave yourselves away up in the mountains, Uthyr has no reason to suspect you girls of knocking bits.”
Eloquent, as ever.
“Did you?”
“Did we?” Had someone been eavesdropping?
“Give yourselves away,” Rhys said slowly, as if she were simple.
She thought back over her weeks in Gwen’s village. She’d been outwardly friendly but hadn’t dared more with Uthyr’s woman around so much. Elain had helped around the house, assisted with harvest, and slept in Bedwyr’s bed. “I don’t think so.”
“Then I believe you’re in the clear. At least until spring. And at that point, the men will take up against the Saxons, so you’re likely safe through the summer as well.”
Through summer. They had months. A sliver of hope wedged itself in her chest. She took a deep breath, and it grew. “Thank you, Uncle.”
“There it is,” he said softly. “I gather Caron has set you to your immediate task?”
“Rehabilitating Palahmed?”
“We’ve been tossing dice, she and I, over who would do it. So, thank you. You’ve saved me the trouble.”
“He’ll be fine. Broken heart, is all.”
“Broken heart,” Rhys scoffed. “Don’t believe a fucking word he says. Left a dozen broken ones in his wake, I’d wager. More likely he’s had some spat with his brother or lost his favorite horse. Whatever the case, he’s useless as he is.”
“I’ll get him back on his feet and in fighting form.”
“Good.” Rhys gave her a smile, but one heavy with expectation. “Welcome back, Elain.”
~ ~ ~
It had taken two days to walk east to Agravain’s camp, a distance Arthur calculated they could have covered in one, but the northmen seemed in no hurry to get there.
Nor to do much of anything once they had arrived. Their band of twelve was greeted with lazy waves from an equal-sized group seated around a fire pit. They exchanged a few words, and some vivid gestures describing their whoring. Several looked at Arthur and Bedwyr with expected curiosity, and one volleyed a question at Agravain. Whatever he answered, every man then looked at the two of them more closely, their eyes settling on Bed’s stump. Agravain snarled something, and most of them looked away to stare at the fire. All but one dark-haired lad, the youngest of the lot, who continued to study Bedwyr and Arthur both.
Arthur had followed Bed’s lead since they’d left Rhys’s, kept his head down and listened. Answered Agravain’s few terse questions with equally brief responses. Left his sword sheathed in its scabbard. He followed Bed now, too, as he led them to a relatively flat spot beyond the farthest bedroll.
“Why do they sleep so far from the fire?”
“Who knows?” Bed said.
But they did, so insisting on sleeping closer to it might weaken their position here. He laid out his bedding and frowned at the stretch of soil between his roll and Bedwyr’s. It was going to be a cold night.
“Let’s get our bearings,” Bed said, and they walked back to the fire.
The men still sat, arranged in the same indolent way as before. It was nothing like one of Uthyr’s camps, where men rested when they needed to but were always ready to rise and fight. And he could only imagine his grandfather Marcus’s reaction, were he to come upon this untidy array of bedrolls or the way the men’s weapons lay scattered about, none close to hand and many exposed to the elements.
It was almost as if they had no intention of using them.
Bedwyr approached Agravain. “We’ll take the watch.”
The man glared up at them as if they were a bother.
“Where is your lookout point?” Bedwyr asked.
“Gwalchmai!” Agravain barked.
May hawk? Was that supposed to mean something?
The lad he’d noticed earlier rose from the far side of the fire. Agravain said something to him in his chewing-leather manner, before ignoring them again. The young man looked from Bedwyr to Arthur for a long moment, then swallowed and tipped his head. “This way.”
He led them away from the fire pit and farther into the forest to the east. He looked to have fourteen or fifteen years under his belt and had the same slight build most of the other northmen had, but where Agravain’s seemed always coiled to strike in aggression, this one’s held a tension that felt finer. More easily spooked but quicker to react and adapt, too.
Then again, maybe Arthur was only wound tight himself. The sooner they had something to do with themselves, the sooner he could shake it off. “You’re called Gwalchmai?”
The young man looked back at him and nodded.
“How did you come by a Cymrish name up north?”
“Good fortune.” The lad grinned.
It was a winning enough grin. “I’m Arthur. This is Bedwyr.”
Gwalchmai nodded to each of them. “What’d you do to get sent here?”
Bedwyr frowned, but Arthur liked the lad’s boldness. “We got lucky as well.”
At that, Gwalchmai shook his head. “To serve under Agravain?”
“He seems… strong.”
“That’s diplomatic of you,” said Gwalchmai. “It’s just up here.”
They walked up a shallow rise, slowing near the top. There, a stand of boulders offered cover. The trees thinned beyond so that they could see another camp in the distance. It looked to hold about the same number of men as their own. The four or five columns of smoke said the Saxons were as unconcerned over being detected as the northmen were over doing anything about it.
“Have you met them?”
“No.”
“No contact at all?”
“None.”
Arthur caught Bedwyr’s eye before scanning the opposite camp again. Settled for the winter. Practically hibernating. “Have they moved since you’ve camped here?”
Gwalchmai shook his head and stared at them.
“Why is no one stationed here right now?” Bedwyr asked.
The lad’s green eyes blinked, and he pointed over his shoulder. “I have to get back. If you need anything, just ask.”
Bedwyr watched him hop back through the trees, springing from rock to rock like a rabbit. “Strange lad.”
“You’d be warped too, if you had to do Agravain’s bidding all day.”
Bed cocked a dark eyebrow at him. “I do. As do you.”
Right. He squinted across the way to the Saxon camp. No immediate threats. Looking back toward their own camp, he spied no one among the trees. “I know how we could pass the time,” he said casually.
“Counting Saxons?”
“Are their Saxons in your trousers?”
“No.”
He hooked a finger in Bedwyr’s belt. “No counting, then. Unless you want to count strokes instead.”
Bedwyr plucked his hand from its hold. “We’re too exposed.”
“That’s the idea.” He reached for Bed’s shirt, only to have his wrist caught in a firm grip.
“Too dangerous, cub. We have to take more care here.”
He could’ve pointed out that Agravain’s men were more interested in their fire pit than in anything happening at this rock, but Bed was right. Didn’t make it any easier to withdraw his hand.
They watched the Saxons for several hours during which nothing of note happened. He could just make out individual men moving about the invaders’ camp. As the light began to fall, their voices sounded now and then, calling to each other and laughing.
As well they might. They sat on the border of Cymru, within a day of Rhys’s wealthy settlement, and no one was doing anything to change that.
When no man came to relieve them, they returned to the fire pit to hand off the watch and to eat. Agravain growled and two other men rose with reluctant grimaces and left for the lookout point. Someone passed down two hunks of dried meat. It had the strong flavor of venison. Arthur chewed on his as long as he could make it last.
Later, when dark had fallen and Bedwyr finally nodded, they walked to their bedrolls. Arthur immediately dug into his pack for the stash of dried apples from home.
The thought caught at his throat, and he nearly put them away again. Taking a bite of one, he let the tang sit on his tongue and offered a ring to Bedwyr. He took a bite, considered it for a moment, then ate the rest at once and set to arranging his armor for the night.
Arthur did the same, placing his on his other side so that only Bedwyr’s lay between them. When he’d finished, he sat for a moment, watching and listening. Hearing no movement nearby, he leaned toward Bedwyr.
Bed seemed to sense him and said, “We can’t.”
Disappointment stabbed, but he said, “I know.”
“Cub.”
“Goodnight.” He began to turn away.
“Arthur.”
It never failed to grip him, the way Bed said his name.
A rustle sounded as the man shifted across his armor. A warm hand curled around the back of Arthur’s neck and pulled him in. Bed’s lips were warm, his mustache a soft scratch. His tongue too quickly gone. “Fire bright.”