The Wind From Hastings by Morgan Llywelyn Page B

“Where are they, my lady? What have you done with the children?”
    â€œThey could not be here!” exclaimed someone. “Small children could not have made the trip to this desolate spot. They must have left them on the other side of Llanberis Pass!”
    I felt contempt for any man who might think the children of Griffith ap Llywelyn too weak for mountain climbing! But I knew better than to open my mouth and brag; let them think the children were elsewhere.
    Gareth kept his eyes on mine. “Where are they?” he said sternly.
    I glared at him and clamped my jaws shut.
    â€œSearch!” he cried. “We will not leave this place until every rock is turned over and every crevice plumbed. I tell you Griffith’s whelps are here, and they must be found!”
    There was no way I could save them, nothing I could do but lie helpless and heartsick. I heard the Saxons scrambling about in the rocks, awkward and swearing, and I wished they might all fall and break their necks.
    Ill wishes do no one any good. They found the children eventually and brought them to Gareth, together with a trembling but defiant Gwladys. One of the Saxons had a rueful smile and a swiftly closing enpurpled
eye. “She hit me with a rock, but I wrestled her down,” he reported cheerfully.
    â€œGood job. It is close upon sundown; we will camp here for the night and leave by daybreak; some of Griffith’s rebels may still be alive in these mountains. The sooner we get out of here the better I shall feel.”
    So they brought us down from the mountains, to the deep blue bay where Godwine’s Saxon ships rode at anchor. I cannot say we were treated unfairly. At Gareth’s order Gwladys was allowed to tend to my needs and dress the children; she bound up my hair for me and saw to it that my appearance did honor to my husband’s memory.
    Part of Griffith came with us also. In a wicker basket, strapped onto the back of a pony who carried no other burden. I tried never to see that pony.
    A landing party met us at the shore. Like Gareth and his men, they wore a body armor of boiled leather, replacing the links of mail I remembered from my childhood. Gareth had caught me eyeing it once and commented, “It is an invention of Harold Godwine, much lighter and easier for mountain warfare. He has many strings to his bow, our Harold,.”
    Our company was drawn up along the beach as the landing party set out from the foremost ship. The boat carried a gonfalon at its prow, a flag hanging from a crosspiece and bearing the golden emblem of the Fighting Man, which was Harold Godwine’s personal device. Beside his banner stood Harold himself, legs braced against the rolling of the boat, the first man to leap out and onto the conquered Welsh shore.
    In childhood I may have seen Harold Godwine at some feast day, though I do not remember. I had heard whispers that he was handsome above other men, but as he looked nothing like Griffith ap Llywelyn I found him ugly. He was of an age with Griffith, somewhere in his early forties, but there all resemblance ended.
    The brute stood a head taller than the tallest of his
men, so that one could not look honestly into his eyes. His hair, cropped short for battle, was as gold as the Fighting Man; the face beneath it might have been chiseled from stone, so firm and unyielding it was.
    His eyes were blue, icy as the Irish Sea. The lashes and brows were gold like his hair, but so pale against his sunburned skin that he appeared to have none. He looked like what he was, half Saxon and half Dane, all arrogance. He returned his captain’s salute and listened gravely to his report, glancing once toward the pony who stood waiting with his dreadful wicker hamper. Then he nodded and strode briskly over to me.
    â€œYour servant, madam,” he said formally. His voice was not deep and rich like Griffith’s, it was roughened by too much shouting in battle.
    â€œGod strike you