cramped muscles. “Well then,” he said, “let us wake the others and get started. There is much to do, and no time to lose.”
Angharad lifted her hand to the men slumped across the room. “Patience. Let them sleep. There will be little enough time for that in the days to come.” Indicating his own empty sleeping place, she said, “It would be no bad thing if you closed your eyes while you have the chance.”
“I could not sleep now for all of the baron’s riches,” he told her.
“Nor could I,” she said, rising slowly. “Since that is the way of it, let us greet the dawn and ask the King of Hosts to bless our battle plan and the hands that must work to make it succeed.” She stepped to the door and pushed aside the ox hide, beckoning him to follow.
They stood for a moment in the early light and listened to the forest awaken around them as the dawn chorus of birds filled the treetops. Bran looked out at the pitiful clutch of humble dwellings, but felt himself a king of a vast domain.
“The day begins,” he said after a moment. “I want to get started.”
“In a little while,” she suggested. “Let us enjoy the peace of the moment.”
“No, now,” he countered. “Bring me my hood and cloak; then wake everyone and assemble them. They should remember this day.”
“Why this day above any other?”
“Because,” explained Bran, “from this day on, they are no longer fugitives and outcasts. Today they become King Raven’s faithful flock.”
“The Grellon,” suggested Angharad—an old word, it meant both “flock” and “following.”
“Grellon,” repeated Bran as the banfáith moved off to strike the iron and rouse Cél Craidd. He turned his face to the warm red glow of the rising sun. “This day,” he declared, speaking softly to himself, “the deliverance of Elfael begins.”
It is a very great honour,” said Queen Anora. “I would have thought you would be pleased.”
“How should I be pleased?”
“Relations are strained just now, it is true,” her mother granted. “But your father thought that perhaps—”
“My father, the king, has made his views quite clear,”
Mérian insisted. “Don’t tell me he has changed his opinion just because an invitation has come.”
“This may be the baron’s way of making amends,” her mother countered. It was a weak argument, and Mérian regarded her mother with a frown of haughty disdain. “The baron knows he has done wrong and wishes to restore the peace.”
“Oh, so now the baron repents, and the king dances dizzy with gratitude?” said Mérian.
“Mérian!” reprimanded her mother sharply. “That will do, girl. You will respect your father and abide by his decision.”
“What?” demanded Mérian. “And is there nothing to be said?”
“You have said quite enough.” Her mother, stiff backed, turned in her chair to face her. “You will obey.”
“But I do not understand,” insisted the young woman. “It makes no sense.”
“Your father has his reasons,” replied the queen simply.
“And we must respect them.”
“Even if he is wrong?” countered Mérian. “That is most unfair, Mother.”
Queen Anora observed her daughter’s distraught expression— brows knit, mouth pressed hard, eyes narrowed—and remembered her as an infant demanding to be let down to walk in the grass on the riverbank and being told that she could not because it was too dangerous so close to the water. “It is only an invitation to join the court for a summer,” her mother said, trying to lighten the mood. “The time will pass quickly.”
“Pass as it may,” Mérian declared loftily, “it will pass without me!” She rose and fled her mother’s chamber, stalking down the narrow corridor to her own room, where she went to the window and shoved open the shutters with a crash. The early evening air was soft and warm, the fading light like honey on the yard outside her window, but she was not in a mood to take in such things, much less enjoy them. Her father’s decision seemed to her arbitrary and unfair. She should, she felt, have a say in it since it was she who must comply.
The baron’s courier had arrived earlier in the day with a message asking if Mérian might come to Hereford to spend the remainder of the summer with his lordship’s daughter, Sybil. He was hoping Mérian would help teach the young lady something of British customs and speech. Sybil would, of course, gladly reciprocate. Baron Neufmarché was certain the two ladies would become fast friends.
Lord Cadwgan had listened to the message, thanked the courier, and dismissed