Rhuddlan (61 page)

Longsword ordered the house burned. The
Welshmen’s bodies were dragged out of the way and the door broken
down. The three children and two women emerged screaming and
pleading. A pair of Longsword’s men pushed them out of the way and
entered the house. They smashed up the sparse interior with the joy
of unruly adolescents and came out with hastily fashioned, flaming
torches which they tossed up into the thatch roof.

Delamere sat on his horse and watched the
proceedings with a cool eye. Longsword glanced uneasily at him once
or twice, wondering why he didn’t join in the destruction and get
some of his frustration out of his system, but was too put off by
his friend’s detached demeanor to ask. He heard the women screech
as they fell on the bodies of their husbands and saw Delamere grit
his teeth in annoyance. The children, all young boys, hovered
nearby, frightened and confused. One of them bent down and picked
up a rock. With freak accuracy and surprising strength, he heaved
it at the pair of Normans and it struck Delamere square on the
shoulder. Delamere cursed and grabbed his reins and Longsword
thought that this was it, but then the other man checked himself;
he stared at the children for a long moment and then turned his
mount’s head in the opposite direction and trotted off.

The return to Rhuddlan was loud and
triumphant. Longsword imagined that Rhirid could hear it wherever
he was hiding. There was cause for celebration apart from the
successful raid because the Normans believed that the old Longsword
was back and they were delighted that after nearly a fortnight of
inactivity, they were to finally be allowed to avenge Rhirid’s
assaults.

Richard Delamere disappeared within the
fortress and did not surface at the wild and drunken revel which
that night passed for supper. It didn’t occur to Longsword until
much later that perhaps his friend had gone back out, dissatisfied
with the attack on an inconsequential holding and determined to
flush out the Welsh chief. Suddenly anxious, he searched the
barracks, the stables, the narrow corridors running among the
outbuildings behind the keep in the hope that perhaps Delamere was
finding solace in the arms of one of the Welsh servants; even the
latrines, but with no luck. The guards at the front gate reported
no one had gone out or come in since the marauders had returned and
the one at the postern, newly placed since the debacle with the
Welsh, also hadn’t let anyone out, although Longsword wondered how
true that statement was; the man had clearly been dozing when
confronted.

But at last he found Delamere in the chapel,
sitting alone with a skin of wine. The small light of the perpetual
flame was the only illumination in the room and it took Longsword’s
eyes a while to adjust to the obscurity and a little longer to make
out his friend’s figure, sprawled on the ground between two rear
benches.

He walked slowly to the back of the chapel
until he was standing over him. “Are you all right?” was all he
could think of to say.

Delamere didn’t look up. He grunted.

“I’ve been looking for you. I didn’t think
this was the sort of place you’d visit voluntarily but I’d searched
everywhere else.”

Delamere sighed. He squinted at Longsword. “I
came here because I thought it would be the one quiet place in this
castle. I wanted to be alone.”

“Oh…Should I leave?”

Delamere sighed again and pushed himself into
a more upright position. “No.” He held up the wineskin.
“Drink?”

“Thanks.” Longsword took a swallow and passed
it back. He sat down on the nearest bench and cleared his throat,
but remained otherwise silent.

“If you want conversation, I’ll have to
disappoint you,” Delamere said. “I’m not very good company
tonight.”

“Well…” Longsword laughed awkwardly. “I feel
I owe it to you. I wasn’t good company myself the past few
weeks…”

He could see his friend smile faintly. “After
all these years, Will, I’m used to your moods…”

Longsword felt a vicious stab of emotion in
his stomach. Delamere knew him better than anyone, had stood by his
side and at his back since they’d been boys, had always counselled
him wisely or prodded him mercilessly when he’d needed advice or a
push, had hitched his future to his not because Longsword was the
son of the king and certain to reap the wealth and prestige of such
a position, but because he genuinely liked him—“I’ll get her back
for you, Richard; I swear it…” he asserted suddenly and
vehemently.

Delamere smiled again. “Thanks, Will.” He
paused and added quietly, “The thing is, I’ve been wondering if she
wants to come back.”

“What do you mean? Of course she does—she’s
been kidnapped!”

“I was told that Rhirid’s men came only for
her. That she screamed and fought because she wouldn’t leave the
children and that when the men agreed the boys could go along, she
calmed down and went without further fuss.”

“But how can you imagine—”

“There are things you don’t know, Will!”
Delamere interrupted forcefully. “Olwen and I haven’t been getting
on lately. Since Henry was born. To put it plainly, she resents my
time with you. She wants me at the manor most of the time and at
Rhuddlan a short time, not the other way around as it is now.”

“Oh…” Longsword asked
tentatively, “What do
you
want?”

The growing silence wasn’t a good sign, he
thought, heart sinking. But then Delamere said, “I want both. I
want to be here and I want to be there. I want to be with her the
way she was when she was happy. I know she isn’t happy now. She
doesn’t complain or nag but I know it, from her silence. She
resents Rhuddlan and you and she’s annoyed with me…” He shook his
head slowly. “And I just don’t know what to do about it.”

Longsword didn’t answer. Delamere raised the
skin to his lips and drank. He passed it up to the other man and
stared down to the darkened end of the bench. “When we were
standing at the bottom of that hill, watching that house burn and
the women scream and the animals being slaughtered and the garden
trampled, all I could think was how horrified Olwen would be to
know I had done something like that to innocent people. She would
hate me for it.”

Longsword wiped the back of
his hand across his mouth. “It’s war, Richard,” he said
matter-of-factly. “It had to be done to flush out Rhirid.
Besides,
you
didn’t
do anything—you just sat on your horse and watched.”

“That means nothing and you know it, Will!”
Delamere said sharply. He lowered his voice. “Don’t you understand
what I’m saying? It was us and them. Not getting along peacefully
but one side murdering and burning and the other throwing rocks.
And Olwen would see herself as them. She’s Welsh, Will.” He drew a
deep breath and let it out unsteadily. “To tell you the truth, I
think being unhappy with us—with me—she would jump at the
opportunity to be with them—which is what she did when Rhirid came
calling.”

Although he had the utmost faith in his
friend’s power of logic, particularly in the instances where it
involved women, Longsword thought Delamere sounded so bereft and
hopeless that he felt bound to boost his confidence. “She’ll be
back,” he said firmly. They were the same words he’d repeated to
himself over and over those first few days after Gwalaes’
departure.

Delamere looked at him, unconvinced. “Do you
know what frightens me the most, Will? The thought of finally
finding her—and hearing her say she’d rather stay where she was
than come back to live with me.”

Chapter 40

May, 1177

Hawarden Castle, Gwynedd

Roger of Haworth stared after Ralph de Vire
with narrowed eyes. He didn’t like this latest addition to the
earl’s entourage, who had shown up on the doorstep a fortnight ago
with a dramatic tale of being unceremoniously cast out of the
Bastard’s service. At first Haworth had been as eager as Hugh to
welcome the young man because the story he brought with him was
proof that the plot Hugh and the Welsh chief Rhirid ap Maelgwn had
concocted had actually succeeded but the allure quickly wore off
when Haworth began to wonder at the length of time de Vire spent
with the earl. In his opinion, it was excessive.

Haworth, unimaginative at the best of times,
started to complain about de Vire to Hugh and then tried to
insinuate that the Bastard had devised a counter-plot which
involved sending de Vire to the earl with a bogus story about Lady
Teleri’s abduction. Hugh’s initial response had been amusement but
as the days passed and Haworth’s complaints and allegations grew
more strident, he became testy and finally snapped at his captain
to get off that tired subject. Haworth was offended and withdrew
into a surly silence but if his intention had been to shame Hugh
into an apology, it did not succeed. Instead, Haworth’s absences
seemed to give the earl an excuse to be with Ralph de Vire.

Haworth had been slow to see betrayal in the
Robert Bolsover affair and since then he’d kept his eyes wide open.
If Hugh so much as looked twice at a brawny laborer on the castle
walls or a handsome man-at-arms, Haworth immediately found a way to
put the former to work clearing a road in the forest and to send
the latter to another one of the earl’s properties. He wondered
once if he was overreacting because Hugh never appeared to notice
the sudden absences of the men he’d admired, but reassured himself
with the thought that it was better to be safe than to be sorry. He
had lost Hugh once before and the result had been disastrous to the
earl’s health. He had sworn not to lose him a second time.

It seemed that this personal oath was about
to be tested. Aside from his pale, blonde looks to which the earl
was annoyingly vulnerable, de Vire had one edge over Haworth in the
battle for Hugh’s affections and that was in the matter of the
Bastard. In de Vire, Hugh discovered a person with as large a
grudge against the Bastard as himself. He told Haworth that de Vire
was providing him with details of Longsword’s management of
Rhuddlan; his security precautions and the like. When Haworth
questioned the need for this information—“It’s not likely that
we’re planning to storm the gates of the castle, is it?” he asked
with an unaccustomed touch of sarcasm—Hugh retorted angrily that
such an attitude was undesirable in the person who was responsible
for his army.

Haworth believed that his master had never
quite forgiven him for trying to dissuade him from a plan of
vengeance against the Bastard upon their return from Rhuddlan.
Indeed, despite the apparent success of the plan, Haworth was still
far more interested in expanding Hugh’s influence in southern
Gwynedd than in hounding the king’s son into war. Yet Hugh was like
a dog worrying a bone: he could not stop thinking about the
Bastard. And now they were waiting for the Welshman to send them
the whore of Richard Delamere because Hugh had the strange idea
that he would be justified before the king in this abduction. If
the Bastard chose to retaliate on his friend’s behalf (as Hugh
hoped), then Hugh would be well within his rights in defending
himself. And this time, unlike Dol, Hugh intended to win.

“There you are!”

An arm landed around Haworth’s neck. He
turned his head away from de Vire’s retreating figure and smiled at
Hugh. “My lord.”

“Beautiful day, isn’t it, Roger?” The earl
sounded happy and relaxed.

Haworth glanced up, surprised. He rarely
noticed the weather. But it was true: the midmorning sun was high
and bright in a clear sky and the air was pleasantly warm. Then he
looked down into the bailey and immediately spotted Ralph de Vire’s
shining head among the crowd of people there, and his pleasure at
seeing Hugh and feeling the weight of his arm on his shoulder
vanished.

“Good weather means only one thing, my lord,”
he said stiffly. “Good traveling—and we’re not going anywhere.”

Hugh’s arm slipped away. “Good hunting, I
suppose you mean,” he said in a displeased voice. “Do you never
think of anything other than Gruffudd?”

“I’m interested only in your good fortune, my
lord.”

“Well, you’ll be sympathetic to my appeal,
then. I’m asking you not to come to my chambers tonight, Roger. I’m
having Eleanor brought down. And perhaps in nine months, I’ll reap
some of that good fortune.”

“All night, my lord? Surely it won’t
take—”

“I can’t say how long it will take, Roger!”
Hugh snapped. “That’s why it’s better if you make other
arrangements tonight.”

Haworth struggled to maintain his composure.
Since their return from Rhuddlan, he’d spent every night with
Hugh—he’d even had the oak chest which contained all his worldly
goods moved into Hugh’s bedchamber—and now he felt slighted. But he
knew the earl needed a male heir and he supposed Hugh might as well
get it over with as soon as was possible. “Of course, my lord,” he
answered finally, with a small bow.

Hugh grinned and slapped his
back. He seemed to have forgotten Haworth’s unfortunate reference
to Gruffudd and querulous question and was once again in a highly
genial mood. “I knew you’d understand, Roger! It’s just something
that’s got to be done, isn’t it?” He gave Haworth an
uncharacteristic wink. “Be thankful it’s not
you
who’s got to do it!”

He walked away, leaving Haworth to stare
after him in puzzlement. For someone contemplating such an
undesirable task, the earl was certainly in high spirits. Haworth
was almost jealous of Eleanor. Not for a moment did he imagine that
he inspired a similar mood in his lover, although it was his most
fervent wish. Hugh was unfailingly considerate but Haworth knew the
blaze of emotion which had marked their early relationship was now
nearly extinguished, despite his strenuous efforts to breathe life
into it. He blamed Robert Bolsover; Hugh may have expressed an
interest in other men every now and again but nothing had ever come
of it and they were all forgotten within days but his affair with
Robert Bolsover seemed to have given him a restless spirit. Haworth
didn’t think he was merely being overly suspicious; he felt
strongly that Hugh was bored with him and yearned for someone else.
Perversely, the idea made him cling all the more to the earl but it
was a desperate clutch and he quite often heard the impatience in
Hugh’s voice or saw the disdain in his eyes.