Castle of the Heart (18 page)

“Yes.” Guy was sympathetic. “I remember the
weeks just before Cristin was born. Take Kenelm with you, and as
many men-at-arms as you think you’ll need.”

The day before he left Afoncaer, Thomas
searched out Arianna, finding her just about to enter her own
chamber.

“‘I need your help,” he said. “It’s about
Selene.” He looked around quickly when a footstep sounded on the
nearby staircase. “I don’t want anyone to overhear me.”

“Then come inside.” Arianna slipped into her
room and Thomas followed her. He stood uncertainly, looking about
at the bed and the chest that held her clothes.

“What is it, Thomas?”

“I don’t know how long I’ll be gone,” he
began. “Perhaps a month, possibly more. I don’t know what Selene
will do in my absence.”

“Do? What do you mean?”

“She’s grown so unpredictable,” Thomas burst
out. “Her moods are wildly changeable. And her rages. She flares
into anger for no reason at all. She’s the way she was just after
we married, only worse.”

“I’ve seen no sign of moods or rages
recently,” Arianna replied.

“No, you wouldn’t have. It’s always when we
are alone. She’s growing heavy and uncomfortable, and she blames me
for it. Who knows what she will do when I’m not here for her to
scream at?”

“I think all women in her condition are
irritable,” Arianna said, not knowing if her words were true or
not. If only her experience as a midwife were not so limited. She
had helped Meredith with only one birth. “It’s quite natural for
Selene to be afraid, and perhaps that causes the rages you spoke
of. But Meredith will take good care of her, and I’ll help as much
as I can. Once the baby is born, Selene will be herself again.”

“Herself?” Thomas shook his head. “I love her
with all my heart, but I see what she is, too. She’s weak-spirited,
Arianna. I’d say that to no one but you. You love her, too, and I
think you understand her better than I ever will. As you are her
friend, and mine, watch over her while I am away. Help her to grow
stronger, to be more like you and Meredith. She will be lady of
this castle one day. That needs a strong woman. And I need a woman
to wife, not a weeping little girl.”

Arianna felt the full irony of her situation.
But she loved them both, and she wanted Thomas to leave on his
journey without misgivings. She put out her hand, and he took it in
both of his and held it as she promised to watch over Selene in his
absence. After he left her, she was uncertain whether to laugh or
to weep.

Selene was not sorry to see Thomas go. She
had grown surprisingly fond of him, and out of that fondness she
tried to satisfy him once Meredith had assured her lovemaking would
cause no harm to herself or the child she carried. But as she grew
heavier and more ungainly, and as she felt increasingly unwell, she
had given up the effort, and he said he understood. She was not
sure he really did, any more than he could comprehend why she was
so angry with him all the time. But it was his fault that she was
so miserable. He had done this awful thing to her. Her ever-larger
girth made it nearly impossible to get comfortable, and her hands
and feet were swollen by each day’s end. Meredith dosed her with
various herbal preparations to ease the swelling, but they only
helped a little.

“I’m glad Thomas is gone,” Selene said to no
one in particular, coming into the great hall at noon. “I don’t
like him to see me looking this way. My face is so puffy.”

“You should not have eaten so much last
spring,” Joan told her. “It will be harder for you when the birth
time comes if you have grown a big baby.”

“Well, there’s not much chance of that now,
is there? The child must be a poor, famished thing,” Selene
snapped, considering the meager display of food the servants were
laying out for the midday meal. “I’m half-starving all the time. I
could eat twice as much as my share, and still I swell larger and
larger.” She burst into tears. “I’m hungry! I want a nice green
salad, and there’s nothing in the garden but wilted, slug-chewed
leaves even the hogs won’t eat. I want bread, and Meredith tells me
to eat nothing with rye in it, because all the rye flour is moldy
and rye mold will make the babe come before its time. I want
apples, and they are all on the ground with worms in them. We will
all starve to death this winter, and I shall have a starved, dead
baby.”

Arianna put her arms around the distraught
woman and led her to a chair.

“Be patient, Selene. Thomas will bring more
food when he returns, and if I know him, he’ll have some special
gift for you. He loves you so much. Be brave, and endure this
deprivation for him, and for your child.”

“Yes. My son.” Selene put a protective arm
across her belly.

“And here,” Arianna added, “Joan has made an
omelet just for you, with herbs in it.”

“The slugs are eating the herbs,” Selene
sniffed, refusing to look at the omelet. “I detest slugs. They
leave slimy trails. I can’t eat slimy things. Take it away.”

“There are no slugs in this,” Joan declared,
plunking the wooden plate down in front of Selene. “These are all
good dried herbs from Lady Meredith’s stillroom. Ask Cristin, I
sent her to fetch them. If you don’t want this omelet, tell me
before it’s too cold to eat, and I’ll give it to Master Reynaud. He
can use the strength in those eggs – and eggs are precious. The
hens aren’t laying well.”

“Eat it for the baby’s sake,” Arianna urged,
and Selene relented.

“She’s a baby herself,” Joan said later, when
Selene had gone to her room to rest. “Why, even Cristin is more
grown-up than that. Cristin wastes not a morsel of food, she’s been
helping me to make cheeses – at least the cows are still producing
milk – and now look at her, learning her letters from Master
Reynaud.” Joan nodded toward the place across the hall, where
Cristin’s curly copper-gold head was bent over Reynaud’s shoulder
to see the book he held open on his lap. “Cristin is a good girl,
if a bit wild, but my Lady Selene will not make a worthy mistress
for this castle.”

“It’s the baby,” Arianna said, surprised at
this outburst from the usually mild-mannered Joan. The bad weather
was getting on everyone’s nerves. “Selene will be better after the
baby comes.”

“I doubt it. She’s weak, I see it in her
eyes. There’s something about her, something I don’t trust.” Joan
picked up a tray and stalked off to the kitchen, calling to Cristin
to come and help her.

“She’s right, you know.” Reynaud laid aside
the book he had been reading to Cristin and shifted about in his
big wooden chair, resettling his body more comfortably on the
cushions. Arianna knew the constant dampness made his injured
joints ache. She could tell by the tight look to his mouth that he
was in pain. She wondered if the tingling and discomfort he had
once told her about, which made him think his lost leg was still
there, still attached to his knee, was bothering him again. “Joan
is right about Selene. I’ve looked into her eyes, and I’ve seen
terror there, and something else. It’s as though she’s keeping some
deep and terrible secret.”

“The baby,” Arianna began, but he would not
let her finish the excuse.

“She had that look before she got with child.
I’ve tried to befriend her, but she avoids me. Perhaps she thinks I
see too much.”

“Reynaud, forgive me if I hurt your pride,
but what you saw may have been Selene’s response to your
injuries.”

“No.” He interrupted her again, his manner
more intense than she had ever seen it before. “Arianna, I tell
you, that young woman is not to be trusted. I’ve known men with
that look who later committed some terrible deed. Sometimes I see
her watching Thomas, and I fear for him.”

“Stop!” Arianna put out one hand as though
she would forcibly silence the cleric. “I’ve known Selene all my
life, she’s like a sister to me, and I believe, no, I am certain,
that she cares for Thomas. If she were capable of violence, which
she is not, she still would not harm Thomas. I tell you, once her
baby is born, this strangeness you and Joan think you see in her
will cease.”

“I pray, my dear, that you are right and I am
wrong.” Reynaud’s pale blue eyes held Arianna’s grey ones.
“Unfortunately, I know too well that violence, and bloodshed, are
not always necessary for treachery. And,” he added, his soft voice
sinking to a whisper, “I will continue to watch Selene.”

Gwenefer

A.D. 1116-1117

Autumn, A.D. 1116

In his secret stronghold hidden deep within
the Welsh forest, Emrys the rebel leader sat drinking and plotting
with his most trusted aide.

“It’s Afoncaer we must destroy,” Emrys said.
“I did not agree with those few raids last winter, the way Gwion
took his men into Powys so openly. It was unnecessary, the loss of
so many good Cymry, and for what? We only killed a few Normans, and
we were lucky to escape with our lives.”

“Gwion was a fool,” his friend agreed. “Brave
enough, but too hot-tempered. He never stopped to think before he
loosed his arrows, and see what has become of him. He and his men
are all dead, and therefore of no further use in our fight against
these cursed Normans, who always have more men to send against
us.”

“Aye, Cynan, you are right about that. The
Normans are too strong for us to meet them in open battle.
Treachery is the way to best them. What we need is a clever,
devious plan, and the patience to wait until the time is right. A
plan like mine. Have you found a girl for me?”

“I have. She’s a distant cousin by marriage
of my wife’s brother. Her father—”

Emrys cut off the flow of his friend’s words.
The family histories his fellow countrymen loved to recite were not
only interesting, they were often useful, revealing relationships
among those who fought the Normans that Emrys could depend upon for
his own advantage, but this time the listing of relatives could
wait until he had decided whether or not to use the girl.

“Where is she?” Emrys asked.

“Waiting out there.” Cynan tilted his head
toward the closed door of the rough stone cottage that served the
rebels as headquarters.

“What, all this time in the rain? You could
have brought her inside at once.”

“Since when has a little rain bothered anyone
who’s true
Cymraes
? Besides, you said you wanted someone
patient. I was testing her.”

“Well, if you think she’s been tested
enough,” Emrys said, refilling his cup with ale, “bring her
in.”

Cynan flung open the door and called into the
wet night. After a pause a figure entered the cottage. Cynan
slammed the door shut on the rain and came back to sit by Emrys.
They waited, watching her, both tense and alert. They were very
alike: short, dark, wiry men whose sharp-featured faces bespoke
their blood relationship. They were similar, too, in the almost
religious fervor with which they hated the Normans.

The girl pushed off her hood and threw the
edges of her grey cloak back over her shoulders, then walked to the
firepit in the middle of the cottage floor and held her hands out
to the flames. She was small, as many
Cymraes,
Welsh women,
were, and from what Emrys could see of her she had a softly rounded
figure. She did not wear the usual white head covering, though her
hair was cut short in the Welsh fashion, and black curls clustered
damply around her face. Dark eyes under thick dark eyebrows met
Emrys’s look with no evasion. She had a good face, not pretty, but
with strong Welsh bones and pale clear skin. Emrys thought she was
the kind of woman who could make a man believe she was beautiful,
even though she was not.

“What’s your name?” Emrys asked.

“Gwenefer.” Her voice was rich and full, and
Emrys imagined she was one of those who would rather sing than
speak.

“Are you a virgin, Gwenefer?”

“I am.” She did not appear at all shocked by
the question, she simply answered it.

“Can you prove it?”

“How shall I do that?” A flicker of amusement
crossed the strong young face, and the rich, musical voice was
filled with mocking laughter. “Shall I bring you all the men who
have offered for me, with whom I have not lain, or shall I swear it
before a priest?”

“It is very important,” Emrys said.

“I know who you are, Emrys, and I have told
you truth.” Her dark eyes did not waver. The momentary laughter was
gone from her voice and she was perfectly serious again.

“Do you hate the Normans, Gwenefer?”

“It is
galanas
, blood feud, between me
and them.”

“Why, Gwenefer?”

“The Normans raped my mother until she died.
They made my father watch what they did to her, and then they took
him to Afoncaer and hanged him.”

“And why did they not rape you, too?”

“That was seventeen years ago. I was but a
babe at the time. My mother hid me in a clothes chest before the
Normans broke into our home, and that is where my uncle found me
later, sound asleep, with my mother’s blood all around and my
father gone. They held a mock trial for him at Afoncaer before they
hanged him, and he said publicly what the Normans had done. There
are still men and women alive who remember it.”

Emrys sat very still, watching her.

“Name your parents, Gwenefer,” he said at
last.

“My father was Cadwallon ap Rhodri, my mother
Angharad.”

“It’s all true,” Cynan assured his
leader.

“I know it’s true. It was in the time of
Baron Lionel. I knew your father, Gwenefer. I was only a lad then,
but I was in that group of angry
Cymry
who tore down the
half-built walls of Afoncaer and overran the place and killed Baron
Lionel. I had the pleasure of loosing one of my arrows into that
bloated pig as he stood on the inner wall directing the
defense.”