Chapter One

November 1146

Gwen

“Gwen! Dear God, Gwen, what are you doing here?” Gareth’s oldest friend, Evan, loped towards her, coming from the lines of picketed horses. His blonde hair was mussed, stuck to his head with sweat from the recent wearing of a helmet, and his blue eyes were full of concern.

Gwen gestured to the bag she’d slung over her shoulder. “I brought supplies for Gareth and Prince Rhun, and letters for the king.”

Shortly after she’d last seen Gareth, the cart carrying his belongings had overturned while crossing a swollen river. All its contents had been lost downstream. According to the letter Gareth had sent her, he’d lived these last weeks in what he’d stood up in that day, plus whatever he could borrow from his companions. Prince Rhun, apparently, had been forced to do the same, since his possessions had been swept down the river too, and not even a prince had time to visit a seamstress in the middle of a war.

Even glared at her. “Yes, but Gwen—”

She cut him off, lowering her voice so it barely carried. “Evan, I need to see him.”

Gwen hadn’t intended to admit that much, even to Evan, but behind the admission was the daily ache Gareth’s absence had become. Every night, Gwen lay awake missing him, her mind roiling with visions of his death in battle. They were vain imaginings, and she knew it, but it took an incredible effort of will to get them out of her head. It seemed impossible that she loved him as much as she did.

On the worst nights, she wished she could simply cut out her heart and put it in a box, because it was so painful to have its continued presence inside her body. Women had felt this way about their husbands and sons going to war from the first day men had gone to war. Gwen herself had felt it before. But except for a brief furlough in early October, during a lull in the fighting, Gareth had been gone for the whole of the last three months. It was getting into winter, and this war needed to end.

The look on Evan’s face told Gwen he understood without her saying more. Evan had avoided female entanglements—or perhaps it was simply that he hadn’t found the right woman yet—but that didn’t mean he didn’t understand love. He didn’t embarrass her by further comment and instead looked past her to the activity going on behind her.

His eyes widened. “I was going to ask if you came alone, but I see that you didn’t!”

“No, I didn’t.” Gwen grinned. “I brought Hywel some friends from Aber. Do you think he’ll be pleased to see them?”

She turned to look with Evan at the group of twenty riders who’d arrived in the camp with her. Six feet tall to a man, the soldiers who conferred fifty feet away spoke in Danish, brandished long swords and axes, and were of a lineage that had struck fear into the hearts of Welshmen for five hundred years. None of the newcomers were bigger, taller, and more dangerous than the man at their center: Prince Godfrid of Dublin. An old friend.

Evan shook his head. “You are a wonder! And you know full well that not only will Prince Hywel be pleased, but we need every last ally we can find.” His expression turned serious again. “I won’t pretend that we haven’t been hard pressed the last few weeks. The English always have more men than we do, and when one of them falls, he is replaced by two more.”

But then he laughed to see Prince Hywel, who’d come out of his tent in order to see what the commotion was about, lifted into a bear hug by Godfrid. The two princes contrasted sharply in coloring and size. While Hywel had dark hair, Godfrid’s hair was so blond it was almost white. And though Hywel wasn’t exactly a small man, Godfrid was twice as wide and four inches taller. They both had blue eyes, though, which sparkled with amused intelligence—and at the moment, mutual pleasure and respect.

Turning away from the scene, Evan took Gwen’s elbow. “Let me bring you to Gareth. He’s just returned from scouting our northern perimeter. You’ll have to pardon the muck on him. We’ve had nothing but rain for the last week.”

“At least winter has held off,” Gwen said.

Evan made a maybe motion with his head. “Those who know more than I about it say we’re due for colder weather within a day or two. I’d like to see the ground harder myself, since it’s better for riding and for moving across the countryside with fighting men, but I’m not looking forward to snow or freezing rain.”

They squelched through the mud towards a cluster of tents on the north side of Hywel’s encampment. Located roughly twenty miles due west of Chester, in a sheltered valley to the west of the Clwyd mountains, the camp was close enough to England to be within striking distance of Mold Castle, but far enough away that any raid into Wales on the part of the Earl of Chester’s forces would be seen before his soldiers could get this far.

Even coming from the west, Godfrid’s company had been stopped by three separate pickets keeping watch, ready to blow a horn at a moment’s notice if the enemy had managed to breach the mountains and come at the camp from an unexpected direction.

The princes’ tents overlooked the main camp, which had grown up in a farmer’s field and held nearly five hundred spearman and archers. The presence of the army wasn’t affecting the farmer’s livelihood, however, since the field had been harvested at the end of the summer. Now in late November, grass grew in what had once been straight furrows, churned and rechurned by the hooves of horses and the feet of men.

Since it was winter, trees denuded of foliage descended down the mountain sides towards the camp. Only during the night would an enemy company be able to approach from that direction without the watchers being aware. From where Gwen stood, she could see anything that moved on the hills above her and the fields around. She let out a sigh and allowed a true sense of relief to comfort her. Gareth wouldn’t be safe until he returned home again, but now that she had seen where he was sleeping, maybe she could sleep better herself.

Near the outdoor kitchen, Gwen recognized the blacksmith’s apprentice from Aber’s village. She made Evan stop for a moment to give the boy the best wishes and greetings his mother had charged her with bringing to him before she left. Every woman at the castle and village had burdened Gwen with the same task. Looking around the camp, which was much larger than Gwen had anticipated, she saw that it was going to take her a bit longer than she’d thought to fulfill those requests. First, however, she had to complete her own mission.

Men of Prince Hywel’s teulu raised their hands to Evan as he passed, and several nodded to Gwen, recognizing her. Evan didn’t stop to greet them, however, continuing to hustle Gwen along.

It was cold—colder than it had been so far this year—and she was glad she hadn’t spent the last three months living outside as these men had. Several nearby soldiers sported bandages on their heads, and one man limped along in the opposite direction from the one Gwen and Evan were taking. He saluted them as they passed, and gave Gwen a wide grin, making her feel better about his injury. For all that the men were clearly tired and dirty, bursts of laughter came from around the campfires, and the overall mood she was sensing wasn’t of gloom or despair.

“You’ve never been in a war before, have you Gwen?”

“No.”

“It’s no place for a lady.”

“I wasn’t always a knight’s wife,” she said.

Evan glanced at her. “I forget that sometimes, but you’ve never been a camp follower either, and I would have you avert your eyes from some of what goes on here.”

Gwen scoffed. “I know what goes on—” She came to an abrupt halt, unable to speak, only to stare.

They’d arrived at the edge of the camp. A washing trough had been set up a few paces from the entrance to the nearest tent. Gareth, who hadn’t noticed Gwen’s approach, pulled off his shirt and tossed it towards a pile of clothes, heaped by one of the tent lines, awaiting laundering. Then he plunged his head into the trough. While still submerged, he scrubbed at his hair and neck with a cloth, and then he came up, shaking his head and spraying water everywhere.

It had been a month and a half since Gwen had seen him, which even then had been for only a single night. Hywel had tasked Gareth with bringing news of the war to Taran, the steward at Aber. It had been a kindness on Hywel’s part, knowing Gwen’s need to see her husband. As soon as she had a moment, Gwen meant to thank him for sending Gareth when he had.

Evan had been right to warn her about Gareth’s scruffiness. While six weeks ago he’d sported a full beard and his brown hair had been long, he’d kept them trimmed and neat, pulling his hair back and tying it at the base of his neck. Today, his hair was newly shorn—badly done too, with uneven ends, making it likely that one of Gareth’s companions had been tasked with it. And he sported a three-days’ growth of beard that was bound to scratch Gwen when he kissed her. Far worse, however, was the newly healed scar across his right breast.

Gwen drank in the sight of him. She didn’t care what he looked like. He was alive, and that was all that mattered. He still hadn’t seen her, and even with him standing in front of her, she wasn’t completely convinced that he was real.

Then she shook off her hesitation, picked up her skirts, and ran forward. Gareth became aware of her a heartbeat before she reached him and turned in time to catch her in his arms as she barreled into him. She clutched him tightly around the neck, and he embraced her fully, both of them heedless of the water dripping from his hair, down his back and neck, and onto her.

Gareth’s arms circled her waist, he lifted her off her feet, and she finally got to kiss him like she’d wanted to for so long (she was right that his beard was scratchy).

When they broke apart, he said, “Cariad. My love. What are you doing here?”

It was the same question Evan had asked, but this time she ignored it. “You were hurt!”

“I’m fine.” Gareth threaded a hand through the back of her hair as he held her. “You shouldn’t be here.”

Gwen squeezed her eyes shut, finding tears pricking at their corners. “I’ve missed you so much.” Her voice broke.

“I’ve missed you too.” Gareth didn’t let go, but he turned his head a little, trying to see into her face. “Are you going to answer my question?”

Gwen still didn’t have the voice to reply.

Gareth eased her back down to the ground. When her toes touched the earth, he kissed her once more and then gripped an upper arm in each hand so he could look fully into her face. “Is something wrong?”

It was only then that Gwen became aware of the fear in her husband’s eyes and hastened to dispel it. “No! No! Nothing like that. Tangwen is well. Everything is fine at home. I just needed to see you.”

Gwen had left their daughter, Tangwen, who was nearly two, back at Aber Castle, fifty miles to the west. Gwen hated being separated from her young daughter, but Tangwen couldn’t visit the front, even to see her father. Tangwen’s new nanny, Abi, whose own daughter had been born within a few months of Tangwen, was capable and caring. Tangwen had a surrogate sister to play with until Gwen came home, which she had promised to do just as soon as she could.

Relief swept across Gareth’s face, a match to what Gwen herself had felt when she’d finally seen the camp with her own eyes.

“If that is the sole reason you are here, you should not have come. It isn’t safe.”

That was exactly the reaction Gwen had been expecting. She brushed a stray lock of brown hair out of her eyes. No matter how she’d tried to preserve her attire for the ultimate meeting with Gareth today, she still looked a sight: dusty, the hem of her dress permanently stained with mud from the road, and her hair falling out of its pinnings—as it always did no matter how tightly she braided it or how carefully she wound it up at the back of her head. Hywel’s wife, Mari, had perfect hair that could remain unmussed even in a windstorm.

Gwen had known there was an even chance her husband would take one look at her and send her away immediately—and it would have had nothing to do with what she looked like. She’d entered a war zone, and he didn’t like it. Gwen didn’t want to upset him, and she would leave if he ordered her to, but at the very least, she was touching him for the first time in a month and a half.

“I was safe enough on the journey.” Gwen’s tears had subsided, though traces of them remained on her cheeks. “I brought a packet of letters and messages for King Owain that Taran received at Aber, and—” she had to gesture with one shoulder to the men behind her since Gareth still held both of her arms, “—I brought some friends.”

Gareth’s eyes had been for only Gwen. He hadn’t even acknowledged Evan, so Gwen was delighted to see his jaw drop when he finally looked past her to the activity that was ongoing nearer the camp’s entrance where she’d come in.

At that moment, Prince Godfrid spied Gareth too. His face split by a wide smile, he strode through the camp towards him. Gareth moved forward too, and since his arm was still around Gwen’s waist, she came with him. Thus, when Godfrid reached them, his choice was to take Gareth’s outstretched arm or to hug them both.

Unusually, Godfrid settled for decorum. “How is my favorite sleuth?”

“I am well,” Gareth said.

Gwen knew the word from previous visits with the Dane. Sleuth was from the Norse and meant ‘tracker of men’. Godfrid meant it entirely as a compliment.

Smiling too, Hywel had followed Godfrid. “You got off easy. I should see the healer because I think he cracked my ribs.”

“It is good to see you, my friend,” Godfrid said.

Gareth and Godfrid grinned at each other, their more subdued greeting no indication of how happy they were to see one another.

Then a wary look came into Gareth’s eyes. “I’m delighted as I always am when you have the opportunity to visit Gwynedd, but if you’re here, it can’t be for a reason that will please me.”

“I don’t know about that.” Godfrid laughed. “My men were getting rusty. Every now and then, they need a good fight to keep their wits sharp.”

Gareth snorted. “And—”

“And—” Godfrid’s friendly face became completely transformed by a sudden sadness. “My father is dying. I need to discuss with your king what will happen to Dublin when he does.”