One of the sergeants of the garrison stopped Eliud as he was leaving the hall. ‘Where is your cousin? Is he sick?’ ‘I know no more than you,’ said Eliud. ‘I’ve been looking for him. He was out before I awoke, and I’ve seen nothing of him since.’ And he added in jealous haste, seeing the man frown and give him the first hard stare of suspicion: ‘But he can’t be far. His cloak is still in the cell. There’s so much stirring here, I thought he might have risen early to find out what was all the to, do.’ ‘He’s pledged not to set foot out of the gates,’ said the sergeant. ‘But do you tell me he’s given up eating? You must know more than you pretend.’ ‘No! But he’s here within, he must be. He would not break his word, I promise you.’ The man eyed him hard, and turned abruptly on his heel to make for the gatehouse and question the guards. Eliud caught him entreatingly by the sleeve. ‘What is it brewing here? Is there news? Such activity in the armoury and the archers drawing arrows… What’s happened overnight?’ ‘What’s happened? Your countrymen are swarming in force along the Minsterley valley, if you want to know, burning farmsteads and moving in on Pontesbury. Three days ago it was a handful, it’s past a hundred tribesmen now.’ He swung back suddenly to demand: ‘Did you hear aught in the night? Is that it? Has that cousin of yours run, broke out to join his ragamuffin kin and help in the killing? The sheriff was not enough for him?’ ‘No!’ cried Eliud. ‘He would not! It’s impossible!’ ‘It’s how we got him in the first place, a murdering, looting raid the like of these. It suited him then, it comes very timely for him now. His neck out of a noose and his friends close by to bring him off safely.’ ‘You cannot say so! You don’t yet know but he’s here within, true to his word.’ ‘No, but soon we shall,’ said the sergeant grimly, and took Eliud firmly by the arm. ‘Into your cell and wait. The lord Herbard must know of this.’ He flung away at speed and Eliud, in desolate obedience, trudged back to his cell and sat there upon the bed with only Elis’s cloak for company. By then he was certain what the result of any search must be. Only an hour or two of daylight gone and there were endless places a man could be, if he felt no appetite either for food or for the company of his fellow, men, and yet the castle felt empty of Elis, as cold and alien as if he had never been there. And a courier had come in the night, it seemed, with news of stronger forces from Powys plundering closer to Shrewsbury, and closer still to the forest grange of the abbey of Polesworth at Godric’s Ford. Where all this heavy burden had begun and where, perhaps, it must end. If Elis had heard that nocturnal arrival and gone out to discover the cause, yes, then he might in desperation forget oath and honour and all. Eliud waited wretchedly until Alan Herbard came, with two sergeants at his heels. A long wait it had been. They would have scoured the castle by now. By their grim faces it was clear they had not found Elis.
Eliud rose to his feet to face them. He would need all his powers and all his dignity now if he was to speak for Elis. This Alan Herbard was surely no more than a year or two his senior, and being as harshly tested as he.
‘If you know the manner of your cousin’s flight,’ said Herbard bluntly, ‘you would be wise to speak. You shared this narrow space. If he rose in the night, surely you would know. For I tell you plainly, he is gone. He has run. In the night the wicket was opened for a man to enter. It’s no secret now that it let out a man, renegade, forsworn, self, branded murderer. Why else should he so seize this chance?’ ‘No!’ said Eliud. ‘You wrong him and in the end it will be shown you wrong him. He is no murderer. If he has run, that is not the reason.’ ‘There is no if. He is gone. You know nothing of it? You slept through his flight?’ ‘I missed him when I awoke,’ said Eliud. ‘I know nothing of how he went or when. But I know him. If he rose in the night because he heard your man arriving and if he heard then, is it so?, that the Welsh of Powys are coming too close and in dangerous numbers, then I swear to you he has fled only out of dread for Gilbert Prestcote’s daughter. She is there with the sisters at Godric’s Ford and Elis loves her. Whether she has discarded him or no, he has not ceased to love her, and if she is in danger he will venture life, yes and his honour with it, to bring her to safety. And when that is done,’ said Eliud passionately, ‘he will return here, to suffer whatever fate may await him. He is no renegade! He has broken his oath only for Melicent’s sake. He will come back and give himself up. I pledge my own honour for him! My own life!’ ‘I would remind you,’ said Herbard grimly, ‘you have already done so. Either one of you gave his word for both. At this moment you stand attainted as his surety for his treachery. I could hang you, and be fully justified.’ ‘Do so!’ said Eliud, blanched to the lips, his eyes dilated into a blaze of green. ‘Here am I, still his warranty. I tell you, this neck is yours to wring if Elis proves false. I give you leave freely. You are mustering to ride, I’ve seen it. You go against these Welsh of Powys. Take me with you! Give me a horse and a weapon, and I will fight for you, and you may have an archer at my back to strike me dead if I make a false step, and a halter about my neck ready for the nearest tree after the Powysmen are hammered, if Elis does not prove to you the truth of every word I say.’ He was shaking with fervour, strung taut like a bowstring. Herbard opened his eyes wide at such open passion, and studied him in wary surprise a long moment. ‘So be it!’ he said then abruptly, and turned to his men. ‘See to it! Give him a horse and a sword, and a rope about his neck, and have your best shot follow him close and be ready to spit him if he plays false. He says he is a man of his word, that even this defaulting fellow of his is such. Very well, we’ll take him at his word.’ He looked back from the doorway. Eliud had taken up Elis’s red cloak and was holding it in his arms. ‘If your cousin had been half the man you are,’ said Herbard, ‘your life would be safe enough.’ Eliud whirled, hugging the folded cloak to him as if applying balm to an unendurable ache. ‘Have you not understood even yet? He is better than I, a thousand times better!’
CHAPTER TWELVE.
IN TREGEIRIOG, TOO, THEY WERE UP WITH THE FIRST BLUSH of light, barely two hours after Elis’s flight through the wicket at Shrewsbury. For Hugh Beringar had ridden through half the night, and arrived with the dove, grey hush of pre, dawn. Sleepy grooms rose, blear, eyed, to take the horses of their English guests, a company of twenty men. The rest Hugh had left distributed across the north of the shire, well armed, well supplied, and so far proof against the few and tentative tests to which they had been subjected.
Brother Cadfael, as sensitive to nocturnal arrivals as Elis, had started out of sleep when he caught the quiver and murmur on the air. There was much to be said for the custom of sleeping in the full habit, apart from the scapular, a man could rise and go, barefoot or staying to reclaim his sandals, as complete and armed as in the middle of the day. No doubt the discipline had originated where monastic houses were located in permanently perilous places, and time had given it the blessing of tradition. Cadfael was out, and halfway to the stables, when he met Hugh coming thence in the pearly twilight, and Tudur equally wide awake and alert beside his guest.
‘What brings you so early?’ asked Cadfael. ‘Is there fresh news?’ ‘Fresh to me, but for all I know stale already in Shrewsbury.’ Hugh took him by the arm, and turned him back with them towards the hall. ‘I must make my report to the prince, and then we’re off down the border by the shortest way. Madog’s castellan from Caus is pouring more men into the Minsterley valley. There was a messenger waiting for me when we rode into Oswestry or I’d meant to stay the night there.’ ‘Herbard sent the word from Shrewsbury?’ asked Cadfael, ‘It was no more than a handful of raiders when I left, two days ago.’ ‘It’s a war, party of a hundred or more now. They hadn’t moved beyond Minsterley when Herbard got wind of the muster, but if they’ve brought out such a force as that, they mean worse mischief. And you know them better than I, they waste no time. They may be on the move this very dawn.’ ‘You’ll be needing fresh horses,’ said Tudur practically.
‘We got some remounts at Oswestry, they’ll be fit for the rest of the way. But I’ll gladly borrow from you for the rest, and thank you heartily. I’ve left all quiet and every garrison on the alert across the north, and Ranulf seems to have pulled back his advance parties towards Wrexham. He made a feint at Whitchurch and got a bloody nose, and it’s my belief he’s drawn in his horns for this while. Whether or no, I must break off to attend to Madog.’ ‘You may make your mind easy about Chirk,’ Tudur assured him. ‘We’ll see to that. Have your men in for a meal, at least, and give the horses a breather. I’ll get the womenfolk out of their beds to see to the feeding of you, and have Einon rouse Owain, if he’s not already up.’ ‘What do you intend?’ Cadfael asked. ‘Which way shall you head?’ ‘For Llansilin and down the border. We’ll pass to east of the Breiddens, and down by Westbury to Minsterley, and cut them off, if we can, from getting back to their base in Caus. I tire of having men of Powys in that castle,’ said Hugh, setting his jaw. ‘We must have it back and make it habitable, and keep a garrison there.’ ‘You’ll be few for such a muster as you report,’ said Cadfael. ‘Why not aim at getting to Shrewsbury first for more men, and westward to meet them from there?’ ‘The time’s too short. And besides, I credit Alan Herbard with sense and stomach enough to field a good force of his own to mind the town. If we move fast enough we may take them between the two prongs and crack them like a nut.’ They had reached the hall. Word had gone before, the sleepers within were rolling out of the
