In Winter's Shadow by Gillian Bradshaw Page A

supplement his knowledge of surgery, but had quarreled with his abbot and been forced to leave. He joined Arthur shortly after the death of the Emperor Uther, before Arthur himself claimed the purple. He was a sensible, hard-headed man who never had a good word or an unkind deed for anyone. When I entered his house he was pouring some sticky syrup into a cup of wine, scowling. Goronwy, the injured man, lay on a bed. His sword arm was bound across his bare chest and his side and shoulder were bandaged. His face above his black beard was pale and he was sweating.
    Gruffydd nodded and grunted when he saw me, but did not greet me. He set the cup in Goronwy’s left, uninjured hand: the wine wavered as his hand shook. He swallowed some of the potion and made a face.
    “Drink it all,” Gruffydd advised him. “It will dull the pain—no, here.”
    “I can drink it by myself; I left my mother years ago. Why didn’t you give it to me before, if it dulls pain?”
    “I did give you some before; I’m giving you more now. I wanted you to have some of your wits about you while I worked. It would be easy enough to cut through a nerve, cleaning a wound like that, and under a broken collar bone. Gloria Deo! Are you eager to lose the use of your arm? As if you hadn’t already given enough proof of your foolishness by dueling!”
    “My lady,” said Arthur, emerging from the shadows beside the bed. I had not noticed him till that moment, and my heart leapt suddenly. He took my hands a moment and pressed them. The lines about his mouth and eyes were very pronounced.
    “Medraut told me you were here, and wanted me,” I said.
    He nodded, letting go of my hands. “I saw him on my way here, and sent him.”
    “Medraut!” said Goronwy, trying to sit up. “He knows of this, then? Already?”
    “I imagine half the fortress knows that you and the lord Bedwyr fought, Lord Goronwy,” I replied, keeping my voice even.
    “Ah.” Goronwy fell back on the bed again. “Well. If you see him, tell him that I would welcome his company. It was for his sake that I fought, and, had he been present, he would himself have fought, so this matter concerns him.”
    Gruffydd grunted. “It is for me to say whether or not you are well enough to see visitors. And I say that you will see none, not until tomorrow.”
    Goronwy tried to sit up again, groaned and fell back. Gruffydd took the cup from him, poured some more wine, and added some more syrup. “Take it,” he ordered. “It will put you to sleep.” Goronwy took it without argument.
    “Why did you fight the lord Bedwyr?” Arthur asked, as soon as the cup was empty. His voice; was quiet, calm. Only I, who knew him so well, could hear the tension in it.
    Goronwy blinked at him. “My lord, he…damn his spear! He said I was a liar!”
    “Did he so? Why?”
    Goronwy blinked again. The drug was having its effect, as Arthur no doubt had calculated. “He said I…no, first we were talking about the lord Gwalchmai, my lord. Morfran ap Tegid, and Constans, and I. We were in the Hall. And I said that you did not send Gwalchmai back to Gaul because you suspected him of negotiating with King Macsen in bad faith. But Morfran said…he said, ‘By Heaven, it was false,’ and that you did not send Gwalchmai because he was ill. And Constans said that he could well believe that, and that Gwalchmai was indeed ill—in his wits, from killing his mother. He has a quick tongue, Constans! And Morfran went very quiet and shifty-eyed, and asked whether it was Medraut who said this; and Constans asked why he wished to know—and it was then that the lord Bedwyr came up—he had been sitting down the Hall from us—and said that Gwalchmai was not ill, but that you, my lord, wished him to rest, and that no one doubted his loyalty. And I said that that was false, for there are plenty that doubt it, and with reason; and he called me a liar. How can an honorable man endure it? I challenged him to fight me then and there.