Brother Cadfael 18: The Summer of the Danes

has a tongue of her own, and can very well make it plain that she is under Owain's protection, and they'll be answerable to him if they do her offence. But even so..."
    They had reached a place where the woodland track divided, one branch bearing still inland but inclining to the west, the other bearing more directly east.
    "We are nearer Carnarvon than Bangor," Cadfael reckoned, halting where the roads divided. "But would she know it? What now, Mark? East or west?"
    "We had best separate," Mark said, frowning over so blind a decision. "She cannot be very far. She would have to keep in cover. If the ship must return this night, she might find a place to hide safely until they are gone. Do you take one way, and I the other."
    "We cannot afford to lose touch," Cadfael warned seriously. "If we part here it must be only for some hours, and here we must meet again. We are not free to do altogether as we choose. Go towards Carnarvon, and if you find her, see her safely there. But if not, make your way back here by dusk, and so will I. And if I find her by this lefthand way, I'll get her into shelter wherever I may, if it means turning back to Bangor. And at Bangor I'll wait for you, if you fail of meeting me here by sunset. And if I fail you, follow and find me there." A makeshift affair, but the best they could do, with so limited a time, and an inescapable duty waiting. She had left the cell by the shore only that morning, she would have had to observe caution and keep within the woodland ways, where a horse must go slowly. No, she could not be far. And at this distance from the strait, surely she would keep to a used path, and not wind a laborious way deep in cover. They might yet find and bring her here by nightfall, or conduct her into safety somewhere, rendezvous here free of her, and be off thankfully back to England.
    Mark looked at the light and the slight decline of the sun from the zenith. "We have four hours or more," he said, and turned his horse westward briskly, and was off.
    Cadfael's track turned east on a level traverse for perhaps half a mile, occasionally emerging from woodland into open pasture, and affording glimpses of the strait through the scattered trees below. Then it turned inland and began to climb, though the gradient here was not great, for this belt of land on the mainland side partook to some extent of the rich fertility of the island before it reared aloft into the mountains. He went softly, listening, and halting now and again to listen more intently, but there was no sign of life but for the birds, very busy about their spring occupations and undisturbed by the turmoil among men. The cattle and sheep had been driven up higher into the hills, into guarded folds; the raiders would find only the few stragglers here, and perhaps would venture no further along the strait. The news must be ahead of them now wherever they touched, they would have made their most profitable captures already. If Heledd had turned this way, she might be safe enough from any further danger.
    He had crossed an open meadow and entered a higher belt of woodland, bushy and dappled with sunbeams on his left hand, deepening into forest on his right, when a grass snake, like a small flash of silver-green lightning, shot across the path almost under his horse's hooves to vanish in deeper grass on the other side, and the beast shied for an instant, and let out a muted bellow of alarm. Somewhere off to the right, among the trees, and at no great distance, another horse replied, raising an excited whinny of recognition. Cadfael halted to listen intently, hoping for another call to allow him to take a more precise reading of the direction, but the sound was not repeated. Probably whoever was in refuge there, well aside from the path, had rushed to soothe and cajole his beast into silence. A horse's neighing could carry all too far along this rising hillside.
    Cadfael dismounted, and led his beast in among the trees, taking a winding line towards where he thought the other voyager must be, and halting at every turn to listen again, and presently, when he was already deep among thick growth, he caught the sudden rustling of shaken boughs ahead, quickly stilled. His own movements, however cautious, had certainly been heard. Someone there in close concealment was waiting for him in ambush.
    "Heledd!" said Cadfael clearly.
    Silence seemed to become even more silent.
    "Heledd? Here am I, Brother Cadfael. You can be easy, here are no