Rhuddlan

Chapter 57

  June, 1178

  Llanlleyn, Gwynedd

  Longsword refused to ride in the litter which had been made for him. The jostling gait of his horse, even at the slowest walk, caused his broken arm to throb mercilessly but he suffered the pain and resulting nausea as a self-bestowed penance. He spoke little but his men didn’t mind; they were happy he was back in Gwynedd and happy that he’d been recovered from the Welsh and the near-fatal clutches of Roger of Haworth. He wished he could have been as happy. Returning to Wales had so far brought him nothing but misery.

  Their pace was tedious. Fitz Maurice sent a messenger ahead to notify the castle about their impending return but the rest of the army stayed together and travelled at Longsword’s speed. Longsword thought this unnecessary but fitz Maurice had insisted and everyone had agreed with him. They couldn’t be certain Hawarden wouldn’t attempt an ambush. Fitz Maurice had made a good argument, but most men believed revenge was both honorable and obligatory, and worth the risk of banishment.

  Longsword had lost consciousness when the two men designated by fitz Maurice to bring him back to their camp had cut the bonds around his wrists. They had seen the blood but hadn’t realized the right arm was broken and he had been so weak from pain that he’d been unable to tell them. They were working quickly on fitz Maurice’s instructions and had tried to lift him as soon as the cut had been made. Pain overcame him and he passed out, which was just as well because it spared him the rather frightening debate back at the camp over how best to treat the break, and he felt nothing when someone ultimately took his wrist and pulled hard and steady on it in an effort to line up the broken pieces of his upper arm while someone else held his torso. The bleeding was stanched and the entire arm wrapped tightly to keep down the swelling.

  He’d regained consciousness as dusk began to fall and the army stopped to rest and have a meal. Fitz Maurice had decided to continue on through the night but it was necessary to wait for the moon to rise. Longsword awoke, groggy and sick to his stomach, and found himself lying on a litter constructed from cloaks suspended between two stout poles, which was presumably carried by a pair of foot soldiers. His head throbbed, his neck and shoulder throbbed and his arm was on fire. Through hazy eyes he saw men nearby but found he had no voice to call to them. He was desperately thirsty. He summoned all that remained of his strength and kicked a foot against one of the poles in an effort to attract attention. The ploy succeeded too well; he soon had a packed circle of concerned faces staring down at him.

  “Water…” he managed to croak and for some reason, everyone started grinning and cheering.

  Fitz Maurice sat with him until the moonlight was bright enough to show the road and told him what had happened to Roger of Haworth. “Who knows what will come of it,” he added with a shrug of indifference. He raised a skin of wine to his mouth and drank. “Will you take some, my lord?” he asked, holding the skin out to Longsword. “It will dull your pain.”

  But Longsword’s stomach revolted at the idea of drinking wine and he was already dizzy enough. “Haworth finally met his match,” he said hoarsely.

  “Thank God everything turned out well for us—except for your arm, of course, my lord—but I must admit, it was probably a boon that Sir Roger and his men showed up, even if they were planning treachery.”

  Longsword was indignant but couldn’t properly show it in his present condition. The best he could manage was a weak hiss. “How so?”

  Fitz Maurice took another swallow of wine. “My lord, I will tell you that when we saw you taken into Llanlleyn, we had no idea what to do. The hostages, the exchange—that was all Sir Roger’s plan.”

  “But you had been warned about him,” Longsword said, a little breathlessly.

  “Yes, but of course I never believed that story!” Fitz Maurice laughed at the memory. “That poor fellow…he couldn’t believe that I—that none of us—believed him! We thought Lady Teleri had gone out of her mind!” He sobered abruptly. “But then Sir Roger appeared the very next morning and proved the story true. How could he have travelled to Llanlleyn so quickly if he hadn’t come from Rhuddlan? And he never mentioned that Earl Hugh was prisoner, just that the earl had sent him to help us. Someone was lying to me, my lord, and I didn’t think it was our own messenger.”

  No, no, that wasn’t it! Longsword struggled to speak but he was exhausted and in such discomfort that the effort defeated him. He gasped for air.

  “My lord, you ought to rest,” fitz Maurice said hastily. “I’ll call for you when we’re ready to leave.”

  But when he closed his eyes, he was tormented by endless images of Richard and Olwen. The last few days had been like a bad dream and he was afraid to sleep any longer for fear of what might happen next. Pain and self-reproof muddled his mind but one thing was clear: fitz Maurice had not met with Olwen. What, then, had become of her?

  The next day brought the question he had dreaded answering since the moment he’d seen Olwen at Llanlleyn. He and fitz Maurice were riding side by side, walking slowly at the head of the army but behind half a dozen scouts, and he was calculating that they would need another day and a half of travel to make it to Rhuddlan at their current pace. The ache in his arm hadn’t lessened and he thought he wanted to be back at the castle more urgently for the opportunity to simply lie flat on his back for a day or two than to confront the earl. And then fitz Maurice asked him, hesitantly, how the Welsh had come to seize him and he told him how he and Delamere had returned to Rhuddlan to find it surrounded by Haworth and his men and how they’d foiled Haworth’s plan to take the stronghold with scaling ladders and how he’d been on his way to retrieve his own army when the Welsh had captured him. He hadn’t spoken so much at one time since being wounded and the exercise cost him dearly. He’d never realized how much the simple act of breathing affected every sinew of the body.

  “So, Sir Richard stayed behind to keep an eye on the earl?” Fitz Maurice inquired. Then he put out a hand. “Stop a moment, my lord. That branch will be right in your face.” He twisted around in his saddle with an ease Longsword envied and shouted for a man to come forward and cut down a slender twig from a sapling growing too close to the road.

  The offending bit of flora hacked away, they continued on, and fitz Maurice said, “Was there a reason Sir Richard didn’t trust Guy Lene to keep a good eye on the earl? I mean no slight against Sir Richard but perhaps the two of you together might have fought off the Welsh…”

  “No…” said Longsword in a voice barely audible above the steady, clomping hooves. “I trust in Sir Guy’s competency. Sir Richard didn’t come with me because he’s dead. Haworth killed him. Rather, one of his men did. While we were crossing the river after disposing of the ladders.” He didn’t look at his companion. He stared at the dun-colored road just past his mount’s head.

  Fitz Maurice was suitably shocked. After a moment of silence, a string of expletives spewed uncontrollably from his mouth. He cursed Haworth, he cursed Hawarden and he cursed the earl, his voice gaining volume as he went on. Longsword felt a little better, listening to this outpouring of grief. Fitz Maurice’s invectives attracted the attention of the knights behind them and the footmen behind the knights, and soon all the army knew of Delamere’s dishonorable murder at the hands of Roger of Haworth. Longsword was touched. He hadn’t had time yet to mourn properly for his friend and when he’d thought of Delamere recently, it had been with shame and guilt. But no one with him seemed to think he was to blame in any way and it was comforting to finally share his burden. Delamere had been well-liked and well-respected. The sympathy of his men made Longsword feel as if he had made all the right decisions concerning the siege at Rhuddlan and the subsequent scrap at Llanlleyn.

  After his initial outburst, fitz Maurice quieted momentarily, perhaps mulling some idea in his head. When he spoke again, his voice was low but grim. “Well, my lord; we just took care of one of the killers back there at the Welsh fort. When we get to Rhuddlan, we’ll take care of
the other one.”

  Longsword was startled. He hadn’t thought of what he would do with the earl. He didn’t think he could summarily execute him without enraging his father, despite the evidence that the earl had plotted to do away with everyone at Rhuddlan and Llanlleyn. Hugh was too important a magnate; there were sure to be questions from the royal court.

  Yet…the man deserved to die. His father should have executed him after the Great War. The earl was a traitor then and obviously hadn’t changed his color. This latest scheme was just one more indictment in his lengthy career of plotting against the royal house. And because of it, Richard was dead. Justice demanded that someone pay for that crime.

  But Longsword was tired and it was hard for him to sustain anger against the earl for very long. It was easier to let grief flood his body and mind; merely saying Richard’s name to himself was enough to feed it. And coupled with the grief was guilt. What had happened to Olwen?