to jump. “Until tonight, my love,” he said over his shoulder, then dropped to the ground in the yard outside.
Mérian rushed to the window and pulled the heavy wooden shutter closed, then turned and began busying herself, stirring up the embers on the hearth as the sleep-numbed cook shambled into the large, dark room.
Bran leaned back against the side of the house and listened to the voices drifting down from the room above—to the cook’s mumbled question and Mérian’s explanation of what she was doing in the kitchen before break of day. He smiled to himself. True, he had not yet succeeded in winning his way into Mérian’s bed; Lord Cadwgan’s fetching daughter was proving a match worthy of his wiles. Even so, before summer was gone he would succeed. Of that he was certain.
Oh, but the season of warmth and light was everywhere in full retreat. Already the soft greens and yellows of summer were fading into autumn drab. Soon, all too soon, the fair, bright days would give way to the endless grey of clouds and mist and icy, wind-lashed rain.
That was a concern for another time; now he must be on his way. Drawing the hood of his cloak over his head, Bran darted across the yard, scaled the wall at its lowest span, and ran to his horse, which was tethered behind a hawthorn thicket next to the wall.
With the wind at his back and a little luck, he would reach Caer Cadarn well before his father departed for Lundein.
The day was breaking fair, and the track was dry, so he pushed his mount hard: pelting down the broad hillsides, splashing across the streams, and flying up the steep, wheel-rutted trails. Luck was not with him, however, for he had just glimpsed the pale shimmer of the caer’s whitewashed wooden palisade in the distance when his horse pulled up lame. The unfortunate beast jolted to a halt and refused to go farther.
No amount of coaxing could persuade the animal to move. Sliding from the saddle, Bran examined the left foreleg. The shoe had torn away—probably lost amidst the rocks of the last streambed—and the hoof was split. There was blood on the fetlock. Bran lowered the leg with a sigh and, retrieving the reins, began leading his limping mount along the track.
His father would be waiting now, and he would be angry.
But then, he thought, when was Lord Brychan not angry?
For the last many years—indeed, ever since Bran could remember—his father had nursed one continual simmering rage. It forever seethed just beneath the surface and was only too likely to boil over at the slightest provocation. And then, God help whoever or whatever was nearby. Objects were hurled against walls; dogs were kicked, and servants too; everyone within shouting distance received the ready lash of their surly lord’s tongue.
Bran arrived at the caer far later than he had intended, slinking through the wide-open gate. Like a smith opening the forge furnace door, he braced himself for the heat of his father’s angry blast. But the yard was empty of all save Gwrgi, the lord’s half-blind staghound, who came snuffling up to put his wet muzzle in Bran’s palm. “Everyone gone?” Bran asked, looking around. The old dog licked the back of his hand.
Just then his father’s steward stepped from the hall. A dour and disapproving stilt of a man, he loomed over all the comings and goings of the caer like a damp cloud and was never happy unless he could make someone else as miserable as himself. “You are too late,” he informed Bran, ripe satisfaction dripping from his thin lips.
“I can see that, Maelgwnt,” said Bran. “How long ago did they leave?”
“You won’t catch them,” replied the steward, “if that’s what you’re thinking. Sometimes I wonder if you think at all.”
“Get me a horse,” ordered Bran.
“Why?” Maelgwnt asked, eyeing the mount standing inside the gate. “Have you ruined another one?”
“Just get me a horse. I don’t have time to argue.”
“Of course, sire, right away,” sniffed the steward. “As soon as you tell me where to find one.”
“What do you mean?” demanded Bran.
“There are none.”
With a grunt of impatience, Bran hurried to the stable at the far end of the long, rectangular yard. He found one of the grooms mucking out the stalls. “Quick, Cefn, I need a horse.”
“Lord Bran,” said the young servant, “I’m sorry. There are none left.”
“They’ve taken them all ?”
“The whole warband was summoned,” the groom explained. “They needed every horse