The track curved past theCastell y Ddraigand the Llanedwyn mansion came into view – red-bricked, slate roofed, with vast wings to either side – and the sight rent him asunder, seized his chest with joy, a yearning so deep he wished his leg was hale so he could hie for the portico, rap on the door and fall into the warmth within.
Thehiraeth.
He’d heard that Welsh word spoken on many an occasion but had never felt its full meaning until this moment.
A longing that assailed his countrymen – grief for the time spent apart from their homeland. A sorrow that tore at the heart and forever guided them back.
A longing for the ancient times that were solely evoked in song nowadays – of princes, warriors, castles and dragons.
He reached for the carved pendant beneath his shirt and felt calmed, at peace, welcomed the light drizzle that sprinkled his shoulders with silver teardrops.
With a shiver, he shuffled on, wondering if snow would extend to the coast this year. It was uncommon but cold enough and he’d noted it had already swathed the inland mountain peaks. If the wind whipped from the north-east, a white blanket would wrap the tower and the surrounding lands, taming the savage crevices and smothering the rampant foliage.
He stared to his scuffed boots, watched them shuffle the forecourt toward the welcoming light within the columned portico and the imposing door with its new coat of blue.
Blinking to clear moisture from his eyes, his fingers brushed the weather-pitted column.
Would his daughter recognise him?
Would she believe it was he?
He reached out a hand for the dragon-toothed knocker.
Was that laughter within?
He could feel the warmt–
“Around the back with you, lad.”
Eh?Tristan spun.
A crone all garbed in black was marching from the parterre garden that faced the house, a bunch of rosemary clasped within her hands as her black-booted feet crunched over the forecourt gravel, skin pale as a five-day-old corpse.
Mrs Pugh.
Their hallowed housekeeper.
And never had a sight been so welcome. She’d bandaged his cuts, belted his arse for pilfering cake and–
“Around the back with you,” she repeated, shooing him with the rosemary. “Cook will sort you out with some stew. You seeking work are you, lad?”
“Mrs Pugh,” he rasped, knowing what she saw: a scruffy vagabond leaning on a cane, a greatcoat borrowed from Mr Hughes which was too cavernous for his spare frame, black hair long and a bare scratch of a voice.
“Mrs Pugh, it’s…” His throat caught and he coughed.
“Are you ailing? Do I know you, lad? Into the lantern light with you.”
He complied and she peered up.
He removed his sodden hat.
She blinked.
“It’s me, Mrs P–”
“Arrggghhh, ’tis a spectre come to haunt me!” Rosemary sailed through the mist-laden air, Mrs Pugh crossing herself a dozen times, even though she was a Methodist, as he recalled. “Have mercy,” she yowled. “Have mercy that I walloped your arse for filching cake. Don’t plague me for eternity. Not that you didn’t deserve that wallop but–”
He grabbed one of her flailing hands. “Mrs Pugh, touch me! I’m flesh and blo–”
