Chapter Twenty-Three #2
The scream came from the entry to Lioncross’ keep, and they all turned to see Penelope launching herself from the doorway, racing across the bailey as fast as her legs would carry her.
William opened up his arms for his youngest child, his baby, and she leapt into his arms, gleeful at the sight of him.
“Sweetheart,” William breathed as he held her tightly. “It is so good to see you.”
Penelope hugged her father so tightly that she nearly cut off his circulation. “You came!” she gasped, releasing him long enough to look him in the face. “Papa, it’s true. What I wrote to you in the missive – it’s true!”
William put a hand up, stroking her soft cheek, drinking in the sight of the lovely young woman. “I know,” he said softly. “Chris was telling me what has happened. I… I can hardly believe it, any of it. I feel as if this is a dream.”
Penelope hugged him again. “Nay, Papa,” she said. “It is not a dream. He is inside, in the great hall. He knows that you are here. I told him to wait in the hall and that I would bring you to him. And, Papa… he brought his wife with him. He is married.”
William’s eyebrows lifted. “He took a wife?”
The brothers were listening. “Rose married years ago,” Troy reminded his father what he already knew. “She is pregnant with her second child with her new husband.”
William scratched his head in thought. “That complicates things a bit,” he said. He looked at Penelope. “Did you tell him that he was already married?”
Penelope shook her head. “He seems so happy with Asmara,” she said.
“That is her name – Asmara. She is a great-granddaughter of a great Welsh king and I like her very much. They are so happy, Papa. You should see them together – I know that he and Rosie loved one another, but I never saw him with Rosie the way he is with Asmara. It is something magical and I did not want to ruin it.”
William wasn’t sure what to do about it, in fact.
It seemed like quite a complex situation to him, one he didn’t particularly want to deal with at the moment.
Rose married over three years ago and she was very happy with her new husband.
It just didn’t seem fair that the unexpected return of James should complicate it, even though, technically, he and Rose were probably still married.
He looked around at his sons, and at Chris and the others, as he spoke.
“Until I can speak with a priest, then I suggest no one tell him that he was already married,” he said. “We must deal with one issue at a time. At this moment, I do not consider this an important detail. We will address it when we must. Now… may we go inside?”
They understood about the marriage issue, a silent agreement to keep quiet on the matter. As the group turned for the keep, William looked to the entry and suddenly came to a halt. When Penelope saw what he was looking at, she came to a halt, too, as did everyone else.
At the top step of the keep entry stood Blayth and Asmara.
The afternoon sun illuminated them and, for a moment, no one moved.
It was as if time itself came to a halt, just for a brief moment, but for William, it was much more than that.
His eyesight wasn’t very good these days, and he didn’t see things at a distance very well, so he was staring for quite a different reason – mostly, he simply couldn’t see.
But he could see enough to know that what he was looking at was his son.
It really was James.
Maybe he truly hadn’t believed it until this very moment, until he actually saw his son in the flesh, and now that he was seeing him, he hardly knew what to do.
As William stood there with his sons, unsure what to do next, Penelope let go of her father and scurried over to Blayth and Asmara.
As she mounted the steps, Bhrodi emerged from the keep and looked sheepishly at his wife.
“He did not want to remain in the hall,” he told her. “Unless I was going to wrestle the man to the ground, I could not make him remain.”
Blayth heard him. He, too, had been staring at the men in the bailey as if in a trance, but Bhrodi’s voice broke the spell. He tore his gaze off the men in the bailey as he turned to Bhrodi.
“I would not have given you much of a fight, great lord,” he said. “But I probably would have pleaded quite a bit. Knowing they are out here… I simply could not wait any longer.”
Bhrodi understood. He patted Blayth on the shoulder as Penelope took him by the hand. “Come,” she said, her eyes glimmering with joy. “Papa has come to see you. He has brought Scott and Troy and Patrick with him. Come and see them, Blayth. Please.”
She wasn’t calling him James any longer because, as she’d discovered yesterday, the name meant nothing to him.
The only name he remembered was Blayth, so she honored that.
But even so, Penelope was coming to swear that there was a spark in him that remembered her because even though he looked differently and acted somewhat differently, the same gentle humor was there.
She had tried to teach Asmara a board game last night and Blayth sat on the table, watching them, alternately praising his wife’s skill and then accusing Penelope of cheating.
It had been good-natured, but it seemed to Penelope that it was very much something James of old would have done to her.
She’d never been so happy to be called a cheater.
Even now, as she coaxed him off the steps and into the bailey, there was something in his gaze that looked just like James to her.
She was relishing this moment, when her father would finally meet the son he thought was dead.
But when she turned to look at her father and older brothers standing in a group, she could see the shock washing over their faces.
She knew why, for she’d had nearly the same reaction when she saw James for the first time.
He didn’t look the way they remembered; with his shaved head, more muscular physique, and missing ear, it took some time to become accustomed to the new appearance.
It was the new James, who really wasn’t James at all.
But quickly, the gap closed between them. William was standing before them and Penelope smiled at her father, still holding Blayth’s hand.
The moment had arrived.
“Blayth,” she said. “This is our father, William de Wolfe.”
Those were words Blayth would remember for the rest of his life.
It was strange, really.
He’d been sitting inside Lioncross’ cavernous hall, engaged in conversation with Bhrodi de Shera and knowing full well that the man he had ultimately come to seek was out in the bailey, having arrived with his army.
Blayth thought that, perhaps, they’d been trying to keep it from him.
They’d spoken of the approach of William de Wolfe in hushed tones and Blayth overheard, so he finally asked Penelope about it, who sheepishly told him the truth.
William de Wolfe was coming, and he was coming to see the son he thought was dead.
That information alone had prepared Blayth for this moment.
So he thought.
But the truth was it really hadn’t prepared him at all.
He stood there, looking at a very big man with a patch over his left eye and a face that was careworn and leathery.
But it didn’t diminish the gleam in the one remaining eye or the expression that bespoke of the joy in his heart.
The man was looking at the son he thought was dead, but he wasn’t rushing forth with hysteria – he was being very measured, fearful that anything he did or said might turn his lost son away from him, so he wasn’t really reacting at all.
Blayth thought that was rather strange until he happened to look down at William’s hands to see that they were shaking.
His entire body was shaking.
That told Blayth that there was a geyser of emotions ready to spew out at any moment and, in truth, he had quite enough emotion of his own.
His gaze moved from William to the very tall man behind him, with dark hair and green eyes, then to the shorter man next to him, also with dark hair but with hazel eyes, and then finally to another tall man next to him with dark blond hair and green eyes.
They were all looking at Blayth with such warmth and he had no idea why.
He didn’t know these men and wondered why they were gazing at him so fondly.
And then, it occurred to him – he’d seen these men before.
In his dreams.
It was as if a great weight had suddenly been lifted from Blayth.
He felt lightheaded with the abrupt realization and, along with that sensation, he could feel a rush of happiness as he’d never felt in his life.
Tears stung his eyes and he started to blink, rapidly, breathing deeply through his nose as if he couldn’t quite catch his breath.
Scott!
Atty!
Those were the names of the men he saw in those dreams, men with swords, men he’d fought with, men he saw in brief glimpses.
These were the men that Morys told him had captured him and tortured him, and he knew in his heart that Morys hadn’t been right.
He’d never felt anything but affection and warmth for these men, and now here they were, looking at him.
They appeared slightly different from the way they’d been in his dreams, but the eyes… he knew those eyes.
Blinking back the tears, his focus returned to William.
“I was told you left me behind at Llandeilo,” he said. “Tell me that was not true.”