Chapter 11 #2
Jamie frowned and Merewyn wondered at the cause. She considered both Owain and Jamie her friends. But since Jamie had learned she was carrying Alex’s child, he had become very watchful of her.
They passed through the palisade gate and she handed Ceinder’s reins to a waiting stable boy. Crossing the bailey, the three of them entered the hall. Merewyn set down her bow and quiver and asked a servant to bring wine and cheese for their guest.
When the servant appeared with a tray bearing a pitcher, three goblets and a plate of cheese and bread, Merewyn offered to pour the wine.
She handed Owain a goblet and he lifted it to his lips and drank deeply.
Jamie took a sip of his wine and, turning to Owain, said, “You come to England at a time when the king’s men fight the Welsh.” To Merewyn, it sounded like a challenge.
“A difficult time, yea,” Owain answered, “but I did not come because of the fighting between our countries. I came for Merry.”
Jamie frowned at the Welshman’s words. “I am sure she appreciates the visit.”
The captain stayed only long enough to finish his wine, all the while his eyes stayed on the Welsh prince. After she and Owain began to share stories, Jamie excused himself and left the hall.
When he was gone, Owain said, “You have grown lovelier. Your face seems to glow.”
Merewyn did not feel lovely. Dressed in her bowman’s clothing, she was dusty and her brow damp with the exertion of her practice.
From where it sat on the table, her bow scolded her for her shabby appearance in the presence of a Welsh prince.
Ignoring it, she said, “Mayhap you remember me as only a novice archer in need of training.”
“Nay, I remember you well. One day you were there, like the sun, and the next day, Rhodri had taken you back to England. Every day thereafter was full of clouds.”
“So somber! What happened to my demanding teacher of the bow?”
“I have never been far.”
* * *
Alex drew his woolen cloak tightly around him, glad for his mail and helm as a sharp gust of wind knifed through his clothing. Azor bent his head to the wind but continued on.
It had been stormy and cold as they left Durham.
Alex was only vaguely aware of Rory and Guy riding beside him, their heads tucked into their hooded cloaks.
His mind was not on the dark clouds that promised more rain, the brown and green hills that seemed to go on forever, nor on the heather trodden down by their horses.
He took it all in but his mind was focused on the golden-haired archer he had left behind.
He imagined Merewyn warming herself with a cup of wine in front of Talisand’s hearth fire as she and his mother fashioned fletchings for their arrows. He saw her as she looked the night before he left when he had kissed her goodbye.
He had not seen her for a month. Did she think of him often as he did her?
“Does my wolf brood over the cold?” asked the king as he rode up beside Alex. Guy pulled back on his reins, dropping behind to make room for William’s chestnut stallion.
“Nay, Sire, though ’tis a brutal autumn. But I do worry about feeding the men. We could have used the corn and other food the ships would have brought us.”
William’s face grew red with his increasing anger. “By the face of Lucca, I will have an explanation for their delay!”
When they had reached the River Tyne, the fifty ships William had expected were nowhere to be seen. The king had waited two days and then, cursing and red-faced, ordered his army to push on.
Since then, they had passed the crumbling stone wall built by the Emperor Hadrian to separate the Romans from the barbarians, a symbol of the Romans’ might much as the Conqueror’s timber castles were a symbol of the Normans’ military strength.
As they’d pressed on toward Lothian, Alex could not help but think of the Roman legions of a thousand years before.
The Scots William would face were no less formidable than the Picts the Romans faced then.
Later that day in the king’s tent, William shouted to his senior knights and nobles. “Our seamen had best be there when we reach the Firth of Forth!”
Alex hoped William was right but he had his doubts. Moreover, William, too, was worried. Judging by his ruddy cheeks and the sparks shooting from his eyes, his anger was replacing his concern.
Alex and his men made camp to the sounds of the red deer rutting.
The loud bellowing of the stags echoed through the glens, sometimes broken by the sharp clash of antlers, as the males fought each other for control over the hinds.
With their food stores running low and the few people they had encountered hostile, Alex knew they must hunt.
After he had watered and rested his horse, Alex had approached the king to seek his guidance.
In response, the king sent his best archers into the woods to search for grouse, hares and small game.
But to feed the army, they would need to set upon larger prey.
The king called for three hunts for the red deer.
William proposed to lead one group himself and the other two would be led by his barons, each setting off in a different direction.
At the king’s request, Alex and his men joined William. As they cantered behind the king, Alex’s thoughts turned to the days ahead. They would soon cross into Scotland. Would Malcolm’s army be waiting for them or, as the king had suggested, must they lay siege to Malcolm’s fortress at Dun Edin?
* * *
Merewyn and Owain rode their horses along the bank of the River Lune, the trees’ autumn colors of yellow, gold and red reflected in the waters. Gentle breezes rustled the leaves, causing some to fall.
A golden leaf drifted down to the water, hovered for a moment on the surface, and then was carried away downstream.
Soon, all the colored leaves would fall, the trees would be bare and winter would be upon them.
She could be like that leaf and allow the flow of her life to carry her and her babe back to Wales.
Owain might take her.
Would Rhodri and Fia welcome her? Or might they rebuke her for the predicament she had gotten herself into?
If she were to bear a child with no father to raise it, she would know her mother’s shame.
Yet she would have Alex’s child to love, mayhap a son that looked like him, and that would be reward enough for loving a man she had known from the beginning could never be hers.
The air was colder than she would have expected for this time of year, but she had worn her woolen cloak and it warmed her.
Owain broke the silence. “When I first arrived, you said you missed Wales.”
“Aye. I was many years among your people and I made friends. I could hardly leave and not miss them.”
“Do you ever think to return?”
“Yea and recently.”
“Your captain, Sir Jamie, thinks me a spy for the Welsh who would throw off the Norman yoke. I have seen it in his eyes. ’Tis true, we wish them gone and, in time, my father, Cadwgan, will see to it.
But that is not my purpose in coming. I was speaking the truth when I told your captain I came for you, Merry. ”
“For me?”
“Yea, I came to bring you back to Wales. Does that surprise you?”
“I suppose it does.” She had wanted to leave so that Alex would be free to pursue the future his king intended for him. Here was her chance. She shut her eyes tightly against the painful thought of leaving the father of her child, the man she loved. But it had to be done.
Owain glanced at her from where he sat on his Welsh pony. “I had begun to think of you as always being with us. Your absence did not sit well.”
She looked into his dark eyes. What she saw there was different from what she remembered from their time together in Wales.
“There are things you do not know about me, Owain. My beginnings, for one thing. Then, too, much has happened since I left Wales.”
“I have known you for many years, Merry. Your beginnings, whatever they were, do not matter to me. I doubt they would matter to my father or Rhodri, should they learn of them.” He chuckled.
“Even knowing you were English did not matter when Rhodri invited you to train with his archers. You were family to my uncle and you are more to me.”
He paused, then continued, looking intently into her eyes. “Whatever may have happened since you left us has not changed you. You are still fy golau, my light, and I would take you back to Wales. Should you be willing, I would make you my wife.”
His words came as a shock and they changed everything.
She had never considered Owain had such feelings for her.
Would it be fair to him to allow him to see her to Wales?
After all, she loved another and carried that man’s child.
Mayhap if Owain knew, he might not want to marry her.
A prince of Powys must have sons of his own, not those of another.
But if he knew the truth and was still willing to take her to Wales, she and her babe might find a new life there.
She needed to think of what she could say, how to tell him.
“I must have time, Owain.”
“You shall have it,” he said. “I will stay until the coming winter forces me to leave. After that, the snow in the mountain passes will make the journey unwise.”
“We will talk again before then,” she assured him. “But not today.”
Her head swiveled toward the river at the sound of beating wings. Hundreds of pink-footed geese rushed through the air to descend on the water. The beating of their wings and the incessant, high-pitched shrieks made conversation impossible.
Drawn from the serious discussion they had been pursuing to the glorious sight, she stared in wonder. The coming of the gray and brown geese with their unusual pink feet was always a magnificent sight. And it reminded her winter would soon be upon them.
“I do love the geese,” she shouted over their honking.
“We have them in Wales,” he shouted back.