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Updated: May 24, 2025
Nor did we draw rein, save to change horses, till we clattered up the ancient paved street of the city on its hill, and dismounted at the gates of the white palace where Gerent waited me. There the first man who came out to greet me was one whom I was altogether glad to see, though his presence astonished me for a moment. Howel of Dyfed passed from the great door and bade me welcome.
I suppose there could be no more frank and friendly host than Howel of Dyfed. Tired I was that night also, and I slept well. But once I woke with a fear for Owen on me, for I had dreamed that I saw some man creeping and spying along the wide ramparts of Norton stronghold. And it seemed that the man had a bow in his hand.
Is that the value of a prince of Morganwg? It is ill to insult a captive." "Nay, Prince, there is no insult " "By St. Petroc, but there is, though! What will the men of Morganwg what will the Dyfed men say when they hear that the Saxon holds one of the line of Arthur at the value of a hundred cows? Ay, that is how I shall be known henceforth! Mordred of the cows, forsooth."
He burst out first in praise of Powell, and then told his wife all that had happened during the past twelve months. She, too, was full of admiration, and told her husband that in Powell he had certainly found a true friend. In Dyfed, when Powell had returned to his own land and castle, he called his lords together. Then he asked them to be perfectly frank and free to speak.
The boy baby grew up fast, and when only two years old, was as strong as most children are at six. Soon he was able to ride the colt that had been born on the May night, and the two were as playmates together. Now it chanced, the man had heard the tale of Queen Rhiannon, wife of Powell, Prince of Dyfed. She had become the mother of a baby boy, but it was stolen from her at night.
But at last we stood with Owen on the deck of the good ship while all the shore buzzed with folk, Welsh and Danish alike, who watched us pass from Dyfed to the Devon coast, cheering and waving with mighty goodwill, and only Howel seemed lonely as he sat on his white horse, still and yet smiling, with his men round him, where the cliff looks over the inner harbour, to see the last for many days of the daughter he had trusted to my keeping.
The father of Bledri, Cadivor, was a great personage in West Wales, and is looked upon as the ancestor of the most important families in the ancient Dyfed, a division now represented by Pembrokeshire, and the Western portion of Carmarthen. Cadivor had three sons, of whom Bledri was the eldest; thus, at his father's death, he would be head of this ancient and distinguished family.
I answered that indeed I hoped that it would prove so, and then asked for Morfed, the priest who had crossed with us, as I did not see him among the other clergy at the table. She told me that he had left them, on foot, at the gate of Watchet, making his way westward, as she believed. He had only joined their party for easier travelling in Dyfed.
"Well, I have waited for you, if I did not look to see you here. And this is Howel of Dyfed. Surely a Briton knows that to break in on the rites of the Druid is death? But Howel ever was rash. And this is the outlaw. It is a true saying that he who sees this place shall die, Evan." Then said Howel boldly: "Briton I am, and therefore I know that the rites of the Druid are banned by Holy Church.
And there Howel of Dyfed dwelt in state in such a palace as that of Gerent, for here again the hand of the Saxon had never come, and the buildings bore the stamp of Imperial Rome. So once again I was lodged within stone walls, and with a roof above me that I could touch with my hand, and I need not say how I fared in all princely wise as the son of Owen.
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