The Good Knight (A Gareth and Gwen Medieval Mystery)

do?” Gareth said.
    “Nothing, not without proof. Don’t think my father hasn’t regretted saving his brother from the gallows. He and I discussed Cadwaladr’s continued existence before I rode to Ceredigion.” Hywel lowered his voice. “It is no small matter to kill a prince. Or have him killed.”
    Gareth couldn’t keep his disgust out of his voice. “Ask Anarawd about that.” He gestured to the guards just entering the stables. “Or our assassin.”
    Hywel shook his head. “Even keeping Cadwaladr imprisoned all these months hasn’t been easy. Cadwaladr has his supporters, as you well know, men who are loyal because they can’t imagine being anything else. My father can’t win them to his side overnight. And certainly not with Cadwaladr dying an unexpected death in his prison cell.”
    “Is that why your father let him out?” Gareth said.
    Hywel blew out a breath. “It was politically expedient.” This was a significant admission on Hywel’s part, and showed his confidence in Gareth’s discretion. Gareth was pleased that Hywel trusted him enough to speak what was on his mind.
    Hywel had continued to grip Gareth’s arm as they walked, but now released him. “If Cadwaladr hired this man, you and I—and Gwen (can’t forget her)—must find it out. Then my father will have no choice but to hang him.”
    “I will do my best, my lord,” Gareth said.
    Hywel clapped Gareth on the shoulder. “I know you will. For now, we deal with what is in front of us.”

Chapter Three

    T hey entered the stables. The guards had dumped the youth in the cell that took up the right rear of the building. Gareth had spent far too many hours in it last summer. He couldn’t help but be glad it wasn’t his bruised body in there tonight.
    Two guards blocked the doorway but moved aside as Gareth and Hywel approached. “Stay here,” Hywel said to them. “I don’t want anyone entering who doesn’t belong.”
    “Yes, my lord,” both men said.
    Two more men stood over the would-be assassin, and at a wave from Hywel, they bowed and left the cell, leaving Gareth and Hywel alone with the youth. If his odd pose on the dirt floor of the cell was an indication, he hadn’t moved since the soldiers had dumped him there. Gareth closed the door behind him but didn’t lock it since the boy wasn’t in any condition to escape. Hywel gazed down at the prisoner for a count of ten, but he still didn’t move, so Gareth prodded him with the toe of his boot. “Wake up.”
    “I don’t know that he can.” Hywel stood with his hands on his hips, his lips pursed, studying the boy.
    Since Gareth had been housed here the previous summer, the cell had reverted back to a storage room. Filthy hay littered the floor and someone had stacked wooden crates in a precarious pile in one corner. It still smelled strongly of horse and urine.
    Gareth glanced at his prince, made uneasy by Hywel’s intense focus on the boy’s face. “Do you know him?”
    Hywel slowly shook his head. “No.” But his denial lacked assurance.
    “I hear hesitation in your voice,” Gareth said.
    His lord, though he strove to keep his face impassive, had a tell when he was eliding the truth—or lying as Gwen would more straightforwardly say. Even if he gazed straight at you as he lied, the corner of his mouth would twitch, and then when you nodded your agreement and appeared to accept his lie as truth, his eyes would skate to the left. It was only for an instant, but Gareth had learned to watch for it. Hywel had very rarely lied to him, but he lied to other men routinely.
    Gareth had learned to search for similar responses in the men he questioned. Most men were honest, as it turned out, and bad liars. The men to be most concerned about were the ones who’d so convinced themselves that their lies were truths, that they felt no guilt and had no tells. Cadwaladr was such a man.
    Gareth didn’t mention any of this to Hywel.
    Hywel glanced at him. “Is this a way of asking if I had anything to do with this? Am I a suspect now?”
    Gareth searched for a way to respond without offending. “I didn’t say so. And yet, why am I here if not to read between the lines?”
    Hywel barked a laugh. “You have me there.” He crouched to brush the hair out of the boy’s face so he could see it better. “The occasion of our meeting tickles at the back of my mind, but I can’t tell you more right now. I have a feeling I’ve seen his face before.”
    Gareth wondered why