The morning lay clear and sunny over the wild green meadow, and far below at the base of the cliffs the ocean sparkled like a casket of blue and green jewels, but Rhodry rode out with a heavy heart. Olwen’s going to weep, he told himself, and it’s going to be horrible. What Rhodry could never admit to another living soul was that he was honestly fond of Olwen. It was one thing to tumble a common-born lass around in bed; quite another to admit that you liked her and felt more at ease with her than with a woman of your own class.
The town of Cannobaen lay nestled around a small harbor in a break in the cliffs, where the Brog, a stream that only qualified as a river in the winter, came to the sea. There were three wooden piers for fishing boats and a larger pier for the ferry that went out to the holy islands of Wmmglaedd about ten miles out to sea. Inland from the piers about four hundred buildings spread out in ragged semicircles. Although Ysgerryn’s soapworks lay about a mile from town to spare the residents the stink of tallow, his family lived in a round house down near the harbor. Rhodry’s courtship had been so successful because Ysgerryn and his wife were up to their arms in grease and potash all day a good long ways away from Olwen, who tended the younger children at home.
As soon as Rhodry dismounted to lead his horse through the narrow curving streets, he realized that he was in for the worst morning of his life. The townsfolk all bowed or curtsied as usual, but he was aware of hastily repressed smirks and snickers everywhere he went. Although he was the lord and they the commoners, satire was an injured man’s right, and apparently Ysgerryn had been exercising it to the hilt. Rhodry tied his horse up behind the house and slipped in like a thief.
Olwen was chopping turnips at the battered table in the kitchen. She was fifteen, a slender little thing with a heart-shaped face, big blue eyes, and a charming triangular smile. This morning, however, she looked up without the usual smile when Rhodry came in.
“Uh, I’ve brought you somewhat.” Rhodry laid the saddlebags on the table.
Olwen nodded and wiped her hands on her apron.
“Do the terms of the settlement please you?” Rhodry said.
She nodded again and began unlacing the bags.
“My mother sent along some honey and things like that.” Rhodry began to feel desperate. “Things that are strengthening, she said.”
She nodded a third time and began taking various pots and sacks out of the saddlebags.
“Olwen, please, won’t you talk to me?”
“And what do you want me to say?”
“Ah, by the hells, I don’t know!”
Olwen took out the small wooden box of coins, opened it, and stared at the heap of silver for a long time, her chance at a decent life. Rhodry paced around the kitchen while she counted out every coin.
“By the Goddess herself,” Olwen said at last. “Your mother’s a generous woman.”
“It’s not just her. I wanted you well provided for.”
“Truly?”
“Truly. Ye gods, what kind of a man do you think I am?”
Olwen considered the question with a weary sort of look in her eyes.
“A better one than most,” she said at last. “Are you waiting for me to weep? I’ve done all of that that I’m going to do.”
“Well and good. Will you give me one last kiss?”
“I won’t. Just go, will you?”
Rhodry took the saddlebags and headed out, pausing to glance back and see her calmly putting the coins back in the box. She looked more relieved than sad to have him gone. He mounted his horse and trotted out fast, letting the townsfolk get out of his way as best they could. His heart wasn’t lightened any when he returned to the dun and found the page waiting for him with the news that his mother wanted to speak with him straightaway. Although he wanted to make an excuse and duck out, he could never avoid the fact that Lovyan was no longer merely his mother, but his overlord, to whom he owed fealty as well as filial respect.
“I’ll wait upon her directly,” Rhodry said with a groan.
Lovyan was standing by the window in the reception chamber. The harsh morning sun brought out the wrinkles slashed across her cheeks and the gray in her once-dark hair, but she was still an imposing woman, if a bit stout from bearing four sons. She was wearing a white linen dress, kirtled with the green, silver, and blue plaid of the Maelwaedds, but thrown over the chair behind her was the red, brown, and white plaid of the Clw Coc, the symbol of the tierynrhyn. It struck Rhodry as odd that after all these years of thinking himself a Maelwaedd, one day he, too, would wear that foreign plaid.
“Well?” Lovyan said.
“I handed it all over.”
“Did the poor lass weep?”
“Frankly, I think the poor lass was cursed glad to get rid of me.”
“She might be, indeed. You’re very handsome, Rhoddo, but I’ve no doubt that you’re a wearing sort of man to be in love with.”
Rhodry had the horrible feeling that he was blushing.
“The midwife tells me that your Olwen is about three months along,” Lovyan continued. “She’ll be having the baby around the Festival of the Sun. Since it’s her first, it’ll doubtless be a bit late.”
“I wouldn’t know, I’m sure.”
“About such women’s matters?” Lovyan raised one eyebrow. “It’s time you realized that upon these ‘women’s matters’ rests the strength of every clan in the kingdom. If your uncle had had a bastard son, I wouldn’t be tieryn. You might think about that.”
Rhodry flung himself into a chair and refused to look at her. With a sigh, Lovyan sat down nearby.
“The real trouble is you were never raised to rule,” Lovyan said. “No one ever thought you had the remotest chance of inheriting anything, so your father got you the best warrior’s training he could and left it at that. You simply have to marry soon, and she’s going to have to be exactly the right sort of woman, too.” She hesitated, assessing him. “I suppose it would ache your heart to marry a plain lass, or one older than you.”
“It would!”
“Now, do try to be sensible. I—here, what’s all that clatter outside?”
Rhodry realized that for some minutes he’d been hearing noise out in the ward. Giving thanks to the gods for the interruption, he went to look out the window. Servants scuttled around, greeting a troop of men on horseback. Rhodry could see the dragon device on their shields, and the blue, silver, and green plaid of the rider at their head.
“Ah, by a pig’s cock!” Rhodry said. “It’s Rhys.”
“If you could please watch your tongue around your brother, I’d be most grateful.”
When they came down to the great hall, they found Rhys standing by the honor hearth. At the head of the table, the plaid of Aberwyn lay over the chair to announce that the gwerbret’s presence superceded that of the tieryn. Rhys was just Rhodry’s height, but stocky where Rhodry was slender. He had the raven-dark hair and cornflower blue eyes of the Maelwaedds, but his face was coarse rather than fine—the jaw a little too square, the lips a little too full, the eyes a little too small for the breadth of cheek. When Lovyan curtsied to him, Rhys bowed with an affectionate smile. Rhodry’s bow he ignored.
“Good morrow, Your Grace,” Lovyan said. “What brings you to me?”
“Naught that I care to discuss in your open hall.”
“I see. Then let us retire upstairs.”
When Rhodry started to follow, Rhys turned to him.
“See that my men are well taken care of,” he snarled.
Since it was a direct order from the gwerbret himself, Rhodry gritted his teeth and followed it. You bastard, he thought, I have to ride this war you’re discussing ever so privately with Mother.
The cluttered reception chamber looked even smaller with Rhys in it. Refusing a chair, he paced back and forth, stopping occasionally to glance out the window. Lovyan took the opportunity to collect her thoughts. This was bound to be a touchy interview, straining the delicate balance of power they’d worked out between t
hem. Since as gwerbret Rhys was her overlord, she was bound by law to follow his orders, but since she was his mother, he was bound by custom to follow her advice and pay her every possible respect. For the past year, they’d done an uneasy dance to this difficult bit of counterpoint.
“Why do I hear rumors of rebellion out here?” Rhys said finally.
“So they’ve reached Aberwyn?”
“Of course.” He trotted out the old proverb with a certain point. “Everything comes under the nose of the gwerbret of Aberwyn sooner or later.”
“And have you heard that Sligyn believes the rumors?”
“Sligyn isn’t given to fancies. Does he have proof? Letters, things he’s personally overheard?”
“Naught—yet. I can send for him if his grace would like to speak with him.”
“Do you want to make a formal deposition to my court? I doubt if the case would stand if all you have is Sligyn’s gossip.”
“Doubtless not, especially if your grace has already decided that the information is gossip.”
“Oh, here, Mother! Corbyn was one of your brother’s most loyal men. He pledged to you willingly when you inherited the rhan, didn’t he? Why should he throw all that over and declare himself in rebellion?”
Talking of dweomer would draw Rhys’s scorn and nothing more. Rhys misinterpreted her hesitation.
“Unless, of course,” Rhys said, “the trouble’s Rhodry.”
“And what makes you think the trouble could be Rhodry?”
“He’s an untried man, and I didn’t hear any rumors until you made him your heir. I don’t think he’s fit to rule, myself.” Rhys held up his hand flat for silence. “Now, I know Rhodry’s a good lad with a sword. But leading men to battle is a blasted sight easier than giving judgments on your vassals. If you disinherited him, I’m sure all this grumbling about rebellion would stop.”
“I have no intention of doing anything of the sort.”
“Indeed? Well, if Sligyn gets real proof, of course I’ll rule that you have every right to your rank and lands.”
“My humble thanks, Your Grace.”
Rhys winced at the sarcasm.
“But if the lords throw Rhodry in my face,” Rhys went on, “that may have to be a point of negotiation.”
Lovyan rose to face him. Although he towered over her, he ducked back out of reach.
“There is no law in the land,” Lovyan said steadily, “that will allow you to force me to disinherit Rhodry.”
“Of course there’s not. I was merely thinking that Her Grace might have to see reason and do it of her own free will.”
“Her Grace also has the right of appeal to the High King.”
Rhys flushed scarlet with rage. It was his sorest point, knowing that although he ruled like a king in western Eldidd, there was a true king in Deverry with jurisdiction over him.
“Very well, Mother,” he snapped. “Then if Rhodry’s to have your lands, let him fight to keep them.”
“Oho! So you do believe the rumors!”
Rhys spun around and stared out the window. Lovyan laid a maternal hand on his arm.
“Rhys, my sweet, why do you hate Rhodry so much?”
“I don’t hate Rhodry,” he snarled, his face redder than before.
“Indeed?”
“I just happen to think he’s unfit to rule.”
“I happen to disagree.”
Rhys merely shrugged.
“Very well, then, Your Grace,” Lovyan said. “There’s no use in discussing the matter further until it comes to a formal case of either law or sword.”
“Apparently so. At the first overt act of rebellion, you may send for my aid, and my warband will be at your disposal to enforce the laws.”
And yet he’d made it impossible to ask his aid, unless she wanted to let him disinherit his brother in open court.
That afternoon, while Rhys and his men drank in her great hall, Lovyan sent a message to Sligyn to come to her on the morrow. When she rejoined her sons, Rhodry was sitting at his brother’s left and discussing hunting dogs, a fairly safe subject. Lovyan sat down at the gwerbret’s right and stayed on guard for the trouble that soon, predictably, surfaced.
“Well, brother,” Rhys said. “I hear from your men that you’ve been hunting a different kind of game than the gray deer. The soapmaker’s daughter, was she? Well, at least she’d be clean.”
When Rhys laughed at his own jest, Rhodry’s eyes went dangerously blank.
“I can’t lie and say that I didn’t dishonor her,” Rhodry said. “Tell me, brother, has your wife conceived yet?”
Rhys’ hand tightened on his tankard so hard that his knuckles went white.
“Rhodry!” Lovyan snapped.
“Well, Mother, it seemed a reasonable question.” Rhodry shot his brother a sideways smile. “Since we’re talking about siring sons and all.”
With a flick of his wrist, Rhys threw the ale in his tankard full into Rhodry’s face. Shouting insults and the worst oaths they knew, they were on their feet and shoving at each other before Lovyan could intervene. She jumped up and ran round the table to push herself between them, and for all that Rhys had the higher rank, she slapped him, too.
“Stop it!” Lovyan yelled. “What a splendid example you are for your men, brawling like a pair of servants! My lords, kindly remember who you are.” They both had the decency to blush. Rhodry wiped his face off on his sleeve and stared down at the floor. Rhys collected himself with a sigh and held out his hand.
“My apologies.”
“And you have mine from the bottom of my heart.” Rhodry took the offered hand.
But the handshake was as brief as they could make it, and Rhodry stomped out of the hall. Rhys and Lovyan sat down and waited while a servant refilled the gwerbret’s tankard and scuttled away again.
“My apologies to you, Mother. That was an ill way for me to treat your hospitality, but ye gods, the rotten young cub made me furious.”
“What he said was uncalled for and cruel.”
Rhys studied the tabletop and rubbed at a bit of rough wood with his thumb. Finally he looked up with a brittle smile.
“Well? Aren’t you going to tell me that it’s time I put my wife aside?”
“I know she pleases you, and never would I wish that bitter Wyrd on any woman. I take it your councillors have been pressing the issue again.”
“They have. That’s another reason I rode to Cannobaen, to ask your advice. I know Aberwyn needs heirs, but it aches my heart to think of Donilla living shamed on her brother’s charity.”
With a sigh, Lovyan considered. Rhys had been married for ten years; he was now twenty-eight and his wife twenty-six; if Donilla was going to conceive, surely she would have done so by now.
“If you do put her aside,” Lovyn said at last, “I’ll make provision for her. At the very least, she can come to me as part of my retinue, but I might be able to do better than that.”
“My thanks. Truly, Mother, my thanks.” He rose abruptly. “If you’ll excuse me? I need a bit of air.”
Yet Lovyan knew that he was close to tears. For a long while she sat at the table alone and brooded on those women’s matters that lay at the heart of the kingdom.
On the morrow, Rhys and his men rode out early, much to Lovyan’s relief. His stubbornness over the rebellion puzzled her; it was, after all, to the gwerbret’s advantage to intervene before things came to open war, both to assert his authority and to issue a warning that rebellions would not be tolerated in his rhan. Later, while speaking with Rhodry and Sligyn in her reception chamber, she found an answer to the puzzle that nearly broke her heart.
“High-handed of him, eh?” Sligyn said. “Never known His Grace to be so unreasonable.”
“Indeed?” Rhodry favoured them with a cold, tight smile. “All my life, Rhys could always hold one thing over my head, and that was that he’d get the gwerbretrhyn and I’d have naught but his charity. And then Uncle Gwaryc has to go and get himself killed
, and lo and behold, I’ve got a rhan after all. Of course it aches the bastard’s heart.”
“Here!” Sligyn snapped. “Don’t call your brother that. Your lady mother had more honor than to put horns on your father’s head.”
“My apologies to you, Mother. Let me refer to the esteemed gwerbret as a piss-poor drunken excuse for a noble lord then.”
“Rhodry!” Lovyan and Sligyn said together.
“Well, by the gods!” Rhodry got to his feet. “How do you expect me to be courteous to a man who wants me dead?”
Suddenly Lovyan turned cold.
“Can’t you see it?” Rhodry was shaking with rage. “He’s letting the war go on in the hopes of seeing me killed. I’ll wager Corbyn and Nowec see it, too. They kill me off, then sue for peace, and Rhys ever so honorably makes them give restitution to his poor mother. Then when you die, the rebels have what they want, direct fealty to Rhys, and he has what he wants, my lands.” Rhodry leaned over her chair. “Well, Mother? Aren’t I right?”
“Hold your tongue!” Sligyn rose and hauled him back. “You’re right enough, but don’t go throwing it into your lady mother’s face!”
Rhodry strode to the window and looked out, gripping the sill with both hands. Lovyan felt as if Rhys and Rhodry physically had her by the arms and were ripping her apart. Sligyn watched her with concern.
“Don’t you brood, Your Grace, we’ll keep your young cub alive. He knows how to swing that sword he wears, and he’ll have plenty of loyal men around him.”
Lovyan nodded mutely. Sligyn hesitated, then sighed.
“My lady? We’d best leave you.”
It seemed to take them forever to get out of the chamber and close the door.
“Ah, ye gods,” Lovyan whispered aloud. “I never thought he hated Rhodry as much as all this.”
She dropped her face into her hands and let the blessed tears come.
• • •
Much to Jill’s delight, it took Dregydd some days to finish trading with the Westfolk. One at a time, either a man or a woman would lead a horse over and sit down in the grass to haggle leisurely with the merchant. When that deal was done, an hour or two would pass before the next horse made its appearance. Since most of the Westfolk knew no Deverrian, the man named Jennantar stayed with Dregydd to translate. In her self-appointed role as Dregydd’s assistant, Jill came to know him fairly well. The second afternoon, during a break in the trading Cullyn came over and insisted that Jill take a walk with him down by the river.