Tuck

CHAPTER 10

Speaking with the humble, yet confident authority that one would expect of a papal envoy, the slender young man introduced as Father Dominic charmed his listeners with tales of his travels in the service of the Holy Father and his dealings with kings and cardinals. It fell to Tuck, of course, to translate his stories for the benefit of his listeners since Bran spoke in the curious, chiefly meaningless jibber-jabber of broken Latin that passed for the language of the Italian nobility among folk who had never heard it. Tuck was able to keep one step ahead of his listeners by his many sudden consultations-to clarify some word or thought-where Bran, as Father Dominic, would then whisper the bare bones of what his struggling translator was to say next. Such was Father Dominic's winsome manner that Tuck found himself almost believing in the charming lies, even knowing them to be spun of purest nonsense and embellished by his own ready tongue.

Father Dominic revealed that he was on a mission from Rome, and explained that he had come to the region to make acquaintance with churchmen among the tribes of Britain who remained outside Norman influence. This was announced in a casual way, but the subtlety was not lost on his listeners. Father Dominic, speaking through Tuck, told them that because of the delicate nature of his inquiry, he was pleased to travel without his usual large entourage to enable him to go where he would, unnoticed and unannounced. The Mother Church was reaching out to all her children in Britain, he said, the silent and suffering as well their noisier, more overbearing, and belligerent brothers.

All the while, their distracted host would glance towards the empty doorway. Finally, when Bran's absence could no longer be comfortably ignored, Llewelyn spoke up. "Forgive me for asking, Friar Aethelfrith, but I begin to worry about our cousin. Is he well? Perhaps he has fallen ill and requires attention."

Bran ap Brychan's kinsmen had done him the honour of travelling a considerable distance to greet their cousin from the south, and although beguiled by the unexpected arrival of a genuine emissary of the pope in Rome, they could not help but wonder about their cousin's puzzling absence. Father Dominic heard Llewelyn's question, too, and without giving any indication that he knew what had been said, he smiled, raised his hands in blessing to those who sat at the table with him, then begged to be excused, as he was feeling somewhat tired from his journey.

"Certainly, we understand," said Llewelyn, jumping to his feet. "I will have quarters prepared for you at once. If you will kindly wait but a moment-"

Father Dominic waved off his host, saying, through Tuck, "Pray do not trouble yourself. I shall find my own way."

With that he turned and, despite Llewelyn's continued protests, walked to the door of the hall, where he paused with his hand on the latch. He stood there for a moment. Then, with the others looking on, stepped back from the door, shook himself around and-wonder of wonders-seemed to grow both larger and stronger before the startled eyes of his audience. When he turned around it was no longer Father Dominic who stood before them, but Bran himself once more-albeit berobed as a priest, and with a shorn and shaven pate.

Llewelyn was speechless, and all around the board stared in astonishment at the deception so skilfully executed under their very noses. They looked at one another in baffled bemusement. When Llewelyn finally recovered his tongue, he contrived to sound angry-though his tone fell short by a long throw. "How now, Cousin? What is this devilment?"

"Forgive me if I have caused offence," said Bran, finding his own true voice at last, "but I knew no better way to convince you all."

"Convince?" wondered Llewelyn. "And what, pray, are we to be convinced of, Cousin?"

Bran shrugged off the black robe, resumed his place at the board, and poured himself a cup of ale, saying, "That I will tell, and gladly." Smiling broadly, he raised his cup to the men around the board. "First, I would know these kinsmen of mine a little better."

"As soon said as done," replied Llewelyn, some of his former goodwill returning. Indicating the elder man sitting beside him, he said, "This is Hywel Hen, Bishop of Bangor, and the granduncle of young Brocmael beside him; Hywel was brother to your mother's father. Next is Cynwrig, from Aberffraw, and his son Ifor. Then we have Trahaern, Meurig, and Llygad from Ynys Mon. Meurig is married to your mother's younger cousin, Myfanwy."

"God with you all," said Bran. "I know your names, and I see my dear mother in your faces. I am pleased to meet you all."

"We've met before, my boy," said Hywel Hen, "though I don't expect you to remember. You were but a bare-bottomed infant in your mother's arms at the time. I well remember your mother, of course-and your father. Fares the king well, does he?"

"If it lay in my power to bring you greetings from Lord Brychan, trust that nothing would please me more," replied Bran. "But such would come to you from beyond the grave."

The others took this in silence.

"My father is dead," Bran continued, "and all his war band with him. Killed by the Ffreinc who have invaded our lands in Elfael."

"Then it is true," said Meurig. "We heard that the Ffreinc are moving into the southlands." He shook his head. "I am sorry to hear of King Brychan's death."

"As are we all," said Trahaern, whose dark hair rippled across his head like the waves of a well-ordered sea. "As are we all. But tell us, young Bran, why did you put on the robes of a priest just now?"

"I cannot think it was for amusement," offered Meurig. "But if it was, let me assure you that I am not amused."

"Nor I," said Cynwrig. "Your jest failed, my friend."

"In truth, my lords, it was no jest," replied Bran. "I wanted you to see how easily men defer to a priest's robe and welcome him that wears it."

"You said it was to convince us," Llewelyn reminded him.

"Indeed." Hands on the table, Bran leaned forward. "If I had come to you saying that I intended to fetch King Gruffydd from Earl Hugh's prison, what would you have said?"

"That you were softheaded," chuckled Trahaern. "Or howling mad."

"Our king is held behind locked doors in a great rock of a fortress guarded by Wolf Hugh's own war band," declared Llygad, a thickset man with the ruddy face of one who likes his ale as much as it likes him. "It cannot be done."

"Not by Bran ap Brychan, perhaps," granted Bran amiably. "But Father Dominic-who you have just seen and welcomed at this very table-has been known to prise open doors barred to all others."

He looked to Tuck for confirmation of this fact. "It is true," the friar avowed with a solemn shaking of his round head. "I have seen it with my own eyes, have I not?"

"Why should you want to see our Rhi Gruffydd freed from prison?" asked Hywel, fingering the gold bishop's cross upon his chest. "What is that to you?"

Despite the bluntness of the question, the others looked to Bran for an answer, and the success of King Raven's northern venture seemed to balance on a knife edge.

"What is it to me?" repeated Bran, his tone half-mocking. "In truth, it is everything to me. I came here to ask your king to raise his war band and return with me to help lead them in the fight. Unless, of course, you would care to take the throne in his absence…?" He regarded Hywel pointedly and then turned his gaze to the others around the board. No one volunteered to usurp the king's authority, prisoner though he was.

"I thought not," continued Bran. "It is true that I came here to ask your king to aid me in driving the Ffreinc from our homeland and freeing Elfael from the tyranny of their rule. But now that I know that my best hope lies rotting in a Ffreinc prison-for all he is my kinsman, too-I will not rest until I have freed him."

Bran's kinsmen stared at him in silence that was finally broken by Trahaern's sudden bark of laughter.

"You dream big," the dark Welshman laughed, slapping the table with the flat of his hand. "I like you."

The tension eased at once, and Tuck realized he had been holding his breath-nor was he the only one. The two younger Cymry, silent but watchful, sighed with relief and relaxed in their elders' pleasure.

"It will take more than a priest's robe to fetch Gruffydd from Wolf Hugh's prison," Meurig observed. "God knows, if that was all it took he'd be a free man long since."

The others nodded knowingly, and looked to Bran for his response.

"You have no idea," replied Bran, that slow, dangerous smile sliding across his scarred lips, "how much more there is to me than that."