Chapter Twenty-One #2
“This part—cecidit—is clear; that means ‘fell.’ And if this partial word is proelio for ‘battle’ or ‘fight,’ it refers to someone who fell in battle.”
“So—the Battle of Beddeigyr!” finished Emily, bouncing in her seat. “HIC IACET something-GYN COMES DE CAERLYR FILIUS WIG-something QUI IN PROELIO APUD BEDDEIGYR CECIDIT.”
“Here lies Something-gyn, Earl of Caerlyr, son of Wig-something, who in Battle at Beddeigyr fell.”
“I do wish we could work out what their full names are,” she sighed. “What and when was the Battle of Beddeigyr? And why does that name sound so familiar?”
“I’m not sure, but we can find out,” said Deo, getting up and going to a pile of books on the side table.
“Oh, why can’t I think? I’m sure I know this!” said Emily, frowning at the part of the text she had written out on the parchment in front of her. Eigyr.
“Eigyr is a personal name that means maiden!” She bounced up excitedly. “Bedd is Welsh for grave and Eigyr means maiden. So, grave of the maiden!”
“What is Eigyr in English? I feel like I should know.” Deo said. Then answered his own question. “Igraine?”
“Beddeigyr. Bedeigraine.”
Deo paused in his sorting through the pile of books and straightened slowly. “Igraine is Arthur’s mother.”
Emily’s eyes widened and her mouth fell open. “Oh, gosh yes, you’re right. King Arthur! But—we can’t have stumbled across anything to do with him, can we?”
Deo shook his head. “Unlikely. He’s considered by many scholars now to be more legend than real—”
“True, but even so, surely there is a man behind the legend. Someone real who may not have performed all those fabulous feats, but who was impressive enough to change history. Someone remembered as Arthur, King of the Britons.”
“Yes, certainly. I agree with that. I think there was such a fellow,” Deo conceded. “A Dark Age king who held back the Saxon tide for a generation or more.”
“Then isn’t our comes too late for Arthur?”
“Not really, Em. Most of the tales associate Arthur with sixth century British kings like Urien and Cador.”
“Oh!” Emily sat down abruptly, her legs giving out.
“Are you all right?” he said in alarm, coming to her side.
“Yes, yes! It’s just—overwhelming! I mean Arthur! The greatest king in British history!”
“Hold on a minute, Em. We don’t know it’s anything to do with him at all, the name may just be a coincidence.”
She took a breath and let it out slowly. “You’re right, of course. I’m getting ahead of myself. But oh, Deo, I’ve got tingles, what if it is?”
“Only one way to find out. We need to comb through the Arthurian texts to see if we can find anything pertinent. I’ve got Geoffrey of Monmouth here, but Rob will have the others in his library, I’m pretty sure.
I’ll go fetch them; you take a look at Geoff.
” He handed her a copy of the History of the Kings of Britain by Geoffrey of Monmouth and headed downstairs.
It was a translation from 1718 by Thomson and contained a gazetteer and index at the back, she was pleased to see. She started to comb through the entries. By the time Deo came back, she was beside herself.
“Deo! Look, this must be where the identification of Caelyr with Leicester comes from. I found it in the gazetteer at the back. But the really exciting bit? I’ve found his name!
The spelling is a bit different, but that would be the variation between Welsh and English, I think. He’s actually mentioned in the text!”
She showed him the passage.
“It gives a list of leaders gathered at one time—consuls—and gives a name, Jugein of Leicester. And there is another reference—possibly a variant spelling—here with Jonathal of Dorchester, commanding the third division of troops at the Battle of Suesia! It must be him; don’t you think?”
“The Battle of Bedegraine isn’t the Battle of Suesia,” objected Deo.
“No, it’s a different battle, but it shows he was a battle commander. And that he fought for Arthur!”
Deo nodded slowly. “Perhaps,” he said cautiously. “But is the name similar enough?”
“Gyn could be a variant of gein, couldn’t it? And we know that part of the name is missing so couldn’t the first part be Ju? His father’s name is Wig something. Couldn’t it be Wigein? Jugein and Wigein are just variant spellings of the same name, aren’t they?”
He smiled ruefully at her. “You make a good argument, Em. Now if we could locate Bedegraine . . .”
“Which books did you get?”
“Bede, Wace, Layamon, and good old Mallory. Which did you want?”
“Mallory! Bedegraine sounds to me like something that he would use.”
He nodded, handing over the volume and sitting down with the rest.
Emily took Mallory and thumbed to the back, looking for an index and was gratified to find one.
“Got it!” she said a moment later. “The Battle of Bedegraine in the forest of Bedegraine!” She looked up, grinning.
“And here, oh my gosh, Mallory says ‘After this Merlin departed from his master and came to King Arthur, that was in the castle of Bedegraine, that was one of the castles that stand in the forest of Sherwood.’”
“Sherwood is close to here, north of the river Trent,” said Deo, putting down his book but keeping a finger in it to mark his place.
“Oh, Deo, this does sound like it might be something that actually happened.”
“Maybe. Though you need to remember, Em, there have been a lot of forgeries over the years associated with Arthur.”
“But don’t you think—?”
“I don’t know, Em. It’s very tempting,” he admitted.
“But you’re not convinced? Surely if someone were going to manufacture a forgery, they would do it about someone famous, like Bedivere or Cai? Not an obscure commander no one has heard of. The cross was broken and buried a long time ago . . .”
“It does look persuasive, Em. I’m just wary of claiming something that is so closely associated with Arthur.
Particularly Mallory’s Arthur, who is much more fable than fact.
The names in Mallory’s work are largely fictitious, whereas the ones in Nennius, Bede, and even Geoffrey are much closer to history. ”
She sighed.
“Don’t look so cast down. I’m inclined to think you might be right. I’ve just found this in Wace. It echoes Geoffrey on our Jugein fellow and there is a variant spelling of Vigenin and,” he paused and grinned at her. “And I’ve found a third variation: Iuegyn,”
“Oh Deo!” She sprang up and flung her arms round his neck. “It is our man, then?”
“I think the order of probabilities comes down on the side of yes,” he temporized.
“Just say yes, Deo,” she said, leaning in to kiss him. He pulled her close then, and there was no more talking for a bit.
“Bed,” he murmured a while later, kissing her neck.
“Yes, I think we’ve earned it,” she said, and he scooped her up and carried her into the bedroom, where clothes got scattered, and they fell into bed.
*
Deo ran his hands over his wife’s lovely body and remembered with a guilty start that he hadn’t taken Kes for his walk. Poor fellow was getting neglected. He would take him out, but after he had finished pleasuring his wife.
As she had said, they deserved it. The joy of doing what you love and sharing it with someone you love—there was no greater felicity, and he hadn’t known it was possible to be this happy.
His somewhat dreary and tightly controlled former existence seemed grey and foggy in comparison to the vibrancy that Em brought to everything.
The intensity of feeling, the visceral pleasure of her body, and the unmitigated joy of her presence colored everything.
It was a shock to realize how quickly it had happened.
In a matter of just over a couple of weeks, his life had been transformed.
All thanks to this lovely woman beneath him.
He cupped her small breasts in his great hands and kissed her with passion and tenderness.
It was getting harder and harder to resist the inevitable.
Fortunately, he was well-disciplined in self-restraint, or he would have given into temptation long ago.
If Em had her way . . . The fact that she wanted him brought him undone in ways that he couldn’t have fathomed a week ago.
He slid sideways and murmured, “Em, turn on your side.”
She threw him a puzzled look and rolled toward him.
“No, the other way,” he said.
She rolled away. “Like this?”
“Yes,” he said, pulling her back against his front and spooning her tiny frame with his large body. He ran a hand down her belly to the place between her legs and stroked her softly.
“Oh, Deo,” she sighed, squirming her lovely bottom into his groin. His cock, already hard, caught between her buttocks, and he groaned. He moved back a fraction and used his hand to adjust the position of his cock. Sliding it instead along the channel of her wet lips, between her thighs.
“Deo,” she gasped.
He kissed her neck and nuzzled her ear, sliding a hand under her to reach a breast, while his other hand continued to stroke that place he knew gave her the strongest pleasure.
He moved his hips a bit and found that sliding his cock along her flesh was just about the most pleasurable thing he’d ever felt. “You like that?” he asked huskily.
“Yes!” She moved with him, and he groaned again.
He wasn’t going to last long in this position, it felt too good.
He sped up the stroking of his fingers between her legs and tweaked her nipple gently, encouraging her to reach her peak before he lost control.
The pleasure was building rapidly in his groin, as his cock slid backward and forward in the hot slippery hollow between the tops of her thighs and the satiny lips of her sex.
Perhaps it was the novelty of it that made it so erotic—he’d certainly never done anything like this before. He was getting quite inventive with ways to pleasure Em without taking her fully.
“Em, come with me!” he begged, panting, his hips moving faster of their own volition. She squirmed, her thighs tightening, and gasped.
“Deo!” her choked cry cut off and her body shook, and he lost the last vestige of his control. The pleasure spiked in a hot rush of heat and bliss, as he came hard, his cock shooting its load onto the sheets in front of her.
He groaned with the release and pulled her tight against him as the throbs of pleasure slowly died away. He got his breath back, listening to the heavy beat of his pulse in his ears and feeling it in his chest as it settled. He hugged her and kissed her neck in wordless joy.
She twisted in his embrace to face him and, wrapping her arms round his neck, she kissed him. “The perfect end to another perfect day,” she whispered.
“Yes,” he murmured, kissing her again. Their legs tangled, and they lay together in silence for a few minutes in contentment and shared accord.
This was what he had dreamed of and never thought he would have.
The best that he had aspired to was the notion of a companion who would share the work with him.
He never thought that their communion would run so deep or extend to such physical passion.
Kes who had been lying by the fire, chose this moment to paw at the bed.
“All right, old fellow,” he mumbled. “I’ll have to take Kes out,” he said, disentangling himself reluctantly from Em.
She nodded and smiled. “Hurry back. I’ll miss you,” she said whimsically, reaching for a handkerchief to wipe the sheets.
He dove back to kiss her again. “I will.” He stroked her nose and got out of bed to pull on his clothes.
The days were getting warmer as they edged toward the height of summer, but the nights were still chilly.
Going through to the sitting room, he let Kes out, and he escorted the dog downstairs and through the drawing room double doors to the north lawn.
He paced while Kes ran about sniffing and finding a suitable spot to do his business under a shrub.
Reentering the house, he closed and locked the French doors and went back out into the front hall. He crossed the hall and ascended the stairs with Kes by his side. He couldn’t wait to crawl back into bed with Em where it was warm and comfortable.
*
His heart pounding in his chest, Bryson watched the Earl climb the stairs through a crack in the library door.
When he was sure Pendrell had reached the second floor and his bedchamber, he slipped out of the library, closing the door carefully behind him. With his prize tucked under one arm while he carried his candle, he made his way quietly back to his own room.
Once there, he lit a full candelabra on the desk and sat down to thumb through Emily’s sketchbook and select the images he wanted.
He then drew paper, pen and ink from the drawer and began the planned letter to his broker.
An hour later, he had the letter copied out fair and, adding the sketches, placed the lot in a large envelope.
He would slip into town early to post it.
He wondered what to do with the sketches he had not used.
Should I return the book with the remaining sketches?
Burn it? He decided against either. The former because it would alert Pendrell that someone was after the items whose pictures were missing, and the latter because they were Emily’s drawings, and he might get an opportunity to win her favor by “finding” and returning them to her.
He was fonder of her than he had thought was possible.
If only he could find some way to drive a wedge between her and Pendrell and turn her heart toward him.
Well satisfied with this night’s work, and contemplating different scenarios in which Emily became his, he undressed and crawled into bed.