"Iwan?" cried Bran, rushing to meet him.
"Bran? Mary and Joseph in a manger, Bran!" A grin spread across his broad face; his thick moustache twitched with pleasure. Seizing Bran, he gathered him in a crushing embrace. "Bran ap Brychan," he said, "I never thought to see you again."
"If it had not been for Angharad, no one ever would," Bran confessed, gazing up into the face of his father's champion. "By heaven, it is good to see you."
Iwan raised his hand high and called out in a voice that resounded through the glade. "Hear me, everyone! Before you stands Bran ap Brychan, heir to the throne of Elfael! Make him welcome!"
Then, turning once more to Bran, the warrior dapped his hand to the young man's shoulder. "Humble it may be," Iwan said, "but my hearth will be all the merrier with you for company."
"I would be honoured," Bran told him.
"Come, we will share a cup," announced Iwan. "I am that anxious to hear how you fared all this time without me,"
The former champion turned on his heel and started back to his hut. Bran caught Angharad by the arm and whispered, "You did not tell them I was coming?"
"The choice, my son, was always yours alone," she replied.
"You knew this would happen," he insisted. "You must have known all along."
"You said you wanted to go to your people." Extending a gnarled hand to the bedraggled gathering before him, she said, "Here are your people, Bran."
How strange she was, this old woman standing before him-at once aged and ageless. The dark eyes gazing out at him from that wrinkled visage were as keen as blades, her mind sharper still. Bran was, he knew, at her mercy and always had been. "Who are you, Angharad?" he asked.
"You asked me once," she replied, "but you were not ready to receive the answer. Are you ready now?"
"I am-I mean, I think so."
"Then come," Angharad said. "It will not take long. Iwan will wait." She led him to a round moss- and bracken-covered hut in the centre of the settlement. The hide of a red ox served for a door, and here she paused, saying, "If you enter, Master Bran, you must leave your unbelief outside."
"I will," he told her. "So far as I am able, I will."
She regarded him without expression and then smiled. "I suppose that will have to do." To the others who had followed them, she said, "Go about your business. Siarles, tell Iwan we will join him soon. I would speak to Bran alone a moment." The people moved off reluctantly; Angharad gave Bran a little bow and, drawing aside the red oxhide, said, "Be welcome here, Prince of Elfael."
Bran stepped into the dim interior of the odd dwelling. Although dark, it was surprisingly ample and comfortable. Light filtered in through a single hole in the roof directly over the stonelined fire pit in the centre of the room. The furnishings were spare. A single three-legged stool, a row of woven grass baskets along the curving wall, and a bed of reeds and fleeces were the only belongings in the room. These Bran took in with a single glance as he entered.
A second look revealed another item he did not see until his eyes had better adjusted to the dusky interior: a robe made entirely of feathers, all of them black. Drawn to the peculiar garment, he ran his hand over the glossy plumage. "What is this?"
"It is the Bird Spirit Cloak," replied the old woman. "Come, sit down." She indicated a place opposite her at the fire ring.
"They called you hudolion," Bran said, settling himself crosslegged on a grass mat. "Are you?" he asked. "Are you an enchantress?"
"I have been called many things," she replied simply. "Hag… Whore… Leper… Witch… I am each of these and none. Banfaith of Elfael… True Bard of Britain, these titles are also mine. Call me what you will, I am myself alone, the last of my kind,"
In her words Bran heard the echo of a long-forgotten time, a time when Britain belonged to Britons alone, and when its sons and daughters walked beneath free skies.
The old woman exhaled gently and closed her eyes. She was silent for a long moment and then drew a deep breath. When she spoke again, her voice had changed, taking on the timbre and cadence of one of her songs. "Not for Angharad the friendly hearth, the silver-strung harp, or tore of gold," she said, almost singing the words. "In the forest she resides, living like the wild things-the nimble fox, elusive bear, or phantom wolf. Like these, her four-footed sisters, the forest is her shelter and her stronghold."
She exhaled again, and another long pause ensued. Bran, accustomed to the old woman's queer moods and eccentric ways, knew better than to interrupt her. He waited in silence for her to continue.
"Oh, beloved, yes, the greenwood is her caer, but it is not her home," she said after a moment. "Angharad was born to a more exalted position. She was born to bless the hall of a king with her song, to adorn and complete a noble sovereign with her strengthening presence. But the world has turned, the kings grown small, and the bards sing no more.
"Listen! Do not turn away. There was a time once, long ago, when the bards were lauded in the halls of kings, when rulers of the Cymry dispensed gold rings and jewelled armbands to the Chieftains of Song, when all men listened to the old tales, gloried in them, and so magnified their understanding; a time when lord and lady alike heeded the Head of Wisdom and sought the counsel of the Learned in all things.
"Alas! That time is gone. Everywhere kings quarrel amongst themselves, wasting their substance on trivialities and the meaningless pursuit of power, each one striving to rise at the expense of the other. They are maggots in manure, fighting for supremacy of the dung heap. Meanwhile, the enemy goes from strength to strength. The invader waxes mighty while the Gwr Gwyr, the True Men, melt away like mist on a sun-bright morning.
"The Day of the Wolf has dawned. The dire shape of its coming was seen and foretold, its arrival awaited with fear and dread. At long last it is here, and there are none who can turn it aside. Hear me, 0 Rhi Bran, the Red King stretches out his hand across the land, grasping, seizing, rending. He will not be satisfied until all lies under his dominion, or until he awakens from his sleep of death and acknowledges the law of love and justice laid down before the foundations of the world."
She spoke with eyes shut, her head weaving from side to side, as if listening to a melody Bran could not hear.
"I am Angharad, and here in the forest I watch and wait. For, as I live and breathe, the promise of my birth will yet be proved. By the grace of the Christ, my druid, I will yet compose a song to be sung before a king worthy of his praise." Then, slowly opening her eyes, she gazed at Bran directly. "Do you believe me when I say this?"
"I do believe," replied Bran without hesitation. More than anything else he had ever wanted, he ached for those words, somehow, to be true.
ishop Asaph stood in the door of his old wooden chapel, watching the labourers break a hole in the wall of his former chapter house, which was to become the residence of Count de Braose's chief magistrate and tax collector-an ominous development, to be sure, but of a piece with the multitude of changes taking place throughout Elfael almost daily.
The monastery yard had slowly become the market square of the new town, and the various monastic buildings either converted to accommodate new uses or pulled down to make way for bigger, more serviceable buildings. One row of monks' cells was being removed to make way for a blacksmith forge and granary. The long, low wattleand-daub refectory was to be a guildhall, and the modest scriptorium a town treasury. That there were no guilds in Elfael seemed not to matter; that no one paid taxes was, apparently, beside the point. The guilds would come in due course; the taxman, too.