The Fallen Princess by Sarah Woodbury Page B

marriage is what
made him think about his own unions differently,” Hywel said. “I
didn’t know my father as well then as I do now. It’s hard to think
of him as ever being wrong about anything.”
    Gareth didn’t know what to say to that. King
Owain had thrown Gareth into a cell a year ago, having accused him
of a murder he didn’t commit. Hywel must have guessed what he was
thinking, because he shot him a sardonic glance. “Except when he’s
angry, my father is usually a good judge of character.”
    “Was Bran a good man?” Gareth said. “I’m
getting the sense that he wasn’t.”
    “I didn’t know him well.” Hywel shrugged.
“Many would say that my character leaves much to be desired, and
yet my father trusts me, and I have ever sought to serve him.
Perhaps the same could be said of Bran.”
    Gareth bowed his head, granting Hywel his
point. “Given that Bran is dead, he cannot be our immediate
concern. He was not the one who left Tegwen’s body on the
beach.”
    “We know who left her body on the beach,”
Hywel said.
    “Cadwaladr,” Gareth said.
    Hywel scowled. “The question now is what
drove my uncle to do so five years after Tegwen’s
disappearance.”
    “Five years after he killed her,” Gareth
said.
    Hywel held up one finger. “We don’t know
that. We don’t know anything about the circumstances of her death,
and until we do, we will not speculate.”
    “Yes, my lord.” Gareth acknowledged Hywel’s
authority in this matter, but just because they weren’t going to
talk about it didn’t mean Gareth couldn’t think it.
    The cart started rolling forward, and after
a pause for it to get a few yards ahead, Hywel lifted his horse’s
reins to get him moving. Gareth did the same.
    “My lord, if I may, you were only fifteen
when Tegwen married Bran,” Gareth said, changing the subject in
order to abide by his prince’s wish. Maybe they didn’t have to talk
about Cadwaladr now, but they would have to face his involvement
eventually. Gareth knew it was petty of him, but he couldn’t be
happier to learn of Cadwaladr’s culpability. The man was a
menace—to himself and to his country. King Owain was going to have
to face his treachery eventually, and to Gareth’s mind it was
better to do so sooner rather than later, before he betrayed them
more completely than he already had.
    “I was a man,” Hywel said. “That should have
been enough.”
    Gareth shook his head. Even if Hywel was
chastising himself for his failure now, the man he was then would
never have interfered in the marriage of his cousin, no matter how
much he loved her. Hywel’s concern for Tegwen did shed new light on
his intervention in his sister’s marriage to Anarawd, who by all
accounts hadn’t been a good man either. In fact, it might explain
everything.
    Llelo tugged on Gareth’s sleeve. “Da.” Llelo
had started calling him that in the last week since Gareth had
returned from Ceredigion. It was a familiarity that warmed Gareth’s
heart, and he hoped their coming baby wouldn’t put Llelo off or
make him jealous. Every child needed an older brother—two in this
case—though Dai, for all his youthful enthusiasm, was taking longer
to warm up. “I found out one more thing. One of the boys I talked
to lives to the west of the beach. He—Ceri—heard a cart pass by as
he was returning from the latrine in the middle of the night. Carts
never pass by at that hour, so he ran after it to see who it
was.”
    Hywel came out of his reverie and looked
past Gareth to Llelo. “Did Ceri recognize the driver?”
    “It was too dark to make out the features of
either the driver or a second man who walked ahead of the cart.
Both were well-wrapped in cloak and hood. But he knew the
horse.”
    That was the kind of news Gareth lived for.
“Go on.”
    Llelo’s eyes were bright. “The horse
pastures on a steading west of the Aber River and just south of the
road to Penrhyn.”
    Gareth looked at Prince Hywel. “Do we