A strange fire gleamed in Llewelyn’s eyes.  The brothers looked at each other a good while in silence.

“And thou thinkest —­” said Llewelyn at last.

Howel was some time in replying, and his answer was a little indeterminate, although sufficiently significant.

“Why, the maid will be left here; but when her father returns to claim her, perchance she will not be found.  If that were so, thinkest thou not that nought but open war would lie before us?”

Llewelyn’s eyes glowed.  He said not a word, and the darkness gathered round the boys in the narrow chamber.  They thought not of descending or of asking for food, even after their day’s hunting in the hills.  They were hardy, and seasoned to abstemious ways, and had no room for thoughts of such a kind.  Silence was settling down upon the castle, and they had no intention of leaving their room again that night.  Dark thoughts were their companions as they undressed and made ready for bed; and hardly were they settled there before the door opened, and the old bard Wenwynwyn entered.

This old man was almost like a father to these boys, and Llewelyn and Howel were particularly attached to him and he to them.  He shared to the full their ardent love for their country and their untempered hatred of the English race.  He saw, as they did, nothing but ill in the temporizing attitude now to be found amongst the smaller Welsh chieftains with regard to the claims made by the English monarch; and much of the fierce hostility to be found in the boys had been the result of the lessons instilled into their mind by the wild-eyed, passionate old bard, one of the last of a doomed race.

“Wenwynwyn, is it thou?”

“Ay, boys, it is I. You did well to abstain from sitting at meat with the stranger tonight.  The meat went nigh to choke me that was swallowed in his presence.”

“How long stays he, contaminating our pure air?”

“He himself is off by sunrise tomorrow, and Res Vychan goes with him.  He leaves behind the little maid in the care of thy mother.”

A strange smile crossed the face of the old man, invisible in the darkness.

“Strange for the parent bird to leave the dove in the nest of the hawk —­ the eyry of the eagle.”

“Ha!” quoth Llewelyn quickly, “that thought hath likewise come to thee, good Wenwynwyn.”

The old man made no direct response, but went on speaking in low even tones.

“The maid has dwelt in the household of the great king.  She has played with his children, been the companion of the young princesses.  She is beloved of them and of the monarch and his wife.  Let them but hear that she is lost in the fastness of Dynevor, and the royal Edward will march in person to her rescue.  All the country will rise in arms to defend itself.  The north will join with the south, and Wales will shake off the hated foreign yoke banded as one man against the foreign foe.”