Page 1

PROLOGUE

Year of Our Lord 1228

Brython Castle, Welsh Marches

“W hat, exactly, did he say?”

The question came from a man whose query was not meant to be ignored. Not even slightly avoided. Christopher de Lohr, the Earl of Hereford and Worcester, was making the demand in the middle of what had been a horrific siege. The English, led by de Lohr, had been trying to gain control of a much-coveted Welsh castle for almost a month on the command of Henry III. Henry wanted that castle to keep it away from the control of Llewelyn, who had defeated the family of a rival Welsh prince, Gruffydd ap Gwenwynwyn, to gain the castle and a foothold on the Welsh marches.

Brython Castle was that target.

That was what de Lohr was trying to negotiate. Standing in his open tent at the base of the hill that led up to Brython, he was surrounded by wounded men, raw sewage, mud, horses, and weary soldiers who had been at war for weeks on end. There had been conflicting reports before and during the siege that Llewelyn didn’t hold the castle at all, that it was some other Welsh lord who hated the English, hated Llewelyn, and was trying to make a name for himself. Whoever it was, the English had been battling for sixteen brutal days before finally damaging the sewers and water supply enough to make a difference. Now, seven days later and with no rain in sight, the castle was starting to falter. No water, no drainage, and, undoubtedly, any food supplies were dwindling.

But de Lohr kept up the barrage.

He was a man with decades of experience in battle, going all the way back to the days of Richard the Lionheart and his bloody crusades into the Levant. There wasn’t much Christopher had not faced in battle, and there wasn’t a battle commander anywhere who could outsmart him. Particularly not a Welsh. He kept up with the siege engines, which had been built from the fine ash forests near the castle and then rolled up to the moat, where they could hurl any number of projectiles over, and at, the walls. Sometimes they used tree stumps covered in oil and lit on fire, swinging those over the walls and hoping to catch something on fire.

They had been successful more than they had been unsuccessful.

In addition to the siege engines, Christopher had put his men to building pontoons and ladders to get across the moat and scale the walls. Led by his sons, his men hauled wood across the pontoons and built a scaffold against the side of the eastern wall because there was enough ground footing. Dozens of men could get up on that platform at once. Christopher had been wise enough to have his men soak the wood in water so nothing flaming could burn it down. The other walls were too close to the moat, and it was difficult for any of the ladders to gain a foothold, so the focus was concentrated on the eastern wall.

As the platform was built and the siege engines were swinging away, Christopher positioned two enormous trebuchets directly across the moat from the western wall and, using those terrible engines, flung boulders into the actual wall. One individual boulder wouldn’t do a lot of damage, but many boulders in successive order could do quite a bit. The western wall had holes and giant cracks as Christopher continued to beat the wall down with the boulders his men were bringing in from the nearby mountains—the rough-cut chunks of ancient black rock that could be hurled into the walls, hard enough to break the sandstone they were made from.

The holes in the western wall grew, but de Lohr’s patience wasn’t infinite. A month into the siege, he’d received word from Henry, demanding that he make short work of the siege by any means necessary. Also contained within that message was the suggestion that the castle not be demolished, and peace was often attained without use of flaming projectiles and swords. Hints were brought about that an alliance between de Lohr and the Gwenwynwyn family still living in the castle should be explored. Then the suggestion became plain—perhaps a marriage offer was in order.

Curtis, Christopher’s eldest son and heir, was not married.

Henry wasn’t hinting. He was commanding.

Curtis de Lohr was slated for the sacrificial altar of peace.

Christopher had to think about that, long and hard. Curtis was his shining star, a knight with no equal. He was big, powerful, brave, tough, and everything that came with a man of his stature. War flowed through his veins. Even now, as the siege raged onward, Curtis was working on the eastern scaffolding, supervising the rebuild of the section knocked away by the Welsh the previous night. Christopher had put it on him specifically because he wanted Curtis out of the way while he tried to negotiate a peaceful end to a siege that threatened to go on for as long as the plucky Welsh could hold out.

God only knew how long that would be.

But now, with Curtis managing the scaffold, Christopher was faced with a Welsh scout who served him, a man who knew the language and customs and had shouted de Lohr’s offer to the Welsh commanders on the western wall.

The answer he received was not one that Christopher was willing to accept.

“Be plain,” Christopher said when the scout was too slow to answer. “What, exactly , did he say?”

The scout took a deep breath for courage. “I was told that the Lord of Castell Brythonig would rather—”

He was cut off by Christopher. “Call the castle by its rightful name in my presence.”

The scout nodded quickly. “Forgive me, my lord,” he said. “It is Brython Castle. But the Welsh will only call it by the Welsh name of Brythonig . After their ancestors.”

Christopher waved him off irritably. “Never mind that,” he said. “What, exactly, did the commander say?”

The scout seemed to hesitate. “Mind you, my lord, I am only the messenger,” he said. “I am told that the Lord of Co… I mean, the Lord of Brython would rather marry his daughter to a pig than an English knight.”

Christopher didn’t rise to the insult. He’d long learned to choose his battles wisely, because when he fought, he fought to win. He wasn’t going to acknowledge the insult dealt to him by men who were on the losing end of a castle siege.

“For decades, Gwenwynwyn ap Owain’s descendants had possession of this castle,” he said. “Since ap Owain was loyal to John and even Henry when he was younger, we left Brython Castle in peace. There was even a contingent of English soldiers here, and they have been for years. My scouts kept abreast of the castle’s activities, but it was never one of concern.”

The scout shook his head. “It was not, my lord.”

“As long as it did not harbor rebels, it was of no concern to me.”

“Indeed, my lord.”

Christopher eyed the scout, who had been with him for many years. “In fact,” he said, “you have been watching it from time to time, Glynn. Much of the information I received has come from you.”

Glynn ap Gower nodded shortly. “It has, my lord,” he said. “I received my information from my own family as well as from people in the nearby village, or those who had passed through, or…”

Christopher held up a hand to silence him. “I am not questioning the accuracy,” he said. “The entire reason we’ve come here is because the castle was lost to Gwenwynwyn’s enemy, Llewelyn. Henry wants it back.”

“I understand, my lord.”

“One question that has not been answered for me is where Gwenwynwyn’s descendants are,” Christopher said. “And by that I mean those who lost the castle to Llewelyn. The man has at least two sons that we know of. Why have we not seen them?”

Glynn shook his head. “No one can seem to answer that question, my lord,” he said, rather wearily. “The castle was lost to Llewelyn over a month ago, but no one seems to know what became of the man’s son.”

“He possibly has a second son, I’m told.”

Glynn lifted his eyebrows. “The Wraith?” he said. “No one that I know of has ever seen him. I do not know if he truly exists.”

That was true. Rumors of how many children Gwenwynwyn had were circulating still, even after many years. No one really knew. But they did know he had at least one for certain. In any case, Christopher simply shook his head.

“Regardless, we do know that Llewelyn himself is not in command of the castle,” he said. “Are we certain that his men are?”

Glynn shrugged. “As certain as we can be of anything right now, my lord,” he said. “I made your offer to the commander of Brython, and he would only say that his daughter would marry a pig first.”

“As we do not even know who the offer was made to.”

“Nay, we do not, my lord,” Glynn said. “But one thing is for certain.”

“What is that?”

“Whoever holds the castle is well placed in Llewelyn’s court,” Glynn said knowingly. “For a castle of this importance, one badly coveted by the Welsh and English alike, it is someone of wealth or ranking or both. Your marriage offer has not been made to a peasant.”

He was right. Christopher sighed heavily, pondering the situation as he grasped a wooden cup of watered wine and drank.

“This is a damn puzzling business,” he muttered. “Clearly, someone holds that castle, someone who has been able to hold me off for almost a month. Me. I would hazard to say that no one holds out against me, but that would sound arrogant.”

Glynn’s lips twitched with a smile. “It is the truth, my lord,” he said. “The man holding Brython against you must be clever, indeed.”

That didn’t make Christopher feel any better, and he scratched his head in a wearied gesture. His hair, blond and full in his youth, had mostly gone to gray. It was still thick, and he still kept it cut in the same fashion he’d always worn, but that silver hair was dirty from having been kept buried under a helm since the siege began. It was dirt fed by exhaustion that covered Christopher from head to toe. The siege was getting old, and he wanted to go home, but they didn’t seem to be getting anywhere. He couldn’t even get a straight answer on who, exactly, was in command of Brython’s defenses or his offer of marriage. In truth, he’d only offered because Henry had demanded it, but Henry didn’t know warfare like Christopher did. Marriage offers weren’t exactly appropriate in the heat of battle, and he’d been loath to do it, but there were too many of Henry’s soldiers and knights within his ranks for him not to have obeyed a command from the king.

He’d been forced into it.

Still… something had to be done to end this siege, or he’d grow old and die here. Perhaps if a marriage offer didn’t work, something else would. Anything to end this mess. He was just about to comment on that when a soldier abruptly appeared in the open tent flap.

“My lord,” the soldier said breathlessly. “Curtis and his men have managed to bridge the gap between the scaffold and the top of the wall. We have breached the castle!”

That had everyone in the tent, including Christopher, running out and heading toward the eastern wall.

A chaotic day was only going to grow worse.