Summary: A "missing moment" from the end of The Book of Three. Gwydion decides to give a special ring to Eilonwy.

Author's Note: I did not come up with the idea of Gwydion being once interested in Angharad - I think a couple of other authors have also dabbled in that idea and thus I gladly give them credit - CompanionWarrior is the one that springs to mind first. I cannot remember the other and I deeply apologize. Also, Dallben's reaction to babies comes from one of CompanionWarrior's wonderful stories. I also think she was the first to suggest the color of Taran's eyes. I simply love her writing; I beg her forgiveness and will remove any references if she asks me.

Also, this piece takes a lot of license with the idea on how Gwydion obtained the ring in the first place. I don't know if it was ever specifically stated how he came by the ring... to my knowledge, it wasn't... hence, this bit of random musing/writing.

~BD

Emerald Ring

He held the ring so that it caught the firelight. The emerald glinted, revealing a couple of imperfections deep within the gem, as was always common in emeralds – even those carved so expertly by the Fair Folk. It was a brilliant, dark green color... reminiscent of Taran's eyes, now that he thought on it. Gwydion smiled, bittersweet. Originally, the ring had reminded him of Angharad's eyes; that had been the reason he had bartered for it in the first place.

He sighed and turned his gaze towards the fire, his hand falling limp against the arm of the chair, the ring still between his index finger and thumb. The memory of that transaction had left a constant, uneasy weight within his mind, one that he had not fully understood at the time but was slowly grasping more as the years went by. It was an unsettling riddle that danced just out of sight, showing him odd hints every so often.

"I wish to barter for something beautiful – something that would bring happiness to the Princess Angharad of Llyr."

"Something like... this, perhaps?" Orddu held up the ring – it had seemingly appeared from nowhere between her fingers. She smiled at him, revealing yellowed, rotting teeth.

His breath caught. It was perfect. He could tell just looking at it from a distance of several feet away, even clutched as it was between the fingers of the old hag.

"That... yes, that would indeed be perfect. What is your price? I have gold – "

Orwen laughed, cutting him short. "Oh, we've no need of gold, dearest."

Orddu agreed. "Orwen is right, we have plenty of gold. And weapons, too – so don't even bother with that offer." She pursed her lips together in thought, glancing at her two companions.

He felt a tingle of fear – something he did not feel often. "What do you desire, then?"

The one with the hood, Orgach, tilted her head slightly. "There is a small matter we could use his assistance with," she murmured, glancing at the other two. The glimpse of an eerie smile flickered within the shadows of her hood.

Orddu smiled again as well, yet it was also a smile that made his knees feel weak with worry.

"Oh, yes. There is that. He could be quite useful in that matter, couldn't he?"

"Please name it," he said, trying to sound bolder than he felt. "And if it is within my power, I will bargain."

"Oh, there's no question of it being within your power, gosling! Everything is, after all." She surveyed him closely. "In one year, there will be a battle."

He straightened. Well, that was simple enough. He would be needed to fight, of course – he was a Prince of Don. He had seen battle before this.

"Where?"

"Oh, the where isn't important," Orddu waved her hand carelessly, the ring glimmering despite the gray, heavy clouds. "The important thing is, you must not get involved."

His thoughts stalled.

...What?

No. Surely he had not heard properly.

"Excuse me?" he stammered.

"The battle," Orwen said patiently, as though explaining something to a two-year-old child. "The Sons of Don must not interfere or become involved in any way. It will be one year to the day."

"If you do become involved," Orddu warned, "this becomes forfeit, and will disappear from wherever it is and immediately return to us. Is that clear?"

Confused, he weighed the options in his mind. They were asking a lot, far more than it appeared at first glance. It was easy to say he wouldn't get involved in a battle, but what if the time came and the battle was against Arawn? What if his father ordered him to get involved? What if he had to go against his men, and his father, to not get involved?

Orddu smiled indulgently, as though she had read his thoughts. "I assure you, Arawn will not be there – he so rarely leaves Annuvin these days. And your father won't order you into it."

"Then what is its importance? Why am I to remove myself from the fray?"

Orwen laughed. "Such as shrewd little owlet!"

Orgach snorted. "Impertinent, more like."

"That is our affair, and that is our price," Orddu said with finality, holding the ring before him. The emerald flashed, a reminder of Angharad's brilliant gaze, and he acted somewhat rashly.

"Very well, you have my word. I will not get involved in this mysterious, future battle."

Orddu beamed. "Done. But one more thing before I give it to you."

"Another price?" Gwydion paled.

Orddu laughed. "Oh no, duckling, just a bit of advice about the ring. It is only fair to tell you. It contains one last bit of magic – Fairfolk magic, of course. It has the ability to grant one last wish, the deepest wish of one's heart. The person who owns it must twist it upon their finger while wishing such a thing."

"What sort of wish?"

Orgach snorted. "We already said. Are you sure he's a Son of Don? One would think he's too daft for such a position. I'm not sure he should be entrusted with – "

"Only the deepest wish and desire of one's heart," Orddu repeated placidly, cutting Orgach's rant short.

With that, the ring dropped into his palm, and the three hags beamed, wished him farewell, and vanished into their cottage, bolting the door behind them. Silence pressed around him, and the cold wind of the moor cut through his heavy cloak like ice.

What on earth had he done?

He drew in a slow breath. Three months later, to his shock, Angharad had refused his gift. It had certainly not pleased her in the least. Defeated, he returned to Caer Dathyl. Angharad did not love him, the ring was useless, and worse, he had promised not to get involved in whatever battle was coming. Perhaps he should get involved, he thought angrily, and then the ring would disappear back where it belonged.

But some small, nagging voice in his head reminded him of honor. It would not do for a Son of Don to go back on his word. He thought of visiting the hags again, but decided against it - it was pointless to do so, and foolish that he had gone in the first place.

And so, he hid the ring in a secret drawer in the elaborately carved desk within his personal chambers, locked away but not forgotten. He mentioned it only once when Dallben visited a few months later and King Math was not around. He had voiced his anger about the situation to his mentor, though not speaking of the price he paid for the ring.

Dallben had merely stroked his beard rather thoughtfully. "Things are rarely what they seem, and those three beings see things as we do not. How did you phrase your request again?"

Ruefully, he replied, "I sought something beautiful that would please the Princess Angharad of Llyr."

Dallben shrugged. "Perhaps it will please her in some other way in the future?" He paused, his brow furrowed. "It is hard to say what they understand about the matter. What was the price for this ring?"

Gwydion did not meet Dallben's eyes. "Never mind. Suffice to say it is something that has caused me mild concern, though the payment is not due for some weeks, yet."

Dallben's tone turned stern. "Perhaps it is not my place to tell a prince what he should or should not do, but I will ask you consider my advice just the same. Have a care in how you deal with them in the future, Lord Gwydion. The prices for their wares do not come cheap."

Slightly abashed, Gwydion nodded heavily. "I have no intention of seeking them again. It was foolhardy to go there in the first place. A lesson well learned, I assure you."

When Dallben left, Gwydion resumed a task no one on earth knew of except for himself and three hags: he counted down the weeks until that fateful day.

In the week leading up to the day in question, he was cagey and edgy, which irritated his father to no end. Yet he heard no rumors of Arawn. The men he commanded on the fields of battle spoke of nothing unusual, and he heard nothing from the spies that came in from various locations to report on the movements of evil. The day in question was just as quiet. Nothing strange happened around him, and he wondered if he had miscalculated the time. Maybe there was no battle after all. Perhaps the hags had been mistaken.

But two days later, the news came in. An unpleasant shiver slithered down his spine when a messenger arrived breathless, stumbling into the council room, just as King Math was reviewing the upcoming numbers for the grain harvest. The young man was white to the lips, his hands shaking.

The massacre had been horrific. Gwydion rode out to the scene himself, but there was no one alive. Bodies were strewn through the village and the surrounding fields, as though a hand of death had crushed them in one blow. Blood seeped into the ground and reeked in the air. Gwydion wondered if it was Arawn's work, though he could not guess why. It had been an agricultural village, ruled by a small cantrev – yet the small royal family and nobles were dead, too. Everyone was dead, scattered across the surrounding fields and meadows.

Slowly, he pieced together fragments of the situation. Letters were discovered – the cantrev had written to Caer Dathyl for help, but the letters were never sent. They'd clearly had some warning that they would be attacked, though they weren't sure who their attackers would be. Had Arawn desired something from them? But if that was the case, what could Arawn have wanted from these people? They had nothing but grain and barley in store, a few herds of pigs and cattle, but little else. No magical implements or enchantments, no secret knowledge.

In grief, he'd helped his men set up funeral pyres – there were too many dead to bury them all. It took several days. The stench of death burned within his nostrils, and he wondered why the letters were never sent. Perhaps there had just not been time.

Then, sadly, he realized he would have been unable to help regardless, for he had bartered the battle for a ring. What a fool he was.

As the last of the corpses were piled and set alight, he told his men that he had urgent business with the enchanter Dallben, and set out for the enchanter's farm alone, leaving the warriors of Don to finish the grisly task.

Restless and uneasy, he rode through the hours of darkness and arrived in the early morn. The farm was quiet when he arrived, the first light of dawn sleepily rising from the east. He found Coll milking, though to his surprise, the former warrior wore an unusually pinched expression. Coll was always so placid and calm. It was strange to see him edgy.

"Is Dallben in?" Gwydion had asked with hesitation.

Coll looked up, but his eyes were oddly unreadable. "Aye, he's in his chambers. And I should warn you first – try not to be as shocked as I was when you see what he's gone and done."

He returned to his milking without another word.

Wary, Gwydion said nothing more, but went into the white cottage.

He drew back almost the moment he entered the main room.

"Belin! What is that?"

Dallben was sitting in a chair by the fire, reading the Book of Three. But at his feet before the hearth slept a baby boy upon a rough, homespun blanket. Without even looking up, he replied dryly, "A baby, of course. Surely they have them in Caer Dathyl?"

The attempt at humor did nothing to ease Gwydion's shock, so Dallben was forced to close the book and recount the facts. The story took little time to tell, and Gwydion felt the hair on the back of his neck prickle – even now, the hair on the back of his neck prickled, thirteen years later – to think that Dallben had pulled Taran from the site of a massacre.

It had to be the same massacre that Gwydion himself had been forbidden to become involved in. Was that why Arawn had sent his liegemen to attack the village? Did he suspect the baby was the same as the one in the mysterious prophecy? Did he even know about the prophecy, though?

No. There was no way he could have known; Dallben kept close watch on his surroundings and was too powerful. Arawn surely knew nothing of the prophecy unless some unseen force of evil had alerted him. But the whole situation raised even more questions. Was there an unseen force of evil? Was Achren involved? Did the hags in the marsh know of the prophecy? Was that why they ordered Gwydion to avoid the battle?

The questions swam in his mind even now, as he stared blankly into the fire. The Horned King was destroyed, Arawn had been beaten back for the time being, but he would strike again at some point. Evil was never far away, it seemed.

Meanwhile, Taran himself lay unconscious in this very castle. He was a headstrong, stubborn, hot-blooded young lad on the verge of manhood, and he had ridiculous notions of honor and glory, and could barely carry a blade properly. When they'd first met in the forest, Gwydion had inwardly scoffed at the idea that Taran could possibly be the prophesied future High King of Prydain. He was certain Dallben had finally lost his mind and miscalculated, somehow.

But then, Gwydion himself had miscalculated the hags. He had been forbidden to enter a battle in which Taran was the lone survivor: a true foundling whose parentage was lost to history. Perhaps, in time, the boy would change. Once, Gwydion thought bitterly, he too had been headstrong and impulsive; for he had bartered a battle for a ring that the woman he fancied had refused, even if the battle resulted in Taran.

Which brought him back to the Princess Eilonwy. She was also in this castle – something Gwydion had not foreseen in the least.

He looked at the ring again. Eilonwy's eyes were not Angharad's, but a brilliant blue instead. Perhaps her father had had blue eyes.

Taran's were green, but a different shade than Angharad's. And then, too, the emerald seemed darker than he remembered. He had not pulled it out in years.

Perhaps...

Perhaps Angharad would be pleased if he gave the ring to her daughter. Not as a betrothal, of course, for Eilonwy was young enough to be his daughter, but as a gift. Perhaps Eilonwy could one day use the single remaining, powerful wish.

He would not yet tell her about the magic the ring possessed – the hags had specifically said the wish must be one's deepest desire. Eilonwy was still too young, too headstrong herself, and he couldn't have her wishing one single wish away as if it were nothing. He would tell her later, when she was older and wiser. When she knew herself better. When she was a woman.

His fist closed around the ring and he sighed heavily.

The tapestry was still weaving itself together, and he could not see the final outcome at all.

FIN