*~*~*~*  

He heard a woman's voice call to him through the 
peaceful darkness. There was no pain here. The night 
covered him like a warm blanket and all he had to do 
was sleep. 

The voice came again, and, deciding he must be the 
one being addressed, he tried to wake, feeling tired 
and light-headed. Finally getting both eyes open, he 
watched sleepily for a moment as the stars swirled in 
lazy, unfamiliar patterns through the Heavens. This 
was not his world, not his Heaven. He was floating: 
he could feel the boat raising and dipping with the 
gentle waves. 

It took him a moment to realize it was a funeral 
pyre. He was lying on a soft pallet on a raft, 
wearing his armor and holding his father's sword, the 
way the pagans once venerated their high kings after 
death. Soon, the men would light the kindling around 
him and the pyre would bear his body away until it 
was a tiny blaze on the horizon.   

Somewhere in the back of his mind, Gwilym heard a 
priest telling him he was neither a pagan nor a king, 
but that voice seemed far off in the distance. He was 
drifting between Heaven and Earth, and the mysterious 
heavens felt much closer.  

He blinked, started to shake his head to clear it, 
and felt a pain so severe that it made his stomach 
tighten before it faded to a dull throb.  

He had not thought being dead would hurt so badly. 

Perhaps the raft was bearing him to Valhalla - the 
Viking Heaven. Perhaps once he reached it, the pain 
would stop. 

The woman's voice called again, and he turned his 
aching head slowly toward it. 

He was surprised that the small figure standing on 
the dock was hazy, like he was seeing her through a 
fog. There should not be fog on the water if the 
stars were so clear; that made no sense. Of course, 
it made no sense for him to be laying on a funeral 
pyre like a pagan king, either. 

She was so far away, but he could hear her calling to 
him as if she was beside him. 

He recognized her. He could not see her clearly, but 
he knew who she was. He had known her for eons, and 
now he was leaving her when he had promised he would 
not. 

He felt the pyre rising and falling with the water, 
ready to bear him away. 

He was so tired. He only wanted to rest, to sleep, 
but he had made a promise. 

She called to him again - not across the water, but 
as if she was a part of him, a reminder, an echo. If 
he let himself die, a part of her was going to die 
with him. He carried her inside him the way a woman 
carried a child. 

He tightened his hands on his father's sword, feeling 
the familiar hilt beneath his fingers. He was a 
warrior. He could battle anything, even Death. Odin 
and his Viking Heaven would just have to wait a 
lifetime. 

He had promised the woman he never lost a battle. 

He took a breath, and there was a sharp pain in his 
ribs in counterpoint to his dully throbbing head. She 
looked miles away. He could not fathom how he was 
going to return to her, but not dying was a good 
start. 

*~*~*~*  

"He is not dead," she insisted, pacing the length of 
her sitting room like a caged animal and clutching a 
piece of dirty fabric in her hand. "William wanders 
off, but he always wanders back eventually. Perhaps 
he is a hostage-"  

"Duana," Fitz said softly, trying to soothe her. "You 
are going to make yourself sick again. It has been 
days now. There were no hostages. The battle went 
exactly as William said it would: the English Army 
surrounded the French and butchered them. Only the 
side that wins takes hostages."  

"But he was not in the battle. William promised..." 
She stopped, looked away, and seemed to grow a 
littler smaller. "He promised," she repeated. 

FitzWalter kept having this same conversation with 
her, over and over, until he was beginning to fear 
for her sanity. 

"They have looked among the wounded: he is not 
there," he told her again. 

"And the dead?" she managed to ask.  

His stern expression started to crumple, and he 
closed his eyes, trying to find a gentle way to tell 
her this. "Sometimes it is difficult to tell. Yes, 
they think so. They think he must be among the dead."  

"Then bring me his body."  

Fitz stared at the floor, not answering. 

"He is still alive, and he is hurt and alone. I know 
it," she insisted. "You have to keep looking." 

"His men saw him fall." William had to be one of the 
dead so mutilated that he was unidentifiable, even by 
his men, and Fitz did not want to share that with 
Duana. "They found his horse wandering."  

"If he was dead, I would feel it, and I do not."   

"I am sorry, Duana. I want you to know I did not plan 
this - nor did I want it to happen, but it is God's 
will. Continuing to believe he somehow survived is 
not rational. Please let yourself grieve and stop 
insisting that William is out there. I am not going 
to give you false hope by pretending there is 
somewhere they have not searched."  

"Please, Fitz," she said, her voice cracking, and his 
heart ached. "Keep looking. Let me go-"

"No," he interrupted. "I will go. I will have his men 
swear we have searched, if you do not believe me, but 
I will not allow you to see the battlefield - to sort 
through pieces of men and try to decide which piece
belonged to your husband. No, Duana."

She draped the man's shirt she had been carrying over 
the back of a chair, rested her hand on it for a 
moment, took a breath and offered, "Whatever you 
want."  

He glanced at her, not understanding, and found her 
teary blue eyes focused on his.  

"I will do whatever you want, just send out another 
search party to look for William.  He is alive, but 
he is hurt. He needs help. I know it. Please, have 
your men keep looking, and I will stay with you until 
William is found."  

The noises of the castle - the servants in the 
hallways, calling instructions, gossiping, laughing  
 - they became very loud and her sitting room very 
silent as he realized exactly what Duana was saying.  

"You know my secrets," he answered. "You have for a 
long time, I think." He picked up her hand, rubbing 
his thumb over hers. "If I thought it would help you 
now, ease your pain, even get you to sleep, I would 
gladly take you to my bed. Then I would have my 
marriage to Isabelle annulled and marry you as soon 
as the banns could be posted. I cannot say that I 
have not thought about it. But I also cannot say I 
care for you and then allow you to act against your 
will. He is dead, Duana. Humiliating yourself will 
not bring him back." 

"I am with child," she said evenly. "He is not dead. 
Please, Fitz. Keep looking."  

"I will keep looking," he replied, dropping her hand.  

*~*~*~*  

The first sensation was a sickening, throbbing pain, 
as though his whole head was a giant toothache. There 
was a flash of light, and Gwilym jerked his face away,  
moaning, and swirled back into the buoyant darkness 
for a few seconds. When the hammer pounding on his 
skull subsided to steady agony, he tried opening his 
eyes, and found himself staring at daylight drizzling 
down through an old thatched roof.   

"Have you finally awakened?" a husky female voice 
asked, putting something wonderfully cool on his 
forehead. A hand, he realized - a woman's hand.  

He tried to answer, noticing the coppery taste of 
blood in his mouth.  

"Drink," she said holding a cup to his lips and 
spilling most of it down his chin and neck.   

"...Happened? What happened?" he mumbled, discovering 
he could speak French as she did, although that was 
not the language he thought within his head. "Get 
here?"  

"There was a battle. Many men died, but you did not. 
You have just hit your head."   

Her face came into focus for an instant: deep brown 
eyes, square cheekbones and full, wide lips, and he 
reached out to touch her, trying to see if she was 
real. She took his hand and rested her jaw in his 
open palm, nuzzling as though they were lovers, and, 
on instinct, Gwilym pulled away. "Get... Get Scully. 
Dana."  

"Who is that?" she asked, picking up his hand again 
and running her finger down his bare chest.   

Images and sensations taunted him as he tried to 
think, coming close to his mind and then fading into 
nothing. There was another pretty, dark-haired woman 
with a little boy on her hip and a hand on her belly, 
telling him to hurry home, that this child was his. 
Hearing hoof beats, feeling the weight of armor on 
his shoulders as he rode away. A fire - the smell of 
burnt hair and the sound of a baby crying. A few too 
many women, far too many battles: those swirled by 
quickly. Frantically searching for something he could 
not find. A girl; he was looking for a little girl 
but she was not in the valley anymore. No, he found 
the girl, so now he was searching for a woman with 
red hair swirling around her face in the icy water. 
She was so cold - someone had hurt her and she was 
cold and afraid, but if he held her against him she 
would be warm again. There were English soldiers, 
Templar monks, a dying king. Tombs: cool marble under 
his fingertips as he cried. Spring. Bonfires. Holding 
a minuscule baby in his arms and a woman pulling back 
the blanket to show him this was a son. Tired, happy 
blue eyes. Then there was blood - so much blood so 
quickly. A battle that he was not supposed to be in, 
but he was going to be careful because he had made a 
promise - an adduned - but his saddle girth broke and 
the ground rushed at him and the sound of a mace 
whistling near his ear and then... just an eternity 
of nothing.   

"I am hurt. Please... Get Dana."  

This time there was no response.  

Gwilym must have moved his head, because the sunlight 
darkened like a candle almost snuffed out, flickered, 
and then slowly returned. There were the stars again,  
laughing at him as they floated by, and then the 
purple and scarlet of the sunrise.   

He licked his cracked lips, and tried, "You? Who are 
you?"  

"My name is Dana," the same woman's voice answered, 
"You have been asking for me. Do you remember?"  

"No... No. Are you Dana?" He squinted at her, having 
the sense that something was not right, and started 
to nod 'no,' but caught himself in time.   

"It is all right." She took his hand, holding it 
between both of hers. "Just rest." 

"...my name? W-who am I?"  

She leaned closer so he could see her pretty dark 
eyes, laying his hand on her slightly pregnant belly 
and then stroked his cheek. "You are my husband."  

*~*~*~*  

It hurt to breathe. To move. Sometimes, it hurt to 
think, even. 

Seeing him standing in the doorway of the hut, hands 
braced on the rough timber beams on either side, she 
observed, "You are up. That is good."  

"I am up. I am not sure I am good," Gwilym replied, 
waiting for the trees at the edge of the clearing to 
stop swaying.   

She smiled, wiping her hands on her mended skirt, and 
getting up from the fire to come kiss him. When he 
pulled back after a few seconds, she asked, "Is 
something wrong?"  

"Yes. No. You are going to have a child?" She nodded. 
"We should not be together while you are with child. 
That is why I stopped you last night," he lied. "Da-"  
He kept trying to call her that and failing. "How is 
it that I call you Dana? That is not a nice name in 
Welsh - to call a woman 'under.'"  

"It is my name." She shrugged, turning away to add 
more wood to the fire.  

"Tell me again: what is my name?"  

"You still do not remember?"  

He thought for a moment. "Fox."  

"That is not a name, that is an animal," she teased, 
tucking her long hair behind her ears.  

He grinned sheepishly. "Whose land is this; whose 
forest?"  

Her brown eyes looked puzzled for a moment, as though 
a shadow had passed over them. "The King's."  

"But who owns the fief? Who is my liege lord? You 
said there was a battle - for whom do I fight?" When 
she did not answer, he continued, "Look at something;  
I noticed this yesterday: look at my hands." Gwilym 
held them out for her. "There are no calluses except 
where I have held reins and a sword. Are these not 
the softest hands you have ever seen? There are pale 
lines where there were rings not so long ago. Are you 
sure I am whom you say? Are we hiding from someone? 
This place seems very safe - very far from the 
world."  

"Feel," she told him, taking the hand he was holding 
out and putting it on her belly. "Your son is 
moving."  

"He is moving," Gwilym agreed in French, and then 
said in Welsh, "He will be proud his father speaks 
this language." In Latin: "And this one, whatever it 
is." He added rapidly in Manx Gaelic, and English: 
"And this one, and this."  

She stepped back, giving him a wide berth as he 
stooped down, very slowly and carefully, and, using 
his finger, wrote in the dirt: 'Llwynog ap Gwilym.' 
"That says 'Fox, son of William,' and this," he 
wrote, "Is that name in another language, and 
another, and another. Am I not the most well-educated 
serf you have ever seen... Wife?" he said, drawing 
out the last word. "Even if I am a tradesman or a 
merchant, I should not be able to read and write so 
well. And the calluses; I would not have carried a 
sword unless I am a knight."  

"You have hit your head hard. Perhaps you should lay 
down again," she tried to persuade him.   

"Are you my mistress?" Gwilym asked, trying to figure 
out why this woman kept skirting around that he was a 
gentleman and she was a commoner, albeit a pretty 
one. Very pretty, but clearly a peasant. "I am not 
angry with you - you have probably saved my life, in 
fact, but I do not belong here in the forest, in this 
life. I only want to know where I belong. You are 
good to me, but I feel adrift, as though someone cut 
all the ropes and obligations holding me and set me 
free. Many men would envy that, but I do not. If you 
do not know who I am, or if I cannot be that man any 
longer, at least tell me who I was."   

"You are my husband," she insisted, her eyes getting 
damp.  

"You keep saying that. Would you like to know what I 
think?"   

She shook her head vigorously 'no,' chestnut hair 
flying in all directions.   

"I am not angry with you; do not be afraid. I think, 
wherever this battle was, you went to the field 
afterward looking for your husband among the dead and 
found me instead. When I did not remember who I was, 
you found it easier to believe that I was your 
husband than to accept that he was killed. I do not 
think this is my land or my home, and I will swear on 
my honor that whoever 'Dana' is, it is not you."  

"You are my husband," she whimpered. "He is not dead. 
You are my husband!"  

He reached inside his filthy, torn shirt - that had 
been his first clue: redressing and discovering the 
fabric, the fit, and the careful, tiny stitches of 
his clothing. Someone had spent a great deal of time 
and money making his shirt and breeches. Given that 
his right hand seemed clumsy, it was probably not he.   

Unpinning the green length of cord he had found 
there yesterday, he pulled it out, holding it between 
his hands for her to see. "Do you know what this is?"  

She looked up through her tears, then shook her head 
'no.'  

"It tied around a man and a woman's hands when they
are married in the old way. I know this piece of 
cord is only for me. A woman gave it to me. I
can see her in my dreams. I can remember that 
night. That the marriage is for a year and a day,
and our year has not yet passed. I promised her 
I would come back for her: that souls mate eternally 
and I would find her in this life or the next. But I 
have tried for a week to remember who the woman is 
and all I know is that it is not you," he said 
coolly.   

"You are my husband, and we are going to have a 
child!"  

"But who are you?" he pressed her gently, realizing 
how fragile she was.   

"I am... No, no... I am..."  

"You do not know either, do you?"  

Sinking into the dirt and pulling her knees as close 
to her chest as her belly would allow, she nodded 
'no,' starting to sob.  

*~*~*~*  

The city was asleep, noblemen and commoners locked 
behind the safety of stout doors. There had been a 
sliver of a moon the previous night, but now the rain 
clouds hid it from view. Hearing the horses return, 
Duana went to the window, then, wrapping her cloak 
around her and signaling her band of guards to 
follow, she hurried through the halls and courtyard 
to the gate.  

Fitz was dismounting, looking twenty years older in 
the dim light from the torches the servants brought 
to meet the search party.  

"You did not find him," she said, more as a statement 
than a question.  

"Prince Llewelyn arrived earlier. He and his men will 
search again in the morning, but William's body is 
not there to find, Duana. I would empty the Thames 
one bucketful at a time if I thought he might be at 
the bottom of it, but he is not. It is starting to 
rain. Go inside; you are going to catch cold."  

"Open the gate, Fitz," she said. She told her guards 
to wait, took a torch from one of the servants, and 
stepped past Fitz. When he did not respond, she 
ordered the castle guards, "Open it!"  

The men were on the verge of obeying when Fitz 
agreed: "Open the castle gate. Duana, where are you 
going?"  

She did not answer, so he hurried to catch up, taking 
long strides to keep pace with her.  

"I am not your prisoner anymore. That was the 
agreement. William won your war; I am free to go. If 
you and all your royal knights cannot manage to find 
one man in an open field, I will find him myself."  

"You cannot-" He took three big steps, getting in her 
path. "You cannot go-" She dodged around him. "For 
God's sake! Even if I let you go walking through the 
streets at night, all the city gates are closed. You 
cannot get out of London until morning."  

She spun around, looking like she had grown a foot 
taller. "Watch me!"  

The Welsh knights followed a few dozen feet behind 
her, but the English knights stopped beside Fitz as 
he watched Duana walking away. "My Lord? Do we stop 
her?"  

"No, she is correct. She is a freewoman and a widow. 
She may go as she pleases. Follow her," he decided. 
"Make sure she is safe. And," he added, knowing 
Duana's hardheadedness, "Make sure she does not find 
some way around the city walls that the French army 
missed."  

*~*~*~*  

Of course she could not get out of the city. The best 
Duana could hope for was to get out of her apartment 
and away from the Welsh knights William had left to 
guard her. They stared at their boots and spoke in 
low, sympathetic voices, telling her how brave and 
noble he had been and how sorry they were.  

Prince Llewelyn had come this evening, as had Sir 
Melvin, so drunk he could barely stand. They too, 
were sorry. Llewelyn was sorry William went off and 
left him at Lincoln Castle while he was bleeding, and 
Melvin was sorry he could not kill every Frenchman in 
this world and the next. But they were both sorry.  

That he was dead.   

Duana swallowed a sob, squared her shoulders, and 
walked quickly and purposefully in no particular 
direction except away from Court.  

She knew what William would tell her to do: marry 
again, and marry before she left London. 'Just pick a 
man who will be good to the children and will not 
bother you too much.' Duana was heiress to too much 
land now to ever be able to reach Wales without being 
kidnapped and 'persuaded' to marry some opportunistic 
knight. His lands in Gwynedd and what Fitz had given 
her in south Wales would become the property to any 
man who married her, and any consummated marriage was 
considered valid, whether she ever agreed to said 
consummation or not. Fitz, whether he realized it or
not, had added more bars to her cage.   

Just pick a man. Check his teeth and his temperament 
and just pick like she was at the market. Pick a 
husband for herself and a father for her children. 

In that case, Duana wanted one who told the most 
awful jokes imaginable and spouted off bizarre ideas 
left and right, making people wonder how far from 
sane he actually was. Perhaps someone who could get a 
baby to calm down faster than she, yelled right back 
when she yelled at him but never struck her, and left 
gifts on her pillow and then swore fairies must have 
done it. One who called Father John to exorcise the 
sprites and then cursed and tried to look innocent 
when the fairies brought her something else the very 
next night. Yes, that was exactly what she wanted: a 
man who still became tongue-tied and blushed if she 
invited him to come to bed, but would, and probably 
had, tell the Devil to piss-off for her sake. And one 
who, if asked if he still had a heart left to break, 
would deny it and be convincing, unless one could 
see his eyes.   

Yes, one of those would be just fine, thank you.   

She just kept walking with her Welsh guards behind 
her and the English knights behind them. Even her 
guards had guards, she thought to herself. There was 
truly no way to escape her prison. 

As she neared the closest the city gate and tried to 
decide what to do next, a figure crossed the street 
in front of her, his dark cloak whipping behind him 
as he hurried through the drizzle. To her tired 
brain, he reminded her for an instant of William: the 
way he moved as though he had decided long ago where 
he was going and was simply waiting for the rest of 
the world to catch up. He paused at the corner, 
looking for someone. Not finding them, he crossed the 
cobblestones, dodging to avoid the puddles. 

The English knights, already unhappy at following a 
woman around on such a miserable night, cursed as 
they had to jog to keep up. This was silly, Duana  
assured herself, picking up her pace: following some 
man on his way home from a tavern because he walked 
like William. She should think of the baby and the  
sickness in the night air and go back to the castle 
so Fitz could scold her for being such an impulsive 
child.  

"William. William!" she called, chasing him through 
the dark city, and figuring that the worst he could 
think was that she was mistaken or insane. Half the  
men alive were named John, Richard, or William, so 
the odds were in her favor.  

He paused, as though he was not sure if he had heard 
his name or not, then, seeming to decide not, turned 
and faded into the shadows and mist as though a cloud 
had passed over the moon and the moon was simply not 
there afterward.
  
She stopped in the center of the street, unsure what 
to do next.  

Down an alleyway, she saw a man laying on his back on 
the ground. His shirt front was soaked with blood and 
more blood was spreading out around him. Beside him 
knelt an auburn-haired woman in an elaborate dark 
blue dress, desperately pressing her hands to his 
chest to stop the wound from bleeding. It was not 
stopping, though. The man's chest stopped moving, and 
he turned his head to the side to look at Duana. He 
could see her, she realized, as clearly as she could 
see him. It was the William that was not hers, and 
the women struggling to save him was his woman - his 
echo of her in his world. Behind them, in the 
shadows, stood two frightened children, an older boy 
and a little girl, watching their father die. 

She started toward them to help, but as quickly as 
the man had appeared, he was gone, and there was only 
the wet alley and the knights behind her. 

"William," she called again, turning in a circle to 
look around her. 

"Scully," she heard quite clearly, in William's 
voice, but with a different accent. 

She ran down a side street, following his voice. She 
was certain that she was going insane, but she had no 
place else to go.

The Welsh knights were staying closer to her now, 
looking concerned, and the English knights were 
arguing that they should make her return to Court. A 
royal guard reached to grab her, and one of the 
Welshmen stopped him. The second Welsh guard drew his 
sword, protecting her, and the other Englishman drew 
in turn. There was circling and raised voices, 
neither set of guards understanding what the other 
was saying.  

While the men squared off, she turned and saw there 
was a dark-haired man sitting on a bench. His white 
shirt was open to the chest, soaking wet, dirty, and 
plastered to his skin. This William held a bloody 
cloth to a gash his head, and the rain was making the 
blood run pink down his face. He wrapped his free arm 
around himself, shaking and trying to stay warm as he 
waited patiently for his Duana to return.  

This William had come to her before as well, in 
Wales, after she fell from her horse. It was like an 
almost forgotten dream, but she was sure it was the 
same man - a William, but different from the one she 
had first seen as a child: lonelier, more haunted, 
more guarded with her than the other. She did not 
doubt his love, though. This man had walked into the 
bedchamber and taken her hand, silently anchoring her 
to the world and refusing to let her leave just yet. 
He had lost one pregnant woman, and he would not lose 
another. She and her child must live, and so she had. 
Like the other apparition, when she no longer needed 
him, he had released her hand and slipped away into 
the shadows. 

He looked up, and, like the other William, seemed to 
see her. Recognizing her, he smiled, seeming content.

She ran to him, but, again, by the time she reached 
him, he was gone. 

If the other Williams glimpsed her in the twilight 
between life and death, she wondered what it meant 
that she could see them in return. Perhaps she too 
was between worlds. Perhaps she was dying. 

Frightened now, she stood in the center of the 
street, looking. A half a block away, the guards 
realized she had left them behind, sheathed their 
swords and tempers, and started chasing her again. 

"William!" she called loudly, sending dogs backing, 
but getting no human response. "Where are you?"

The dogs raised a racked, and several townspeople 
yelled for her to shut up, but there was no response 
from him. 

The rain continued to fall, and her belly was 
beginning to hurt: the baby protesting at all the 
running. 

"Muldar!" she called desperately,  

She heard his voice from the street on her right say 
clearly, "Here."

Rounding the corner, Duana sidestepped to avoid 
tripping over a man sitting on the bottom step of a 
church, hunkered down against the night. Standing in 
the middle of the deserted street, she looked, 
turning in circles to survey every brick, every 
stone, as her torch sizzled in the rain, but there 
was no one.  

No voice, no William who was not hers. There was 
nothing except the sleeping city and the rain and the 
guards coming to take her back to the castle. 

Perhaps she was tired and alone and afraid and her 
mind was playing tricks on her. Perhaps she was truly 
insane. Or perhaps she was only seeing and hearing 
ghosts. William did tend to wander off; trust that 
man to wander completely into the next world without 
her and without even thinking to look back.  

She stood there, one hand on her flat stomach as it 
cramped. After the pain passed, she tried to catch 
her breath. If she wanted this baby to live, she was 
going to have to stop looking. 

"Are you lost, my lady?" the man asked from behind 
her, standing up and rubbing his hands briskly over 
his sleeves to warm his arms. He watched her, but 
kept back, making sure not to frighten her. "I saw a 
castle nearby. Did you lose your way?"  

Duana whirled around, inhaling sharply at the hideous 
French spoken with a strong Welsh accent, and pushing 
back her hood in disbelief. "William? My God  
William! Where- Why- How- My God!" Losing all sense 
of propriety and forgetting about the royal posse 
following her, Duana dropped the torch onto the wet 
street and threw her arms around him.  

"I think you have missed me," Gwilym said, 
tentatively putting one hand, then both hands on her 
back. 

"Missed you?" she echoed, letting him up for air. 
"Where have you been for the last week and a half? I 
do not know whether to kiss you or knock you silly, 
William!"   

"Am I William?" he asked, looking down at her. "I 
thought so, but I was not sure."  

"You are hurt." She peered at him in the darkness, 
noticing the cuts and bruises on his face. As the 
guards arrived with more torches, she discovered, 
"Your head is hurt. Yes, you are my William," Duana 
assured him. "William of Aber."  

"I did not believe I was William of London," he 
answered thoughtfully. "I was just looking around, 
trying to decide. I am looking for my home, but I do 
not think this is it. It was the closest city, but I 
hope I do not live here. It smells foul."  

"No, this is not your home. You are the Lord of 
Gwynedd - Northern Wales. There was a battle; we have 
been searching for you. You must have somehow found 
your way into the city. Damn it, William: you 
terrified me! And, and," she picked at his torn 
sleeve, starting to cry, "You have ruined another 
shirt. Really, I cannot take you anywhere," she said, 
and sniffed, her tears mixing with rain. 

Gwilym watched her, his dark eyes lighting up. "You 
are my Dana. No, Duana," he decided. "I have been 
looking for you, Duana."  

*~*~*~*  

"Choose," Llewelyn offered, shrugging one shoulder 
casually. "If you do not believe me, choose among 
your guards - any knight - and ask: when Lord William 
is absent from London Court, where does Prince 
Llewelyn pass the night?"

Fitz thought a moment, then turned his head to the 
right and repeated the question. The answer from the 
young Norman knight was immediate and contemptuous: 
"In Lady Duana's apartment." Several other knights 
nodded in agreement. 

From behind his desk, Fitz looked to Merfyn and asked 
in formal French, "At Welsh Court- At Dolwyddelan 
Castle," he amended, trying to use words Merfyn might 
understand. "In which chamber does Lady Duana sleep?"

Merfyn's head did not move, but he glanced at Prince 
Llewelyn, who repeated, "Ou - where. Dort - sleep. At 
Christmas, A mon chateau - Ou dort-elle? Answer him 
truthfully."

Merfyn stood at attention, swaying a little, and 
answered as clearly as he was able, "Dans la chambre 
du roi." 'In the royal apartment.' 

"Where does Lord William sleep?"

"Avec les hommes." 'With the men,' Merfyn answered. 

"Where does Prince Llewelyn sleep in Aber Castle?" 

"Dans la chambre du Madam Duana." 

Fitz leaned forward, interlacing his fingers and 
wrinkling his forehead thoughtfully.  

Llewelyn just waited. Merfyn did not know why the 
questions were being asked, and he was still too 
drunk to manage a lie anyway. It did not matter, 
though. Fitz could ask all the questions he wanted; 
he was not going to find a detail missed in a plan 
Gwilym had devised.  

"This is contrary to what Duana has told me," Fitz 
told Llewelyn, watching Merfyn carefully. "Duana says 
William fathered her children."

"Count the weeks, Fitz; Eimile is not William's," 
Llewelyn said, having rehearsed the words a hundred 
times and fortified himself with a cup of brandywine. 
"I married her to William because King John wanted 
her married. William is fond of her - and she of him 
- but the children are mine. I am certain of it. We 
have an agreement."  

Gwilym had made Llewelyn practice in February, saying 
he was not a convincing liar. 'Believe it is true as 
you say it,' Gwil had advised. 'Be as the Normans 
expect you to be: savage, coarse, enigmatic. You 
grieve your friend's death, but it perplexes you that 
the Crown would not understand you sleeping with 
another nobleman's wife.'  

Llewelyn found himself not only repeating the words 
exactly, but mimicking Gwilym's inflection and 
gestures as he did. He remembered, after practicing 
with Gwil four or five times and still not pleasing 
him, telling him to piss off. He was the Prince of 
Wales, for God's sake: his word was law. Gwilym had 
refused, and made  him start again, this time being 
sure not to cross his arms. 'There is a great deal at 
stake here, Llewel - to Duana, to the children, to 
you, and to Wales. Speak as if it were Tang.' At 
that, Llewelyn had told him again to piss off, and 
that time truly meant it. 

There were so many pitfalls here, and he needed Gwil 
to guide him. He could wage war on Hell, so long as 
Gwilym planned the battle. Gwilym was too damn pretty 
and brilliant and rotten to die; Llewelyn expected 
him to out-think Death, somehow, but that was not the 
case this time. 

Fitz still did not seem convinced, so Llewelyn 
improvised, "William's mistress is at my Court while 
she is with child. Muretta is a pretty blonde 
peasant, a tavern wench previously. He has kept her 
for years. I visit Aber, Will visits Dolwyddelan 
Castle. We are polite about it, for men you think are 
barbarians."  

"Father," Gruffydd called from his perch on the 
windowsill, watching some commotion in the bailey.  

"I am here, son. It is fine," Llewelyn assured him in 
Welsh, hoping the boy was living inside his own empty 
mind, and not paying attention to the conversation. 
"Just a minute." 

"The arrangement between you and Duana: is it what 
you Welsh call a hearth wife?" Fitz asked, still 
seeming cautious.  

"Yes. She is my hearth wife. I acknowledge her 
children as my own."

"What of William's woman?"

"A mistress," Llewelyn answered, thinking he was 
making progress if Fitz was trying to sort out 
legalities. "He does not acknowledge her child, and, 
since he is dead, it will be sent away. I will see it 
is pledged to the Church, but I do not want another 
man's bastard playing with my own children," he said, 
since that was a convincing addition. 

'Do not add,' Gwilym had warned him. 'You are not 
imaginative, Llewel.' 

He did make sure not to cross his arms. 

"What of the child she carries now?" Fitz asked.  

Llewelyn blinked, caught off guard. Gwilym had not 
specified that part of the plan.  

"Likely mine as well," he guessed, hoping that was 
the correct answer. If Duana was with child, she 
would need a husband - a man powerful enough to be 
able to hold both Gwil's and Pembroke's lands in 
Wales. Much of the western coast of Wales. That kind 
of power was no small thing.  

"Likely?" Fitz echoed slowly, displeased. 

"Father," Gruffydd said again in Welsh, making 
Llewelyn and Merfyn almost jump out of their skins. 
"Uriah is here. There is no Bath-Sheba for King 
David."  

"Just a minute, son. FitzWalter, you have my word as 
well as Sir Melvin's. You have witnesses among your 
men. We all mourn Lord William. Give me leave to take 
Duana and return to Wales." 

Fitz considered a moment, and then nodded his 
approval. "I will have it entered in the record. Do 
you want the boy to be 'Mab' or 'David'?"  

"David," Llewelyn decided, thinking that if there 
were any justice left, perhaps that was it: "Dafydd 
ap Llewelyn, heir to Wales."  

He hoped Gruffydd did not hear or understand that 
sentence, either.  

Gruffydd seemed to find comfort in being around 
Duana, and sometimes even pretended - or possibly, 
believed - she was his mother. 'The big Norman 
man wanted to kiss her,' Gruffydd had informed 
Llewelyn earlier, clearly angry. 'While you were 
away, Father: he kissed her. She did not want
him to.' 

Duana had told Llewelyn nothing of the kiss, 
but Gruffydd had shown his father the dagger 
that was hidden in his boot, in case Marshall 
FitzWalter tried to kiss her again. 

"I will speak with Duana. If she wants to leave with 
you and your son, she may. If she wants to remain in 
London - then you and I will speak again." Fitz made 
a note, then stood, looking tired. "Are we finished?" 
he asked, as though he was not the most powerful man 
in England.  

"He is back, King David - you do not get Bath-Sheba 
after all," Gruffydd said cryptically in his singsong 
voice, still speaking Welsh, though he was fluent,  
or had been, in French.  

"What is it, Gruffydd?" Llewelyn asked, thinking his 
son was just talking nonsense again. Uriah was the 
soldier in the Bible that King David had sent out to 
die in battle so the King could have Uriah's wife, 
Bath-Sheba.   

"Uriah," the young man said sadly, pointing out the 
window. "Too bad for King David." 

Llewelyn leaned over Gruffydd's shoulder to see. 
Clearly, at the moment, Gruffydd knew who Duana was, 
and which man was truly her husband. Llewelyn waited 
until he was sure he could believe his eyes, and then 
said, "Not Uriah, son - Lazarus."   

Fitz looked out in time to see Duana and a battered- 
looking William walking hand-in-hand across the 
bailey, with a half-dozen guards following them like
a pack of herd dogs with only two sheep. 

"Jesus Christ," he said slowly, "I should learn not 
to underestimate Duana when she says she will do 
something. Jesus!"  

"No, Fitz," Llewelyn replied, exhaling and grinning, 
"Jesus only took three days to return; William took
eleven."   

Hearing the name, Merfyn pushed his way through so he 
could see this with his own eyes. Llewelyn grabbed 
him quickly, reminding the old man that while jumping 
out the window might be the fastest way to reach 
Gwilym, it was not the wisest.  

"Of course," Merfyn said as they hurried down the 
stairs two steps at a time. "Of course it took him 
eleven days instead of three to return from the dead 
Goliath is still in Wales. Gwilym had to borrow a 
horse."  

*~*~*~*  

End: Hiraeth VII: Adduned