Serpent (54 page)

Becker was growing very interested. “What do you mean?”

Paige was still looking at a photocopy of something. “I was in London doing most of my research at the British Library and a colleague of mine, who has connections with Northumberland Heritage, made a call to see if I could get a look at the de Wolfe family papers. There are a ton of them, you know, from the time of the conquest up until the Georgian era. Their seat was Castle Questing, which is now just a ruin. Sometime in the late sixteenth century they built a big manor house near Belford up on the Northumberland coast and abandoned the castle. Anyway, I was able to drive up to the manor and take a look at their papers.”

Becker pulled up a chair, as did Deshere
. The sat on opposite sides of her, straining to catch a glimpse at what she was looking at. Paige glanced up at the pair, seeing they were rather anxious.

“I know Dr. Paz is working on the skeleton of the creature,” she said quietly. “Do you want to bring her in here to hear this?”

Becker sent one of the grad students on the run and Paige didn’t say another word until several minutes later when Dr. Paz entered the tent. The woman was sweating profusely in the early June humidity, removing her gloves and ball cap as she approached.

“What’s all the excitement?” she wanted to know, wiping at her forehead as
her gaze fell on the young women with the stack of papers before her. “Hello, Paige. I thought Dr. Becker sent you to London.”

Becker thrust a chair at her. “Sit down,” he said. “Paige has discovered something about the site. She says you’re going to want to hear this.”

“Really?” Dr. Paz perked up. “What did you find?”

Paige looked up from the papers she had been reading. “Rhydilian Castle has connections to the House of de Wolfe, so I went to Northumberland to do some research and see if I could come up with some kind information about this sauropod and its history here by way of the de Wolfes. They had a daughter who married Bhrodi de Shera, a very big warlord during
the late thirteenth century. I focused on William de Wolfe because it was his daughter who married de Shera, and it turns out that de Wolfe, in later life, ended up dictating a lot of his history to a local priest. It’s all written in Latin, but there’s a section that talks about his daughter’s marriage to de Shera and how Edward betrayed the very treaty he had proposed. It says that one night, when Edward came to lay siege to Rhydilian, that The Serpent did smite its enemies and that Edward was turned back. According to William de Wolfe, Bhrodi de Shera was also known as The Serpent.”

Becker’s brow furrowed in confusion as he looked at Deshere. “Have you ever heard of that?” he asked. “You’re the Welsh folklore expert.”

Deshere sat back in his seat, pondering the question. After a moment, he cocked his head. “You know,” he said thoughtfully, “I did a research paper once on the families of Anglesey and there was a passage in one of the sources that described the de Shera family as having bred a beast. I didn’t take it literally because they were known for their fierce warlords, but now that I think on it, it’s quite possible that the source meant literally. If de Shera was known as The Serpent, the beast and The Serpent could have been one and the same, but there’s a problem with that.”

“
Why?” Becker wanted to know.

Deshere shook his head. “
Because the sources are very early, possibly eleventh century,” he said. “Well before Bhrodi de Shera was born.”

“Wait,” Paige said
, interrupting their conversation. “This gets better. I went back to the history of Edward the First during the time that Bhrodi de Shera married into the de Wolfe family somewhere around 1283 A.D. This was the same year that Dafydd ap Gruffydd was captured and executed as the last Welsh prince when, in fact, de Shera was really the last Welsh prince. He was a hereditary king, in fact, but Edward left the man completely alone, which I thought was really bizarre. I found all kinds of information about the battles Edward fought in northern Wales, including the battle of Moel-y-don, which was when Edward’s men built a pontoon bridge over the Menai Strait and tried to invade Anglesey but were defeated. The only battles described between January and June of that year are, in fact, with Dafydd, but in cross-referencing those battles with other known sources, I came across an account of a knight who fought with Edward during those months. The knight’s name was Keir St. Héver. It’s St. Héver who describes Edward making an attempt to seize Rhydilian but was driven back by what he describes as a great and terrible serpent.”

Becker digested the information, as did the others. “But you said de Shera was known as The Serpent,” Becker said. “He could have meant de Shera.”

Paige nodded. “Maybe,” she said. “It seems pretty coincidental, don’t you think? De Shera is known as The Serpent, yet you find this sauropod skeleton with bodies scattered all over the place. St. Héver stated that Edward lost nearly a thousand men. How many skeletons have you found?”

Becker was coming to understand that this entire situation was not so cut and dried. Now, it was starting to make some sense
and that great mystery they had been trying to solve was slowly beginning to pull together.

“More than eleven hundred,” he muttered, turning to look at the scene in the distance
. Mind working furiously, he stood up, rubbing at his chin. “So… maybe what we’re seeing here is an army and not a dumping ground for bodies. That would explain the weapons we’ve found.”

Paige was
startled by the information. “You have?”

Becker nodded. “
Tons of them,” he said. “The first big beautiful broadsword we found with the stones was only the beginning. Since then, we’ve found more swords, crossbows, spears… you name it. But those kinds of weapons don’t make the injuries we’ve seen. Moreover, there are teeth marks all over the bones and we know those came from the beast. But now it’s making some sense – this was Edward’s army and that… that
skeleton
Dr. Paz is excavating annihilated them.”

Paige nodded. “It makes a lot of sense,” she said. “Interesting we had to find this out from English knights not local Welsh
folklore, though. It’s like the Welsh didn’t want to acknowledge it.”

Deshere held up a finger. “That might not be necessarily true,” he said. “I seem to recall a nursery rhyme that most Welshmen know. It’s very old but now that I recall it, it seems to fit this situation perfectly.”

“How does it go?” Paige asked.

Bodie turned to look at her, his eyes glimmering
. He began to recite in a soft, alluring voice.

“…A knight, he traveled, lone and weary,

Upon a road so
high.

Upon this road, a wraith came leery,

And moved the knight to by.

‘Behold,’
said he, ‘I clearly see,

Your heart is not content.’

‘Be wise,’ it replied, ‘and know, forsooth,

That all is not as it seems.

Your road is long, and your path is wrong,

For you have entered the realm of the Serpent.’”

For a moment, no one spoke. Even Becker turned to look at him. “And you’re just remembering that now?”

Deshere shrugged. “It’s a common enough nursery rhyme,” he said. “But I never made the connection until she said that de Shera was known as The Serpent. An ironic coincidence, I’d say.”

Becker returned gaze to the archaeological dig in the near distance
. After a moment, he sighed heavily.

“Well,” he said, “I suppose what’s left now is to start seeing if we can link the weapons we found to something Edward the First’s army would carry. We’ll need to call in some Medieval Military experts for that.”

Deshere shook his head. “No need,” he said. “I’ve got you covered on that. Medieval Warfare is one of my specialties.”

Becker glanced at him. “Even for an English king?”

Deshere snorted. “
Especially
an English king,” he said, looking rather peeved. “Those guys were always lusting after my country. Who was it that said ‘know your enemy’?”

“Some Englishman,” Paige muttered.

Everyone laughed as Becker and Paz trickled out into the site to begin re-examining the find, now with Paige’s research attached. Deshere started to go but something made him hang back; he ended up back over by Paige’s table as she neatly put her documents in order. He couldn’t seem to move away from her, really; from the moment he saw her, there was something very magnetic about her. Familiar, even, as if he’d seen those wide hazel eyes before.
Maybe in my dreams
, he thought. In any case, he didn’t want to walk away from her. He just couldn’t seem to do it.

“Excellent job on your research,” he said.

Paige looked up from her papers. “Thanks,” she said, eyeing him as she put the sheets away. “So… how long have you been here with Becker?”

“Long enough.”

She grinned. “Have you been up to the castle yet?” she asked. “I was thinking about heading up there. I’ve been reading so much about it lately that I feel as if I know it.”

Deshere nodded. “I’ve been up there,” he said, but he couldn’t let the opportunity
to learn more about her slip away. “I’d be happy to go up there with you. Maybe there are more clues up there about whatever this thing is. I’m all for a good mystery.”

So was Paige. Once they arrived at the castle, she couldn’t seem to explain why she felt so at home there, as if she knew it, or had at least visited there once even though she hadn’t. As she wandered around in the ruined bailey struggling with a strong sense of déjà vu, she noticed that Bodie had climbed the steps to the keep and stood lingering in the keep entry.

She’d seen that before. As Paige stared at Bodie as the man ran his hands along the long-ruined doorway, she knew that she’d see him there before. Her heart began to pound. She didn’t know how or why, but she knew she had envisioned that scene before. Something was telling her to run to him, to dash up the stairs and to make it to his side, although she had no idea what odd and impulsive sense was telling her that.

Still, she obeyed, and as she ran up the steps to the keep, it seemed like the most natural thing in the world to do. Instinctively, she knew he would be waiting for her there, and when he turned around and saw her, his arms opened up. Without explanation, without provocation. His arms opened up
wide and Paige threw herself into them.

Six years and four kids later, she couldn’t have
explained that moment if she’d tried. And neither could he.

⌘

AUTHOR’S NOTE

I hope you enjoyed Bhrodi and Penelope’s story!

As you have discovered, this is a very involved and complex book. Lots going on! First and foremost, what about that beast? Was it really a dinosaur? My theory is this – every legend has a basis: dragons, creatures, ever fairies or elves. Somewhere, somehow, there is a basis o
f fact for all things. As for the creature, dinosaurs and other creatures have survived into our modern times – crocodiles, for instance, and ants. Yes, ants! They’ve been on the planet for fifty million years. And over the past two thousand years, many species have become extinct, so who’s to say that some kind of sauropod didn’t survive into Medieval times as the last of its kind only to die out and become extinct? That is certainly a question to ponder.

And let’s think about this, shall we? Seriously… if you’re Edward the First and you get your ass kicked by a serpent, are you really going to tell anyone? Of course not! Edward wasn’t about to tell anyone he got creamed by
The Serpent. He was right – nobody would have believed him, anyway.

This book was such a joy to write. William and Jordan are back! And the camaraderie between William and Paris and Kieran is, I think, some of the best in any of my books.
They would do anything for each other and their family, their loves, was so very important to them all. I tried not to make this a “William” book and overshadow Bhrodi, but William does figure very heavily in the novel and I’m not sorry about it one bit. Bhrodi and Penelope were definitely left to shine but William had some opportunity to shine once more as well. Love that guy.

And what about poor Kevin? Is he going to get his own story? You just never know. I would say odds are that Kevin, too, will eventually have his happy ending because that guy really grew on me. Now I have to give him a good adventure!

Much in this book is historically accurate, by the way – Edward’s battles in Wales, the siege of Castell y Bere, the siege of Dolbadarn Castle, and the eventual capture of Dafydd ap Gruffydd. The time frame and the locations are accurate, except I added my own characters to the mix. And did you notice Keir St. Héver making an appearance? Now The Wolfe is linked to the Dragonblade series. This was pre-Chloe for Keir by about two years.

So, stay tuned for MORE of the Wolfe Pack.
Perhaps Kevin’s book will make it on to my 2015 release list. Visit my website at
www.kathrynleveque.com
for any and all updates on new releases.