“Thank you,” he bobbed his head and started to dash off again, but suddenly stumbled to a halt. “Would… would you like to come? Carys was asking for you this morn but mother said that you were still sleeping.”
Elizabeau shrugged, smiled, and followed him. “I was,” she said as they crossed back across the ward. She eyed the lad a moment. “You would not happen to know where Rhys has gone, would you?”
He nodded. “He took Maddoc to visit the place where Gwyneth is buried.”
“Gwyneth?”
“Maddoc’s mother.”
“Oh,” Elizabeau looked more closely at the youth as they neared the barn. “And where is that?”
“St. Briavels,” he said, jabbing a finger in an easterly direction. “Not far. That is where Rhys’ castle is, you know.”
As his wife, Elizabeau realized she probably should have known that so she pretended that she did. “I’ve not seen it yet,” she thought she played well to his statement. “I suppose you have, many times.”
They entered the cool, dim barn. Pigeons roosted in the rafters, cooing gently. “A few,” Dylan shrugged. “Gwyneth did not like us there.”
“Why not?”
Dylan shrugged. “She never seemed to like Carys or me. We did not go there often.”
They had reached the massive sacks of grain, neatly stacked against the old barn wall. Dust and bits of straw floated through the air, passing through streams of sunlight that filtered in through the wide, uneven wall slats. Elizabeau watched the boy struggle with a large sack, still mulling over his last statement. Although she knew it was none of her affair, she could not help but be curious.
“Perhaps she simply did not like the company,” she said, probing him even though she tried to tell herself that she was doing no such thing. “Some people are like that, you know. They prefer to be alone.”
Dylan tried to lift the sack but gave up and started dragging it. “She just did not like us,” he said flatly, grunting as he lugged the grain. “Her father was a FitzPeter, constable for the earl of Monmouth and constable of St. Briavels. Her mother was the earl’s daughter. Gwyneth was born in the castle and when she married Rhys, it was part of her dowry.” He suddenly stopped lugging and looked up at her. “But you already know that, right? I talk too much.”
Elizabeau shook her head. “Your brother and I were only… married recently and we’ve not had the time to learn everything about one another. I did not know that his first wife was a granddaughter of Monmouth.”
Dylan went back to yanking on the sack, having no idea he was blathering information he probably should have kept to himself. “She was rich but she was mean,” he gave one big pull and almost tripped over his feet. “Mother didn’t like her but Father said she was wealthy and that Rhys needed to marry her, so he did. Everybody knows that Rhys’ father is the Duke of Navarre. Gwyneth and her father only wanted ties to the duke, but they didn’t get that at all. When they found out that the duke didn’t provide inheritance for Rhys, they got furious. They hated him and they hated us. That’s why we weren’t allowed in the castle.”
Elizabeau stared at him in shock as the hint of a tragic story began to unfold. “But what about the baby?”
“Maddoc?” Dylan was beginning to sweat with exertion as he pulled the sack out of the barn. Elizabeau followed. “They weren’t even married a year before Maddoc came. I heard Mother tell Father that Gwyneth wished the baby would die when she was giving birth to him. She cursed Rhys and she cursed Maddoc. And then she died instead. Mother said it was God’s punishment because she was so wicked.”
Elizabeau’s shock deepened. So did her sense of pity for the massive, silent man with the unhappy past. “But still he goes to visit her grave?”
Dylan shrugged. “Mother says that Rhys is a saint. She doesn’t know why he goes, either, but I heard Rhys tell her once that the woman was still Maddoc’s mother no matter what. I guess he doesn’t want Maddoc to grow up hating her even though she hated him.”
Elizabeau’s sorrow overwhelmed her sense of shock; never would she have imagined such a tale. But it explained a good deal of why Rhys had been so cold when they had initially met. She had thought once that the man had a wall around him; now she could see that she had been correct. He had every reason to have a wall of protection around him. But she also realized that the past few days had seen that wall topple slightly. He had warmed to her to the point where they could banter somewhat. She began to feel horrible for the way she had treated him in the beginning, her maliciousness and aggressive behavior. It seemed that Rhys had been exposed to his share of women who behaved that way towards him.