Here Be Dragons - 1 (59 page)

that Llewelyn ab lorwerth and the French King have entered into a treaty of alliance."
Richard and Will exchanged looks of dismay, for they both knew that had always been John's greatest fear, that his enemies should unite against him, that he should find himself fighting a war on two fronts.
John was striding up and down before the open hearth, clutching a crumpled parchment. He thrust it at Will, saying, "Read for yourself, »e what that
Welsh whoreson has dared to do!"
Richard, reading over Will's shoulder, saw that it was a letter from Uewelyn to Philip, one that spoke of a treaty "between the kingdom of the French and the principality of North Wales," that promised LleweVn would be a friend to
Philip's friends and an enemy to his enemies. 'How did you get this, John?"
Will asked, and John gestured imPatiently.
How do you think? I've paid informants at the French court."
atching the letter back, he scanned it rapidly. "Listen to this. '. . . by
' Q s grace, I and all the Princes of Wales unanimously leagued to-
er have manfully resisted ourand yourenemies, and with
^ s help we have by force of arms recovered from the yoke of their nny a large part of the land and the strongly defended castles which

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they by fraud and deceit had occupied, and having recovered them, We hold them strongly in the might of the Lord.'"
The more John read, the angrier he became. "God rot his wretched soul for this," he spat. "But if he thinks Philip is going to save his skin he's in for a bitter shock. What was it they said of the Romans, Will, that they made a desert and called it peace? That will be Wales, too, by Christ it will, and
Llewelyn ab lorwerth will go to his grave knowing that he brought destruction upon his people, he and he alone. Let him look out over the burning crops and smoldering woodlands, let him count the bodies and then say it was worth the price!"
He swung about, beckoned to the nearest man. "I want a gallows built in the bailey, and then I want to see Llewelyn's Welsh hostages hanging from it, each and every one. Maelgwn's, too. See to it ...
now."
His fury had dulled his perception, and it was several moments before he became aware of the utter silence. He turned, found they were all staring at him.
"My liege." The Earl of Chester stepped forward, said quietly, "My liege, I
would advise against that. I do not deny Llewelyn has given you cause. But if you kill the hostages, your war will become a blood feud. You'll find yourself fighting the Welsh for the next twenty years." He lowered his voice still further, said, "Even more to the point, how are your own lords likely to react? If you hang these Welsh hostages, what do you think will happen the next time you ask a man to yield up his son? He might well prefer rebellion."
"Or do exactly what he's told, knowing now what will be at stake." Chester was first and foremost a realist. He'd done what he could to dissuade John from committing an act that he saw as neither morally justifiable nor politically expedient. Having failed, his concern now was to disassociate himself from the killing to come, and he was quite willing to defer to the Earl of Pembroke.
If Chester's objections had been coolly rational, dispassionate, Pembroke's plea was unashamedly emotional. "My lord, listen to me. When I was a little lad, my lord father rose up in rebellion against King Stephen. My father had given me as a hostage, and the King warned nitf that I'd be hanged if he failed to keep faith. My father sent back word that he had the hammer and anvil with which to forge other sons, and was taken out to be hanged. I was but six and I did not understand, thought it was all a game, and I laughed even as they put the noo about my neck. King Stephen watched, and was moved to mercystopped the hanging, with his own hands removed the rope."
He paused, but John said nothing. If he was moved, like Step" ' by pity, it did not show in his face. Pembroke walked toward him/s
"Some of those Welsh hostages are just lads, have not yet reached manhood. My lord, I ask you not to do this. Do not take your vengeance Up0n the innocent."
"You'd do better to tell that to Llewelyn ab lorwerth," John said coldly-
"He's the one who chose to gamble with the innocent, not I. If his son's life means so little to him, why should it mean more to me? No, jny lord Pembroke, he set the stakes for this wager. I'm merely collecting what's due me."
Will had been listening in appalled silence. He'd known this war would be a brutal one, but the cold-blooded killing of helpless hostages, many of them youngsters, far exceeded his worst expectations.
"John, I beg you . . ."
"Do not, Will. Do not."
Their eyes locked, held until Will could bear it no longer, had to look away.
"At least," he mumbled, knowing how ineffectual his protest was and despising himself for it, "at least spare Llewelyn's son . . . for Joanna's sake. If you murder the boy, Llewelyn will be bound to blame her. Do not do that to her, John."
"It matters little whether Llewelyn blames her or not. He'll be dead ere the

summer is out."
Richard waited to see if Will would argue further. When Will did not, shoulders slumping in demoralized defeat, eyes averted from that which he'd fought a lifetime against acknowledging, Richard realized that Will's moment of truth was his, too. His every instinct told him to keep silent, to distance himself as he'd always done, even as he moved toward his father.
"I think it could work to your advantage to spare Gruffydd, Papa," he said softly. "Llewelyn would be half crazed with fear for the boy. You could make use of that fear, hold it over his head like the sword of Damocles. To have leverage like that over an enemy ..."
He saw John's eyes narrow and he dared to hope he'd hit upon the one argument that might stay his father's hand.
"There is much in what you say, Richard," John conceded, "and I'd agree with youbut for one thing. Llewelyn ab lorwerth is a dead man, ar|d there is no need to seek leverage over the dead."
John glanced about the hall, saw that no one else meant to speak. "I ant it done this forenoon," he said. "The sooner they die, the sooner Word of their deaths will reach Llewelyn."
f lrst one to suffer from Llewelyn's rebellion had been his son. Gruf-
to s status had been changed overnight from that of highborn hostage
Prisoner of state. As yet, he was not being abused, and his confine-

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ment was in castle chambers, not the dark, airless dungeons that fille(j him with such fear. But his days and nights were passed under guard and he was finding it harder and harder to keep at bay his most persistent enemies:
boredom and loneliness.
Soon after their arrival at Nottingham, he had been escorted to the uppermost chamber in the Black Tower, and then left alone. The room was sparsely furnished, containing only a bed, trestle table, bench, and chamber pot. He wandered about rather aimlessly for several moments indulging in the fantasy that occupied most of his waking hours, thoughts of escape. A pity the window was not large enough to squeeze through; mayhap he could have knotted the bedsheets, lowered himself down into the bailey once dark came. He never passed a church now without thinking of sanctuary, never picked up an eating knife without evaluating it as a weapon.
His meal had already been laid out for him; there was a glazed clay flagon brimming with ale, a round, flat loaf of bread marked with a cross, a chunk of goat's cheese, and a baked pigeon pie. Gruffydd would have liked to believe that his friends were eating as well as he, but he had no way of knowing. In these six weeks of his captivity, his isolation had been complete.
He was reaching for the clay flagon when the door opened. At sight of the three men, Gruffydd stiffened. It may have been the way they moved toward him, hands on sword hilts, saying nothing. It may have been the rope coiled from one man's belt. Or it may have been a more subtle indicator, an inborn sense of sudden danger. Gruffydd did not pause to puzzle it out; his reaction was as instinctive as it was immediate. He got to his feet, and as the first guard approached the table, he swung the flagon in a wide, deadly arc. It shattered against the man's face; he screamed and staggered backwards.
They had not been expecting resistance, and that gave Gruffydd a momentary advantage. He overturned the table onto the second man, dived for the doorway.
Had the third guard been slightly slower in his reflexes, he would have made it. But the man was cat-quick; slamming the door, he flung himself at
Gruffydd.
He at once regretted it, for he could match neither Gruffydd s strength nor his desperation, and he found himself in a savage, noholds-barred brawl in which he was getting much the worst of it. Unable to unsheath his sword, he soon stopped trying to keep Gruffydd fr° reaching the door and concerned himself only with keeping Grufryo from killing him.
After what seemed a lifetime to him, his comrade untangled him5 from the wreckage of the table, came to his aid. Even then, it took two of them to subdue Gruffydd, and the struggle ended only when

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anaged to draw his sword, put the blade against Gruffydd's throat, d snarl, "Give me an excuse, go on, just blink1"
They forced Gruffydd to kneel, jerked his arms behind his back, began to bind his wrists tightly together, cuffing him about the head and shoulders when he resisted
The third man had taken no part in the fight, was slumped, moanine, against the wall But now he stumbled to his feet, and his companions swore in startled sympathy His face was already swelling rapidly, bloated and bloodied, his mouth so distorted and puffy that it resembled nothing so much as the grotesque gnmace of a scarecrow He bent over, spat into his hand, stared incredulously at a bloody tooth With that, he lurched toward Gruffydd
For a moment he stood over the boy, looking down at him And then he grabbed
Gruffydd's tunic collar, struck him across the face You hear that hammering in the bailey7 They're building a gallows for you and the other hostages The King wants the lot of you to hang ere he dines And you, you misbegotten Welsh bastard, you shall be the very first to die, I'll see to that1"
"No, my lord Salisbury said we're to wait with this one, that he's to be last"
The man swore, discovered another loose tooth, and hit Gruffydd again, this time in the stomach "Mayhap that is even better This way he 11 have time to think on it, to imagine how that rope'll feel about his neck, how it'll feel to be choking for air, and not getting any1"
Gruffydd could not breathe, each breath was more constricted, more labored than the last It was partly the blow he'd just taken, but mainly it was panic
Not only was hanging a dishonorable, shameful way to die, but it was, he knew, also a particularly painful death Only if a man was hanged from horseback did the fall break his neck, otherwise he slowly strangled
Never had Gruffydd known fear like this, terror made all the more intense by his utter helplessness He strained against his bonds, tried frantically to free himself, while the men watched and laughed at his futile efforts Out in the bailey, the hammering continued
'°HM stood at the window of the great hall, watching as the Welsh hos-
ages were hanged Some tried to fight, had to be dragged cursing and eking up onto the gallows Others, especially the younger ones, were ° stunned to offer resistance A few wept, a few pleaded Richard
3 seen executions before, and had not thought he was particularly
Beamish But this had been too much for him, he'd turned away, un-
able to watch

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The hangings were still going on when dinner was served. The cooks had prepared one of John's favorite dishes, stewed lamprey eels in saffron sauce.
It was a favorite of Richard's, too, but he found he could not swallow more than a mouthful. Some of the hostages being hanged were no older than the young pages serving the lamprey and roast peacock. He laid his knife down, did not pick it up again.
The pages were bringing in the subtlety, a spun-sugar creation sculptured to resemble a flame-breathing dragon. On their heels came the marshal of the hall. Kneeling before John, he said nervously, "\ thought it best not to wait till the meal's end, Your Grace. A courier has just ridden in from Wales, bearing an urgent message from your daughter, the Princess Joanna. Shall I
send him in?"
John nodded, and a moment later a young Welshman stumbled into the hall. He was unshaven, his clothing stained with sweat and the dust of the road, and at first Richard thought he was drunk; his eyes were glazed, slid blankly past
John without seeing. But then he saw how the man's gaze kept coming back to the window, and he understood. Not drunk, in shock.
When prompted by the marshal, the Welshman knelt, held out a folded parchment.
"My lady entrusted me with this. She said . . ." He swallowed, tried to remember, to blot out for a moment what was happening in the bailey. "She said
I must give it into your hands and yours alone, that none but you must read it. . ."
John reached for the letter, made sure that the seal was indeed Joanna's and had not been tampered with. Only then did he break it open, begin to read.
When he glanced up, he had paled noticeably.
"Someone give this man a shilling for his trouble. My lords of Chester and
Pembroke, you stay. Will and Richard, you stay, too. The rest of you, out. . . now."
Men set down their wine cups, stared at him in astonishment, mouths full of unchewed food. But after taking one look at his face, they pushed resentfully away from the tables.
Within moments the hall was cleared. John rose, but he was suddenly reluctant to share the contents of Joanna's letter. He hesitated, and then said abruptly, "Joanna has written me that some of my own lords are plotting with
Llewelyn and the other Welsh Princes. She says that they mean to rebel once we're in Wales, either to kill me or to turn me over to the Welsh."
As he spoke, his eyes moved intently from face to face, assessing the impact of his words. He did not truly suspect Chester or Pembroke. but he was relieved, nonetheless, to see that their surprise was un feigned. At least these two could be eliminated as suspects. But that s left so many, half his court. How could he trust anyone? How could he ever be sure, ever be safe?
"John, what mean you to do?"
"I do not know, Will," John admitted. "I need time, time to think." He began to pace. "Christ, it could be any of them. De Vesci has always been a malcontent. De Clare never wanted me to be King; he thinks I've forgotten that, but I have not. Derby is de Braose's blood kin, and Huntingdon"
The Earls of Huntingdon and Derby were Chester's brothers-inlaw, and he interrupted hastily, "My liege, this serves for naught. We need more than suspicions. First of all, we must look to your safety. Thank Jesus for your daughter's warning."
John nodded. "My God," he said softly, "I'd have walked blindly into their trap. If not for Joanna ..."
"She saved your life, Papa," Richard said, and again John nodded.
"Yes, lad, I think she did."