The Unexpected Ally (15 page)

Gareth raised his eyebrows. “I did not know
that.”

“In the course of our conversation, Rhys
told me that King Henry did not die from eating too many lampreys.
He was murdered at the behest of Geoffrey of Anjou, Empress Maud’s
husband.”

Gareth took in a breath. “Who else knows
that he knows?”

“A handful of men at most, all spies.”

“You say Geoffrey was responsible, not
Maud?”

“According to Rhys, it was done without her
knowledge.”

Gareth rubbed his chin. “That wouldn’t
matter if the truth about Henry’s death became known. Stephen’s
claim to the throne would be instantly validated. Nobody would
believe in her innocence, and nobody would allow her to take the
throne over the dead body of her predecessor.”

“No, they would not.”

“It would end the war.” Gareth barked a
laugh. “Your father wouldn’t be happy about that. It is only the
war in England that is preventing every Norman in England
and
the king from turning his attention to Wales, thinking
we’ve been a thorn in England’s side for too long.”

“Especially if Cadwaladr gives them reason
to fight. The end of the war would mean that he finally gets what
he wants.”

“Your father’s head on a pike.” Gareth made
a guttural sound deep in his throat.

Hywel frowned. “More immediately, in the
wake of Erik’s murder, I’m concerned about Rhys’s personal safety.
With him rising to his current status, he is no longer living a
retiring life. Someone at some point might remember who he once was
and worry about his conscience. He should never have accepted such
an elevated position, knowing what he knows and the secrets he’s
keeping.”

Gareth swore. “My God, the man’s a danger to
himself—but good luck convincing him of that.”

Hywel put out a hand. “There’s more, Gareth.
I must speak to you of Cadoc, the archer Rhys vouched for and we
accepted into our company after Newcastle.”

“What about him? He’s your best archer bar
none.”

“He was Rhys’s assassin when he worked for
Maud.”

Gareth whistled low. “So that’s his story.
Why are you telling me this now?”

Hywel pointed into the courtyard with his
chin. “Look at Madog.”

Gareth’s expression hardened. “You’re not
thinking of assassinating Madog, are you? Promise me you wouldn’t
violate Rhys’s trust that way!”

“No, that isn’t what I meant. Cadoc is the
best archer I have, and he has proven himself worthy these last
three years. I was thinking that he might serve me now as Erik
did.”

Gareth snorted. “As long as you don’t tell
him that serving you got Erik killed.”

Down in the courtyard, Rhys was now speaking
to Llywelyn while Madog was conferring with his captain. Gareth
kept his eyes fixed on them, but Hywel didn’t think he was really
seeing them, which proved to be the case a moment later when his
friend added, “I’ve been thinking about what you said back in the
guesthouse—about finding your own men, your own allies. Now that
you’ve brought up Cadoc, I’d like to … suggest a venture.”

“What kind of venture?”

“You have your
teulu
, as befitting a
prince of Gwynedd, but I’d like to separate out another small force
of men who aren’t noblemen or knights and train them
specially.”

“Train them how?” Hywel kept his eyes on his
captain.

“Quite frankly, to be—” Gareth seemed to be
having trouble articulating his thoughts.

“Killers? Spies?”

Gareth let out a burst of air. “Yes and no.
I wasn’t thinking so much of them being like Erik, but more akin to
what Rhys was for Geoffrey and Maud. Part of an elite force—a small
group of men who can infiltrate a castle, or rescue a hostage,
or—”

“Or win a war before it starts.”

Gareth nodded.

Every now and then Gareth, who because of
his strong sense of rightness many thought to be the most
predictable of men, surprised even Hywel with the way his mind
worked.

“Yes.”

Gareth blinked. “Yes? Just like that?”

Hywel nodded. “Would you have Cadoc as their
leader?”

“I was thinking of Gruffydd, Rhun’s former
captain.”

“He might view it as a come down from his
former station.”

Gareth shook his head. “He has already
fallen as far as a man can fall short of losing his own life. He
will see it as the opportunity it is.”

Hywel was more glad than he could say—or
would say—to have Gareth standing at his right shoulder again. The
trip to Shrewsbury had seemed necessary at the time, but Hywel
needed Gareth’s clear vision and common sense—Gareth’s
and
Gwen’s. Hywel might be just selfish enough to ensure that any
attempts to go off on their own in the foreseeable future were
curtailed.

“I also need to speak to you of what we’ve
discovered about Erik,” Gareth said.

“I hear the body is returned.”

“Yes, but not in the condition in which it
was originally found. His stomach was cut open.”

Hywel was aghast. “Why?”

“We fear he was killed because his assailant
knew he was working for you. All of his belongings were taken, and
we are wondering if the killer could have been hoping to acquire a
token that you gave to Erik.”

The conversation had distracted Hywel from
his hatred of Madog, but now his stomach twisted again. “I did give
him a ring. I didn’t think of it before. You haven’t found it?”

“No, my lord. What does it look like?”

“Gold, stamped with my crest.” Hywel stared
unseeing over the battlement. What a stranger could be doing with
Hywel’s signet ring, pretending to be his agent, didn’t bear
thinking about. And yet, he would have to think about it—and worse,
he’d have to tell his father of the danger.

Then, as if Gareth could read Hywel’s
thoughts, he tipped his head towards the other side of the
battlement. “Here comes your father for the evening mass. You
should be at his side when he enters the courtyard.”

Hywel gave a jerky nod and took the stairs
from the gatehouse tower down to the gate. He strode out of the
monastery without a backward glance and caught his father’s bridle
the moment that he reined in.

“He’s here?” King Owain said by way of a
greeting.

Hywel nodded. “With Susanna and young
Llywelyn.”

His father took in a long breath through his
nose and let it out. Then he dismounted, landing on his feet in
front of his son. “Are you ready for this?”

Hywel simply looked at his father for a
heartbeat.

Owain nodded and took another deep breath.
“I know. I’ve lost one son this year already, and he meant to
deprive me of another. I can’t think about it, Hywel, because if I
do, I will be unable to speak with him.”

Hywel tipped his head. “We don’t have to do
this. We could still walk away.”

“No.” Owain sighed. “I promised Susanna and
Abbot Rhys that I would try. Besides, my counselors tell me that
fewer of my barons have turned up than I might wish. If we fight
Madog, it won’t be with the full strength of Gwynedd.”

“We aren’t the only ones who are watching
and waiting,” Hywel said with a bit of acid in his mouth. “To
answer your question, Father: Yes, I am ready. As ready as I’ll
ever be.”

“It isn’t her fault that my father gave her
to Madog,” Owain said, as an aside as they walked together
underneath the gatehouse tower. “She paid the price for our need
for peace. I will not begrudge her the right to keep it.”

As they entered the courtyard, Hywel
acknowledged that this was why his father was a great king. He had
an army at his back—not as large a one as they might have wished,
but big enough—and he was able to turn away from war because not
only was it the right thing to do for his family, but it might be
the right thing to do for Wales. They had taken Mold Castle
finally, as some outlet for their grief at the loss of Rhun. An
attack on Powys would have given them a similar feeling of
vengeance—but vengeance could take a king only so far—and it wasn’t
wise to rule with vengeance in mind. It was far better to be
strategic, as they’d discussed on the way to the encampment.

Hywel had lurked at his father’s side,
usually a few paces behind Rhun, his whole life. He’d learned
rudimentary strategy before he was ten years old simply by watching
what his father did. He fully intended to keep watching and
learning as long as his father was willing to teach him.

“I will follow your lead, Father.”

Gareth

G
areth had been
neglecting his duties to Hywel for some time now, ever since he’d
left his company to journey to Shrewsbury. That Prince Hywel had
wanted Gareth to go and that the journey had resulted in news about
Cadwaladr’s whereabouts had been all to the good—and one of the
purposes of the trip—but he was the captain of Hywel’s guard, and
he had men to see to.

He was worried, in particular, that some
might have started to resent his elevation when so many of his
duties had to be borne by others in his absence, and now because he
was injured. To that end, with Evan at his side, he left Hywel and
the king to their awkward reunion with Madog and his family, and
began a circuit of the monastery grounds, starting at the back in
the northeast corner, to the east of the rear gate. The rain had
momentarily stopped, and some of the clouds had cleared, revealing
a patchwork of stars.

“Did Erik’s body tell you anything?” Evan
said.

Gareth suppressed the frown that formed on
his lips at the memory of Erik’s mutilated body. He sighed.
“Someone held him down in the trough below the water level. Whether
he died from strangulation or from drowning, I can’t say for sure
unless I cut him open even more than the men who stole him already
did.”

What Gareth didn’t feel like talking
about—and was more information than Evan needed—was that he’d
pressed down on Erik’s chest and the characteristic pink foam that
formed in a man’s lungs when he drowned had come up. Still, Gareth
had seen the same pink foam in strangulations. On a certain level,
it didn’t matter which method had killed Erik, only that he was
dead.

As they walked their inspection circuit, the
first man they came upon was the least expected. Gruffydd had been
the captain of Prince Rhun’s
teulu
; he was a knight and a
landowner in his own right. He had a wife and child Gareth had
never met, and the loss of Rhun had meant that he and many of the
men he’d led had been folded into Prince Hywel’s retinue, while
others had been added to King Owain’s.
Teulu
was the Welsh
word for
family,
and in this context it meant exactly that.
Thus, Gruffydd had lost a portion of his family, his lord, and a
large dose of his authority in one go. It was why Gareth had
proposed giving him the task of leading Hywel’s special force. Even
with his changed status, however, sentry duty was not among his
usual chores.

The immediate grounds of the monastery were
surrounded by a stone wall, which started out ten feet high at the
gatehouse, where the main road ran east to west through St. Asaph,
and also along the road by the river, which Gareth had traveled in
his aborted attempt to bring Erik’s body to the chapel. By the time
the wall had run around two-thirds of the monastery, however, it
was more like six feet high—about Gareth’s height—and more of a
deterrence to trespass than an actual barrier to an invader.

Gruffydd stood atop the wall, a dark shape
against the lighter evening sky, straddling the exact corner of the
wall with his legs spread wide, one foot on the wall running
east-west and the other on the one running north-south. The wall
was only two feet thick here, and there was no wall-walk or steps
up. Gruffydd wasn’t holding a torch, which was only to be expected
if he wanted to see anything beyond the margins of the monastery,
and Gareth and Evan hadn’t chosen to carry one either. If they had,
they might have missed Gruffydd in the dark.

Gareth and Evan stopped a few paces away and
looked up at him. “See anything?”

“Sheep. Many sheep. And a party of men I’m
not liking at all.”

“Whose men?” Gareth cast around for a way to
climb onto the wall, and Gruffydd pointed to a tree to Gareth’s
right. If he grasped one of the lower branches, he could swing
himself up into the tree and then step over to the wall. Doing so
might be painful, but he let Evan go first to show him that it
could be done, and he used his good right arm to heave himself into
the tree. He tried not to think about the fact that Gwalchmai could
have done this without a second thought. Growing old wasn’t for the
faint of heart. Then again, he wasn’t ready for his death bed
either, even if during this last week he’d felt sometimes like he
was already on it.

Evan steadied him once he was up, and the
two men picked their way along the top of the wall to where
Gruffydd stood, still unmoving, his arms folded across his
chest.

Torches flared in the distance, perhaps
three hundred yards away across the orchards and fields that formed
this part of the monastery’s property.

The monastery itself was laid out in a long
rectangle, with the main gate facing south along the east-west road
that ran through St. Asaph. The gatehouse protected the primary
buildings of the monastery, which lay beyond the cobbled courtyard
and were approximately a hundred yards at the widest and perhaps a
hundred and fifty yards deep north to south. All of this was
enclosed by the stone wall, which protected the most vital portions
of the monastery’s gardens and upon which Gareth and the others
were currently standing.

From here, however, the monastery’s lands
fanned out, with the river running north to south on the far
western side, and the eastern road making a wide curve around a
portion of the monastery’s expansive pastureland, fields, and
orchards.