the bishop’s face. His smile of welcome wilted, and his eyes grew sad. “Ah,” he sighed. “I would that you had asked anything but that. Alas, you will not find the man you seek amongst the living.” He shook his head with weary regret. “Our young Prince Bran is dead.”
“Dead! Oh, dear God, how?” Aethelfrith gasped. “When did this happen?”
“Last autumn, it was,” replied the bishop. “As to how it happened—there was a fight, and he was cruelly cut down when trying to escape Count de Braose’s knights.” The English monk staggered backward and collapsed on a bench against the wall. “Here; rest a moment,” said Asaph. “Brother Clyro, fetch our guest some water.”
Clyro hobbled away, and the bishop sat down beside his guest. “I am sorry, my friend,” he said. “Your question caught me off guard, or I might have softened the blow for you.”
“Where is he buried? I will go and offer a prayer for his soul.”
“You knew our Bran?”
“Met him once. He stayed the night with me—he and that tall tree of a fellow—what was his name? John! They had a priest with them. Good man, I think. One of yours?”
“Iwan, yes. And Ffreol, perhaps?”
“The very fellows!” Aethelfrith nodded. “They were on their way to Lundein to see the king. I went with them in the end. Sorely disappointed they were. But I could have told them. The Ffreinc are bastards.”
“From what we have been able to learn,” Asaph said, “our Bran was captured on his way home. He was killed a few days later trying to escape.” He regarded his visitor with soft-eyed sadness. “It pains me the more,” he continued, “but Iwan and Brother Ffreol also fell afoul of Count de Braose.”
“Dead, too? All of them?” asked Aethelfrith.
Bishop Asaph bent his head in sorrowful assent.
“Filthy Norman scum,” growled the friar. “Kill first and repent later. That is all they know. Worse than Danes!”
“There was nothing to be done,” Asaph said. “We said a Mass for him, of course. But”—he lifted his hands helplessly —“there it is.”
“So now you have no king,” observed Aethelfrith.
“Bran was the last of his line,” affirmed the bishop. “We must be content now to simply survive and endure this unjust reign as best we can. And now”—his voice quivered slightly— “another blow has been dealt us. The monastery has been taken over for a market town.”
“Scabby thieves, the lot of ’em!” muttered Aethelfrith.
“Nay, worse than that. Even the lowest thief wouldn’t rob God of his home.”
“Baron de Braose has determined to install his own churchmen in this place. They are to arrive any day—indeed, when you came to the door, we thought it might be the new abbot come to drive us from our chapel.”
“Where will you go?”
“We are not without friends. The monastery of Saint Dyfrig in the north is sister to Llanelli, or once was. We will go to them . . . and from there?” The bishop offered a forlorn smile. “It is in God’s hands.”
“Then I am doubly sorry,” said Aethelfrith. “This world is full of trouble, God knows, and he spares not his own servants.” Brother Clyro returned with a bowl of water, which he offered to their guest. Aethelfrith accepted the bowl and drank deeply.
“Why did you want to see our Bran?” asked the bishop when he had finished.
“I had a notion to help him,” replied the friar. “But now that I see how events have fallen out, I warrant it a poor idea.
In any event, it is of no consequence now.”
“I see,” replied the bishop. He did not press the matter.
“Have you travelled far?”
“From Hereford. I keep an oratory there—Saint Ennion’s.
Have you heard of it?”
“Of course, yes,” replied the bishop. “One of our own dear saints from long ago.”
“To be sure,” conceded Aethelfrith. “But it is home to me now.”
“Then it is too far to come and return all at once. You must stay with us a few days”—the bishop lifted a hand in a gesture of helplessness—“or until the Ffreinc come to drive us all away.”
Friar Aethelfrith spent the next day helping Asaph and Clyro pack their belongings. They wrapped the bound parchment copies of the Psalms and the book of Saint Matthew, as well as the small golden bowl used for the Eucharist on high holy days. These things had to be disguised and secreted amongst the other bundles of clerical implements and utensils, for fear that the Ffreinc would confiscate them if their value was known.