Chapter 3

The town market was a hive of activity. I wove through the cobbled street dodging horses and carts as I looked for a stall selling the finest thread. Alice had managed to rip another dress, but with the arrival day of a new shipment of thread unknown, I needed to darn the dress until I could make a new one with the expensive cloth from the shipment.

The clang of metal rang out next to the impatient stamp of the horses tethered outside the forge. The smell of melting metal drifted across the stands, mingling with the smell of roasting pig from the butchers. We were on the edge of spring, the winter weather giving way to warmer days and fresh winds. The icy season was not yet willing to release us, and it was a cooler day. I wrapped my thick woolen coat tighter about me against the bitter wind. The spring sun shone, but it was not yet strong enough to overcome the wind chill. Plus it was slowly sinking in the sky as the day ebbed on.

I had passed many thread stands whose reels were too thick and coarse. There was only one stand left and I hoped old lady Cope would still have some suitable thread. I was in luck.

"Seen much of that wizard young Bella?" She asked as she handed me my purchase.

I smiled, "No Shelly. It seems he keeps himself to himself."

The older, portly lady nodded slowly. "Well you take care of yourself. Are you visiting your father today? He would love to see you. Complains he doesn't see his daughter half as much as he wants any more."

"I know Mrs Cope, I am visiting him now." I bade the older lady farewell and began to make my way to my father's easterly cottage. My mother had been a servant in the castle and it was through her that I ended up playing with Lady Alice as children. Yet, when I was 8, my mother died but with the bond between Alice and I already formed and my mother's good reputation within the castle, King Carlisle decreed that I stay on to become one of Alice's ladies in waiting. It is a position usually only filled by nobles, yet the queen found our friendship endearing and the rule was dropped on that occasion. It meant, however, that my father continued to live alone. I visited him as often as I could, bringing him the better foodstuffs the palace possessed. It was not often that the poor got fish.

From the age of 6 I had been betrothed to Jacob Black. He was a fellow peasant and my father's apprentice. We were due to marry a few years after I became a lady in waiting, but my father postponed it in the hope that Alice would release me from service to return home, marry and tend to Jake and our house. Noble ladies had servants to look after children and their house. Being a peasant still, I did not have that luxury.

Alice had yet to release me and I was unsure of her reasons to keep me in the palace but it was a double-edged sword. I was growing old, regarded an old maid by most. Girls were usually married off by the age of 14 but I was 19 and unmarried still. If it was not for Jacob waiting for me, I would become undesirable to a future husband and such a thought concerned my father.

Slipping in the door of his tiny, rundown house, I called out to him. The cottage had only 2 rooms, an area to sleep and an area to cook. It was small, but no smaller than any other peasant house. My father was carving a small wooden statue beside the fire and looked up, smiling as I came in. "Bella!" He put his carving down and walked over, pulling me into a hug. I clung to him. As much as I was used to our time apart, I was uncharacteristically close to my father for the social norm. "How are things in the castle? Staying out of trouble?" He had asked me this every time I visited since I was a small child playing with Alice.

"Of course, Father." I hummed, appeasing him.

"So, is it true Emrys is in the castle?" I rolled my eyes. It was becoming tedious how many people asked that question, but news travelled slowly and was subject to rumours causing people to seek confirmation on what they had heard.

"Seemingly so. I do not know whether to believe it is him. The King and princess believe it is though."

My father nodded slowly, taking in what I was saying. "I wonder what Siobhan will make of it?"

Siobhan was an elderly lady some believed to be a witch. She came from a distant land with many tales and legends. She was well loved within the community, but with word reaching the town about witches being drowned and burned, it had begun to make some of the townspeople fearful of her.

"I wonder." I hummed softly, my mind already mulling over an idea.

Some time later I slipped from my father's house. I had fed him lunch and left him eating well. It was getting dark, but I was not needed in the castle as Lady Alice had granted me an afternoon off whilst another of the ladies in waiting took over my duties. Following the torchlights, I negotiated the dark street and its litter of mud and animal dung before reaching Siobhan's little house before the night fell completely. I knocked on the makeshift wooden door. I could see light pouring out from large gaps between the wooden slats and then a figure moving slowly through the light. Finally the door opened a crack and the old lady peered inhospitably out at me. "Who is there?"

"It's Isabella Swan. Charles Swan's daughter." I spoke loudly so she could hear me, She had begun losing her hearing over a decade ago and I worried she would not be able to hear much at all now.

"Bella." She hummed, drawing my name out on her tongue, as if testing how it sounds. "Come in." She opened the door further and beckoned me in. The little room she had for a house was cold, but she was wrapped up in thick clothes ready for the nighttime chill. "What brings you here my dear?" I sat in a rickety old wooden chair, barely daring to sit down incase it crumpled in its attempt to hold me. I glanced about the room, there were jars with various strange objects in them and scripts of paper lay about the room with writing on them. Spells maybe?

Casting my gaze away from the potentially incriminating paper, I began with my reason for visiting her. "What do you know of the tale of Olwen?" The old lady smiled knowingly, her wild gray hair framing her frail face. "So many have asked me about so many legends since Emrys decided to come here." Her gnarled fingers danced over the table, moving objects as they went. It was only then that I realized Siobhan had become nearly blind. "Tell me Bella, what do you know of the tale of Olwen?"

"Only what Lady Alice has told me. I knew there was a legend about her and then Alice said she was a mortal girl in love with Emrys."

Siobhan nodded, "And he loved her." She confirmed. "So they say. Why the interest in Olwen and not the tales of Emrys, child?"

I paused, ruminating over my thoughts, "Well, I am sure Emrys' stories will come to light in court as he tells them."

"You don't believe its him." She concluded from my tone.

"I do not know. Maybe only time will tell."

"You want proof before you believe."

"Yes." I murmured.

"Well, if it is him, I hope you are not too surprised. Magic is not always well received." She added darkly and I knew she had already fallen victim to accusations of witchcraft.

"Not even if it comes from a great sorcerer of legend?"

She laughed huskily, "Child, if you are going to welcome him only if he proves himself with magic, then why not welcome him now. He may be unwilling to prove himself in such a way. People change when they are afraid, Isabella." She rose from the table. "It is late. Come back to me when you have decided to believe that man is be the great Emrys. Until then, if they remain mere legends to you, there is no need to know of the tale of Olwen."

With that she pushed me out the door. "Return to the castle carefully. It's a fine night for criminals. Keep to the east wall." Siobhan shut her door with a snap leaving me feeling unfulfilled and more confused as to why that man, Emrys, called me Olwen. Surely it was a mistake?