A Gift Of Sanctuary

Four

The road from Haverfordwest wound through gently rolling countryside. The scent of early blossoms mingled with salt air. Owen drank it in, feeling as if he imbibed a heady wine. ‘In all my travels, no place has ever smelled as sweet to me.’ He had forgotten how much he loved this place, riding towards the sea and anticipating the moment at which it spread out beyond the cliffs. He had come here so long ago, from the north that time, proud to be considered man enough to escort his mother and his baby brother on a pilgrimage. His heart had been light, his faith strong. Suddenly the sea appeared, white-capped and unending, just beyond the cliffs.

‘Glory be to God the Father,’ Sir Robert cried, ‘that I have lived to experience this holy place. Michaelo, does this rekindle your ardour?’

Brother Michaelo huddled deeper into his hood. ‘I for one do not enjoy a brisk wind from the sea. Water is not the element that kindles the spirit.’

‘Be comforted,’ Owen said, ‘St David’s Cathedral and the bishop’s palace are in a valley protected from the sea.’

‘Praise God,’ Michaelo muttered. ‘Though I do not much prefer damp.’

Geoffrey wagged a finger at Michaelo. ‘You must cease this game of contrariety else God might decide that you are too critical of His creation to deserve indulgence.’

Michaelo sniffed.

Owen reassured them all. ‘We shall be in St David’s by mid-afternoon, God willing.’

Sir Robert smiled. ‘Would that I had the years left to make this journey twice.’ It was said that two pilgrimages to the episcopal seat of Menevia, St David’s, were equal to one to Rome: Roma semel quantum bis dat Menevia tantum. ‘But perhaps one is enough to thank God for bringing my family through the pestilence.’

As they approached St David’s they joined a crowd of pilgrims coming from Nine Wells and all in the company dismounted, but Sir Robert. When he moved to do the same, Owen forbade it.

‘You have been unwell. To ride is more of a penance to you than walking is to many we have passed.’

‘Age brings many blessings,’ Michaelo said.

‘And much humiliation,’ Sir Robert retorted.

‘It is good for a pilgrim to be humble.’

Owen did not join in their argument, and it soon died.

Geoffrey came alive in the crowd, speaking to as many of the pilgrims as he could, asking whence they came, their purpose in the pilgrimage. He was disappointed that many spoke only Welsh.

Now they saw many Welsh, the women in starched white veils folded up at the front like bonnets, the men in light wool cloaks and long shirts, often bare-legged. All went by foot. Sir Robert towered above the crowd, his face stony.

At last the elderly pilgrim dismounted at the edge of a rough-and-tumble row of houses that led towards Tower Gate, the pilgrims’ gateway to the city of St David’s. Sir Robert wished to descend on foot to the cathedral. He invited Owen, Geoffrey and Brother Michaelo to accompany him, while the other men took the horses round to Bonning’s Gate and through to the stables at the bishop’s palace. Owen judged it a reasonable walk for Sir Robert. The city was little more than the cathedral close, comprising the church, the cemetery, the dwellings of those connected to the cathedral either as clerics, administrators or servants, and the hostelries for the pilgrims. The four made their way slowly through a throng of people whispering and jostling one another. There were townspeople as well as pilgrims, judging from their garments.

‘Have we forgotten a feast day?’ Sir Robert wondered. ‘God forgive me if I have.’

Michaelo shook his head. ‘St David’s Day is past. We are in Lent, but not so far.’

Owen’s attention was drawn to a clutch of men who huddled about a point just without the gate. He lingered long enough to hear that at dawn the porter had found a body there. Everyone must now expound their theories and dire predictions.

‘It must have been brought here during the night,’ said one man. ‘But why did the porter not spy the activity?’

‘The man had been gutted, they say,’ another whispered.

‘There will be war now among the Marcher lords.’

‘They say that a shepherd in Ceredigion once ate a box of hosts — the Lord split him open like a gutted pig so that the faithful might witness his sin.’

‘What is it?’ Sir Robert asked at Owen’s side. ‘Of what do they speak in such hushed voices?’

Thank God Sir Robert knew no Welsh. ‘An argument, is all. It means naught to us.’ Owen wanted neither Michaelo nor Sir Robert to learn of the body — one would panic, the other would interfere.

As they passed through the gate, they all paused and exclaimed. Without the gate they could see but the top of the cathedral’s central tower. Now, tumbling down the steep hill and spread in the valley below was a small city with cottages and great halls, all clustered within the walls and round two huge and magnificent structures straddling either side of the River Alun, the Cathedral of St David and St Andrew, and the bishop’s palace beyond.

Brother Michaelo was most impressed by the palace. ‘See the scalloped arcading? That is Bishop Henry Gower’s work. Was he not the most ingenious man? Is it not as I described it?’

Geoffrey laughed. ‘You mean as Owen described it.’ Owen was the only member of the company who had ever been to St David’s. ‘Though I grant you have often repeated tales of the palace’s splendour.’

Years ago, when Owen was thirteen, his mother had brought him here with his baby brother Morgan. He remembered workmen atop scaffolding, adding clean stone to peeling, mossy walls. His mother had explained how they would then clean the older stone and apply fresh colour. Now Owen saw for the first time the completed result of Gower’s work. As he walked down the steep slope along the north side of the cathedral, he admired the sunlight playing on the reds, blues, greens and golds of the palace walls below. He shielded his eye against the brightening sun and gazed in wonder upon the delicate arcading atop the walls, with a chequer-work pattern of alternating small squares of purple and white stone. It was a decorative lace, serving no purpose but beauty — the palace was protected by the wall that enclosed the entire complex, cathedral, palace and additional residences. There was no need for guards to pace the palace roofs.

‘It is peaceful here,’ Geoffrey said as he paused before the stone bridge over the small, placid River Alun.

‘God grant that I find peace here,’ said Sir Robert.

Owen observed the unhealthy flush on his father-in-law’s cheeks and forehead and prayed that their lodgings at the bishop’s palace would be warm and dry. But he said nothing, not wishing to call attention to a weakness that Sir Robert found humiliating. ‘Even before St David founded his monastery in this vale, it was a holy place.’

‘A heathen holiness,’ Michaelo reminded them.

The bridge was a great slab of marble ten foot long, six foot wide, a foot thick. Its surface had been polished by the shuffling feet of hundreds of pilgrims, and was cracked down the middle.

‘They might provide a better bridge,’ Michaelo muttered.

‘You do not replace such a bridge, not until it no longer serves,’ Owen said. ‘Have you not heard the legends of this bridge?’

‘It is but a plain bridge. There is no art to it.’

‘This bridge that you so despise is called Llechllafar — the singing stone,’ Owen said. ‘Once, as a corpse was being carried across it, Llechllafar burst forth with a reprimand so passionate it cracked with the effort. Ever since, it has been forbidden to carry the dead across this stone.’

‘A stone cannot speak,’ Michaelo protested.

Owen paid him no heed. ‘Merlinus predicted that a king of England, upon returning from the conquest of Ireland, would be mortally wounded by a red-handed man as he crossed the stone. Henry Plantagenet crossed it unscathed on his return from his successful campaigns in Ireland; he declared Merlinus a liar.’

‘The Lionheart’s father was here?’ Michaelo said, suddenly more interested.

‘Aye, that he was. Come, let us cross over.’

But now Michaelo looked wary as he considered the stone. ‘Your people tell tales about everything.’

‘Everything has its tale.’

‘What happened when the King called Merlinus a liar?’ asked Sir Robert.

‘Someone in the crowd laughed at the King and said, “Perhaps the prediction spoke of another king, yet to come.” It is said that Henry was not pleased, but said no more.’

‘Foolish pride,’ Geoffrey muttered.

It was a nervous group that crossed the bridge.

The courtyard of the bishop’s palace appeared to be a meeting place for pilgrims and the various clerics who lived in the close. From their furtive gestures and excited whispers Owen guessed they, too, discussed the body that had been left at the gate.

But the courtyard in which they stood claimed Michaelo’s attention. ‘How magnificent,’ he said, gazing round.

Sir Robert reluctantly agreed.

Two great porches, approached by broad stone stairways, led to separate wings. Directly in front, the expanse that housed the great hall presented a deep red ochre façade; at a right angle to the left, the wing that held the bishop’s private quarters was rendered and whitewashed. Owen and Geoffrey stepped aside to allow Brother Michaelo and Sir Robert to ascend to the porch of the great hall first. They were, after all, the pilgrims.

The porter perked up at Sir Robert’s name. ‘His Grace left word that you should dine with him this evening, Sir Robert. And this will be Brother Michaelo? Secretary to the Archbishop of York?’

Brother Michaelo bowed low, beaming.

‘His Grace requests your presence this evening also. And Master Chaucer.’

Geoffrey started at his name and made a sweeping bow.

But the porter was already looking beyond Geoffrey. ‘Captain Archer?’

Owen gave a curt bow.

‘My lord Bishop would see you at once, Captain.’

‘At once?’ Sir Robert said. ‘But he has made a long journey-’

Owen shook his head at his father-in-law, silencing him. ‘Did His Grace say anything else?’ he asked the porter.

‘No, Captain.’

A clerk appeared behind the porter and asked Owen to accompany him down into the courtyard to the bishop’s wing. Michaelo began to follow.

The porter raised a restraining hand. ‘Brother Michaelo, His Grace wishes a private word with the Captain.’

Michaelo turned back, indignation colouring his cheeks. Geoffrey coaxed him back up the stairs to the waiting porter.

Owen followed the clerk down the broad steps and up the matching set to the bishop’s porch. An image of St David greeted him as he drew level with the great door that led into the bishop’s hall, a painting larger than life. Proud it made Owen, to see the patron saint of his people so honoured. Liveried servants flitted about their duties with curious glances at the two who moved swiftly through the brightly painted hall into a parlour with a window overlooking the gateway of the palace. The voices in the courtyard were muted in here. The figures seemed a dumb show.

‘Would you care for wine?’ the clerk wheezed, drawing Owen’s attention from the window. The man’s round face was red with exertion from the short walk. A pampered lot here.

‘I would be most grateful. But you must not trouble yourself.’ A mere courtesy. Owen knew the poor young man was under orders to give him refreshment.

Alone, Owen went back to his study of the courtyard. But it offered up no explanation for the bishop’s summons. Did Thoresby’s reach extend so far? Had he found yet another task for Owen?

Bishop Adam de Houghton paused in the doorway as two servants preceded him, carrying wine and goblets. Tall, fair, with aquiline features and a friendly demeanour, Houghton need only stand there smiling to put a stranger at ease. When the servants had ceased their fuss and slipped away, the bishop entered, making the sign of the cross towards Owen. ‘God be with you, Captain Archer.’ Houghton spoke in Welsh.

Owen was surprised — though Houghton had been born nearby, in Caerforiog in the parish of Whitchurch, he was of old English stock. He was the first Englishman Owen had encountered to extend the courtesy of speaking the native tongue to a Welshman. Owen bowed low and replied in Welsh. His speech was embarrassingly halting. He had become more careful of his words since he left this country, and he must now not only search for phrases in his rusty Welsh but also weigh and consider each word.

The bishop motioned for Owen to be at ease. ‘Presently we shall sit and have some refreshment while we talk of your journey and your mission, but first I would explain my purpose in commanding your presence without the courtesy of allowing you to rest from your journey.’ His voice, soft and with a raspy character, seemed at odds with his appearance. ‘The Duke of Lancaster has spoken highly of your work for him and Archbishop Thoresby. God sent you at a time when I have great need of your talents. We have had a most unfortunate incident today. I do not like to think of it as an omen, but-’

‘There was a body.’

Houghton’s pleasant countenance darkened. ‘Someone told you of it?’

‘I heard people discussing it.’

The bishop relaxed. ‘Of course. I suppose it is to be expected. Well then, as you may have heard, this morning the porter discovered a body without Tower Gate.’

‘A violent death?’

‘The sort of wound that — well, you must be accustomed to it. I am sure you have heard many theories about why you lost your eye.’

‘My sight, my lord. I still have the eye.’ Owen supposed he meant divine retribution for some sin, as with the tale he had heard at the gate.

Houghton squinted at Owen’s patch. ‘Do you indeed? Well, they would make a moral tale of that, too.’ Heavens but the man jabbered. ‘My clerk will show you the corpse. You can be the judge of the condition of the body.’

‘I-’ Owen shook his head. ‘Forgive me, Your Grace, but I must disappoint you. I am here-’

‘As my guest,’ Houghton said in a louder, firmer voice. ‘And representing the Duke of Lancaster. I am quite certain he would expect you to assist me in this.’

The sudden assumption of his compliance momentarily robbed Owen of speech. Was this to be his lot in life, ever to drop to his knees and sniff out any pests that discomfited the nobility? A clerk appeared behind the bishop — not the same poor, overheated lump of flesh who had shown him in.

‘Ifan, this is Captain Archer, a man who has solved many problems such as ours for both the Duke of Lancaster and the Archbishop of York. Show him the poor soul below. I shall await you here.’

Owen bowed. ‘Your Grace.’

The young clerk bowed to Owen and motioned for him to follow. They crossed the room, slipped behind a hunt tapestry on the east wall, through a door and down a narrow passage into a tower lit by wall sconces, descending stone steps to an undercroft that echoed as a guard moved from the shadows barking a challenge.

‘It is Ifan, with an emissary from the Duke of Lancaster,’ the clerk announced.

The guard took a good look at Owen, nodded. ‘You may pass.’

‘You have had no trouble?’ Ifan asked.

From whom, Owen wondered, if the victim was dead. Pilgrims staying in the other wing of the palace?

‘All is quiet, God help us,’ the guard said.

The clerk led Owen into a room lit with many candles.

The warring scents of beeswax, incense, smoke and decaying flesh assailed Owen. ‘He has been dead some days.’

‘We have done our best to mask the odour.’

‘There is nothing hides that stench.’ Owen approached the well-lit table on which the corpse lay beneath a loose shroud. He nodded to the clerk to pull the cover aside. An ugly, gaping wound. If it had originally been a simple knife thrust to the belly, then something had been eating at the flesh. ‘Have you cleaned the wound?’

‘No. We removed the clothes, that is all. The body is very clean, I know.’

The man had lain exposed for some time after being wounded, Owen guessed. One at a time, he lifted the hands, studied the nails and palms. The nails were dark with what might be blood, the palms abraded. Bruises on the face and arms suggested a struggle. The knees, too, were rough with abrasions. The man had been in his prime, muscular, no deformities. His hair, a pale blond, had been neatly trimmed, though now it was wild, stiff with sea water.

‘Where are his clothes?’

The clerk stepped back, picked up a basket, which he handed to Owen. Lancaster’s livery, with the emblem of Cydweli. Owen poked through the items. ‘There was nothing else? No weapon?’

‘No.’

Owen lifted the tunic. The tear proved the knife thrust. Whatever had eaten into the wound had no interest in the cloth, which was stiff with blood round the wound, but the remainder of the cloth was rough and brittle, too. Owen lifted the leggings. They also had the feel of having been soaked in brine. The knees were rough. The boots — they were of good quality, sturdy, slightly worn. Owen tilted them. Sand rained down on the stone floor.

‘This man lay on the beach. Crawled along the beach, I think. But the tide found him. And he fed the crabs for a time.’ Owen stooped, brought a candle close to the pile of sand. He knew of one beach very near with sand of such dazzling colour. ‘Whitesands.’

Owen noticed how the clerk peered down, glanced up at him, then quickly away, as if uncertain what to think. That Owen saw too much, even blinded in one eye? Devil take the bishop for putting such thoughts in his head.

Owen straightened. ‘Let us ascend to fresh air, Ifan. Warm ourselves with wine.’ Though at first it had felt stuffy in the undercroft, that had been the illusion of the smoke of incense and candles. Slowly the underlying chill had seeped through Owen’s leather travelling clothes. This valley had once been a marsh. Man’s stones and mortar could not keep out the damp chill.

The clerk bent to cover the dead man, then led Owen back whence they had come.

Bishop Adam de Houghton paced as he listened to Owen’s assessment. ‘He died of the knife wound?’

‘I believe he did, though how quickly I cannot say. It may have been a slow death. I believe his wound bled as he lay in the water. The crabs-’ He stopped, seeing the bishop blanch. ‘Forgive me, my lord bishop.’

‘You deserve your reputation. Whitesands.’ Houghton was quiet a moment but for the whisper of his costly gown and his velvet shoes on the tiles. ‘It is far to carry a body from Whitesands to Tower Gate. Why? Why was he brought to the bell tower?’

Owen neither knew nor cared. ‘Your Grace, do I have your permission to join my companions now?’

Houghton looked first surprised, then apologetic. ‘Of course. God help me, I am forgetting my duties as a host. You have ridden far, and I have kept you from a well-earned rest. Go in peace, Captain. And tonight, when we dine, we shall not speak of this, eh?’

‘Of course not, Your Grace.’

Owen must have slept, for his thoughts as he opened his eyes in drowsy confusion were of York. He had been telling his daughter Gwenllian the tale of the Water Horse of St Bride’s Bay, and now she shook him for another story. As he woke he realised it was Sir Robert who gently shook him.

‘His Grace sends for you.’

‘Again?’ Owen groaned, rose slowly, made his way to a table with an ewer and dish for washing.

‘I told the servant that you were resting. There is no need to hurry.’ Sir Robert sat at the edge of the bed, his eyes worried. ‘His Grace wishes a word before we dine tonight. With you and Master Chaucer. What is it about, my son?’

‘Houghton mistakenly believes that I care about his problems,’ Owen said, splashing water on his face. He departed before Sir Robert had a chance to ask more questions. Geoffrey waited in the main hall, speaking with much gesturing and wagging of the head to a woman who was richly dressed and fair of face. She covered her mouth daintily when she laughed.

‘We are summoned,’ Owen said to Geoffrey.

The woman’s eyes drank Owen in and she smiled brightly, forgetting to cover her bad teeth.

‘Mistress Somery of Glamorgan,’ said Geoffrey.

‘God go with you, Mistress,’ said Owen. ‘I pray you forgive me, but the bishop is expecting me and Master Chaucer.’

‘Captain,’ she said with a flirtatious tilt of her head, a flutter of her lashes. ‘I look forward to making your acquaintance.’

Geoffrey hurried away with Owen. ‘It is not fair how they look on you.’

The man had peculiar priorities. ‘Have you any idea why the bishop sends for us?’ Owen said.

‘Not the least.’ With his short legs, Geoffrey had practically to skip to keep up with Owen’s long strides, which made him breathless.

Owen relented, slowed down, told him of the body.

Geoffrey was fascinated, but did not see what it had to do with them.

That made a pair of them. ‘I cannot but think that the bishop has learned something to link the body with us. What of John de Reine? Do you know anything of his appearance?’

Geoffrey paused, understanding Owen’s suspicion. ‘I do not like to think-’

‘Neither do I. Was he fair?’

‘I do not know.’

‘Let us hope I am wrong.’

They marched in silence through the corridor leading from the great hall to the bishop’s hall.

Bishop Houghton got to the point as soon as he learned Geoffrey knew of the situation. ‘How would you proceed in this business, Captain?’

What had transpired since Owen left Houghton? ‘Surely you have a coroner, Your Grace. And staff who assist you in keeping the peace?’

Houghton fussed with a sleeve, feigning distraction, as he said, ‘He wore Lancaster’s livery.’

‘I noted that.’

‘It is a delicate matter. The Duke of Lancaster and the Duchess Blanche, may God rest her soul, have provided me with the funds to build a college for the vicars. It is much needed. I cannot tell you the trouble the vicars manage to- But that is not the point. The delicacy. You must see, I wish to keep it a secret. .’

How like Thoresby he sounded. ‘It is too late for secrecy — all the city buzzes with the news of the corpse at the gate,’ Owen said.

Houghton seemed distracted by the hem of his sleeve. ‘I cannot keep the body a secret, of course. But who he was- One of my vicars served as chaplain at Cydweli Castle a year past. He identified the body.’

So that was what had happened while Owen slept. ‘Then you have the information you need.’

‘His name is John de Reine,’ Houghton said, as if he had not heard Owen. ‘The man you were to meet at Carreg Cennen.’

‘John de Reine,’ Geoffrey muttered, as if testing the name against his memory. He stole a glance at Owen.

So he was right. But with the realisation came a twinge of unease. How much did the bishop know? Uncertain how to answer, Owen let the silence lengthen.

Houghton glanced from one to the other with a puzzled frown that suddenly brightened into an embarrassed smile. ‘In faith, I leap ahead without explaining,’ the bishop said. ‘Forgive me. Pray do forgive me. It is a fault with which I continually struggle. I am in the Duke’s confidence, gentlemen. You need not worry about what you say to me. The Duke thought it wise that another Marcher lord know of your purpose. Of his concerns about Owain Lawgoch’s supporters, whether Lascelles has gone over to their side, what that might mean to Cydweli.’

Looking much relieved, Geoffrey said, ‘Would that he had informed us.’

Owen might have used stronger words than Geoffrey’s, and his feeling was less relief than irritation.

‘What I wish to discover is why John de Reine was in my lordship. He had arranged to meet with you at Carreg Cennen,’ Houghton said.

‘A sudden urge to go on pilgrimage?’ Geoffrey suggested with a grin.

Houghton clenched his teeth and took a deep breath as if to keep himself from saying something he would regret later. ‘The man was brutally murdered, Master Chaucer.’

Owen’s companion blushed and bowed his head.

‘The Duke told you why we were to meet with Reine in particular?’ Owen asked carefully.

‘He did.’ Houghton nodded. ‘I confess to being uneasy about the young man’s intentions, betraying his father to the Duke.’

He did indeed know the heart of it. ‘His was a choice few sons would make out of love,’ Owen agreed. ‘But Lascelles’s choice of a wife seems unwise in these uneasy times.’

‘Of course. Still. .’

‘Who was Lascelles’s father-in-law accused of harbouring?’ Geoffrey asked. ‘A known supporter of Lawgoch?’

‘One whom the people call merely the Fleming. Amusing, considering how the country round Haverfordwest is overrun by Flemings. As to the man’s supporting Lawgoch, he is an opportunist. It was the Earl of Pembroke’s mother, a Mortimer, who heeded the rumour, and when Lascelles gave Goronwy sanctuary in the Duke’s March, she made haste to inform Lancaster. She knows the Fleming because he has worked for the Mortimers in the past. I do not know what she knows of his present activities.’

‘And hence the ambiguity.’

‘Indeed. Was Gruffydd ap Goronwy harbouring a real traitor, or had he found himself on the wrong side of the Mortimers?’ Houghton rubbed his forehead. ‘I did not know it was the son of Cydweli’s steward who lay in the undercroft when I sent his fellows away.’

‘Whose fellows did you send away?’ Owen asked.

‘Reine’s fellows, Cydweli men.’

‘When?’

‘This morning. They rode up to Tower Gate and demanded to see the body that had been left there.’

The bishop was full of surprises. ‘Cydweli men came here today?’

Houghton nodded. ‘Demanding to see the body.’

‘What did they say when they saw it?’

‘They did not see it. They had no littera marchi. I sent them away. They had been sniffing round here earlier — several days ago — though not so boldly.’ Houghton paced. ‘I assure you, Captain, I am and always shall be the Duke’s ally. I would do nothing to impugn him, his authority or his honour. But I am lord here, and I cannot allow the Duke’s constable — or his steward — to order his men into my lordship and challenge my authority.’

‘I have no quarrel with that.’

‘But now it seems I behaved rashly. I had no idea it was John de Reine. He may have known of some danger and sent for the men, who came too late. But they gave me no explanation.’

‘Then I very much doubt he had sent for them,’ Owen said. ‘Yet it is strange, so many from Cydweli in St David’s.’

Houghton’s pacing became more vigorous. ‘Reine took a risk in writing to the Duke of his father’s inappropriate marriage. Was he silenced by his own father? Or those loyal to his father?’

‘You do not have a high opinion of Lascelles,’ Geoffrey remarked.

The bishop stopped. ‘You misunderstand me. I have never before had reason to distrust the man. In faith, I know almost nothing of Lascelles. But his natural son has been murdered and left at my doorstep, and I was one of the few people privy to his- Well, you must see that many would consider Reine disloyal to Lascelles.’

‘Was the Duke wrong in trusting Reine?’ Geoffrey asked.

Houghton paused. ‘What?’ he asked distractedly. ‘Wrong to trust him? No. Not at all. Reine was the personal guard of the Duke’s late steward, Banastre, who chose his men with great care.’

‘A steward who kept personal guards?’ Owen said.

Houghton clasped his hands behind his back, nodded solemnly. ‘Banastre considered himself more lord than steward.’

‘You have heard nothing more than what the Duke has told you, the general rumour of Gruffydd ap Goronwy and the Fleming?’

‘Nothing more.’

‘What would you have us do?’ Geoffrey asked.

Owen thought that an ill-considered question. What they must do is tell the bishop that this was none of their concern.

‘You return to Cydweli soon?’ Houghton asked.

‘My intent was to depart in a few days,’ Owen said.

‘I would ask a favour of you.’

‘My lord bishop, our duty is-’ Geoffrey began, belatedly in Owen’s opinion.

‘Lawgoch’s followers and Lascelles’s loyalties,’ Houghton said, ‘and the more public issue of the garrisons and recruiting archers for the Duke’s campaign in France. About the latter I do not agree with the Duke’s plan: you take soldiers away from the Marches just as the King orders all to ensure the security of the ports in their lordships. But I honour the Duke’s orders and will not detain you. My request should prove a simple matter: I would have you slip away quietly, without any eyes to observe your departure, and bear John de Reine’s body back to Cydweli.’

‘A simple matter?’ Geoffrey muttered.

‘You fear the men who came today,’ Owen said.

‘I am uneasy about them. And about someone’s purpose in leaving Reine’s corpse at my gate. Caution seems the best approach. I shall provide you with some of my men, armed men, and a priest fittingly to accompany a funeral corte`ge.’

‘A priest?’ Owen asked.

‘He was lately chaplain of Cydweli — the vicar who identified the body. If Cydweli men meet you on the road they will find no cause to complain about my treatment of their steward’s son. In fact, Edern volunteered to escort you when he identified Reine.’

‘Why should he care?’ Owen asked.

‘He is a devoted servant,’ Houghton said.

Owen doubted it was that simple. This turn of events made him uneasy. But it would be difficult to justify denying Houghton’s request. The body should return to Cydweli, and they were an armed party headed that way. ‘Can this Edern be ready in a day’s time?’

‘He can be ready in the morning.’

‘The morning? What is the haste?’ Geoffrey asked.

‘Reine has been dead for some days,’ Owen said. ‘Already the body will be an unpleasant companion. The longer we wait, the worse it will be.’

Geoffrey made a face.

‘Where might I find this Edern?’ Owen asked. ‘I would speak with him before we set off on the road.’