Chapter One

Late August 1146

Gwen

Gwen peered into the courtyard of the monastery before venturing across the hot cobbles into the mid-afternoon sun, which shone out of a rare deep blue sky. Heat radiated off the stones, and Gwen moved towards the garden, seeking the breeze coming off the brook. She’d swept up her brown hair into a chignon, but sweat clung to the tendrils at the back of her neck.

The guesthouse lay to one side of the large square, which was fronted on the road by a gatehouse and a long stone wall. The monks’ quarters, church, and college of priests were opposite, as far from the guesthouse as possible while still remaining in the same compound. Given her hour-long struggle to get her daughter to go to sleep, Gwen had to admit the genius of that decision.

In point of fact, that distance was not because the monks feared to hear a crying child but was left over from when Norman monks, who viewed women and children with a certain degree of hostility, had occupied the monastery. Now that Hywel ruled Ceredigion, the monastery had been restored to the native Welsh Church. Still, the presence of young women and children in the guest quarters made some of the older monks uncomfortable, and Gwen had been trying as best she could to keep Tangwen quiet and out of the way. She’d failed utterly at both today.

For the moment, however, Tangwen was asleep, and Gwen’s fourteen-year-old maid, extravagantly named Elspeth, remained with her. Gwen hoped her daughter would sleep for at least two hours. To say Tangwen was overtired after all the activity of the last few days was an understatement.

Unfortunately for the monks’ peace of mind, Gwen’s adorable baby girl was the least of the monks’ problems this week. Travelers filled the guesthouse, with more coming every hour. At Prince Hywel’s request, the abbot had agreed to suffer through the presence of whatever women came to stay with them, regardless of their seductive beauty.

And it wasn’t just the guest quarters at the monastery that were filling up. Aberystwyth castle, the villages of Aberystwyth and Llanbadarn Fawr, and the entire surrounding area were full to bursting with travelers who had arrived at Prince Hywel’s invitation. He’d put out a call to every corner of Wales for bards to travel to Ceredigion for a music festival with him as the host. Even King Owain—along with Gwen’s father, Meilyr, and brother, Gwalchmai—were journeying from Aber for the celebration.

Gwen (and Prince Hywel too) had hoped they would have arrived already, since the festival had opened that morning. Given the distances involved and the number of people traveling, however, it was hard to judge how long any journey would take. Regardless of when they arrived, they would stay for a week afterwards, which was some consolation. Gwen had missed her father and brother in the two months she’d lived in Ceredigion.

As Gwen stood in the shadows of the guesthouse, a party of riders entered through the monastery gate and halted on the cobbles. Gwen stood on tiptoe to look past them, hoping Gareth might be among the stragglers. He wasn’t, and Gwen sighed in disappointment. Then a frazzled stable boy ran to hold the bridle of the lead horse, and the hosteler, a fat, balding monk in charge of the wellbeing of guests, waddled out of the chapter house to greet them.

Although Gareth had not come, Gwen smiled when she recognized Prior Rhys riding in at the tail end of the group. His soldierly bearing was unmistakable even underneath his bulky monk’s robe. He wasn’t in Aberystwyth for the festival but had come because his abbot had sent him to St. Padarn’s to consult with the members of the college of priests on a spiritual matter. Gwen hadn’t seen him since the evening meal the night before and, at the sight of him, she lifted her hand and finally stepped into the hot sun so she could greet him.

But instead of allowing her to come to him, Prior Rhys dismounted and ran to her, hitching up his robe to reveal the breeches and boots he wore underneath. Just looking at the weight of his clothing made Gwen feel hotter. In addition, his behavior was unusual enough to turn her expression from a smile of greeting to a frown of concern.

“Where might I find your husband?” Rhys said when he reached her. He was of the same generation as Gwen’s father, but unlike Meilyr, Rhys’s age was revealed not in a burgeoning paunch but in the lines on his face, evidence of many years spent outdoors in the wind and sun. At the moment, his bushy eyebrows had drawn together, making the lines on his forehead more pronounced than ever.

“He was at the castle last I heard.” Gwen sidled back to the guesthouse wall so she could stand in the shade. She also wanted to put a few more feet between Rhys and the new arrivals, who were shooting curious glances at the prior. She didn’t want him to be the subject of anyone’s entertainment, and, had they known him at all, they would have realized that something was very much wrong for him to behave with anything less than absolute dignity.

“I already checked. Both he and the prince were absent. I had hoped to find them here.”

Gwen shook her head. “I haven’t seen Gareth since this morning. What’s wrong?”

“Do you have someone to keep an eye on Tangwen?” Rhys said.

“Elspeth is sitting with—”

“Good. You must come with me.” Rhys took Gwen’s elbow and urged her across the cobbles to his horse without waiting for her to finish her sentence. He paid no attention at all to the guests, who were now openly staring as they passed. Hoisting himself into his saddle, he held out his elbow for Gwen so she could mount behind him.

She didn’t question him, merely took his proffered arm.

The hosteler, however, gazed up at both of them, open-mouthed. “Whatever is the matter? Where are you taking Lady Gwen? What should I tell the abbot?”

Rhys made an exasperated sound at the back of his throat. Glancing at the guests, none of whom were making any pretense of minding any doings but his, he leaned down to speak to the hosteler, lowering his voice so nobody else could hear. “The body of a man has been found in the millpond.”

“He’s dead?”

Generally, ‘body’ implied ‘dead’, and Rhys didn’t deign to answer in words but simply nodded.

The hosteler stepped back, shocked and sputtering. “But—but—”

“Just tell him,” Prior Rhys said.

Then, as Gwen clutched Rhys around the waist, the prior turned the horse toward the exit. Once underneath the gatehouse, however, Gwen said, “May I please have a moment?”

Rhys stopped to allow Gwen to lean down to the gatekeeper, who had come out of his small room next to the gate in response to all the commotion. He was an aged man with white hair and hunched shoulders. “Sion, would you tell my husband or Prince Hywel if he arrives that I have left with Prior Rhys on an urgent matter?”

“Where am I to say you’ve gone?” Sion said.

Gwen glanced at Rhys, who spoke for her. “The millpond.”

The millpond had been carved out of the north bank of the Rheidol River, southeast of the monastery. Everyone in the region brought their grain there to grind, though it was most often used by the castle and the monastery, since they had the most land planted in grain.

“Of course, Prior Rhys,” Sion said. Gwen didn’t know that the gatekeeper could actually see the prior at that distance, but Rhys had a distinctive gravelly voice that Sion would have recognized. “Go with God’s blessing.”

“Thank you,” Rhys said and then continued under his breath as he spurred his horse out onto the road, “We’re going to need it.”

Once on the road, he skirted another group of travelers, some walking, one driving a cart, and two on horseback. This party was bypassing the monastery in favor of continuing south to the castle and the festival grounds.

Instead of following them, at the crossroads Gwen and Prior Rhys headed east towards the mountains. A half-mile farther on, they turned into a clearing in front of the mill, a stone building built on the edge of its pond. Several empty carts were parked by the entrance, and the giant water wheel spun as the water flowed past. A small group of people had gathered near the edge of the millpond.

At Rhys’s and Gwen’s appearance, the man in the center, who’d been crouching low over something on the ground, looked over his shoulder. It was Prince Rhun, Hywel’s brother and the eldest prince of Gwynedd. His bright blond hair was lit by the afternoon sunlight that filtered through the green leaves overhanging the pond. Even with a dead body at his feet, Rhun’s blue eyes remained bright. Gwen had seen this prince somber, but not often. Prince Rhun had been in Aberystwyth longer than Gwen, escaping (he said) his stepmother’s matchmaking.

Prince Rhun had confessed to Gwen upon her arrival that circumstances had reached such a dire point in Gwynedd that his father had decided to become involved. He’d warned Rhun before he left that if he didn’t find a wife for himself by the Christmas feast, King Owain was going to allow Cristina to choose one for him.

Recognizing Gwen, Rhun stood. “Thank the Lord the prior found you.”

Two monks, instantly recognizable in their undyed cloaks, and two men, wearing the breeches and sweat-stained shirts of laborers, surrounded the body. The monks had kilted their robes and were soaked to the waist, implying that they’d waded in to retrieve it. Although some monasteries employed day laborers or lay brothers—peasant members of the order who were restricted to agricultural work—this monastery required everyone to work and made no distinctions among types of labor.

Rhys and Gwen dismounted, and Gwen studied the dead man from a few feet away before approaching Prince Rhun and the others. The body lay in the dirt and grass beside the pond out of which it had been dragged, far enough away from the water that it didn’t lap at its feet. At other murder scenes, how and when the body was moved could make a difference between solving a murder and allowing the murderer to walk free. Today it didn’t, since this wasn’t the spot where he’d died. Nobody had yet said the word murder, but Prior Rhys had to suspect that the man’s death wasn’t an accident, or else he wouldn’t have come to fetch her.

Gwen hadn’t been involved in an unexplained death since before Tangwen’s birth. Men had died in Gwynedd since then, but none mysteriously as far as she knew. And she would have known: while Prince Hywel was absent and living in Ceredigion, she’d served as a liaison between Hywel’s spies and King Owain. Gareth had sworn more than once that he would protect her from these investigations. But since he wasn’t here, Gwen was fully capable of stepping into his place, even if she couldn’t be pleased that a dead man had been found in the millpond.

“What happened?” she said.

One of the men, larger than most, with thick muscled arms characteristic of heavy labor, scoffed. “He drowned.”

Prince Rhun pinned the man with a gaze that would have shot right through him had it been an arrow. “Start at the beginning. Tell Lady Gwen what you know.”

Gwen wasn’t surprised at the man’s dismissal of her question. Until they learned more of her, most men treated her that way. Rhun, however, was a prince, and the man’s face flushed red to be chastised by him. He didn’t defend himself but merely ducked his head in apology. “Yes, my lord.”

“What is your name?” Gwen said.

“My name is Bran. I work the mill. I’m the journeyman, though I know more about milling than the miller.” He made a motion as if to spit on the ground but stopped himself at the last moment.

“So you’ve been here all day?” Gwen said.

“Since early morning,” Bran said. “I had a short break at noon, but I’ve been grinding since just after dawn.”

“That means you’ve been inside all day?” Gwen said.

Bran nodded. “It is necessary to pay attention all the time in case something goes wrong. I didn’t notice anything amiss out here until young Teilo came running in to tell me about a body in the water. I don’t know how long it’d been there. I didn’t notice anything this morning or after my noon meal, but I didn’t look hard either.”

“Thank you.” Gwen looked at Teilo, the other laborer not dressed as a monk. His brown hair was cropped close to his head, and like everyone else, sweat beaded in his hairline. He wore a filthy shirt that might have once been the color of cream, brown breeches cut off at the knees, and bare feet. In regards to the heat, he had to be the most comfortable of all of them. “What did you see?”

Teilo looked as if answering the question physically hurt his throat, but he cleared it and said in a low whisper, “I was coming by like I always do—”

“From where?” Prior Rhys said.

Teilo swallowed, and his eye skated from Gwen to Prior Rhys and back again. As with Prince Rhun, Prior Rhys’s authority was unmistakable. “From swimming in the river with my friends. We’ve all worked in the fields since dawn.” He said these last words somewhat defensively.

Gwen didn’t care if he was avoiding work and didn’t blame him for wanting to cool off in the river. “On our way here we passed a water hole full of caterwauling local boys. You’d been among them?”

Teilo nodded.

“My boys would have loved it.” Gwen gave a rueful smile at the thought. Gareth had formally adopted their two wayward charges, Llelo and Dai. The adoption meant that they were now sons of a knight and no longer destined to be herders like their grandfather or a trader like their father. Consequently, their training to be soldiers had begun.

Since neither Gareth nor Gwen had kin of their own to provide guidance for the boys, Prince Hywel had arranged for them to fall under the care of Cynan, his twenty-three-year-old half-brother. Cynan had been fostered by King Owain’s sister, who was married to the King of Powys. Recently, King Owain had made Cynan custodian of Denbigh Castle, north of Rhuddlan. From there, he and his two younger brothers, Cadell and Madoc, protected eastern Gwynedd for their father. Dai and Llelo had been welcomed into the garrison, and Gareth was confident they would learn to be knights there.

It had been two months since she’d seen them, and Gwen missed her sons. She planned to visit Denbigh upon her return to Gwynedd in the autumn.

She motioned her hand to encourage Teilo to continue his story. “You were walking by and …?”

“And I saw him, bobbing about in the reeds,” Teilo said.

“Face down or face up?” Gwen said.

Teilo’s face went blank for a moment, but then he said, “Face down.”

She needed to ask these kinds of questions, even if they appalled the men, so she tried to ignore their shock. She looked at the two monks. “You two retrieved him?”

They nodded.

“Can you show me exactly where he was floating?” she said.

Prince Rhun answered for them. “He was under the trees, over there in an eddy.”

One of the monks then pointed east, to the opposite side of the pond from the mill. The Rheidol River flowed from east to west, emptying ultimately into the sea. Upstream, a portion of the river had been diverted into a man-dug channel to form a pond here, in order to provide a steady supply of water to the water wheel that ran the mill.

Gwen turned back to Prior Rhys. “While I examine the body, would you mind following the others around the edge of the pond to see if you can discover the place where the dead man went in? It would be good to know the exact spot.” Gwen remembered from an earlier investigation how uncomfortable the prior had been to witness her examination of a corpse. She would avoid discomfiting him this time if she could.

A smile hovered around Prior Rhys’s lips—perhaps in acknowledgement of what she was trying to spare him—but he nodded and gestured to the two monks that they should lead the way. The journeyman begged off, saying he had to get back inside the mill. Gwen watched him go, telling herself not to distrust the man just because he was resentful of his position.

Teilo went with the monks, but before Prior Rhys himself moved away, Gwen caught the edge of his sleeve. “I don’t want to tell you what you already know, but Gareth would want me to say this: try to make sure they don’t trample whatever evidence has been left.”

A smile twitched at the corner of Rhys’s mouth.

“Sorry.” Gwen looked down, chastising herself for even mentioning it. Prior Rhys had been a soldier and spy before she’d been born. She had no business telling him what to do.

“I value your counsel, Gwen,” he said. “I will do my best.”

“Thank you.”

Prior Rhys turned away to follow the other men around the millpond, and Gwen eyed Prince Rhun, who was hovering over her. “Are you ready for this?”

“I’ve seen dead bodies before, Gwen.” He looked at her carefully. “You must know that I have killed men.”

“Yes, but—” Gwen broke off as she thought of how best to say what she meant. Rhun had killed men in war. Gareth had too, of course. But murdering a man—and the sight of a murdered man—was different in both thought and deed, and a man who could kill another man in the heat of battle might find himself squeamish at the sight of the same man dead beside a millpond on an August afternoon. “I know you’ve seen murdered men before, but it’s a beautiful day and maybe you have other tasks that need your attention.”

“One—” Prince Rhun held up his right forefinger, “I’m not leaving you alone here with a dead body and men you don’t know, and two—” up went the second finger, “I’m interested. I have witnessed the beginning of investigations before—Newcastle comes to mind—but I had other duties there that prevented me from seeing the whole of it.”

Gwen took in a breath and let it out, accepting that Rhun meant to stay and deciding not to worry about it. “If you mean it, we might as well get started.”

“What do we do first?” Prince Rhun said.

“First of all, we should acknowledge that this man didn’t drown.”