Memories of the Heart (7 page)

“Ulrich says as how Lord Morton of Bendale's loyalties are ever changing and that it makes him and this border the most likely origin of intruders threatening danger for Westbourne.”

Tal nodded, but didn't verbally respond. Ulrich was far too impressed by his own opinions for Tal to ever take either them or their source seriously. In truth, but for the promise he'd given his dying father, Tal would already have replaced his guard captain.

Ulrich and his brother Simeon had been fostered by Tal's father in Westbourne. In honor of that relationship, Earl William had first employed Ulrich in his garrison and later promoted the man to its leadership. Tal didn't approve of Ulrich's methods of discipline as, although necessary to have strict discipline, he believed its value completely undermined when unjustly applied. Ulrich unsteadily walked a dagger's sharp edge between what Tal would and wouldn't abide—but had yet to tumble over.

Tal forced the return of his attention to more immediate and ominous possibilities. If the treachery hinted at on this found scrap of paper hadn't sprung from Bendale, then who had placed it here? Tal had no doubt but that it had been put precisely where it would be and was found.

Though unknown to outsiders, each and every member of Tal's garrison was familiar with this path often followed by regular patrols. But would one of his own be a party to such ill deeds? Nay! Tal firmly shook his head. He refused to wildly jump to unwarranted suspicions. It would require a great deal more detailed and specific evidence to make him blame one of his own—still he would cast a wary eye over all to stand better prepared for whatever might yet come to be.

*   *   *

In the shadows of the same forest but on its western edge, Ceri quietly followed Lloyd's lead over secret pathways descending a steep, heavily forested mountainside that to others would likely appear impenetrable. The trail wound between trees, over fallen trunks, and through shallow streams. The trip had been long and required nights spent sheltered by leafy boughs. Her back ached and feet hurt but she wouldn't complain when it was a journey embarked upon at her insistence. To divert thoughts from sore legs and burning soles, she attempted to initiate conversation on a far different matter with the man moving relentlessly onward.

“How well did you know my mother? You must have been nearly of an age with her.” Although Ceri had broached this topic for a simple purpose, once begun she realized how important the information was to her. “What was she like?”

Completely unprepared for this abrupt inquisition, Lloyd came to a dead halt in the middle of a narrow path. Since near the day of Ceri's birth, he had willingly accepted Mabyn's request that he stand as guardian to Ceri. Yet in all those years he'd exchanged precious few words with the girl, and he was ill-equipped to discuss this sensitive subject with her.

“Your mother, Gwynth—” Lloyd gruffly forced the words out even while making himself resume the steady pace of their progress down the route from Dyffryn in Llechu through Westbourne lands to the castle. “Gwynth was—” He compelled himself to start over in a tone utterly devoid of emotion. “As you already know, your Aunt Vevina's twin sister.”

Though Ceri calmly nodded she was surprised by Lloyd's unexpected reaction to these simple questions on a issue she had, apparently wrongly, believed a safe one to raise.

“Aye,” Lloyd continued while struggling to hide the uneasiness clearly revealed by the bright color of a face only partially hidden by the short curls of his beard. “Gwynth and Vevina were so much alike that during childhood they took joy in tricking the unwary into thinking one was the other. Not even Mabyn, their own mother, could always tell them apart.”

Ceri gently smiled, pleased with this new insight on the mother she had never known.

“Then to know Vevina was to know my mother.” These words weren't a question but rather the delighted welcome of implied fact.

Though the girl trailed behind Lloyd with a step seemingly lightened by misconception, his still burning face closed into a hard mask. He was unwilling for Ceri to see the anguish her query had roused … a distress further deepened by the sad fact that her assumption was so very, very wrong.

Lloyd remained silent, allowing Ceri to linger in a cheerful fantasy. What else could he do? No good purpose could be accomplished by selfishly and uselessly burdening her with the whole unhappy truth. However, the decision not to speak did nothing to prevent his own thoughts from wandering again through caverns in his mind where unpleasant memories dwelled.

Vevina and he had been betrothed when, decades past the young Princess Angwen of Llechu was sent to wed with William, Earl of Westbourne. Their princess had requested Vevina's company on the journey into Norman lands but had also promised to promptly send her friend home to Wales once the marriage was performed.

Angwen hadn't kept her word. Instead she had begged Vevina to remain in the castle until her first child was born during the depths of winter. With the arrival of spring's warm days following that son and heir's birth, Lloyd had traveled to Westbourne and begged Vevina to return home with him for their own wedding rites. Unfortunately from his point of view, Angwen was already awaiting the birth of a second child. Terrified of childbirth without a friend at her side, their princess, now Lady of Westbourne, had again pleaded with the soft-hearted Vevina to stay and support her through the frightening event.

The ensuing heated quarrel had cast a dark blight across the bright future they'd planned. Lloyd stormed back to Llechu swearing he'd never again seek Vevina's company. His beloved had also closed the door on their relationship and neither had reopened it even after Angwen's second pregnancy ended with a stillborn daughter. During the decades since Vevina had rarely visited her Welsh home, then only for brief periods of time and never in the past twelve years.

While her inexplicably brooding guide strode relentlessly forward, Ceri accepted the fact that he meant to say no more. She wasn't surprised. Lloyd rarely spoke without purpose and yet she trusted him more than anyone else save Gran Mab. He had given her unwavering support all her life.

Smiling affectionately at Lloyd's back, she silently trailed behind until an exciting view demanded her full attention. Through the thinning forest's web of interlaced leaves and branches a stunning sight slowly appeared.

“Is that our destination?” Ceri gasped, voice warmed with awe.

Lloyd shook himself free from desolate memories to peer through the last trees lining the edge of tilled fields covered with orderly rows where fresh green shoots sprouted.

“Aye—” Black curls liberally streaked with grey bobbed as Lloyd firmly nodded. “Castle Westbourne it is … the site you were determined to reach.”

The closer they moved to the massive structure, the smaller Ceri felt and the more erratic the beat of her racing pulse. Sunlight gleamed so brightly over towering, whitewashed walls that she blinked rapidly against the discomfort it caused her eyes.

Lord Taliesan's home was infinitely more impressive than anything Ceri had ever in her life seen! And if Lloyd were not at her side, if she hadn't earlier fought so boldly to reach this goal, she might've turned and hastened back toward the safe haven of Gran Mab's small cottage.

Nay, Ceri scolded herself, that she would not! She'd sworn to never be content with so little and must bolster her courage to continue the quest for more.

The remainder of their approach to the castle across verdant fields passed all too quickly for Ceri who was caught in an uncomfortable struggle between anticipation and alarm.

They counted themselves fortunate that the broad drawbridge of thick planks was daily lowered for daytime traffic with outlying farms and neighboring villages. This practice allowed them to penetrate Westbourne's fortified outer bailey wall by merely walking under the portcullis' sharp teeth and over a wide moat filled with placid water.

A burly guardsman suddenly barred their path into the courtyard. This impassive figure held a deadly broadsword across his thick chest in a wordless threat. “State your business.”

Lloyd promptly answered the brusque demand. “I am Lloyd from the village of Dyffryn in Llechu, and from there I bring Ceridwen to Castle Westbourne for a visit with her Aunt Vevina, your lady's companion.”

“Does Vevina expect you?” This question was as lacking in emotion as their inflexible barrier's initial challenge.

“Nay.” With his unhesitating and unequivocal response Lloyd earned a measure of respect from the guardsman although the man's expression remained indifferent.

“Wait here,” the guardsman flatly ordered. “I'll send word to the one you seek to learn whether or no she welcomes your arrival.”

Having little choice, Lloyd nodded. Ceri silently gulped, apprehensive of what this unexpected complication might bring. Would her Aunt Vevina be willing to accept an uninvited guest? Or had Gran Mab been right in saying that her presence would be resented? Ceri had met Aunt Vevina only twice in her life and both times she'd been but a child.

Ceri uncomfortably stood at Lloyd's side under the full force of the afternoon sun as what seemed an endless time crawled by at the pace of a particularly slow snail. And all the while she tried not to notice the many surreptitious glances cast her way by natives of both the castle and the village built within the security of its bailey walls.

“Lloyd, you've returned.” These soft words instantly sundered the strain of the waiting two. Unrecognized by Ceri, they held far more emotion than their speaker would've openly revealed.

With deep curiosity Ceri watched as the woman gracefully glided toward them with hands outstretched. Although her memories of their past encounters were sketchy at best, Ceri had no doubt but that this was her Aunt Vevina.

Moreover, Ceri's attention was sharpened for having learned on the journey here that this figure was the image of her own mother. And what a vision of gentle loveliness the willowy woman was with her thick black hair barely touched with silver, gentle brown eyes, and a face nearly unlined by her more than four decades of life.

“Aye.” As Lloyd answered the brisk chill in his voice sliced through Ceri's trance. “I have come back to Westbourne but at your mother's behest and only to carry out
her
mission.”

“Oh—” The quiet joy on Vevina's face faded into a blank mask of resignation. She had wrongly thought, nay, hoped.…

“What mission was it that my mother insisted you undertake?”

“I've brought your niece Ceridwen safely to this castle.” Lloyd motioned toward the companion Vevina had blindly walked past in her haste to greet him. “She begs that you will allow her to stay with you—leastways for a visit.”

Vevina's heavy lashes fell for a long moment before she squared her shoulders and turned toward the younger woman with a forced smile that soon softened into true kindness. The winsome girl full of youthful courage and fresh dreams seemed so much an echo from her own past that Vevina's heart instantly opened and invited this newcomer into its warm center.

“Welcome, Ceridwen, to Castle Westbourne.”

Ceri's nervous tension eased as she gazed into pale brown eyes so clear they must be sincere. “Everyone calls me Ceri.”

Vevina nodded her acquiescence. “Come with me to the great hall. The two of you must be hungry after your long journey, and I'll arrange that food be brought to you there.”

As they crossed the courtyard to climb the outer stairway to the castle entrance, none of the three noticed the thoroughly amazed young boy who gaped from the stable's shadows.

Tom was shocked, as if twice struck by lightning. The same magical figure who'd vanished from a Welsh cottage had suddenly reappeared—right here!

Chapter 7

“I have talked with Godfrey,” Vevina quietly told the niece primly sitting beside Lloyd as she approached the trestle table hastily assembled for the unexpected guests' impromptu meal. “He is Westbourne's seneschal, responsible for all who toil in the castle, everything that they do, and how well they perform their allotted tasks.”

Vevina tried not to falter under her onetime betrothed's steady stare. The still attractive man had spoken precious few words since she'd gladly greeted him only to be shamed by his announcement that he hadn't come for her.

Sensitive to the feelings of others, Ceri was much aware of the uneasy pair's silent conflict. Something from their shared past must be responsible. Ceri only wished she'd some inkling what it was and thus be able to help heal its unmistakable wound. But when her Aunt Vevina continued, she focused her attention on the woman's words.

“Godfrey has agreed to allow your continuing presence.” The tinge of relief in Vevina's smile hinted at a concern previously unsuspected. “Though pages in training for knighthood are always responsible for serving at the lord's high table, he means to assign you to perform that same task at the great hall's lower tables.”

Ceri promptly nodded. She'd had no clear notion what might be expected of her in return for the right to remain in this mighty fortress and at its lord's expense. However, with the undimmed memory of Tal's loving embrace she was willing to do whatever was asked for the chance to stay and pursue her quest for a renewal of that happiness, no matter how unlikely its success.

“Toward that end, Ceri,” Vevina instructed, “follow me down to the kitchens on Castle Westbourne's ground level.”

Without further words, Vevina pointedly turned her back on Lloyd and led her niece across the great hall to a corner stairwell built into the width of a thick stone wall.

Anxious to be as little trouble as possible, Ceri quickly rose and rushed after her aunt. Having never been inside even a humble abode of stone, Ceri was amazed by nearly every detail about this magnificent structure. And after climbing the exterior's wooden steps to enter by way of a cold tunnel through the castle wall's width, this steep and sharply curving stairway straight down was another new experience. One that promptly captured Ceri's vivid imagination.