He’d explored every chamber in the castle, from kitchen to chicken roost, upturned every chest, unlocked every box, examined every parchment of de l’Ami’s. Nowhere was there a hint of anything more holy than tithes to monasteries and mission houses. Nothing whatsoever about safeguarding treasures coming out of the dark ages of Christendom.
It was as if every hint of it had been swept away by time. Or Ionnes de l’Ami, who’d wanted the Hallows above all things.
And now, Griffyn was starting to want them too.
He paused in his shoveling and wiped the back of his arm across his sweaty forehead, listening to the sounds of his men working. He stared over the battlement wall at the green expanse of the Nest’s fertile fields and hills. No. He might be home again, but a life’s mission realised was not enough anymore.
Not since he’d heard the dying words of Ionnes de l’Ami. Not since he’d been given a key that might unlock a treasure.
Gwyn was changing. Over the course of the weeks, she felt it, deep inside. Shifting like sheets of ice atop a melting river, rushing towards the falls, she was lost in Griffyn.
She even almost forgot. There were days where hours passed without her recalling the loyal treachery in her cellars. At times, it was as if Prince Eustace didn’t exist. Until the night the messenger came.
The afternoon had tilted away in long slanting shadows when Gwyn climbed up on the battlement walls and let the wind blow her skirts back. She smiled at the bustling around her, which was slowing now as suppertime drew near. But even during the lull, there was a verve, a pulse, that had been absent for years.
The castle had come alive again.
The architect had arrived days ago, and every male over the age of ten was now up on the walls or down in the forests. Huge trees had been felled to make the scaffolding, and now wooden skeletons danced beside the tumbled-down ramparts, their steps and platforms filled with sweating men in chausses and boots, buckets of cement, and pages running hither and back again.
The valley resounded with the shouts of men and the ring of hammers, the slow squeal of cranes lifting the huge stone blocks into place on the castle walls. Cartwheels clattered over cobblestone, horses whinnied, children shouted and laughed, racing to pick up nails that had fallen or to carry water to the men.
But what moved Gwyn most of all was that the women were laughing again. Their dead husbands and fathers became more distant ghosts each time a Sauvage warrior smiled at them or their children.
She doubled rations for every soldier who had made one of her women laugh.
Out on the fields, too, came renewed life. Griffyn’s men augmented her agricultural force considerably. The effects were immediate and obvious. Fast and furious the fields were ploughed now, ridge and furrow, ridge and furrow. For the first time in two years, Gwyn’s heart lifted.
Griffyn seemed happy too, turning towards her with the half-smile that dimpled his cheeks and made her belly flip over. Of course, there were the days when no one knew where he was for hours, but she was far too busy to monitor him, and not inclined whatsoever. Unless he came upon her mid-day (which he had twice now, once in the landing outside their chambers, once in the orchards, both times bringing her to such a swift, stunning climax she was dizzy for half an hour afterwards) she might not see him from dawn until dinner.
Her job was to direct the children, tend the wounded, manage merchants and orders and servants, and ensure food and a steady stream of sweetened water made it up to the workers throughout the crisp autumn days. And throughout all the chaotic, loud commotion, Gwyn smiled.
Which is why as evening darkened the sky into a dusky twilight that evening, she knew very well why she climbed to the ramparts and let the wind blow back her skirts. Because she wanted to be near Griffyn, purveyor of miracles.
The air was wondrously chilled tonight, and the men were purple outlines along the ramparts, clustered in groups of twos and threes. Some leaned against stone merlons, some sat on the stairs, others perched on the walls themselves, legs dangling as the sweat dried on their tired faces. Every second man was one of Griffyn’s, but their allegiance was indistinguishable under the cover of darkness, sweat, and the leather flasks being passed round.
Griffyn stood with a small group of men—Alex, Jerv, Fulk, a few others—the russet sunset flaming behind their outlines.
Guinevere approached. “My lord?”
He turned and smiled at her, that slow, lopsided grin. Even now, even after all they’d…done, the blood still rushed to her face. He held out his hand. “Come, Gwyn, see what we’ve done.”
What they’d done was astonishing. They had almost completed repair along this section of the west battlement wall. Forty soaring feet of ashlar restored to its glory. Even the gap in the accompanying defensive tower had been repaired, up to twenty feet or so.
This is what Papa had dreamed of doing. Rebuilding, restoring the Nest to its glory.
“I know you don’t care if he thought you a demon, Griffyn,” she said softly, “but you should know that my father would have been proud of this. Of you.”
Griffyn pursed his lips. “’Tis simply stone and strong men, Guinevere. Had your father wanted to, he could have done it.”
Gwyn smiled sadly. “Perhaps. But I think, if he could have, he would have. There was very little that mattered to him after, after—” She swallowed through the tightness in her throat. Behind them, men drifted back to their conversations. She could hear Alex say something soft but abrupt, then he fell silent.
“After Mamma died,” Gwyn continued, “the only things that moved Papa were my mother’s letters to him on Crusade. I remember watching him, after supper. He would sit on a bench in front of the fire trough, night after night, reading those letters til the flames burned out.”
Griffyn caught up her hand in his. “Your mother was lettered?”
“Oh, certes. Papa ensured she could read and write before he left on Crusade. That little chest I gave you, back at Saint Alban’s? All their letters were in there. Not that I could read them,” she added. “But one day, I had hoped—”
She broke off as Griffyn’s fingers tightened almost painfully around hers. His face looked odd.