I remained at Caer Myrddin another day and then set out with Pelleas and one of Tewdrig's advisers – Llawr Eilerw, one of the two who were always with him – and a small force of ten warriors as escort. We rode at once to the north, for I wanted to present Aurelius with as much support as I could gather before returning to him. Partly out of vanity, I suppose; ashamed as I am to say it, I wished to demonstrate my power to him, to gain his confidence. It was in my mind that I would need his complete trust, and very soon.
With Dyfed in hand, I could go to the northern kingdoms without feeling the beggar. Tewdrig ap Teithfallt was well respected in the north and, as I have said, the ties between the two regions were ancient and honourable. I anticipated no trouble and, indeed, received none.
Along the way, Llawr told me all that had happened since I had lived and ruled in Dyfed – most of which had come down to him from his elders, since he was in no wise old enough to have remembered it of himself.
It seems that word of the Goddeu massacre eventually reached Maridunum. Maelwys was heartbroken, but since my body had not been found there was some hope that I still lived.
'King Maelwys held firm to his dying day the notion that you were alive,' Llawr told me as we journeyed through the cool mountain passes of Yr Widdfa one afternoon. 'All those years, and he would never hear a word but that you would return one day.'
'I wish it could have been sooner,' I replied sadly. 'He died in the raid that took the villa, I believe?'
That he did – and more than many with him.' Llawr's tone betrayed no emotion. Why should it? The events he spoke of had happened before he had been born, and the world he described was different from the one he knew. 'The barbarians came at us from the east, so the beacons were no use. They were on us almost before the alarm could be given. We beat them back, of course, but we lost Maelwys and the villa to them that day – Maelwys to an axeblade, the villa to the torch.'
I was silent for a time, out of respect for Maelwys, and all that he had given me of himself. Great Light, grant him a place of honour at your feast.
‘Teithfallt succeeded him?' I asked a little while later.
'Yes, a nephew – Salach's youngest son.'
'Ah, Salach, I had forgotten about him. He went to Gaul to become a priest, did he not?'
'So he did, I am told. He had returned some years earlier to help Bishop Dafyd with his church – the bishop was getting old and required a younger hand take over certain duties. Salach had married and fathered two sons: the eldest one, Gwythelyn, already dedicated to the church, and the other, Teithfallt, he dedicated to Dyfed and its people.'
'In time Teithfallt distinguished himself in the eyes of Maelwys' lords as a canny battlechief, so when the king was killed it was natural they should choose him. Teithfallt ruled well and wisely and died in his bed. Tewdrig already shared the throne with his father as war leader, and he became king upon Teithfallt's death.'
'So that is the way of it,' I mused. The realm was in good, strong hands, and that was how it should be. I could never be a king again, even if I wanted to be; Aurelius needed me, the Island of the Mighty needed me, far more than Dyfed ever did, or would. It was clear to me that my Lord Jesu had placed my feet on a different path; my destiny lay another way.
If I had any qualms about returning to the north – to the scene of my beloved Ganieda's hideous death – they were swallowed up hi the desire to see, at long last, her grave. Since my healing, I no longer felt the insane morbidity that had consumed and nearly destroyed me. I did feel the fleeting emptiness of a grief that would remain with me for ever. But it was not unbearable to me, and not without the upward-looking hope that we would one day be reunited on the other side of death's many-shadowed door.
So, before coming into Custennin's old stronghold in Celyd-don, I had Pelleas conduct me to my wife's grave. He waited outside the little grove with the horses while I went in alone, as into a secluded chapel to pray.
I will not say that the sight of that small mound lying in the wooded glade, now much overgrown with woodbine and vetch, did not move me: I wept to see it, and my tears were sweet grief to me.
A single grey stone stood over the mound where her body lay in its hollowed-oak coffin. The stone, a single slab of slate, had been worked, its surface smoothed and trimmed, and an elaborate cross of Christ incised on its face. And, beneath the cross, the simple legend in Latin:
HIC TVMVLO IACET
I traced the neatly-carved words with my fingertips and murmured, 'Here in this tomb lies Ganieda, daughter of Custennin, in the peace of Christ.'
There was no mention of the child, nor of my heart, as there might have been, for in truth both were buried with her.
All in all, it was a tranquil place, near where she had died; and if the gravesite was not much visited any more, at least it was hidden from the casual desecrations of unthinking wayfarers.
I knelt down and prayed a long prayer, and when I rose I felt peace reclaim its place in my soul. I left the grove content in heart and mind.
Then Pelleas and I returned to where our escort waited and we continued to Goddeu.
I should have known what to expect. I should have been prepared. But I was not. Too much had happened in too short a time, it seemed, and the sight of Custennin and Goddeu, unchanged, shocked me as much as the change in Maridunum had shocked me. But there he stood, bold and big as the day I first had seen him: proud monarch of Celyddon, Fair Folk king, great battlechief and ruler of a haughty people.
Like Avallach and others of their race, the years had not touched Custennin, nor would they. He even maintained the same appearance as when I knew him before – in everything, including the two black wolf-hounds crouching at his heels.
I swung down from the saddle as he approached and went to him. Without a word he gathered me in his powerful arms and crushed me to him, as I had seen him do with Ganieda countless times. 'Myrddin, my son,' he murmured in his deep voice. 'You have come back from the dead.'
'I have indeed,' I replied.
He pushed me away and held me at arm's length, looking at me. There were unshed tears in his eyes. 'I never thought to see you again… ' his eyes slid past me to Pelleas, whom he acknowledged with a nod, 'but Pelleas insisted you were still alive and he never stopped searching for you. Would that I had had his faith… '
'I only wish I could have come sooner.'
'Have you seen Ganieda's grave?'
'I have just come from there. It is a good stone.'
'Yes, I had the priests at Caer Ligal make it.'
I noticed he said nothing about his son, so I asked: 'What of Gwendolau?'
'He is buried on the field where he died. I will take you there if you like – but you will remember the place.'
'I have never forgotten it.' Nor would I ever.
'We have spoken our respect for the dead, and that is good and proper,' Custennin said. 'Now let us talk of the living. I have another son, for I have taken a wife in recent years and she has just given birth to a babe.'
This was good news and I told him so. Custennin was well pleased, for the birth of this child meant a great deal to him. 'What is his name?'
'Cunomor,' he told me, 'an old name, but a good one.'
'May he grow into the stature of his illustrious ancestors,' I said lightly.
'Come inside and rest from your journey. We will eat and drink together,' Custennin said, pulling me along with him. He held me by the arm as if he were afraid that I might disappear again if he relaxed his hold for even an instant. 'And then you will meet my new son.'