Page 56 of The Road to Avalon
Archfedd must have dismounted as well. Suddenly she was beside me, Llawfrodedd just behind her. “Where is he? Where’s my brother?” She stared wide-eyed at her father as her voice rose.
“Hold her, Llawfrodedd,” Cei said.
Archfedd rounded on him. “I don’t need holding. Where’s my brother?”
I shook Cei off. “Neither do I. Where is my son?”
In the pit of my stomach a horrible dread was forming, like a ball of cold stone, weighing me down. My legs had dissolved into jelly. How was I even standing?
I stared up into Arthur’s gray-tinged face, his eyes ringed with shadows not put there just by exhaustion, and in them I read horror, disgust, despair.
“He ran,” he said, the words emerging racked with pain from between rigid lips. “Tell me why he would run if he was innocent?”
Archfedd’s eyes had gone so wide they looked as though they might start out of her head. “Because he knew you’d blame him,” she cried, her voice rising. “Because youdid! He thought you didn’t love him and would blame him because of his fight with Llacheu.”
“He ran,” Arthur repeated. “What else was I to think?”
Shock had me in its relentless grip. “That he should have the benefit of the doubt. That you should hearhisside of the story.” How were the words coming out of my mouth? My heart pounded so hard and loud everyone must have been able to hear its thundering rhythm. It beat inside my head. My ears throbbed, and my body shook with it.
“Where’s my brother?” Archfedd’s demand came out on a broken sob. “What have youdoneto him?”
Cei made a grab for me again, but I shook him off. “Where is my son?” I spat out the words like bullets.
Arthur lifted a hand in my direction, but I stepped back, my own hands up to beat him off, not wanting to be touched. Not by him.
“He ran,” he said again, as though this justified everything. “He ran because he was guilty. He did it, Gwen. He did it. He killed his brother like a thief in the night. He crept up behind him and opened his throat and dumped him on a midden like a dead dog.”
“But hedidn’t,” I spat. “He’s innocent. Merlinsaw. Hetoldme Amhar was innocent.” If only we had Merlin with us. Without him I was impotent and powerless, as though every argument I made were feeble. I rounded on Cei. “Where is he? Where’s my son?”
Cei’s blue eyes went to Arthur.
The conviction they’d done something terrible overcame me. I lunged for Cei, this time, hammering my fists on his broad, mail-covered chest. “You have to tell me.” Tears ran down my cheeks. “What have youdone?”
Arthur’s strong hands grabbed me by my shoulders and pulled me around to face him. I kept on going, hitting him, now, as hard as I could with my balled fists. “You’ve done something to him. I know you have.” Despite my determination to keep calm, I couldn’t keep any semblance of control.
“No! Don’t!” Cei shouted.
Still gripped in Arthur’s hands, I craned my head around to see why Cei had shouted.
Archfedd had pushed open the farmhouse door and was standing in the oblong of darkness, staring inwards, frozen to the spot.
Cei ran to her, reaching her at the same time as Llawfrodedd. They snatched her away from the door and it banged shut behind them. Limp in their grip, her face blanched paper-white and her mouth hung open in a wordless scream.
I fought Arthur’s grip. “What is it?” I had to make him let me go. In desperation, my knee came up and caught him in the groin. He doubled over and released his hold. I raced for the farmhouse door. Llawfrodedd and Cei were too busy hanging on to Archfedd to be able to stop me.
I flung the door wide, the bright summer sunshine streaming in across the beaten earth floor. Not much furniture. Just a long oak table in the center.
Amhar lay on the table. His head at an awkward angle. It had been severed from his body.
I screamed. The world spun and the ground came up and hit me hard. Merciful darkness descended.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Someone was carryingme in their arms, the unsteady motion making my stomach lurch. My head lolled against a solid shoulder, and the familiar smell of sweat and leather and horses surrounded me. I tried to open my eyes, but the world spun, and I had to shut them again, drawing deep breaths to steady my pounding heart.
Even then, the dizziness continued, as though the whole world were rocking like a ship at sea. Nausea welled in my stomach, but I’d eaten nothing and all that came up was bile. I swallowed it and wished I hadn’t. Sounds boomed as though I were underwater: voices, the whinny of a horse, a cockerel crowing, the crunch of heavy footsteps as they jarred through me.
Whoever was carrying me laid me down gently on a hard, lumpy surface. My groping fingers, desperate for something tangible to cling to, grasped the roughness of a blanket. I fisted my hands on the cloth, pulling it tight about me, as the world beneath me rolled as though the ship had met a storm.
