The Beast of Caer Baddan (52 page)

The outer room looked much the same as it had before, perhaps with a few of the furnishing changed and some of the cushions replaced. The shutters were closed to the cold winter's night, and a fire blazed in the hearth, filling the room with warmth. Owain glanced over at the two doors on the far wall and spied a sleeping servant girl on a mat by the left of the two. He guessed that Leola and the babies were probably in that room and quietly went in. The room to the right had been his mother's bedroom, but in this left chamber Owain himself had slept from ages one to four. It had been a comfortable shelter for an innocent child.

“Now a
sanctuary for Leola,” he mused.

She lay there in a large bed, with the covers pulled up to her chin. Her light hair was so blond that it seemed hold merely a w
hisper of yellow hue. Her face was more smooth then he remembered and her lips more crimson.

When Owain first saw Leola huddled along the back wall of Saxon's great hall, she had been a lovely young woman, and that had hardly stayed in his mind. But now as he gazed on her, his was seized by her radiance, and it would not release him.

Why had she called him “Master” when she knew that she was his wife?

One of the babies stirred, and Owain went around Leola's bed to the cradle. It was easy to be silent in soft slippers, and his movements woke neither Leola nor the two nurses who
laid on cots on the other side of the infants.

Owain gazed down at his sons and marveled.

Their faces were small and white like new fallen snow, and their clenched fists were held to their closed eyes. The fuzzy hair on their heads was a bright orange-like red, the exact same as Owain's own mane. The babies looked much like Gratianna had when she was born, only perhaps larger boned.

As Owain's eyes traveled over them, taking in every detail, his heart filled with wonder until it seemed to spill over. They were so perfect that he could think of no words to describe them.

One of the babies whined, and Owain reached into the cradle and drew him out.

“Shh there, my precious one,” he whispered, as he coddled the infant. “Do not wake them from their sleep.”

A little purple cord tied around the baby's right wrist indicated to Owain that this was the elder of the two. Euginius, his father said his name was.

“Euginius, my son,” Owain mused. “But a man must be twice blessed to pray for a boy and get two.”

He touched the other baby's soft cheeks carefully so as not to wake him.

“Ambrosius, my son,” Owain whispered. “You both shall be great.”

When Leola awoke, it was still night and the bedroom was warm with a new kindled flame. Her quick ear caught the sound of Euginius cooing in delight, and she turned over to get up. Her eyes fell on Owain, standing by the cradle and holding Euginius in his muscular arms.

Her first instinct was to attack him, and her hand slipped under her pillow to grasp the handle of the knife she still kept there. It came to her that those were his children too. She had never actually thought on it before, but it was true. And now that he was alive, she would be forced to share them with him.

So, she sat there staring at Owain with wide eyes, as he rocked Euginius back and forth and kissed the baby’s tiny fists.

As Leola studied him in the fire light, she thought that he seemed greatly altered from when she had met him the spring before. Even though he was now clean, shaved faced, and meticulously dressed, he looked ashen pale and thin compared to what she remembered. His lips
and right cheek appeared to have been burned with fire, and there was an odd puncture hole on his face. But beyond these, his eyes bore a gravity which she had not noticed in them before.

You are sad but it is from something far more recent then your mother's death.

“Shh, Beauty,” he said in Saxon. “Go back to sleep.”

Beauty?
At least that has not changed.

Did he then still consider her dear to him? Had he even thought her dear before when he took her from the mead hall?

She lay back down in the bed but watched him for a long time until he spoke again.

“They are perfect,” he said.

Leola saw the tenderness in his eyes as he looked on them.

“Thank you, Master,” she replied.

Master!

Her own words frightened her.

“My father says they were early,” Owain said.

“Six weeks,” and her words were so hurried they seemed to all fall off her tongue at once. “They are very small.”

“So was I when I was born,” he said. “So my mother told me.”

Leola was silent, thinking about what King Irael had said of Owain’s mother. She wondered how much of it was true, that Owain's heart was broken because of his mother's death. She was certain that even if it was, something else had hurt his heart within the last few months.

Perhaps it is my marriage, our marriage, that has caused this change in him?

Leola shuttered.

“Do not worry for them,” he said. “They shall grow. Now, go back to sleep.”

He laid Euginius back down beside his brother in the cradle, laid a gentle kiss on each one, and went out.

How much everything can change in an instant!

Owain made his way up the stairs and through the passageway to Gratianna's rooms. He found the child fast asleep in her bed and pulled a chair up beside it to be near her.

“Ah, my little one,” he whispered. “How I have missed you,” and kissed her temple.

She had always been precious to him, since the day he first held her in his arms and kissed her curly red hair.

His eyes caught the decorative wooden box set on the other side of the bed. The last thing he did before he married Leola was emptied that box of the nonsensical trinkets that had filled it, and placed there things he knew she would love. The knife he had found in the land of the Maetae Pictii, new strings for her harp, and a wishing stone.

Owain did not remember when sleep took him, but he woke to his daughter’s elated squeals.

“Tada! Tada! Tada” she cried. “You came back!”

The child sprang from her bed and threw herself in his arms.

Owain laughed, fighting back happy tears.

It felt so good to just sit there and hold his daughter in his arms. The cares of the world seemed to fade as she snuggled in his chest.

“Oh, Tada,” she whispered. “How I missed you.”

“I missed you too, my precious one,” he said.

“Tada!” she said, looking up at him. “You have ouchies all over your face!”

She pulled herself up on him, so that her own face was up against his, and laid kiss after kiss on his scars.

“Do they hurt, Tada?” she asked.

“Not when you are kissing them, my little one,” he replied.

She hugged him tighter still and buried her face in his neck.

“I'm so happy!” she squealed.

“So am I.”

Chapter Forty Two: Uncertainty

The day brought Lady Gratianna’s full joy over the return of her father.

“Tada! Tada!” she screamed. “I love you! I missed you!”

“And I missed you too, my love,” Owain said.

Owain scooped her up and swung her around the sitting room, to her obvious delight.

King Irael winced and gasped at the commotion, clenching the arms of his chair.

“Careful, Owain,” he said. “Do not... drop her-”

“Very well, Da,” Owain replied.

He sat down on the cushioned bench across from his father and placed Gratianna by his side.

“Ugh!” he grunted.

His body twisted and his hand gripped at his back, as a sharp pain bolted up his spine.

“Tada!” the little girl cried. “Are you hurt, Tada?”

“Sore. That is all,” Owain replied, with a tired smile. “Now, how old are you?” and he gave her a tap on the nose.

“Four!” and she burst into giggles.

“Four?” he said in false surprise. “Are you really? What a big girl you are! Have you been practicing your harp for me?”

“Noooooo.”
Gratianna looked downcast.

“Ah, well,” Owain replied, with a casual wave of his hand. “I shall give you a lesson tomorrow. And then you must practice it every single day.”

“I shall! I shall!” the child squealed.

“Tell me what you have been up to then, as you have not touched your instrument.”

Gratianna folded her little hands under her chin.

“I knew you would come back!” she said, in an excited whisper.

“Did you, my little one?” and he laid a kiss on the top of her head. “And how did you know that?”

“Because I prayed that you would not be dead anymore and turned my wishing stone over every night.”

Leola looked up in surprise at the child’s words.

“Really,” Owain said, actually impressed. “The wishing stone I gave to you?”

Gratianna nodded her head an affirmative.

“You turned it over for me?” he asked.

“I did it for grandfather, and he wasn’t sick anymore,” Gratianna said with a proud lift of her chin. “And I did it for Ambrosius, and he wasn’t sick any more. And then I did it for you and now you are not dead anymore!”

She gave him a grin that seemed to fill her whole face, and her large round eyes grew greater still as she gazed up at him.