Lammas Day

Chapter 38 of "A Sword for Wellington", Book Three of The Môrdreigiau Chronicles

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The story began in A Grail for Eidothea and continued with A River Trembles. Now the Chosen Court seeks another Arthurian treasure. New here? Did you see in your welcome email the first two books for you to download? Save this post and have a binge read. You deserve it.

Llyr declined to stay and sleep in the same bed as Jasper and Eidothea. He revealed he had blisters on his feet. Eidothea treated them. Unable to stay separated from either Jasper or Llyr, Eidothea entered their bedroom. I mean, you should really read the previous chapter to get all the nuances, but the three of them curled up and slept together. Eidothea declared her love for BOTH of them. Told you to go read it.

Gwenddydd’s Chosen Mark is confirmed by Llyr but she rejects joining the Chosen Court. With Hugh dead, she’s going to go back to her own time via Lady Meredith’s stone circle.

At Ostend, we again asked Gwenddydd to join our Court.

And at Dover.

And finally at Caldicot.

Each time, Gwenddydd refused. At the doors of Craiglyn House, she bowed her head, turning away and walking across the green lawn towards the wood.

Lady Meredith pressed my hands in hers. “Thank you for all your care and attention for Miss Jones—Gwenddydd. I know this Chosen Court is a great honour and responsibility.”

I smiled, sadness rising at my failure to convince Gwenddydd to join my Court. “But you will send her back?”

Lady Meredith nodded. “If she will not change her mind. Lammas Day is a most auspicious date. If we fail, it will be the Lady’s choice to keep her here. Perhaps then…”

Father hugged Lady Meredith’s waist. “I will write Mr. Tregallas and let you know. I will be living here by then.”

I sighed. So much had changed. Father had proposed to Lady Meredith and she accepted. She insisted she could not leave her duty to the stone circle, and so my father had agreed to move to Craiglyn House.

Ondine had been right that my love for two different men would be impossible to hide. Father still favoured Llyr as my husband but did not push the issue. Even so, he kindly allowed Jasper to stay in my childhood home. Perhaps he knew I needed a place to come ashore, to call home. With the Severn Channel being so busy with maritime traffic, that could not be Craiglyn House.

Father kissed my cheek before following Lady Meredith into the mansion, leaving me with Jasper on the gravel drive.

“I will escort you down to the beach,” he murmured.

Like him, I wanted to delay our separation for as long as possible. That is why I had continued on the last leg from the port at Caldicot to Lady Meredith’s home instead of returning to Caer Morgana with the others. They waited for me to rejoin them.

We took a short carriage ride to an isolated cove. We left the driver waiting with the horses, while Jasper and I walked down the narrow laneway. I carried a small bag. Jasper would return with it filled with my clothing.

The lane dropped into a small cove with a narrow sandy beach.

Near the shoreline, I paused. “Jasper…” I dropped the bag and clung his hand.

“It’s not goodbye,” he murmured, his voice hoarse. He balanced against his crutch. “There is still much we need to do. I will bend my attention on learning the Duke of Wellington’s location and then we can go after the sword.”

I shook my head. “We need Gwenddydd with us … and you need to talk with Father, about us.”

“About you, Llyr and I?” He drew my hand up to his chest, over his heart. “That is for you to do, Eidothea, when you are ready. You know nothing more than kisses have happened between us. There is no public scandal to force us to hastily wed. I won’t tie you down while there is still so much to be done. I know how you feel about me, Eidothea, and how you feel about Llyr. Once we’ve retrieved the sword, you will be spending so much time in Caer Morgana. How can we make a life together?”

“I want a life with you,” I told him, “and with Llyr. We will figure it out as we go.”

With a sad smile, he caressed my cheek and bent down to kiss me. I leaned into him, eagerly returning his kisses. At length, he broke away, his breath coming fast. “You better undress and go, Eidothea. They are waiting.”

Llyr, Ondine, Cychwr and a sizeable contingent of royal guards waited for me in Môr Hafren. It was time to return home.

Gŵyl Awst (Lammas Day), August 1, 1815

The mist swirled around grey standing stones worn with age. The barest sliver of the waning moon rose high above the tree tops. Tall fiery torches cast long shadows into the centre of the stone circle. Before her, Gwenddydd’s breath puffed nervous mist into the night air.

Lady Meredith touched her arm. “My dear, are you sure you want to do this?” she asked for the umpteenth time. “You will always be welcome to stay here.”

“I am sure.” Gwenddydd touched the locket at her throat. Lady Meredith had given it to her earlier that day. It contained a small portrait of Hugh from a time before the wars.

Nothing remained for her here. History foretold there would be nothing for her back in her own time. Yet what else did she know? Nothing kept her here, not even the invisible mark that meant she should join Llyr’s cause.

But it was not and could never be her cause. It would affect people centuries after she lived and died. Instead she would fight to the very last breath to preserve what was left of her home. This circle had survived. So, somehow, would she. And if she did not, nobody would mourn her passing.

Dressed in her old clothes of leggings and tunic, she strode to the centre of the stones, circled by robed priestesses. She carried a sword, an old piece Lady Meredith had found.

Lady Meredith completed the line of women that encircled the stones. “Last chance, my dear. Are you sure you are strong enough? We could wait until the next quarter day.”

“Yes. I am as strong as I was when I came here.” Gwenddydd almost spoke almost true. After being unable to find Hugh on the battlefield, the fever and grief had weakened her. In the months since, she had worked hard to regain her strength, knowing what faced her at home. “I am ready.”

She tilted her head to feel the moon’s caress upon her face. She began the chant that would send her back in time, the chant that a faint Olwen had whispered in her ear until she knew it waking or sleeping. It sounded like a soft beseeching croon in her native tongue.

The circle of women echoed her words, increasing in volume until the croon became a cry. Gwenddydd lifted her sword, and traced a mystical symbol in the air. Sparks of blue flared in the corner of her eyes. The spell worked.

Coalescent ribbons of blue joined her to the priestesses and they to the stones until the entire circle leapt with the unnatural cerulean light.

Her guts tightened, a mix of fear and anticipation, the familiar stringing of nerves before battle.

The spell swelled around her. The Lady looked favourably upon this transition.

She was going home.

Hugh thought he could say, without the slightest exaggeration, that every inch of him ached. A bone deep aching from the jarring coach ride from Dover, augmented by sharp flares of pain as his new injuries complained of this unjust punishment. The Channel, at least, had been kinder.

He should have waited until morning, breaking his journey in the small port, but something drove him homewards. Nightfall caught up with him on the road, but he convinced his driver to change horses at the next inn and push on. It seemed a pity to waste a full moon. He wanted to get home, to see—

His heart pounded with the very thought of his Gwen. His blood called to hers. They were warriors alike, but she had left him to die on the battlefields of what his duke had named Waterloo.

No, he didn’t want to see her, he thought, the drive’s gravel shifting under his shuffling feet. He didn’t want her to see him, a wreck of a man, beyond any redeeming love.

Which did not explain why he had chosen to come to Craiglyn House.

:Yes, why are you returning to her?: the voice grated inside his mind. He’d heard her once before, coming from Eidothea’s lips, and ever since Waterloo, the spirit Maeve had cajoled him to live.

‘Very well. I do want to see Gwen.’ He snapped the thought at the spirit. He wanted to know why Gwen had left him behind. He had first thought she’d taken Lady Meredith and the Pendyrs to Antwerp or Ghent, safe from the invading forces, but she had not.

They’d left Brussels after a week. Why? He’d find out before he hid his ravaged body in some disused wing of the family home in the Cotswolds. He doubted his brother would want him around to scare the children, but he had nowhere else to go.

:You worry too much,: Maeve opined.

‘When will you get out of my head?’ Hugh grumbled. He shifted his crutch to his other armpit and lifted the large brass door-knocker, letting it fall against the heavy oak.

Lady Meredith’s butler opened it and fell back with a cry of horror, the back of his hand almost swallowed by his wide mouth.

Hugh’s lips twisted in what he knew to be a true mockery of a smile. The butler hadn’t been the only one who’d turned away from his destroyed face.

The butler stepped closer. “Sir...Sir Hugh?”

A shattered eyebrow rose. No other had recognised him since Waterloo.

“Sir, you’re much changed.”

That put it mildly. He supposed to ought to be thankful for the butler’s polite attempt. “Yes. Is my aunt in?” His voice at least remained strong, unchanged. He had his thick black stock to thank for that. It had been one of the many trivial blessings he’d recounted on his sick bed, instead of doing the decent thing by everybody and dying.

The butler wagged his head. “No, no, sir. She isn’t.”

Hugh made a shambling half-turn on the top stair. “Where then?”

“Forgive me, but we thought you dead. She...she...”

Dead? Was that the reason why he’d been abandoned? How many bodies were never collected from those bony fields?

He decided against a reassuring smile. That would’ve sent the man into a fit of the gibbers. “I know of the Lady, my good man.” Indeed, in his wilder moments, he’d even prayed to her. It seemed to work for Gwen. “Are they at the stones?”

The butler’s head bobbed, guiding him in. “Aye, sir. ‘Tis the feast of Lammastide, when the most powerful of praises can be made.”

Hugh gingerly lowered himself onto a soft-cushioned bench lining the hall. “Will she be back soon?”

“Who’s to say?” The butler’s gaze still shifted away from Hugh’s face but at least the man talked to him. “They have been all agog for weeks now, preparing to send Miss Jones back. You remember her, sir, she—“

“What?” His voice whip-cracked.

The butler stuttered. “Th-they fig-figured it out. Although I heard tell a ghost had a hand in it. Such strange rumours.”

Hugh lurched upright and fit his crutch under his armpit with ease. He’d never make it from here to the circle in time. “Saddle a horse. Bring it around at once.”

“A horse?” The butler streaked to do his bidding.

A horse? Was he mad? His back, strained beyond its limits already, voiced its protest as he hobbled out the front door.

A horse? His twisted, gnarled claw of a hand mocked him.

He eyed the coach and four with despair. With no road, it could not take him to the stones.

He couldn’t wait for the horse, just to fall off it again. He started to walk, his crutch swinging. The groom could catch up with him. He might yet make it.

The stones stood on a hill. A healthy man could reach it in about ten minutes. The ground beneath his feet began to rise. One more hill to go.

Breathless, Hugh paused, cresting the rounded peak. Pain shot up through his leg, burning and screaming its message to stop into his brain.

He ignored it, staring at the stones atop the next hill. They blazed with a blue-tinged light, a rainbow of colours rising above the stones in the faint outline of a twisting whirlwind.

His heart pounded. He had to make it. He pushed forward with his crutch into a stumbling run.

He drew close enough to see into the glowing stone circle. His Gwen stood in the centre of the circle, her body outlined in tongues of blue fire. “No,” he gasped. He coughed, his chest spasming with pain.

He swallowed hard and yelled, his voice breaking, “No!”

The women’s chanting drowned his protest. She hadn’t heard him. He must get closer yet. Groaning with effort, he started his hobbling ascent of the slight hill.

The blue light fairly pulsed through the gaps between the stones, threatening to reach down and take him too.

‘Lady,’ he begged, reaching for the unseen divinity with his mind, ‘don’t take her from me now. Let me get there in time.’

The chanting rose to an exultant high, ringing out across the soft rolling hills. The intensity of the fantastic light show blinded, carrying an eerie, high-pitched song of its own. In the distance, Hugh heard dogs howl.

He fell, sprawling headlong into the damp grass, his breath expelled in a painful whoosh. He squeezed his eyes shut, renewing his prayer. “Lady! Lady! Don’t take her from me now. I love her.”

For it was the truth. He hadn’t come to hear her excuses, but to see her again, to be reunited if she didn’t pity him so much for the blasted shell which housed his soul. He would see her once more before fading from the memory of all.

But the Lady could not be so cruel as to rip his heart from him. Not like this.

Gwen had to know he lived.

“Lady, do not send Gwen to her death.” For death it would be. The Saxons, the Saeson, won after all and he knew his Gwen. She would fight to her last breath to save her people.

He staggered to his feet, every nerve and sinew afire with lashing pain. He stumbled forwards.

Panting, he pressed a hand to his side. He inhaled and expended it in a shout. “Wait!” He drew in another shuddering breath. “Gwen, don’t go!”

A man’s voice reached her, a faint echo through the incantation. Gwenddydd squeezed her eyes shut. Why must she hear his voice now? Why must her memory taunt her so?

She reached up and clutched the locket, pressing it against her breastbone. A sob rose in her throat. He was gone. Nothing could bring him back.

“Gwen!” His hoarse cry ripped through her concentration.

Her eyes flew open. He sounded closer, real, not imagined. Was this some trick of the Lady? Wildly, she looked around, beyond the women who encircled her. Mist and blue light blinded. She made out only the outlines of the stones, aged and crooked. She saw only women and magic.

She blinked and her vision cleared.

He stood at the stone’s outer perimeter, propped up by a crutch, one hand pressed to his side. He looked thin, so thin.

“Hugh?” The sob broke clear of her throat. She felt the Lady take hold. “Hugh!” she screamed.

She burst from the Lady’s grasp, breaking through the human circle, knocking one of the priestesses flat. “Hugh!”

She ran to him, her strides eating up the small distance between them. Flashes of her past came to her: the whirling of the fighting Saeson, the arrow-straight forms of the priestesses, Olwen falling. Hugh stood there, immovable by time, alive. Alive!

From behind, Lady Meredith cried out his name.

Gwenddydd stumbled to a halt, two steps from him. She gasped. His old scar had a twin on the other side. It twisted, mashing his cheek. She reached out to touch it. “Oh, Hugh.”

“Don’t,” he croaked, grabbing her hand before it brushed his cheek. “Don’t pity me.”

Tears blurred her vision. “You live.” She flung her arms about him. “You live!”

She pressed herself against him. He felt cold, stiff. He shook, the after-effects of too much exertion. She curled her arms around him, afraid he would fall.

Gwenddydd gazed into his clear, blue eyes. His tormented gaze drew her closer. She stood on tiptoe and laid a light kiss on his newly ruined cheek, barely healed. “I will never pity you, mi cariad.”

“I—I hoped that would be so,” he confessed. “I almost didn’t come.” His eyelids fluttered shut when she brushed his mouth with hers. “My body is broken. I’m too frightening a sight to be a diplomat.”

“Not to me,” she breathed.

One arm came about her and held her tight. He pressed his lips to her forehead. “I never thought I’d hold you again. I’m afraid even now.”

Her eyebrow quirked and she forced him to meet her gaze. “Why?”

“I am of no use to anyone.”

“Neither am I,” she breathed. “We make a perfect pair.”

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