The Renegade Merchant (3 page)

“By the time John interviews the people who
live near this street he should know,” Gwen said, “or at least have
come a ways towards finding out.”

“My lord, we may have something.” Oswin
lifted a hand to gain their attention. He was hardly older than
Gwalchmai, with beardless chin and blue eyes.

Gwen and Gareth moved towards him, and he
shifted to one side to show them what he and his companion had
found: a dozen broken slats from a now-worthless crate. A few of
the slats were still attached to one another, and several were
stained red with blood.

Oswin pointed to one in particular, which
had been splintered along its whole length and the sharp end of
which bore a strong resemblance to the point of a sword. “If one
man stabbed another with that, it would be no surprise that he bled
out.”

“The assailant could have injured himself in
the process,” said the second watchman, whose name Gwen didn’t
know. He was young too, not even into his twenties, with blond hair
and a scruff of beard on his chin and upper lip. “Good job gripping
it without finding your hand full of splinters.”

“Perhaps that means the wounded person
wasn’t actually the victim here,” Gwen said.

“What do you mean by that?” Oswin said.

“If one man was attacking another, the
person under assault could have defended himself with the slat,”
Gwen said. “It isn’t a weapon to bring to a fight.”

Gareth let out a low, quick laugh, since it
seemed Gwen had thought of something he hadn’t. “At the very least,
the confrontation would have been spur of the moment.”

A rattling sound came from above them, and
Gwen looked up to see a woman poke her head out of an upper floor
window. She held a basin in her hand and looked as if she was about
to dump it on their heads. Oswin saw her too, stood, and pointed a
finger at her. The woman didn’t need Oswin to speak to know what he
was telling her. She made a face and pulled back inside. Gwen told
herself that the basin had contained dirty water, but that was
probably a false hope.

Gwen had lived in castles most of her life,
but none had ever provided shelter to more than a hundred
residents. Two thousand people in one place was difficult to get
her head around. When they’d ridden to Chester last year, Gwen had
thought it was a busy town, but Shrewsbury was twice as large. Its
houses were packed in close to one another and surrounded by a
river and a wall, which prevented the town from expanding
outward—and made appropriate and convenient disposal of waste a
problem.

Prosperity—in Chester under Earl Ranulf or
in Shrewsbury under its town council—meant either packing more
people and buildings into the narrow spaces between current houses
and businesses or building upwards. Gwen could see the join in the
wall of the woman’s house where two stories had become three.

“My apologies, ma’am,” Oswin said to Gwen.
“This is a rough part of town.”

“It does seem that the neighborhood uses
this street for their refuse pile,” Gwen said. “That might explain
the presence of the crate.”

Oswin dropped one of the unbloodied slats
onto the pile he’d created. “It’s surprising that anyone would
discard a crate like this one. It’s of no use anymore for carrying
anything, but it would make good kindling.” He glanced upwards
again at the now-empty window. “It’s unlikely it lay here long,
because someone who lives around here would have scavenged it.”

“There must have been a great deal going on
in this alley this morning in a very narrow window of time,” Gwen
said.

Gareth nodded at the two watchmen. “Good
work. I’m sure John will want to see what you’ve found when he gets
back.”

Oswin nodded. “Yes, sir. Thank you,
sir.”

Leaving the men to continue their work,
Gareth took Gwen’s arm and walked her back towards the eastern
entrance to the alley, past the pool of blood, which was finally
sinking into the soil.

The audience had mostly dispersed, which
wasn’t surprising given how little there was to see. The only
onlookers remaining were a young woman, two boys, and an elderly
gentleman who appeared to have stopped to rest on his walk up the
hill rather than specifically to find out what was happening in the
alley. Luke and Alfred had abandoned all pretense of searching for
clues and were now chatting with the young woman.

As Gwen edged past Luke and out into the
main street, she heard him say, “—not even sure it’s human
blood.”

Gareth heard him too and grunted in disgust,
though not loud enough for Luke to hear. Maybe it would have been
good for Luke if he had. Gwen dearly wished they were back in Wales
where Gareth would have been assured of the respect and loyalty of
his underlings.

Once they were out of earshot, she said as
much to Gareth.

“They’re English. A Welshman has to be twice
as good as any Englishman at what he does if he’s going to win
their respect. If I’d sworn it was pig’s blood, Luke would have
insisted it was human.”

Gwen wrinkled her nose. “At the very least,
I wish they would stop undermining John’s authority.”

In the distance, church bells rang, the
sound blending with the call of an oxcart driver urging his charges
along the street below theirs. Gareth halted across from the
entrance to the alley, near the front door to a tavern. The tavern
had a green door and a whitewashed front, in keeping with its
neighbors on either side. Most of the homes and business in
Shrewsbury were well taken care of, at least on the street side.
The refuse was left in the alleys.

At this hour, nobody was going in or out of
the tavern, but Gareth made sure they weren’t directly underneath
an upper story window. He looked down at her and spoke in an
undertone, though there wasn’t anybody close enough to
overhear.

“Don’t worry about him. What John’s men
think of him is of no concern. The sheriff appointed him, and
whether or not John feels confident in his authority, I am
comfortable with John and his men handling the official
investigation, which I truly don’t want any part of. I can provide
support if he needs me. As it is, Hywel will have my head for
calling as much attention to myself as I already have.”

“You haven’t done anything!” Gwen said.
“This isn’t your fault at all. You could hardly let a pool of blood
go uninvestigated, and King Owain wouldn’t thank you for refusing
to help the Deputy Sheriff of Shrewsbury when he asks. King Owain’s
alliance with Earl Robert has been long established, but Shrewsbury
belongs to King Stephen, and his relationship with Gwynedd is new.
What we do here could go a long way towards engendering real good
will.”

Gareth made a
maybe
motion with his
head. “I can’t see how this rises to the importance of saving the
life of Prince Henry, as we did in Newcastle-under-Lyme, but you’re
not wrong—especially since Gwynedd has all but failed to keep up
its end of the bargain in regards to the Earl of
Chester.”

“With Rhun’s death—”

Gareth made a dismissive motion with one
hand. “You don’t have to defend Prince Hywel to me. The treaty with
Chester was the right thing to do at the time, just as renewing
hostilities against Mold Castle is the right thing to do now. King
Stephen might even thank us for attacking Mold, given that Ranulf
decided to march his men to Lincoln while the king is otherwise
occupied. Prince Hywel wouldn’t object to any of that.”

“Then what will he object to?”

“If Cadwaladr is in the
area, and I involve myself in this investigation to the point of
asking questions among the people of Shrewsbury, and Cadwaladr
hears of it, he’s going to think I’m here for him. It may have been
mere courtesy that prompted me to introduce myself to the sheriff
in the first place, and as the captain of Prince Hywel’s
teulu
, it would have been
rude of me not to make myself known to him upon my arrival, but
unfortunately, it also means that Hywel’s hope that no rumor of my
presence would reach Cadwaladr’s ears died the moment I had set
foot inside the town.”

Gwen sighed, nodding her understanding. King
Owain had specifically ordered that they not pursue Cadwaladr,
which is what it now looked like they were in Shrewsbury to do.

To say that King Owain had been capricious
in the last few months was a gross understatement. One of his most
puzzling decrees involved the pursuit—or lack thereof—of his
brother. Hywel and Cynan had successfully ejected Cadwaladr’s
retinue from Meirionnydd, but instead of sending Cadwaladr’s people
to England—to wherever it was that Cadwaladr had gone to
ground—King Owain had sent them to Aberffraw, which had been the
lesser of Cadwaladr’s two seats. Thus, through the administration
of Cadwaladr’s wife, Alice, for all intents and purposes, Cadwaladr
retained his lands in Anglesey.

Hywel couldn’t understand it. Nobody could
understand it. King Owain had been consumed by Rhun’s death to such
a degree that he had no thought for anything else, not even
revenge, retribution—or justice. In desperation, Hywel had resolved
to shore up his own position on the chance that his father lost his
mind completely and chose to reject him as his heir or asked
Cadwaladr to return to his side.

Consequently, Hywel had brought his next
three oldest brothers, Cynan, Madoc, and Cadell, into his inner
circle. He’d also sent word to his foster father, Cadifor, that he
was needed. Cadifor had come at Hywel’s call, bringing with him two
of his sons. A third, Ithel, was already at Aber, having been named
captain of the king’s guard. The position had been briefly held by
Cynan, Hywel’s next oldest brother, until Rhun’s death had given
him new obligations.

Gareth and Gwen liked these newcomers well
enough, and Gwen was glad that Hywel was forming a reliable cohort
of companions to protect him, but their presence did make Gareth
himself feel like he wasn’t needed and should be doing other
things.

Which, as it turned out, was exactly what
Hywel had intended. King Owain’s permission for Gwen’s father to
ride to Shrewsbury had then become an excuse to send Gareth (along
with Gwen and Meilyr) into England on a quest to ascertain Prince
Cadwaladr’s whereabouts without the king becoming suspicious.

“Worse, this could make Cadwaladr target you
again,” Gwen said. “He tried to murder you, remember. Just because
he misfired and killed Prince Rhun doesn’t change how much he still
hates you.”

Gareth looked down at his wife and spoke
softly. “I haven’t forgotten.”

“I know. I just—”

“You worry, and I don’t blame you for
that.”

Gwen took in a breath before speaking again.
“So, what do we do now?”

“We ask the questions we came to Shrewsbury
to ask, and if that takes us along a path similar to the one we
would have followed at John’s behest, so be it.”

Gwen looked at him curiously. “You mean
about Adeline? Surely questioning townspeople about her is going to
bring us close to Cadwaladr.”

“Ah, but King Owain gave us permission to
pursue that line of inquiry, didn’t he?”

“He gave my father permission.”

“Yes, and since I’m his son-in-law, that’s
as good as giving it to me.”

Gwen shook her head, but she was smiling.
“It’s happened. You’re splitting hairs. Hywel’s way of doing things
has finally rubbed off on you.”

“Hywel doesn’t split hairs; he doesn’t even
accept their existence.” But Gareth smiled too. “It’s only fair,
since it may be that some of my way of doing things has rubbed off
on him too.”

Gwen moved closer to her husband and put her
forehead briefly into his upper arm, as the only sign of affection
she could allow herself in so public a place. “You’ve been a rock
for him. We all know it.”

“As have you.”

Gwen pulled a long face not unlike the one
the woman from the upper floor of the building had made when she
discovered she couldn’t dump the contents of her basin into the
alley. “I can’t see how I’m going to be much use to you among the
people here. I don’t know what I was thinking. It wasn’t as if I
expected the inhabitants of Shrewsbury to speak Welsh, but what’s
clear is that my English just isn’t good enough to enable me talk
to them.”

“We’ve been staying at the abbey, which has
few Welsh monks,” Gareth said. “I think you’ll find that more
people than you might expect speak Welsh. Shrewsbury is only seven
miles from the border with Wales after all. And besides, with you
by my side, just by your very presence, people are more likely to
talk to me.”

“Why would that be?” Gwen said.

Gareth rolled his eyes, but he was smiling.
“Gwen, didn’t you notice the way the watchmen looked at you as you
came in?”

Gwen’s brow furrowed. “I suppose.” Quite
honestly, her eyes had been only for Gareth, and a scruffy, bearded
Englishman held no interest for her beyond her anger that they were
deriding Gareth.

“You forget that you look like Adeline, who
grew up here,” Gareth said. “As long as you are with me—or with
your father when he starts asking questions about her—we aren’t
going to have any difficulty getting people to talk to us.”

Gwen hadn’t forgotten that she looked like
Adeline. She and her father had decided it would be better if she
didn’t go with him to visit Tom Weaver because they hadn’t wanted
to scare him by having Adeline—or Gwen looking like
Adeline—suddenly appear on his doorstep. It was just that the pool
of blood had temporarily driven that knowledge from her mind. “What
about you? Has anyone accused you of being Cole?”

“While the story of Cole’s and Adeline’s
deaths has spread far and wide,” Gareth said, “he never did look
much like me. John attacked me when he saw me for the first time
only because Cole was at the forefront of his mind. With my hair
shorn and without a beard, I am a different person.”