Disclaimer: Not mine, no profit made, I will put the knights back tidily once I've finished borrowing them.

Llyna accompanied Galahad out of the barn and back towards the tavern reluctantly. She liked Galahad - he was not much older than her, and still retained a little of the bright-eyed eagerness that had been long since crushed from his fellow knights, but even so, she would have much preferred to have gone after Balan. The man was obviously half witted, and it was more than possible that he had no real knowledge of what he had spoken of, but the anguish in his eyes had been real, his distress obviously genuine. The village had secrets, that at least was a certainty, and Balan seemed to be struggling under their weight.

Grimacing as the mud squelched beneath her shoes, and trotting a couple of steps in order to keep up with the young knight, Llynya caught a glance of the meadow. The shadows were lengthening and it would be dark very soon. It had been agreed earlier that bonfires might help in either repelling or revealing the beast, and already several had been lit on the outskirts of the village, the first sparks floating like fireflies through the darkness. You ask them why the Woads leave them alone. Balan's words echoed in her head and she paused. The village elder had said that Woads did not pose a threat to the village, but if there had been a Roman camp nearby, wouldn't they too have expected loyalty? If either the Woads or Romans discovered the village was friendly towards their enemy then retribution would be swift and bloody. Revenge - it could hardly be described as justice - was dealt without remorse and usually left no-one alive to bury the dead, let alone mourn them. There was no middle ground when it came to alliances, and it seemed strange that the village had remained so unscathed by what must have been a slaughter when the Woads attacked the Roman camp.

"Llynya?" Galahad gestured towards the tavern. "Come on, It's safer inside."

"Alright." She nodded and followed him into the building, smiling a little as she caught a glimpse of Gawain cantering across the meadow towards Bors.

Arthur was wearily slumped in the corner of the tavern, the remains of the meal Louisa had prepared for him discarded upon the table; his attention obviously concentrated on Tom and Dynadan beside him rather than the food. Nearby Tristan sat quietly, sharpening one of his daggers and barely glancing up as Llynya and Galahad entered the room. Lancelot, Llynya noted with amusement, was either asleep or unconscious, Charlotte sitting beside him rolling bandages, and obviously loath to take her eyes off him. The blond girl glared at the new arrivals as though daring them to say something, but gave an embarrassed smile when Llynya grinned at her. From the looks of things Charlotte had suspended hostilities when it came to the roguish Knight, and given that her father was in the room, even if Lancelot awakened he would be forced to mind his manners, she thought with amusement.

Lark greeted the pair enthusiastically; her tail whipping back and forth and paws dancing across the flagstones. Bending down to scratch the lurcher's ears, Llynya took a moment to gather her muddled thoughts. She wasn't quite sure how to explain what she had heard, but Balan had been so distraught she certainly believed that he at least thought he had information that could help them. Biting back her apprehension, she walked over to Arthur, the village elder and Tom with a bravado she didn't really feel.

"Sirs?" At Arthur's questioning glance she squared her shoulders and took a deep breath. "A moment ago I spoke with Balan, well he spoke to me… well he said some things that were strange, about the Woads and the village and the Roman boy." Tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, and looking at Dynadan nervously, she sat down awkwardly when the big man gestured towards the bench beside him. The Roman commander looked at her patiently. "I see. And what did he say to you?"

"He mentioned Tauleas. The Roman boy, the one who was killed." Llynya felt a prickle of unease as Dynadan paled and avoided her eyes. "Tauleas and other names… Shona and Cara something, Caramock? Caraloc? I think he thinks that they have something to do with what's happening. With the beast, I mean."

"Caradoc?" Charlotte whispered, sliding off her chair and walking over. "Caradoc is dead Llynya, he… he.."

"He murdered Shona, a village girl, and was punished accordingly," Dynadan said tightly. "That was the end of it - that is the end of it."

"Balan doesn't seem to agree with you," Arthur replied quietly.

"Balan is a half-wit!" The village elder stood abruptly, and glanced towards the door. "It was a terrible crime, but it happened almost a year ago. Shona died by Caradoc's hand, Caradoc died by ours. Tauleas has been dead for years - it was a pity that he and those in the fort were killed, but that was a fight that had nothing to do with our village and is almost forgotten now. Romans kill Woads, Woads kill Romans. My people are neither - it is not our fight." He sat back down and fidgeted restlessly. "None of this has anything to do with the beast."

Galahad shifted against the wall he was leaning against and glanced at Arthur. Something didn't ring true about Dynadan's explanation, and the man was obviously unnerved by the conversation. Charlotte looked merely confused by the mention of Caradoc, but her father was fidgeting restlessly, his fingers twisting into the fabric of his tunic.

Arthur also seemed unconvinced with Dynadan's version of events. "Galahad, find Balan." The young knight nodded leaving the tavern swiftly, and Arthur turned his attention back to Dynadan. "Who was Caradoc? Why did he kill the girl?"

"He was crazy," Charlotte muttered, "wasn't he father?" She wrinkled her nose at the memory. "Alice said he once…"

"That's enough," Dynadan snapped. Recovering his composure a little, he continued more calmly,

"Caradoc was a blacksmith; a good one too." he paused as though hunting for the right words. "He had a temper on him though - if there was a brawl at the tavern then you could bet your horse that he'd be at the centre of it. Even so, none of us could have foreseen what happened." Rubbing a hand through his greying hair, he sighed heavily. "I don't know what it was about Shona that made him so obsessed with making her his own. She was a shy little thing; lived on the outskirts of town and didn't mix with folk much. Her mother died several years back, and her father… Well no one really knows, but he was probably a soldier from the fort that used to be here. I never heard evidence one way or another, but some people were a little…" Dynadan shifted uncomfortably, "you know how people talk… She kept herself to herself anyway - I don't think she would have welcomed company much even if people had offered it."

"She was not accepted in the village?" Arthur asked, his eyes intent upon the man sat before him.

"It wasn't as though anyone was hostile towards her," Dynadan protested. "She came down every couple of weeks to sell her wares and there was never any trouble. She used to collect herbs, make potions and lotions and what-not. Her mother used to do the same."

"She wasn't a witch," Charlotte added hastily, as though that would have been the first thing to spring to the Roman commander's mind. "They really worked…" quailing under her father's glare, she fell silent.

"Thank-you Charlotte," Dynadan said irritably. "As I said, I don't know why Caradoc was so taken by her - he was popular with the village girls, although he had a tendency to go after married women. He didn't need to go chasing after her. She rebuffed his advances several times, but that only made things worse. It was the harvest festival when he.. It happened. He was drunk - but then so was everyone else. She must have struggled, his face was scratched when I found him, and she… He said he hadn't meant to hurt her, but her neck was broken. Everyone was drunk and Caradoc was not well liked, at least not amongst the men."

"A lynch mob," Tom murmured.

Dynadan looked up sharply. "I'm not proud of what happened. That isn't the way justice is usually dealt here, but people were drunk, things got out of hand, and it was no great loss. He killed the girl, no-one was prepared to speak in his favour, and he paid for his crime. It was a horrible business , but it's over, it ended there." Glancing at his daughter, he added, "if he was capable of killing once then he could have done it again. I couldn't…"

His words were cut off by the arrival of Galahad and a very frightened Balan. The young man was visibly trembling, his eyes darting around the room, sliding away from the people that watched as the big knight half ushered and half dragged him towards Arthur. At the click of the door closing behind him he jumped, and suddenly feeling sorry for him, Llynya scrambled off the bench upon which she had perched and patted his arm reassuringly.

"It's alright," she said, looking into his terrified blue eyes. "No-one is going to hurt you." Noticing Dynadan's fierce expression, she silently made a wish to the goddess that she was making a promise that would be kept.

"Balan," Arthur said, softening his voice at Balan's obvious terror. "Sit down." He gestured to the chair beside Dynadan, "I only wish to talk to you."

"I don't know nothing." Balan made his way towards the centre of the room and sat down, his fingers skittering over the worn edges of the chair, and his eyes firmly fixed upon the floor. "Why'd you bring me here?"

"You spoke to Llynya of Caradoc and Tauleas." Arthur glanced at Llynya who flushed and nodded. "Why did you speak of them?"

Balan did not meet the Roman commander's eyes, but seemed to tense at the mention of the dead boy's name. "I didn't mean nothing by it," he muttered, "I talk too much - ask my ma. Can I go?"

"In a moment." Arthur looked at the boy with confusion. This was not a situation that he had any experience in, and by the looks of things the boy was utterly terrified of him. Tom grunted with annoyance, and he shot him a quelling look. Balan might be half-witted, but it was obvious that he was hiding something, and information would not be forthcoming by way of threats or intimidation. Glancing at the corner of the room, Arthur's eyes lit upon the two girls. Llynya had retreated to Charlotte's side, her eyes intent upon the scene unfolding. Balan had spoken to her before - perhaps he might be persuaded to speak to her again. "Llynya?"

She jumped slightly when Arthur motioned her forward, nervously brushing her hair back as she took a couple of steps forward. "My lord?" she asked tentatively, "what is it that you would have me do?"

Arthur gave a half smile of reassurance to the young girl. "Perhaps Balan would be more comfortable talking to you." He glanced at the young man who refused to meet his eyes. "Will you speak to Llynya?"

Balan gave a swift nod that could have been agreement or merely a nervous twitch, and Llynya stepped forward, horribly self conscious and baffled as to what she was supposed to do. "Balan?" she asked quietly, "you spoke of Tauleas before, why was that?"

"I don't know nothing," he muttered, eyes fixed firmly on the floor.

"Then why did you mention him?" Llynya tried to think back to their previous conversation. He doesn't mean it see - if he knew they were Roman then he wouldn't have… Realisation hit her like a blow to the stomach. "Tauleas isn't dead is he Balan?"

The man raised his head slowly. His eyes were bright with tears and his nose had started to run. Despite his size his expression was that of a miserable child. "I'm not supposed to tell," he mumbled. "He said they'd kill him. Said they'd kill me if I told."

"Tauleas told you that?" reaching out for his hand she squeezed his fingers, crouching down beside him. Balan nodded, rubbing his nose with the back of his free hand. "Everyone was dead - I mean his pa and everyone. He ran away." He glanced at Dynadan nervously. "But it was alright because he had Shona and sometimes I would see him and I would give him bread and he would give me meat."

"He lived in the forest?" Charlotte looked at Balan incredulously. "But we would have taken him in, we could have sent word to… someone. He needn't have been alone." She glanced at her father in search of reassurance and her voice trailed off. "We had no fight with the fort…"

"You shouldn't have done it." Balan glared at the village elder fiercely. "He knows what you did. You betrayed them, you drugged them and let the woads in. He knows what you did. All of them died and it was your fault. He loved Shona and Shona's dead and he don't care anymore, and he said if I…" He started to cry, untangling his fingers from Llynya's and tucking his hands against his stomach. "She stopped him before, her and me - but now she's dead and he says if he sees me again I'm dead."

Dynadan had almost stopped breathing. His face was completely drained of colour, his forehead beaded with sweat. Unable to meet the eyes of the men beside him, he glanced at his daughter. Charlotte looked utterly confused, her big blue eyes flicking towards him with the unspoken trust that he would say something to explain Balan's words, that he could make things right.

"I'm sorry love," he said quietly. "I'm so sorry."

"You betrayed the fort." Arthur's words were not a question, his eyes hard as he looked at the man before him. "You drugged the Romans."

Dynadan nodded. Dragging his eyes away from his daughter, he met Arthur's eyes. "The crime is mine and mine alone. The woads threatened the village, they threatened…" he glanced at Charlotte. "It was them or us. They were going to start with the children, make the rest of us watch.. We had good ties with the fort, they trusted us," he swallowed hard. "They trusted me. It wasn't difficult to slip nightshade into the stew when I helped the cook take the bread to their kitchen. After that I left and…" his voice trailed off. "It was supposed to have ended there. We aren't warriors, there were at leasttwo hundred woads living in the hills back then - we wouldn't have stood a chance against them. Tauleas…" he rubbed a weary hand over his face, "I had no idea that he was still alive."

"He is." Balan looked at Dynadan solemnly. "He loved Shona, they were going to run away. She told him not to hurt anyone, even though people didn't talk to her and said bad things about her. They were going to leave, and then everything would have been alright, but then Caradoc killed her, and Tauleas isn't like he used to be". His voice faltered slightly, "if they had just gone then none of this would have happened. She was nice Shona, she never called me a half-wit or an idiot. They were going to run away from here and get married."

"But what of the beast?" Galahad looked at the young man in confusion. "Is it his?"

"He had a cat," Balan whispered. "A beautiful stripey cat. He let me play with it back when I used to visit the fort sometimes, back before... He brought it from Rome; his uncle gave it to him. He said it was special, and that when it was older and he went back home it would fight in competitions. I thought that was stupid, 'cos it was a big cat but cats don't fight, and he kept saying it was only a kitten, and I said 'no it isn't, cos that's a big cat, and even old Mrs Ellie's cat wasn't that big'." Balan looked at Dynadan solemnly. "It's an awfullot bigger now."

The slam of the door made even Arthur jump, and before anyone had a chance to follow her, Charlotte had fled.

Charlotte ran blindly, stumbling through the darkness without any care or knowledge of where she was headed. The thundering beat of heart and the cold chill of the air dragged into her lungs, were enough to drown out every thing she had heard, the sting of the nettles against her ankles a welcome distraction from the thoughts racing around her head. Finally running out of breath, she slowed to a walk. She was beside the pig pen,she noted dimly, although the animals had had obviously been moved somewhere else. Nothing stirred in the little pens, and the wooden shelters they liked to sleep in were empty. Slumping down against the nearest one, she leant against the weathered wood for a moment and tried to catch her breath. It was dangerous to tarry for very long in the darkness, but going back meant facing her father - meant looking at the man she had respected with new eyes and the guilt of knowing that for years she hadn't really known the person she loved best in the world. People had died because of her father - dozens of Romans slaughtered as a direct consequence of his actions. Villagers had been killed because of that same betrayal. People she had known, people she had liked. Why hadn't she seen what was happening? Why hadn't he told her about the Woads - hadn't he trusted her? Arthur would probably execute him and there was nothing she could do to save him - by trying to protect her Dynadan had damned them all. She shoved the thoughts away and got to her feet, carefully picking her way over the stony ground. It was tempting to stay where she was, lost in the darkness, but her inner practicality forced her to her feet and made her walk back to her home.

The village was silent, the faint flicker of candlelight in the occasional window the only sign of life. Across the meadow the silhouette of a person moved before one of the bonfires, almost ghostlike in the darkness. Stumbling over a rut, she barely managed to avoid sprawling head first into the mud, her palms stinging as the gritty ground abraded them . With a muttered curse she scrambled to her knees, brushing her hair from her eyes and suddenly froze. There was something breathing behind her. Perhaps it was one of the knights, perhaps it was her father, a dog or.. Feeling her muscles tense and terror flood like ice water through her veins, she slowly turned her head. The beast crouched behind her, eyes gleaming like green fire, the sleek muscles bunched and rippling in the faint light. It was upon her before she had a chance to even think of screaming, the powerful jaws closing around her throat and the heavy body forcing her backwards and knocking the breath from her body. The last thing Charlotte saw was the young man who stood in the shadows watching silently, her last thought a distant memory of her mother.

"Come." Tauleas looked dispassionately at the young woman's body and ran a hand over the big cat's back. The beast gave a rumbling purr and rubbed it's magnificent head against his side affectionately, and together they slunk back into the shadows, as swift and silent as the clouds that scudded across the moon above them.

A/N: So much for my intended short fluffy story -I don't know what happened there! I hope this chapter wasn't too confusing - I know there are still a lot of questions that need answering. Thanks to everyone that reviewed the last chapter (thanks Phia - hope things are becoming a bit clearer now - although probably not!).