Page 40 of The Bear's Heart
Arthur’s face remained impassive. He wasn’t going to rise to any bait Manogan might throw at him. “We have a fleet of warships based at Caer Legeion. They’re always in need of men to man the oars. I couldn’t deprive my general of twenty brawny sailors. The Saxon prisoners will be kept in irons for the rest of their useful lives. Probably they’ll die chained to their oars. They’ll never again raise a weapon against a British kingdom.”
Manogan’s rheumy eyes flashed angrily. “I want your word that if you take prisoners again, you’ll give them to me.” He pointed at his two sons. “I’ve but the two boys left. I want my revenge for my firstborn, and I’ll have it.” He paused. “God has promised it to me.”
I very much doubted God had done anything of the sort, but it looked as though Manogan was convinced of it. I began to see why Beli regarded his father’s time spent praying inside the cathedral as time wasted.
Arthur shook his head. “I’ll make you no false promises. If we take prisoners, they’ll go to our fleet or to the tin mines in Cornubia, or the iron mines in Gwent where my cousin Caninus has need of strong arms.”
Manogan bristled with rage, his bloodless lips drawn together in a bitter line. “What plan does the Dux Britanniarum have to offer, then?” He was a proud old man, and having to ask another king for help obviously came hard to him. His face mirrored the thoughts that must be flashing through his head.
Arthur leaned forward. “I’ll need detailed reports of where the attacks have come, a map of your kingdom, and Prince Beli and your best warriors added to my force. I’ll need scouts who know the land, who I can send out to find the Saxon raiders with no risk of capture.” He paused. “And accommodation suited to the status of my queen. She’s tired after many days’ riding. And a bath for her.”
I was a tiny bit miffed my comforts had come last in his list of requirements, even though I was getting used to that by now, with a better understanding of his priorities.
Manogan’s bushy white brows jutted further in a frown, as though Arthur were asking for his own weight in gold. However, he barked a sharp order to his older son, and the prince disappeared, to return a minute later with a young woman in an ankle-length russet tunic, her long auburn hair bound in a single plait.
“My only daughter, Princess Essylt,” Manogan said, nodding to Arthur. “She will see your queen well cared for.”
For a moment I was distracted. Essylt? Why did that name seem familiar?
I didn’t really want to leave Arthur with the irascible king of this strangely hostile northern kingdom, but he was right. I was exhausted. With reluctance, I rose from my uncomfortably hard seat and went with Princess Essylt through a door in the back of the hall and out into the more Romanized part of her father’s palace.
She was young, scarcely more than fifteen, I’d have guessed, and very pretty, with large hazel eyes, a generous mouth and a sprinkling of freckles across her well-proportioned nose. “We’ve prepared the best guest rooms for you and the Dux Britanniarum,” she said as we walked down a wide corridor whose un-shuttered windows opened onto a shady courtyard garden.
The best guest accommodation consisted of a pair of rooms opening into one another. The outer was an antechamber with seating and a table. Intricately carved double oak doors led into a spacious sleeping chamber furnished with a wide, fur-covered bed. A mosaic of geometric shapes decorated the floors of both rooms, and faded, vaguely pornographic scenes adorned the walls. She didn’t seem in the least bit self-conscious about taking a visiting queen into what looked as though it might once have been a brothel.
A pair of servants were waiting in the antechamber. Princess Essylt sent them off with a wave of her hand to fetch a bathtub and hot water, and sat herself down on one of the cushioned benches. Leaving her there, I went into the bedchamber.
Our saddlebags had been brought in from the stables by a servant and lay on the floor beside the bed. I sat down, glad to have my bottom on something soft at last, and then lay back, letting the comfort of the bed wash over my aching limbs. I laid my hands on the still only slight rise of my belly, thinking about the growing child within.
Essylt appeared at the door and stood for a moment looking down at me. “Are you really a queen?”
I didn’t sit up. The bed was too comfortable. “Yes, I am.”
“You don’t look like one. Not that I’ve ever met one. My mother died when I was young, birthing my sister. And no queen has ever visited us before. Queens usually stay behind when kings go to war.”
“Not me. I’m different.” She’d have been surprised at how different.
She nodded, leaning against the doorpost. “I know. You’re the Ring Maiden.”
I wanted to change the subject. “Didn’t your father marry again after your mother died?” If I closed my eyes, I would surely be asleep in minutes.
She shook her head. “He never took another wife. God told him not to. My father is famous for his piety, and now for his celibacy, as well.” She stepped up to the bed. “Are you with child?”
“I am indeed.”
From outside in the antechamber came the sound of the bath arriving.
She put out a hand and touched my saddlebags. “Do you have dresses in here? Or do you always dress as a boy? It’ll look funny when you’ve a nine-month belly.”
I pushed myself upright. “I have dresses with me, but it’s easier to ride in boys’ clothes. Don’t you ever ride?” She was young, and she was a princess, so surely she must ride. The nagging feeling that I should know who she was persisted, but I was too tired to concentrate.
“Not by myself.” She sounded shocked. “I hunt sometimes, sitting up behind my father’s body servant with my hawk. But I’ve never straddled a horse as you were doing when you arrived.” She paused, and then said, by way of explanation, “I was watching, and saw you. It looks a much better way to ride, but I don’t think my father would allow it. He’d say it wasn’t ladylike.”
I stifled a yawn. “Have you never asked him if you could ride properly?”
She shook her head.
I got to my feet and went to the doors into the antechamber. The two servants were pouring jugs of hot water into a wooden bath which looked like a foreshortened but wide-based beer barrel lined with white sheeting. Just what I needed– a hot soak for my aching limbs.
