Uneasy Lies the Crown (28 page)

“Could you not have done better in raising a son?” Henry said.

Northumberland braced a fist upon the floor to steady himself. “I tried to dissuade him, my lord. There is no way, I fear, to atone for his wrongs. Your mercy, I beg. Allow me to see my Harry and I will —”

“You haven’t heard?” Henry bent over, touching the earl on the shoulder.

“Heard?” The earl drew his head back, his ragged white brows drawn tight in question.

So, he didn’t know of the fate of his brother and son? There was no sense in keeping it from him a moment longer then. “Your son perished on the battlefield at Shrewsbury. Your brother was taken prisoner and lost his life on the block. They rose against me, Lord Henry. They brought against me vile, traitorous accusations. You knew of their plans. And yet you did nothing.”

Northumberland paled. His arm, then his knees, began to tremble. A whimper rose to a sob as grief overcame him. He pressed his forehead against Henry’s plated shins and wetted them with his tears.

Henry allowed him his sorrow. The ride northward had allotted him some time for reflection and an easing of his own anger. Northumberland may have known of their plans, but he had not joined with them. Even so, why had he not talked sense into them? Did he think they might win? Or did he fear from the first that they would lose?

Finally, Henry crouched down. His voice went low, almost soft. “What hand had you in this, Percy? Swear to me that you did not plot against me, too.”

Northumberland bowed his head deeper, until his white hair brushed the floor. He drew in breath and slowly raised his face. “You know my son, sire. Harry is...” He seized up, another sob threatening to overtake him, but he gulped it down. “Harry was a man of his own mind. Fierce and proud. He could have returned from hell itself for all his determination. Did it matter what advice I gave him? Did it matter? He would not listen.”

“You knew then? All along?” Henry’s voice cracked. Deep inside, he wept for Hotspur as well. He had admired him greatly. Sometimes, he even liked him. Prince Harry, he knew, worshipped the very ground that Hotspur had walked on. The man had not been without merit. Yet he had failed to act with caution, failed to honor his oaths.

“I could only pray that he would come to his senses, my lord,” Northumberland said, “and give up his grudges. Would you not have done the same for your own son?”

Henry swept a hand over his face to collect himself. “My son would never have been so rash—and if he had thought to, I would have convinced him otherwise.”

“I failed to do so.” Northumberland averted his eyes. “Then I should be condemned, as well.”

Henry clasped his shoulders so hard, the earl could not but help to meet his gaze. “I want your solemn oath, in the name of your son and your brother and all that is holy, that you will never take up arms against me, that you will stand by me in all and do me honor. Swear it, Percy, here and now before these witnesses.”

Northumberland swiped at his tear-streaked face. He looked at Henry with eyes that had seen much in his sixty years. “Tell me first my punishment.”

“There is none as long as you swear and mean it. You have lost your son. I cannot inflict any more harm on you than what that loss has caused you.”

“I swear,” he said, hanging his head low again.

Henry helped him to his feet. He knew that without Hotspur at his father’s side to exhort his assistance, Northumberland was an inert figure. But he also wondered what resentment might burn deep inside Northumberland over the loss of his heir. For now, he would take his word.

Iolo Goch:

When Henry returned to London in sore need of rest, he learned that his son’s wound had become infected. The prince, still in Shrewsbury, was consumed by fever. Physicians were at his bedside constantly, but Henry, nursing his own secret ailment, stayed in London.

My lord Owain grieved over the loss of his friend Hotspur. But all was not lost. The English had ceased in their harassment of Wales, momentarily content in their victory.

Owain’s letters to France finally elicited a response. French ships raided the English coastal towns to the south. Plymouth was burnt to the ground. It was enough distraction for the English that my lord was able to continue with what he had set out to do. Among Owain’s new treasures were the grand castles of Aberystwyth and Beaumaris—two of the very symbols of English domination commissioned to Master James of St. George by Edward I.

In January of 1404, at Parliament’s insistence, Henry conceded command of Wales fully to his son, now recovered from his wound. But Harry’s task was so dire, the Welsh now so strong, and his own troops so completely discouraged by the lack of pay that by June he withdrew to Worcester, leaving Wales entirely to the Welsh—as he should have always done.

After a long, arduous siege, Harlech fell to Tudur. He delivered it into his brother’s hands with serene contentment. It was a palace fit for princes and if Owain had been reluctant the year before to own up to any designs of sitting upon a throne, he was now, most seriously, considering what it might mean to Wales if he did so.

38

Harlech Castle, Wales — Spring, 1404

Late into the spring, Owain’s family was still establishing itself at Harlech. The children had been collected from their various transitory arrangements and at long last brought together under a single roof. But some of them were no longer children, Owain recognized. He had lost two more daughters, Alice and Janet, to bridegrooms. Gruffydd and Maredydd were often gone on soldiers’ business and Madoc was yearning sorely to follow them.

With her children growing and several gone, Margaret consumed herself with arranging furniture and tapestries. That the soldiers who had occupied the castle the year past had decimated the gardens vexed her to no end. When she was not busy with those matters, she was stocking the cellars and storerooms with enough victuals to feed an entire army. She was concise and far-thinking and even though she was exacting of her servants, she knew the precise moment to grace them with a smile or a compliment that would keep them scurrying at her whisper for weeks. It may have appeared that Margaret was simply fashioning herself anew to fill the role now allotted to her—that of a princess. But in truth, her purpose was entirely different. If she did not occupy every waking moment with household affairs, a minute of thought could tear at her soul, as she wondered how Owain spent his nights away from her when he went to Aberystwyth.

In all of Wales, Harlech was the most perfectly situated castle. Like an eagle guarding its nest, it sprung from a rock, lofty and untouchable above Tremadoc Bay. On its western side, a great wall of jumbled stone fell to the sea. To the south and east, a deep ditch had been carved into the hard earth. Although Margaret and Owain ruled from a castle perched on ragged cliffs above the battering sea, Margaret no longer knew what or where ‘home’ was. If not for the ballads strummed by Iolo on his beloved harp in the vast great hall, nothing would have been the same. Certainly, there was something very different about Owain.

The afternoon sun was at its zenith when Owain went for a long walk along the sandy shore alone. Far above, Harlech commanded everything within view. Over the cobalt waters, seagulls dipped their wings and plunged from the sky to land on foamy crested waves.

A smile of delight lifted Owain’s mouth as Madoc galloped past on his new gray horse—a fine animal of Irish blood and the filly of the horse he had brought back from Ireland when he accompanied Richard there.

“Trust her, Madoc,” he called out, his hands cupped around his mouth to carry his voice over the steady roar of the sea. “She’ll give you her heart if you just let her go!”

Although he was of an age to be considered a young man, Madoc had not inherited the robust build his older brothers possessed. He looked perpetually underfed and had never gained the weight to match his gangly limbs. Awkward with words, curly-haired Madoc had found comfort in the company of the horses in his father’s ever-growing stables. Honing in on that singular strength, Owain had fostered it diligently and now watched with pride as Madoc relaxed his posture and flew along the glistening shoreline.

“Ho!”

Owain looked up to see Rhys trotting toward him. He must have just arrived from Aberystwyth. The castle was his to care for now, so it concerned Owain to see him away from there and approaching with such haste.

“Welcome, Rhys. Did you see Madoc there? His shield would weigh him to the ground, but by God the boy’s a fine horseman. We’ll make a soldier of him yet. I would not have thought it when he was four and fell from his first pony. He refused to ride again for more than three years. We gave the little beast to his twin sister, Isabel, but even jealousy would not inspire him to get back on then.”

Rhys’s mouth was set in a firm line, his bushy brows pinched together. “My Nesta’s with child. Is it yours?”

Owain gazed out at the sea. His stomach churned with every wave that pummeled the shore. “It is.” Then he looked squarely at his friend. “But she and the child will never want. I promise you, Rhys. I’ll not put her aside because of it.”

“I told you to keep from her and you ignored me to suit your own selfish needs.”

Owain could see Rhys’s fists tightening. “Rhys... you don’t understand.”

“Understand? I don’t understand? Understand this: she is my daughter.
Mine
. Not some nameless wench plucked from a tavern to warm your bed on a drunken night. Now you’ve made her into a whore!”

“Do not speak of her that way.”

“Why? Are you going to tell me that you love her? Should I tell your dear wife that?”

Owain spun around and began to stomp away. He was not fifty feet down the shore when he turned and went back to Rhys. He stopped an arm’s length from him and thumped Rhys’s chest with a heavy forefinger.

“You’re going to be a grandfather now, too. Does that make you feel old, Rhys?”

“I am three years younger than you.”

“You are three years older than me. And you’re one to condemn me. How long has it been since you’ve seen your wife? Do you even know where she is? Bedding pretty girls is daily sport to you.”

Rhys’s eyebrows jumped into his hairline. “Was that supposed to hurt?”

“Not as much as this.” Owain slammed his fist into Rhys’s nose. Rhys staggered backward. “That’s for calling your own daughter a whore.”

Blood gushed from Rhys’s nostrils. Covering his face, he sputtered through the blood-wet cracks between his fingers, “You broke... my nose. Holy Mother of God... I can’t breathe.”

Owain hooked him under the armpit and guided him along the beach toward the castle. The salty wind beat at their faces as they trudged through the sand.

Rhys sucked back the blood in his throat, coughing on it. “I would never have said anything to Margaret, Owain. It would break her heart. I would never do that.”

“I know.”

But Owain realized that he did not need Rhys to do that for him.

Iolo Goch:

Owain’s dream was nestled in the palm of his hand like a newly hatched chick taken from its nest. The English were ousted from Wales. Gone! Henry’s treasury was so empty his parliament would have been loath to finance another disastrous Welsh campaign. And while England’s king had to beg for loans, money was flowing into Wales like an endless river. The monasteries of Wales and England alike were the collecting points for those who desired funds to be channeled toward the Welsh cause. Many an English baron, who despised Henry and the manner in which he had come to his present state, had no qualms about striking a blow to his purse, even though they would not openly defy him.

In early May of 1404, Owain dispatched his chancellor Griffith Young and his brother-in-law John Hanmer to Paris. They were entertained with tremendous ceremony and feasted upon delectable dishes the likes of which neither had ever before known. There were masked balls and tournaments conjured up to impress the visitors. In time, they had secured an alliance with King Charles VI of France.

Beyond its borders, Wales was gaining powerful allies and within them it was becoming nothing but stronger and surer of its own identity.

39

Machynlleth, Wales — May, 1404

When they placed the crown upon Owain’s head it was nothing but a plain circlet of silver, without jewels or fancy embellishments, but it sat upon his golden brow with perfection. The ceremony was at daybreak just outside of Machynlleth, with the sun waiting behind the mountains to shine upon Owain, a robe of blue brocade draped from his high shoulders. Only his closest generals, councilors and oldest sons were there to witness the solemn, understated occasion. Owain would not have it any grander. It was the meaning of it that held value, he said, not the pomp.

In a half-timbered house in Machynlleth, with its narrow and twisted streets, Owain convened his first Welsh Parliament.

The accommodations in Machynlleth were exceedingly modest and so Owain had selected the most suitable residence available: the Royal House on Penrallt Street. From his window, he could look out in the mornings to the sun climbing above the mountains. There was a knock at his chamber door and Rhys Ddu entered. The swelling was gone from his now crooked nose, but traces of bruising still remained in the dark circles under his eyes.

“You were never one to wait for an invitation.” Owain slid a bulky ring onto his right hand.

“Is that it?” Squinting, Rhys walked closer to where Owain stood by the window.

Owain spread his fingers out against the bold backdrop of sunlight. “The seal of the Prince of Wales.”

“Humph.” Rhys crinkled his nose as he inspected it. He wiggled his fingers in a circle around it. “Does it shoot fire or give you the gift of soothsayers?”