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Shouting for Bedwyr, Gwenhwyfar dropped her
gathered
bundle and ran to the corner,
kicking the foul heap of stuff
aside.
Two frightened grey eyes, set in a dirty face swamped by a
tangle of
black, unwashed hair, met hers.

Bedwyr darted in, sword
drawn, two of the escort hard at his
heel.

‘Jesu,’ he swore, ‘where did she come from?’
Gwenhwyfar squatted, her hands held forward,
palms down,
showing peace and good
intention. ‘Put up your sword, Bedwyr,
she is frightened enough without
that.’

‘Not until I have reason to believe she is
not so frightened as to be hostile.’
Gwenhwyfar
clicked her tongue. ‘Do as I say. Even were she
inclined to hurting us, she is in no condition for it. The lass is in
heavy
labour.’
The girl — Gwenhwyfar discovered
later that she was barely
ten and
three summers of age — was curled in a ball, knees drawn
up against the
pain that swamped her abdomen. Her face contorted, and now that she was
discovered, another whimper left her lips.

‘
There is
bracken, make it into bedding,’ Gwenhwyfar
ordered Bedwyr, ‘and I require a fire for light and warmth. You,’
she
nodded at one of the escort, ‘fetch Nessa. There is a spare cloak in my
baggage, tell her to bring it.’
Exchanging
a shared expression of resignation, the men did
as they were ordered. Gwenhwyfar persuaded the girl to let her
feel her swollen body, silently counting as the
contraction
ceased and another followed.

‘How long have
you been here?’ she asked.

The girl was ragged and unkempt. Gwenhwyfar
wondered
when she had last eaten. Judging by
the harsh, protruding
bones, some time since.

‘
Three
days,’ the girl gasped.

‘And the pains?
When did they come.’

‘
Las’ night,’ the girl
groaned, between chattering teeth. ‘I am so cold, Lady. I had nought more strength
to light a fire with.
Please,’ she grabbed
for Gwenhwyfar’s hand, clung tight.
‘Please stop this pain, I can bear
no more of it!’
Reassuringly Gwenhwyfar
patted her hand. ‘It will not be
long afore it ends.’ Nessa thrust in,
her tongue clicking with disapproval. ‘What in God’s good name is a mere child
like this doing alone out here? And in her condition!’

‘
Have
water fetched,’ Gwenhwyfar ordered, ignoring Nessa’s
flood of agitated
concern. She was a good hand-maid, but inclined to prattle.

Bedwyr himself brought
the water, placed it beside the fire that
was flickering into life through black, reeking, smoke.
He touched
Gwenhwyfar’s arm,
indicated the door. ‘I must speak with you.’

‘
Not now.’

‘Now!’
About to make a sharp
retort, Gwenhwyfar saw his firm,
determined
look. ‘Quickly then.’ She withdrew with him,
leaving Nessa to comfort
the girl.

Sheltering beneath the slight roof overhang,
Bedwyr turned his back to the wet, placed a hand on the wattle wall, said, ‘I
appreciate the lass needs help, but it is not for
us to get involved
here. She is of
the Picti People, you can see that by her
darkness, and she wears a slave collar.’ The rain fell in a straight
sheet of grey that all but obliterated the
entrance gate on the far
side of the rectangular courtyard. Gwenhwyfar
had made no
response. Irritated, Bedwyr
continued, ‘Where she has run from
I cannot imagine.’

‘Nor do I care,’ Gwenhwyfar snapped. ‘She’s a
child who is
having a child, and she is very
frightened.’ Her fists were
screwed
tight, her body taut. ‘You men, you take your pleasures
where you will, not concerning yourselves with the
conse
quence of nine months hence ...’
Bedwyr
held his hands in surrender. ‘Whoa! I am not at fault
here!’
Gwenhwyfar shuddered a release of breath, calming
herself.
‘I am sorry. That girl is barely on the brink of womanhood, yet
some man has bedded her, got her with child.’ Bedwyr shrugged, unconcerned. ‘She
is a slave.’

‘And that makes it all right?’ When he did
not answer Gwenhwyfar persisted, ‘Slaves have basic rights no less than any
person high- or low-born. The right to be warm and fed. The right to remain a
maiden until the body is grown.’
Bedwyr
placed a hand on her shoulder. ‘I agree with you, but
we cannot stay
long here. We must move on.’

‘We can go nowhere in this storm and night
will soon be approaching. Are we not to camp here?’ She smiled, patted his
hand. ‘The babe ought to be safe born come morning.’
The men ate a thin gruel of corn and wild fowl and the
thunder raged, drowning the girl’s screams. The
horses stamped
uneasily and the men made the sign against evil. Night
came, with the rain settling into a steady drizzle.

An hour after full dark Bedwyr came to find
Gwenhwyfar, stood talking with her again beyond the door.

‘The birth is wrong, Bedwyr. I fear for babe
and girl.’
His patience was ebbing. This
was all getting out of control.
It
was one thing to ride, merry-making for a few miles along the
Wall, but
to be squatting here in this squalid midden-heap, exposing the Pendragon’s Lady
to God alone knew what .. . ‘Look,’ he said. ‘She’s an escaped slave. What
manner of death
faces her when she is
returned to her master? Let me put a swift
end to her now. She will feel
no more pain and —’

‘
You
disgust me.’ Gwenhwyfar turned on her heel and,
tossing the door-skin
aside, ducked back into the hut.

At a loss,
Bedwyr ran his fingers through his rain-wet hair. He had a bad feeling growing
in the pit of his belly about thisnonsense, was beginning to wish he had never
initiated this damn fool excursion.

Why was Gwenhwyfar behaving so God-damned
stubborn about a slave and her brat? This was not the Gwenhwyfar he had known
as a boy in Less Britain, the practical woman who could cope calmly and
reasonably with awkward situations.
Slowly,
shaking his head, Bedwyr retraced his steps back
through the mud to the
men and their fire. He supposed this uncharacteristic behaviour was to do with
the loss of her own small babe – but surely she would be over that? A child’s
death was a common enough thing, expected almost, for babes were frail
creatures. And she still had the other two boys, still had
Llacheu and Gwydre; how much loss could one small
babe
leave? He shrugged. Women were strange creatures. A pity
though, he had always thought Gwenhwyfar different
to the
rest of them. He ducked into the smoky-damp warmth of the men’s
shelter, shook his head. They would not be leaving this wretched place this
side of the morrow’s morning.

§L

Sweeping a hand through the crown of her
hair, Gwenhwyfar raked the curls with her spread fingers. She felt unwashed and
itchy; there was water in the burn beyond the gate, how long before she could
cleanse herself of the grime from this squalid place? She sighed and hunkered
down to her heels beside the babe that was once again whimpering, its knees drawn
tight against its belly.

Patiently, Nessa dribbled
cooled, boiled water into its
mouth.
Within moments it spewed it back. The hand-maid
shook
her head. The child would not survive long.

Gwenhwyfar glanced at the mother, sleeping
fitfully, then screwed her eyes shut against threatening tears. The memories of
her own last child, that had been born close to death, were
too new and vivid. The ragged skin draped across
the door was
thrown back, and Bedwyr entered, his hair and shoulders
glistening wet. ‘It’s
raining again,’ he said pointlessly. ‘I
thought it would not hold off for long.’ Resisting the
impulse to
cover his mouth and nose against the putrid stench that filled
_,
the place, he added, ‘I know not how you stand this foul
air.’
The smell of
death,’ Gwenhwyfar answered despondently,
without
looking round. ‘You grow used to it.’ She lifted the
baby, cradling the pathetic thing in her arms,
giving it some
love as its brief, pain-ridden life fluttered and
surrendered to what had to be. Her tears were there, but did not come. The
terrible remembrance of her own recent loss had carried her beyond the point of
weeping.

She laid the dead child
beside the fire, covering the little
body
with a rough-spun blanket. The mother stirred, her
hollow eyes resting on the bundle. She had said little of
who she
was, where she had come from. Was not
likely to say more; Gwenhwyfar did not wish to know.

‘Shall I take the babe? Bury it?’ Bedwyr
squatted before her,
concerned; she looked
so tired and sad. ‘We knew it would die,’ he reminded her, as though he had
spoken the words a thousand
times. To himself he had, sitting before a
smoking fire in the
derelict guard room,
where the men of the escort had said
nought, although their uneasy
thoughts showed plain enough.

When Gwenhwyfar failed to answer, he sighed,
moved to gather the dead child and strode once more out into the rain. What was
the use? She had been determined to stay from the
outset and was hardly likely to ride away now, not until the
thing
was finished. He crossed himself, hoped the girl’s god would hurry and take
her. Preferably before mid-morning; that would give them chance to cover a few
more miles.

Gwenhwyfar
watched him go. Poor Bedwyr.

‘
You are a good woman, Lady.
May Christ give you his blessing.’ The girl’s eyes had flickered open, she
attempted a smile.

Startled, Gwenhwyfar
gasped, went to her. ‘You are a
Christian?’
The girl glanced at the fire, saw the bundle had
been
removed. In less than a whisper, said, ‘Jesu looked on me with His
love, when he sent you.’

‘It was the storm that brought us to this
place, not Christ.’
The girl tried to laugh.
She would have been pretty, had it
not been for the grime and
pain-hollowed cheeks. ‘He brought
the
storm.’ Her speech was slurring through a daze of the sickly
stuff Gwenhwyfar had induced her to drink. ‘That
one with
you,’ she managed, ‘though he
is kind, he would not have
stayed.
He would have waited for the anger in the skies to pass,
then ridden on.
After dispatching me first.’
Gwenhwyfar
could not deny it.

‘Why did our
Lord take my babe?’
Gwenhwyfar
did not know how to answer, it was a question
she
would ask for herself. But there was no need to think of one.
The girl
could ask Christ.

Tutting beneath her
breath at the senseless waste of life,
Nessa covered the dead girl, said, ‘I’ll inform Lord
Bedwyr,’ and
scuttled from the
hut, hurrying through the rain, relieved that
at
last they could be gone from this foul place.

Gwenhwyfar rose, her joints stiff, back
aching, thinking and
thinking of her own dead
children, folded her arms around
herself to stop the shivering. She had
never forgotten plump little Amr, and now the other son, born three months
past. She
saw in front of her, where the
dead girl’s babe had lain, her own
child’s
little crinkled face, blue tinged, his lungs unable to
breathe life-giving air. She leant against the
rough stonework of
the Wall, which formed the rear of the room, rested
her head against its cold, old dampness, closed her eyes, and wept.

Rain drummed on the turf roof, finding its
way through the
gaps and holes, puddling on
the earth floor. Thunder was again
grumbling somewhere. Gwenhwyfar left
the hut, stood beyond the shelter of the sloping roof, letting the cooling rain
mingle
with her hot tears. She could hear
the men thankfully preparing to leave, they were talking and laughing,
gathering their belongings, saddling their horses. The north gate through the
Wall was barred
by a broken hurdle, beyond stretched the solitude of the
rain
mizzled hills. Gwenhwyfar lifted the
hurdle aside, intending to go
only as far as the trickling burn. She did
not notice the rain
stinging against her
skin as she splashed through the water, up the
far bank and out onto the
open moorland.