The Good Knight (A Gareth and Gwen Medieval Mystery)

“Now. For his own safety.”
    “Why do you do this?” Alice said. “We’ve done you no harm.”
    “Your husband paid mercenaries to murder Anarawd, the King of Deheubarth, and all his men,” Hywel said. “As Cadwaladr has fled and left you and his men to face the consequences of that decision, my father has disowned him.”
    Alice stared straight ahead, absorbing this news without apparent emotion. She believed Cadwaladr had done exactly as Hywel said; she had to know him well enough for that. Perhaps she knew of his numerous other crimes. This time, however, he’d been found out and there were consequences in that for her.
    Hywel saw it too. “Cadwaladr thinks only of what he wants and getting it, whether or not his wants are good for him or Wales,” Hywel said. “I’m sorry you’ve been caught up in it.”
    “Mama!” A boy of five raced out the gate, which Goronwy then closed behind him. Gareth scooped him up before he could reach Alice and carried him to Braith. Hywel, meanwhile, boosted Alice very gently onto his horse.
    “Then why did you not let me defend Aberystwyth as I intended?” Alice said. “Surely your father wishes that Cadwaladr and I should share the same fate.”
    Hywel gave a derisive laugh. “Do you know my father as little as that? We will take your castle, but I would not do it with you and the boy in it.”
    And that, right there, was all anyone needed to know about the difference between serving Hywel and what Gareth’s time had been like under Cadwaladr.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

    A t that first feast, Gwen scared her captors when she threw up everything she’d tried to eat. She should have known better than to consume anything more than broth after her illness on the ship, but nobody had suggested it. She’d eaten until she was full, and then thrown off the grasping hands of her guards in order to lose it all in the grass outside the hall. She’d been given leave to go to bed after that, and slept all of the next day and night. Two days in Dublin, nearly a week since she’d been at Aber, with how many more before they could return home?
    Gwen sat on her pallet combing her hair with her fingers. She’d slept near the main hall in a small hut which comprised the women’s guest quarters. She was glad the Danes were civilized enough not to make her sleep in the hall. She wished she had other clothes to put on but so far none had been forthcoming.
    A young woman appeared in the doorway of the otherwise deserted room, blinking in the transition from sunshine to the darkness within the hut. “Godfrid says to come out now.”
    Gwen looked up at her as she stood silhouetted in the doorway. “Excuse me?”
    “Come out now,” the girl repeated. Then she added, “Godfrid says.”
    “Thank you.” From the girl’s accent, Gwen didn’t think she knew much more Welsh than that. Gwen pulled on her boots, straightened her filthy dress and followed the girl outside.
    “Food and drink,” Godfrid said without preamble.
    “No, ‘how are you?’; no, ‘I’m sorry this has been so rotten’?” Gwen tossed the conversation back at him. “No, ‘I’m sorry to have taken you away from your home?’”
    Godfrid coughed and gave Gwen a quick bow. “How are you, Gwen?”
    “Filthy and hungry, thank you for asking,” she said. “What’s to become of me?”
    Godfrid allowed the smile that was in his eyes to show on his lips. “Food first.”
    “Godfri—” Gwen swallowed the rest of the name at Godfrid’s quizzical look. This was a man used to giving orders and having them obeyed. Just as with the girl, who ran off at a gesture from him. Gwen bit her lip and looked down at her scuffed boots.
    “This way.” Godfrid headed back to the hall.
    Two dozen other people—men, women, and children—gathered for the meal. Gwen would have liked to sit with a family, to remind herself that she had a father and brother back in Wales—and a man who just might love her—but Godfrid nudged her towards an empty table and sat across from her.
    A different girl, this one with a collar around her neck indicating her slave status, laid a full cup of beer and a bowl with the needed broth inside it.
    “Eat,” Godfrid said.
    “Thank you,” Gwen said to the girl, who didn’t meet her eyes. Gwen took one sip, hesitated, and then took another. The broth warmed her stomach and for the first time in a week she didn’t feel ill.
    “Wait.” Godfrid put a finger on the rim of the bowl and