‘A chilly welcome,’ Owen said as Lascelles caught sight of his wife, stiffened, lifted his chin. As she curtseyed to him, Lascelles appeared to sniff and give a hardly courteous nod.
‘How did such an angel alight in this gloomy place?’ Geoffrey whispered.
‘Let us not forget that she was her father’s salvation,’ Owen said.
They approached their host, his wife and the stranger.
Mistress Lascelles raised her eyes to the newcomers and smiled. Her eyes were a pale green.
Lascelles was first to speak. ‘Master Chaucer, Captain Archer. I do not think I thanked you for escorting my son’s body from St David’s. You are our most welcome and honoured guests this night. Ask for whatever delicacies you wish after your long and difficult journey.’ His voice did not echo the warmth of his words.
‘You are most kind,’ Geoffrey said, bowing. Owen bowed likewise.
‘My wife,’ the steward said, inclining his head slightly towards the beauty at his side.
Owen bowed low and greeted her in Welsh, expressing his regret for having brought such sorrow to her family this day. Her smile faded, she bowed her head, and in her own language she said, ‘I shall miss John de Reine. He was a kind and gentle man.’
‘This is most unfair,’ Geoffrey said, ‘for I would greet you but have no knowledge of your tongue.’
Mistress Lascelles glanced up. ‘Forgive me, Master Chaucer.’ Her voice was slightly hesitant in her husband’s language. ‘May I introduce to you my father, Gruffydd ap Goronwy.’
The handsome man stepped forward. ‘Master Chaucer, Captain Archer.’ He bowed. ‘All of Cydweli is abuzz with your coming. Young men are honing their skills to impress you so that they might join the Duke’s forces in the great war.’
Owen happened to glance towards the fair Mistress Lascelles as her father spoke, and was intrigued by the look of surprise on her face. And indeed Gruffydd’s voice carried a note that warred with his seemingly genuine smile.
Despite Geoffrey’s efforts to keep the conversation light and pleasant, the ensuing meal was an assay of wills: everyone seemed at war – John Lascelles spoke curtly to Burley, who joined them at the table, and seemed irritated by his wife’s occasional lapses into Welsh when addressing Owen or her father; Richard de Burley lectured the company at large about the foolishness of the Duke’s contradictory orders to reinforce the garrisons while at the same time recruiting archers from their ranks; Mistress Lascelles chided the constable on his poor manners. Gruffydd was the only one in the Cydweli party who seemed determined to enjoy the evening, asking Owen and Geoffrey about their travels and their impressions of Carreg Cennen and St David’s. Mistress Lascelles graced her father with an affectionate smile whenever their eyes met.
As it grew late, Owen’s mind wandered back to the day’s events and he thought of Edern, searched the diners for his face, but saw him not. In Welsh he asked Mistress Lascelles why the priest who had escorted John de Reine’s body was not included in their company at the high table.
Mistress Lascelles’s white skin flushed as she glanced at her father, then Owen. ‘Father Edern of St David’s?’
Owen nodded.
‘He is here?’ she whispered.
‘He seemed a suitable choice.’
‘No doubt he put himself forward as such,’ Gruffydd said. He made no effort to soften the words with a smile.
‘I fear my question was clumsy,’ Owen said. ‘Forgive me, Mistress Lascelles.’
‘You were right to ask about your companion,’ she said, but she seemed to withdraw into herself. In a little while she rose and begged leave to retire.
Lascelles bowed to her. ‘I shall join you later,’ he said.
Gruffydd rose to follow his daughter, who already walked away. ‘Tangwystl,’ he called.
She paused, turned. ‘I pray you, stay and entertain our guests in my stead.’ She smiled. ‘You should enjoy your evenings away from the farm.’
Gruffydd bowed to her and resumed his seat, though he watched her departure with anxious eyes.
Once Mistress Lascelles had departed, Geoffrey complained how weary he was. Soon he and Owen also took their leave of Lascelles. Gruffydd accompanied them to the door of the hall.
‘Neither you nor the constable seems fond of Father Edern,’ Owen commented. ‘He seemed pleasant enough on the journey from St David’s.’
‘I do not know the constable’s mind in this, Captain. My feelings about the man go back many years. They would not interest you.’ He stretched, gazed up at the stars. ‘The weather has turned in our favour. I bid you good-night, Captain, Master Chaucer. May you sleep well.’ He strode away.
‘A pleasant man,’ Geoffrey said.
‘He would certainly have us think so,’ Owen said. ‘It cannot be an easy thing, to know that all look on him and wonder whether he is a traitor to his king.’
‘At least he does not hide.’
‘I think his daughter is too fond to allow that. But he dines without his wife. Perhaps she finds it more difficult to face the questions in everyone’s eyes.’
‘Tangwystl,’ Geoffrey said softly. ‘A lovely name.’
‘Aye, that it is.’
Dafydd ap Gwilym stepped to the edge of the cliff, his robes billowing in the up-draft, and opened his arms to embrace the day. The sea mist kissed his hair, beaded on his lashes, cooled his face. God’s morning was magnificent. As he drew his eyes down from the heavens, he saw no break between the grey sky and the grey sea, which this morning appeared to lie placidly in the great arch of Cardigan Bay. A dangerous imagining, a placid sea. Dangerous to one who believed it. The white-tipped waves were merely veiled by the early morning fog, which also muted the sound of the sea crashing against the rocks below with a power mightier than any man might counter.
‘I do not think we should take him so near the edge,’ Brother Samson said in his low, booming tones. Dafydd had never noted how like the sea breaking on the rocks was Samson’s voice.
‘It is quite level here.’ Dafydd held out his arm to the pilgrim, still unnamed, who limped towards him in the protective shelter of the monk’s guiding hands.
The monk spoke softly to the young man, encouraging his efforts, but he glowered at Dafydd. ‘You push him too far too quickly.’
Were all healers fretters? Was that what drew them to their calling? The pilgrim walked with a limp, to be sure, and the bandage round his head reminded Dafydd of his terrible injury. He looked weary already, head bowed and shoulders rounded, though he had made a good effort, taken perhaps a hundred steps from the house. Yet his expression, when he lifted his head to Dafydd’s, was unchanged – resigned, despairing, ready to give up the effort as soon as permitted.
‘Good lad,’ Dafydd said. ‘You will see, all this effort will prove worthwhile.’ To Samson he whispered, ‘We agreed that our pilgrim must build his strength for the journey.’
‘Build his strength, yes. Such must be done gradually.’ Samson, on the other hand, looked overfed and nervous, as if he needed a good month in the fields, preferably behind a plough.
Dafydd wearied of the monk’s contrariness. ‘You fret that the Duke’s men will return, that we must hide our pilgrim, that we must make plans, and yet you wish to take your time readying him? Whence comes this sudden confidence that the Duke’s men are not just down the hill?’
The short monk looked up at his charge, steadied him, then moved alone towards Dafydd. ‘I am wise enough to know that I cannot change nature. Why do you whisper? Do you fear we will be overheard?’
‘It is a morning for secrets and whispers. God sets the tone of the day – listen to the sea, how its voice is hushed by the fog.’ Dafydd nodded towards the pilgrim, who had stepped to the edge of the bluff. ‘You see? Is it as I said?’
He regretted his words at once as he saw the young man gaze down with such an expression of longing that Dafydd feared he had been unwise in trusting the pilgrim alone so near the edge. Dafydd took a step towards the young man. ‘Are you dizzy?’
‘I feel I could lean into the wind and go soaring out above the sea like a gull.’
‘I do not think that is God’s intention,’ Samson said, with a nervous gesture as if he might stay the young man with a wave.
‘I know I am not a gull.’
‘But what are you, then?’ Dafydd whispered. ‘Are you Rhys?’
The young man turned back to the sea as if he had not heard. Dafydd wished that Dyfrig would return with the gossip from St David’s.
Sir Robert had been most grateful to the white monk for his offer to escort him and Brother Michaelo on a circuit of the holy wells in the vicinity. Brother Dyfrig seemed a gentle soul with a ready laugh, and his familiarity with the countryside made him the perfect guide. At St Non’s Well, as they awaited their turn at the stone-lined grotto, Dyfrig had mentioned Owen. ‘It is a pity your one-eyed companion left in such haste. He might have found solace, perhaps even healing, here. Many eye afflictions have been cured by St Non.’
‘He wished to stop here,’ Sir Robert had told him. ‘But the bishop sped him on his way.’ Sir Robert watched as Brother Michaelo knelt on the stones, dipped his fingers in the well and pressed them to his temples. ‘My companion hopes to find relief from his head ailment.’ Feeling eyes on him, Sir Robert looked up, found a dark-haired man regarding him with a curious expression. He looked vaguely familiar.
‘And you, Sir Robert?’ Brother Dyfrig was saying. ‘You are of a venerable age to undertake such a pilgrimage. From York, you said?’
‘It is a long journey for me, but I have been singularly blessed in my old age. God has returned my only child’s affections to me. And spared all the family in the last visitation of the pestilence.’
‘So your purpose is to give thanks so that you may die in peace?’
‘That is my wish.’
‘I shall pray for you.’ As Michaelo moved away from the well, Dyfrig caught Sir Robert’s elbow and helped him drop to his knees on the stones at its edge. Sir Robert dipped his fingers in the well. The water was clear and cool. He crossed himself with his wet fingertips and was filled with a sense of peace. He prayed for Lucie and his grandchildren, and for Owen on his long journey home. When Sir Robert lifted his staff and planted it firmly so that he might use it to help him straighten up, he felt the monk’s supporting hand under his elbow. ‘You are good to me. God bless you, Brother Dyfrig.’ Up higher on the slope, the stranger still regarded them. ‘Do you know him?’ Sir Robert asked, but by the time Dyfrig glanced up, the man was walking away.
‘So many pilgrims. I should not wonder at meeting someone I know.’
They joined Brother Michaelo, who stood at the edge of the gently curving bowl in which sat the well and St Non’s Chapel, gazing down at the sea. Sir Robert had not yet been to the cliff’s edge. On either side stretched high, rocky cliffs ruffled with inlets, pocked with caves. Directly below them, a rock almost as high as the cliff had separated in some ancient time from the mainland and stood, a sentinel, in the inlet.
‘At high tide it is an island,’ Dyfrig said.
‘That cave on the far side – how comes it to be light within?’
‘Daylight from the other side,’ Michaelo said. ‘I can see why our King worries about pirates and smugglers along this coast. One would never lack a cave in which to hide.’
‘Such villains are rarer here than popular imagination would have it,’ Dyfrig said. He turned towards the north-west. ‘You should walk along the cliff when the sea is calm and the sky clear. From the north end of this finger of land you can see Ireland, just as Bendigeidfran, son of LlŶr, saw it when Matholwch’s thirteen ships came across the sea for Branwen.’
Owen had recently told Sir Robert the story of Branwen, and it had caught his interest. ‘Was this LlŶr’s kingdom?’ Sir Robert asked.
‘All this land was his kingdom. But he was not at St Non’s Bay when he saw the ships. He sat on a rock in Harddlech, in Ardudwy, at one of his courts.’
‘You people speak of the folk in your tales as if they were real,’ Brother Michaelo said with a smirk. ‘But they are full of too many marvels to be real.’
Brother Dyfrig bowed his head, shook it as if considering something sad. ‘What we now call marvels were once ordinary occurrences,’ he said softly, as if to himself. ‘How our glory has faded.’
Michaelo caught Sir Robert’s eye. ‘Dreamers,’ he muttered. More loudly he said, ‘If we are to visit St David’s Well before sunset, we must continue.’
Dyfrig glanced out at the westering sun. ‘You are right, my friend. Let us proceed.’
As they walked, Dyfrig kept one hand at Sir Robert’s elbow, ready to assist him if he stumbled. The paths down to the harbour of Porth Clais were well worn, but muddy with the spring rains, and as they headed down the monk was particularly attentive. While they walked, they talked. ‘The palace at St David’s – is it comfortable?’ Dyfrig asked.
‘Certainly we have been provided with everything we could wish for. Bishop Houghton has been most kind,’ said Sir Robert.
‘There must have been much gossip among the pilgrims concerning the body left at Tower Gate.’