Chapter 4
Chapter Four
Aknock sounded at her door. “Gemma?”
Gemma hugged Caelin, then stood and went to open the door. Rhiannon entered, carrying two trenchers of food, and placed them on the table.
“I brought your food. It seemed the easiest way to be allowed in to see you. Eat before it gets cold,” Rhiannon said. “Lady Aoife is much improved. She is asking for you.” But Rhiannon’s voice lacked its usual warmth. Gemma looked at the woman who kept her gaze fixed on the food.
“Arne has asked us not to leave this room for as long as the fishermen are still here,” Gemma said.
Rhiannon looked at her sharply, and Gemma thought she detected guilt in her expression. “But Lady Aoife is asking for you. Surely Arne cannot order you—”
Gemma held up a hand to stop her. “Arne is justified in his concern. He only wants to keep Kirkjaster safe. Besides, I am not in charge here. I am nobody,” she murmured.
“Here, I am an inconvenience at best and a danger at worst. Please, tell Aoife I will come as soon as the fishermen have gone. I don’t want to place you all in danger if I am seen. ”
Rhiannon nodded curtly and went to the door. She stopped just short of it and turned back, wringing her hands. Her face was pale and her hands were trembling.
“What is wrong?”
“I overheard them talking,” Rhiannon whispered.
They were alone in the room, so why was Rhiannon whispering? “The fishermen?”
“Life is not easy in Ir Ysgyn.”
“Is that why they were fishing in such poor weather?”
“The steward, Lord Fergus, is asking them for too much. The crops were good last year, but the taxes are too high, and the villagers were not able to put enough into storage. Many of the people are now starving.”
There was always a balance to be maintained between tenants and lords.
Her husband had already been very demanding, so if Lord Fergus was asking the tenants for even more, it was troubling and risked the people turning on them.
Many of the villagers had also left their homes over the previous summer to join Marcant’s group of dissenters, and it was rumoured many had not yet returned home after his defeat at Isallawr. “There is nothing I can do.”
“Is there not?” Rhiannon turned away, and Gemma could only see her face in profile.
“Caelin is still too young to control his lands.”
“Can you not—”
Gemma shook her head, remembering the day she had discovered her brother had placed a steward in charge of the lands she had assumed she would look after on her son’s behalf.
Rhun would never accept a woman being in charge of any of the lands under his rule.
A fact he had made clear when he had berated her about all the decisions she had made that he disagreed with.
“I did so at first, then Rhun installed Lord Marcant as steward and ordered me to bring Caelin to him in Perthawc. Then he sent us away to Car Luel. He will not hear of me controlling the lands for Caelin.”
“Why? You’re his sister. Surely he trusts you?” Rhiannon frowned.
“My brother doesn’t trust anyone.” Gemma moved over beside Rhiannon, not wanting Caelin to overhear. “He is greedy and I think… I think Rhun may be responsible for our father’s death.”
“King Causantin—”
“Both Rhun and Causantin benefitted from my father’s death.
They most likely arranged it together with the backing of the Church.
The power of the holy men is growing. They have filled Rhun’s head with promises of great riches and tales of God protecting his kingdom — so long as he contributes to the Church, of course. ”
“How can he justify keeping Lord Caelin from his lands?”
Gemma sighed and watched her son eat. “Caelin is too much of a threat to Rhun. Eochaid has no children, which makes Caelin his heir. Lord Marcant has already kidnapped Caelin once, intending to place him on the throne instead of either Rhun or Eochaid. There is always a danger that Rhun will take decisive action to prevent the threat of Caelin’s claim to the throne. ”
“He is just a child!”
“Children grow.”
“Is that why you stay here?”
“Lord Cenydd told me I would be safer here. I trust him. Besides, the Norsemen don’t care whether it is a Briton or a Pict or a Dal Riatan on the throne.
So long as they have their alliance, these things do not matter.
But our people care. We saw last year that our people care a great deal, Rhiannon.
Many want a return to my father’s kingdom, with less power going to the Church.
Then there is less chance of our kingdom merging with those in the north.
Marcant promised them a return to that past and many were eager for it. ”
“Marcant cares only for himself. He thinks he deserves…” Rhiannon clenched her fists, then lowered her head.
Gemma knew she had been captured by Marcant after he had arranged the murder of Aoife’s father last year.
As she watched the woman now, she sensed that whatever had happened to her had been far worse than just being captured.
“What did Marcant do to you, Rhiannon?”
Rhiannon kept her eyes on the floor and shook her head. “I won’t speak of it.”
“If I can ever ensure it, I promise you he shall pay for his crimes.”
“A lifetime in hell would not be enough.” Rhiannon said it so quietly that Gemma nearly didn’t hear her. Then she lifted her head. “Please do not bring him here, Gemma.”
“I would never do anything to endanger you or Aoife,” she said, but it saddened her that Rhiannon believed she would do such a thing.
Rhiannon took a step towards her, her arms outstretched. “I want my son to have a safe place to live and grow and if that place is amongst the Norse rather than his own people, then that is how it must be.”
“I understand,” she said and smiled sadly. “I might even agree, however, I can only promise not to betray the settlement. There is nothing more I can do.”
Rhiannon let her arms fall back to her sides, her gaze once more on the floor. “I didn’t tell you everything.”
“What more is there?” Gemma wasn’t sure she wanted to hear it.
Rhiannon looked up, her lips pursed. “There have been soldiers in Ardd Gowan and Ir Ysgyn, looking for you. For both of you. They are offering a reward. Gold.”
All the air left Gemma’s lungs. She took a step backwards and perched on the end of the bed before her knees gave out.
Her whole body shook as she fought to keep breathing.
Soldiers might be her brother’s men or Marcant’s.
She had been Marcant’s captive the summer before, but he had chosen not to show himself to her.
Now everything had changed. He’d once tried to force Aoife to marry him so that he could take her lands.
He had controlled Caelin’s lands by then, anyway.
Would he now seek to marry her to ensure he ruled those lands?
But why not do that before? Gemma had never understood why Marcant had not tried before.
“Please don’t bring danger here, Gemma,” Rhiannon pleaded. “We are not all as able to control our fates as you are.” Then she hurried out.
Gemma flinched as the door banged shut behind her.
She couldn’t stop herself shaking as everything she believed about her time in Kirkjaster shifted around her.
Until this moment she had not understood that even Rhiannon saw her as a danger.
Did Aoife? Regardless of anyone’s feelings, if there were soldiers looking for her and her son, then their presence did indeed place the settlement in danger.
Rhiannon was wrong — Gemma had as little control over her fate as anyone else.
She had thought that they’d be able to remain hidden until a way forward presented itself, but clearly it was not possible to remain here any longer.
She would never forgive herself if she was responsible for harm coming to those who had helped her.
King Artgal, her father, would have detested her choices, refused to hide.
She grimaced. That attitude had got him killed after the siege of Alt Clut.
If he had surrendered earlier, maybe more of his people would have survived.
She shuddered. No, she had seen the Norsemen fight.
Surrendering would not have helped the Britons.
The only reason any had survived was that they were more valuable as slaves than as corpses.
She hadn’t been at Alt Clut during the siege, but her husband had.
Everyone inside had been doomed as soon as it became clear the Britons at Alt Clut couldn’t break the siege, and those outside, under her brother’s command, were not willing to mount a force large enough to rescue them.
None of this altered the bald fact that both Rhun and Eochaid would have a more secure future if Caelin were dead.
Marcant had already tried to build an army with the intent of putting a pure-blooded Briton on the throne.
The fact she and Caelin had already escaped from him by then had not deterred him.
After a brief battle between factions within her own people, where Bjorn had been almost fatally wounded, Marcant’s attempt to put Caelin on the throne and destroy the alliance with the Norse had ended, however, there was nothing to stop him trying again.
Gemma had overheard the Brothers of Thunder discussing it one evening, although they stopped as soon as they realised she was within earshot.
As far as the rumours went, many of the villagers who had left home to join Marcant’s army had so far not returned and were either dead or could be building an army somewhere else.
Marcant remained at large and while the winter had cut short the flow of villagers to join him, it was possible that come the spring he would start to attract those dissatisfied with Rhun’s reign once more.
“Mama?” Caelin’s voice brought her attention back to the present.
“Yes?”
“You should eat before it gets cold.”
Gemma smiled and nodded at her son. She ate her meal slowly, wondering if it would be their last here.