“How long will you stay this time?” No echo of the anger of a moment ago remained in his voice.
I could feel the shame that weighed Devyn down at this question. Other emotions pulled at the edges of that shame. A wish to be able to make that promise. Frustration at being unable to do so. As if the promise was not in his gift to give. I swallowed as I crouched in the tack room, the straw scratching at my ankles.
“I have forgiven you twice. There will not be a third time.”
Once, when he was a child, Rion Deverell had chosen to stand in front of the boy the world hated for his mother and sister’s death. When was the second time?
“Twice?” Apparently Devyn couldn’t do this calculation either.
“When I saw you in Londinium, I thought…” There was a pause, as if he could not find or name the words he had felt there in the middle of the masquerade ball. “For a moment I half expected you would step forward and present…”
Would Devyn tell him now? That he had done what he had set out to do and found his long-dead sister.
There was a huff.
“You should have come directly to me.”
No response again. Devyn wasn’t the most liberal with words when under pressure.
“A thrice-damned trial,” Deverell said. “Your uncle seeks to save you. But he… There is little I can do here.”
“I know.”
What did that mean? Little he could do about what?
“Will you have me back?” Devyn’s question was barely audible.
“Should you live so long,” came the flat reply.
There was nothing for Devyn to say in response to that. “Damn you.”
Deverell ended the conversation, the crunch of straw indicating his departure. I opened the stall door to find Devyn standing there, his head thrown back and his eyes shut.
“Are you okay?” I asked. I could feel he wasn’t. I knew how difficult hiding the truth had been for him.
He lifted his head and looked over at me. A smile broke across his grey face. Like the light that breaks through a bank of cloud and in shards of light illuminates a single section of countryside.
“I broke my vow but he…” His chin crumpled. His friend had forgiven him his betrayal, without even knowing that Devyn had succeeded. Irrespective of everyone else’s condemnation, he had forgiven him.
I wrapped my arms around him as he sucked in great breaths to steady himself.
I knew that my brother’s opinion mattered a great deal to Devyn and the fact that he had been forgiven for breaking the vow he had made to Mercia would go a long way to healing the jagged tear that I could occasionally sense in Devyn.
“This is good, right? No need for a trial now?”
Devyn shook his head.
“It’s too late. Once the trial was called, my uncle acted immediately and sent out riders with a summons to neighbouring lords to convene here. Llewelyn meant well.”
“What do you mean?”
“He forced Rion’s hand by calling for a trial. If we had made it to Carlisle, then Rion alone would have had the power to decide my fate, and there would be little his peers could do to gainsay him, whether he forgave me or had me executed. It is his right as it was his house I broke my vow to,” he explained.
Executed? Since when was that the punishment for a broken promise? I knew that Devyn had been outlawed when he left the north, but I had assumed that the punishment would fit the crime. When the others had said… I’d thought it was a figure of speech. Breaking a promise wasn’t even a crime against the Code, but this felt like a massive overreaction. Surely some kind of fine would be more appropriate.
Devyn ran his hands down my arms. “It will be all right, Cass. The trial is a formality. The lords hereabouts should vote with my uncle.”
“Should?” I asked, my voice coming out a little on the shrill side. “Like the King of Mercia’s confidence that said you could return to his service if you live long enough to do so?”
Devyn lifted his head at the sound of approaching voices. He brushed his lips against mine.
He took the reins to lead the waiting horse outside. He was obviously still planning to go for that ride.
“It will be fine.”
But it wasn’t going to be fine. The first of the lords had arrived while Devyn was enjoying his ride along the coast in the wind and rain. And Lady Morwyn of Caernarfon, Llewelyn’s closest neighbour, was seriously displeased when she learned of it.
The gruff old lady insisted on standing in the courtyard to wait for his return. Llewelyn waited with her, simmering at the implication that Devyn could not be trusted.
Devyn finally returned, dark curls dripping down his face as he cantered in, immediately taking in his not so welcoming committee.
He dismounted and bowed formally to Lady Morwyn, who had the guards escort Devyn directly to his room where he was to remain for the duration of the trial. An oathbreaker was not to be trusted to his word not to run. Rion Deverell watched the whole scene, unblinking, from inside the doorway and merely stood aside, expressionless, as Devyn was marched past him.
His eyes flicked to me afterwards, less out of an interest in me than merely noting the anger on my face. My reaction was worth noting. Again, I had the impression that Deverell was assessing me like a piece on a chessboard.
Between my response now and his recollection of Devyn’s reaction at the ball in Londinium, he clearly had suspicions about our relationship, but whatever triangle was going on, while noteworthy, was no concern of his. I gnawed at my lower lip. For now.
It took some days before the Prince of Gywnedd announced that with six lords present they had a quorum ready for the judge. Llewelyn himself, the King of Mercia, his neighbours Lady Morwyn, Lord Arthfael and Lady Emrick, who came from
