In Winter's Shadow Read Online Free PDF Page B

quiet, boy,” Cei snapped, but I raised my hand for him to wait.
    “Can you read, Gwyn?” I asked.
    He nodded eagerly. “Yes, noble lady. And I can write, book hand and cursive both. My mother wanted me to be a priest, and made certain that I learned how to write. She taught me herself.”
    I looked at Cei, lifting an eyebrow. “There is a shortage of servants who can read, even here,” I said. “I could use a copy clerk to take down inventories and keep records for me.”
    Cei shrugged. “As you please, my lady. It is a waste of time to teach some priestly little bastard from a convent the arts of war, but if you need a clerk, by all means keep him. Will you speak with Rhuawn?”
    “You may stay,” I told the boy. “Go to the Hall and ask for Gweir, the steward; he will look after you, and tonight I will ask my lord Arthur to confirm you in a place as a servant. Yes, Cei, I will speak to Rhuawn, but I will promise him that if he apologizes you will as well. Good fellows,” to the farmers, “if you will come with me I will arrange for you to receive the price of your grain.”
    The farmers were satisfied, Cei grumbled agreement, and the boy Gwyn was overjoyed. The next matter, then, was to talk to Rhuawn—though while I was in the storerooms I ought to see about the wool for the weavers. And then there was the feast for that night.
    I spoke with Rhuawn before the afternoon was half over, and eventually persuaded him to apologize to Cei. But I knew that neither of the warriors would be content. Their reconciliation was like the forcing together, of two fragments of a broken dish, which might hold together for a little while if undisturbed, but which left the break as deep and unremedied as before. And at first Rhuawn had not listened to me, but only eyed me with a kind of suspicion and given polite, noncommittal replies. By the end of our talk he had grown warmer, and told me how he regretted his harsh words, but that Cei’s insult had been too much for any honorable man to endure, and so on and on.
    Yet when walking back up the hill toward the Hall I kept remembering the way his eyes slid sideways from mine at the first. The mistrust was growing. I could scarcely bridge the gap between the two factions now, and if things continued as they were, Rhuawn and his friends would soon regard me as an enemy. Indeed, I was aware of rumors about me circulating, conversations suddenly hushed at my approach. Only up to now no rumors about me had been believed.
    As I approached the kitchens, where I would check the arrangements for the feast to be given that night, my name was called and I found Arthur’s second-in-command, the warleader and cavalry commander Bedwyr ap Brendan, hurrying toward me.
    “My lady Gwynhwyfar!” he called again. “My lord Arthur asked me to find you. He wishes to have a conference upon the situation in Less Britain before the feast tonight.”
    I stopped, trying to order my thoughts and rearrange my plans for the afternoon. “Very well, lord,” I said, after a moment, “but I must give some orders to the kitchens first or there will be no feast tonight.”
    He nodded, smiling, and fell in step beside me. As Arthur’s warleader, Bedwyr would naturally be at the conference as well, so he had nothing to do but wait for me.
    Bedwyr was a complex man. He was Arthur’s best friend and Cei’s as well. But he was as different from Cei as a man can be, and different from most other warriors as well. He dressed plainly, without any of the bright colors or jewelery they love. He had very dark brown hair, brown eyes, wore his beard close-trimmed, and his usual expression was one of quiet attention. Very little escaped his notice. He was a Breton, from the southeast of Less Britain, of a noble, Roman-descended family. He had had a Roman education, for the Roman ways are stronger in Gaul than in Britain, but he had not paid much heed to it. He joined the warband of Bran, the younger son of the king of