Footsteps in Time (5 page)

Anna slid off the
horse onto packed dirt and looked for David. She caught his eye but
Hywel, one of the boys who’d cared for the horses during the trip,
grabbed his arm and pointed towards a long, low building squatting
against the curtain wall.
The
stables?

David shrugged and waved. “Later,” he
mouthed.

Anna edged away, trying to
be inconspicuous, and found a wall to stand against. So many people
milled about, all talking at once, that she wished she could hide.
Without looking her way, Prince Llywelyn disappeared into the keep
with two older men. Before turning away, one of them had looked at
her as if he’d wanted to speak but didn’t.

What is to become of
us?

After five minutes of total
insecurity, Anna was relieved to see an older woman beckon to her
from the entrance to the hall. She felt an intense longing to turn
around and head back down the road. It had been a long, fairly
unpleasant journey, but she’d grown accustomed to it. The familiar
seemed infinitely more desirable than the unknown that now faced
her.

The woman greeted Anna with
a smile and a slight bow and introduced herself as Bronwen. With
Anna trailing after her like a lost duckling, Bronwen led Anna into
the keep, across the great hall, down a corridor and up some stairs
to another corridor. They ended up in a room occupied by several
young women. A fire blazed at the far end, and Anna stood close to
it, grateful to be indoors at last. Bronwen said something to the
women, and they giggled before filing from the room and leaving
Anna alone with Bronwen.

Talking the whole
time, Bronwen looked Anna up and down and then opened a chest set
against the wall. From it, she pulled a dark green dress,
surely borrowed from someone
else
, a girdle, a linen shift, a corset, a
petticoat to go over that, stockings, slipper-like shoes, and a
cloak, and laid them on the bed.

Anna looked at the
clothes. They were pretty and clean, but Anna clutched her cloak to
her. She felt awful. It seemed that if she agreed to take off her
clothes and put on these, she would cease to be Anna and would
become someone even she didn’t know. Her clothes were dirty, and
she’d never worn the same thing for more than two days in a row,
much less four, but these clothes were
hers.

Her hands clasped in
front of her, Bronwen waited.
There was no
help for it.
Anna
undressed completely, shivering despite the fire. Bronwen
clucked her tongue at Anna’s underclothes, which must have seemed
totally bizarre to her, but once
Anna
removed them, Bronwen dressed her
from the inside out. Then she sat
Anna
on a stool and began to brush her
hair.
Anna
was so
tired she settled into it, to the point that her head fell forward
with every stroke.

Bronwen braided
Anna’s hair in two braids and twisted them onto the top of her
head. To this, she pinned a piece of cloth that went from ear to
ear but left Anna’s face uncovered.
Anna
stood, and Bronwen walked around
her to get a view from all sides. She tweaked the dress here and
there, but it fit very well.
Anna
wondered whose dress it was and if the owner
begrudged the loan. If she did nothing else,
Anna
resolved to find her and thank
her as soon as she could.

Finally, Bronwen
nodded, satisfied. She took Anna’s arm and steered her through the
door and back down the stairs to the entrance to the great hall.
When they reached the doorway, however,
Anna
found it impossible to enter. At
least a hundred people sat at the tables, and every single one was
looking at her. Prince Llywelyn sat at a raised table at the head
of the room. Two long tables perpendicular to his extended down the
hall. David was near the head of one of them, with space left
beside him. Trying to ignore the looks she was getting,
Anna
hurried over to him
and sat down.

“
Where did you go?” she
said. “Is everything okay?”

“
I think so. Hywel took me
to the stables to take care of my horse, and then he showed me to a
room where I could wash. He even brought me these clothes.” David
looked down at himself.

Anna
inspected him. He wore a cream-colored tunic, a
deep blue over-tunic that matched his eyes, and a pair of brown
pants, along with his own brown leather boots, which were out of
place, but not too dramatically different. David had cleaned his
face and hands, but a ring of dirt adorned his neck where he hadn’t
scrubbed, and his hair really needed a wash.
Anna
decided not to mention
it.

“
What are we eating?” she
said, noting that most of the diners were nearly
finished.

“
We have some kind of meat,
along with vegetables I’ve never seen before. And wine,” he said,
significantly.

“
Have you had
any?”

“
Nope.”

“
Do they have
water?”

“
I don’t know,” he said.
“If they have a well the water ought to be fine.”

He tapped the man
next to him, and introduced him as Bevyn.
Anna
greeted him and then couldn’t
help staring. He had the most humongous set of mustachios she’d
ever seen, not that she’d seen any before arriving in Wales. For
some reason, Welsh men wore mustaches but no beards, not even in
winter. Bevyn’s mustaches grew long, thick, and immaculately curled
along each cheek. It was an amazing sight, and
Anna
found herself fighting the
giggles.
Okay, just a little punchy here,
don’t mind me.

David said something
to Bevyn that
Anna
didn’t catch, except for the
dŵr
, meaning
water
. Bevyn replied, twisted in his
seat, and signaled to a serving boy who ran off and came back with
a pitcher of water and a cup. It was marvelous what knowing the
language could do!
Anna
was going to have to contrive some way to keep David
around.

She ate a full
portion of food and before long, felt hot and sleepy, even without
the alcohol.
Anna
tried to stay awake by examining other individuals in the
room: the clothes they wore, their hair styles, and their position
at the tables. She occupied herself in imagining what their stories
were.
Thankfully, the people around her
talked and laughed, and nobody was paying any attention to either
Anna or David. Then, after what seemed like hours, Prince Llywelyn
got to his feet. The hall quieted, and he began to
speak.

He told a lengthy
tale, mentioning their names several times, which prompted everyone
to look at them again. David studied Prince Llywelyn and ignored
the others.
Anna
wanted to slump in her seat but refused to succumb to the
urge. At last, Prince Llywelyn finished and silence descended on
the hall. Abruptly, David got to his feet and pulled
Anna
with
him.

“
He wants us out there.
Just do what I do!” he whispered.

They walked around
the table to stand in front of Prince Llywelyn. David bowed and,
belatedly,
Anna
made what she thought was a curtsy, thankful for her
‘princess’ period between the ages of six and eight when it was
something she’d practiced in front of a mirror, for just such an
occasion. She guessed it was acceptable because Prince Llywelyn
took a step and held out both hands, slightly apart. David knelt on
one knee and put his hands between Prince
Llywelyn’s.

Prince Llywelyn spoke a few
words, and a murmur of approval went around the hall. Then it was
Anna’s turn, after which Prince Llywelyn sent them back to their
seats and signaled for music to begin. Anna and David settled on
the bench again.

“
What do you think that
speech was about?” she said. “What did we just do?”

“
I think Prince Llywelyn
gave some version of how we came to be on that hill with him, and
we pledged our allegiance to him. Hopefully, we’re his
responsibility now, because I hate to think about being thrown out
in the cold.”

“
I’m pretty sure that as
long as we don’t betray Prince Llywelyn, he’ll take care of
us.”

“
Let’s hope so,” David
said.

“
What do you think will
happen next?”

“
I don’t know,” David said.
“I’m as much at a loss as you.”

Chapter Four

David

“K
eep your guard up,” Bevyn
said.

Dutifully, David raised his wooden
sword above his head, two hands on the hilt, ready for another
attack by Dai, a boy bigger than he was (as most of them were), and
nearly two years older.

“
Now!” Bevyn said, and
they met in the middle of the practice ring, set in the courtyard
of the castle. The courtyard sloped in a northerly direction, and
as Bevyn had taught, David tried to maneuver onto the higher
ground.

Anna might have been
having difficulties with the whole sewing thing—she’d spent the
last twelve evenings complaining about living here: having to spend
all day in the women’s solar, the gossip she didn’t understand, the
lack of showers, the lack of Mom, which David could appreciate—but
David didn’t see how it could compare to what he had to deal with
every day. Not only was he having to learn three new languages at
once: Welsh, French, and the God-awful Latin, but he actually had
to
fight
boys every
day—and have the adults in authority think it was perfectly
fine.

So, David was a black
belt in karate.
Okay, yeah—that was really
helpful.
David
knew
how to fight, both fairly and
unfairly, and he wasn’t having trouble holding his own in
hand-to-hand combat. In fact, nobody wanted to fight him anymore
and Bevyn was having him teach the boys a few things. It was the
sword fighting and the quarterstaff that were another matter
entirely.

“
Thwack;
thwack; thwack
.” Their swords met, little
splinters flying off as they hacked at each other. David had done
all right that first session around the fire on the road to Castell
y Bere, but in the daily grind of squire practice, his inadequacies
and inexperience were bare for everyone to see. There were
rules
for how to
swordfight, attacks and counter attacks and strategy, none of which
he knew.

Dai’s weapon smashed
into his fingers. “Merde!” David swore in French and dropped his
sword. Despite his exertions, his hands were freezing in their
fingerless gloves and only more painful now that Dai’s attack had
nearly severed them. Once he became a knight—
Ha! If I became a knight, as if the thought wasn’t entirely
ludicrous under the circumstances—
David
would wear gauntlets to protect the back of his hands, but no one
had issued him any yet, the worse for him.

“
You became distracted by
your footing.” Bevyn gestured to the ground where David’s sword
lay, and David bent over to pick it up. “You were not
attentive.”

“
Yes, sir.” David resisted
the temptation to roll his eyes, knowing that Bevyn was right.
Every one of these boys had at least five or six years of
experience in sword fighting on him—lightsaber fighting with his
friends didn’t count—and David was woefully behind.

“
Try again,” Bevyn
said.

Dai and David faced each
other. Dai was sweating despite the cold, and perhaps because he so
badly wanted to beat David. Dai was the boy David had dropped to
the ground that first day at wrestling, and he’d not forgiven
him.

They hacked away at each other for
another ten minutes, ending in a draw this time. Finally warm
enough, David pulled off his woolen jersey and stood in his linen
tunic. It was soaked with sweat and steam came off his
torso.

Bevyn gave David a quick
nod of his head and slapped his hand on David’s left shoulder as he
passed, heading to the keep. “Good.”

David turned to watch as Bevyn strode
across the courtyard.

“
He
said
good
?” Owain,
a tall lanky boy, came to stand next to David. “He never
says
good
! The best
I’ve ever gotten is a grunt. Christmas must have gotten the better
of him!”

David shrugged. “Maybe he’s encouraged
by the fact that I managed to hold onto my sword. He’s happy that I
don’t appear completely hopeless.”

“
You’re not hopeless,”
Owain said. “Dai is second only to Fychan in ability with the
sword. You’ve been with us only a few weeks, and you’re younger
than any of us. It will come.”