The blood of the rebel

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The Blood of the Rebel is the second Geraldines novel by Sabrina Qunaj and the sequel to The Daughter of the Last King . The main role is played by Isabel, the youngest daughter of William FitzGerald, Nesta's son, who joins the Welsh freedom fighters in the course of the novel , which mainly describes the situation in the country from a Welsh perspective.

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In the summer of 1146 the South Welsh rebels, led by Cadell ap Gruffydd, take Llansteffan Castle , the castle of Isabel's uncle Maurice . It is Isabel's first encounter with the rebels and thus the last three remaining cousins ​​of her father, of whom, despite their attack, she at least takes Cadell into her heart.

After the fall of the castle, Isabel was sent to a monastery in England for five years while her father arranged a marriage between her and the Flemish sheriff of Pembrokeshire, William Hayt. On her return to Wales in September 1151, Isabel witnesses a group of Freinc ​​(as the Normans are called by the Welsh), including their future husband, two dozen fleeing Welsh rebels, slaughtering and knocking down their leader, none other than Cadell . Together with Ralph le Walleys, a North Welsh prince whom his father Cadwaladr ap Gruffudd sent to the sheriff as pledge and page, Isabel is able to bring the seriously wounded rebel to safety. The two thirteen-year-olds are united by their shared secret, and they soon become deeply friends. Ralph's presence in Tenby , the sheriff's castle, almost makes Isabel forget that she has to marry a monster in two years. Together they meet Trystan ap Iestyn, a bow maker and rebel supporter from the village, who promises Ralph to show him how to use the longbow, and calls Isabel, who has an insatiable thirst for stories and songs, a future bard . They lead a seemingly simple and insignificant life in Tenby, and Ralph makes it plausible that the wars his family wages among themselves and against the Freinc ​​concern him as much as the many sacrifices they cost.

But in the course of the next two years he was unable to maintain his neutrality and increasingly attracted the anger of the sheriff, who made Ralph atone for his insubordination in the pillory. When Sir William finally learns from one of his knights that Isabel and Ralph helped a rebel leader to escape, Ralph is supposed to pay with his life. Isabel causes the execution to be canceled and Ralph's sentence commuted to thirty lashes and imprisonment until the wedding in exchange for tolerance in the marriage bed.

But on the night before the wedding, the rebels invade Tenby, this time under the leadership of Cadell's brother Maredudd , to find and punish those responsible for the attack on Cadell and his men, on this occasion to free Ralph and kidnap Isabel in order to prevent her marriage to the sheriff and thus his connection to the mighty Geraldines, while the latter is now running away. It is only when they are separated that Ralph and Isabel notice how their friendship and feelings for each other have changed in recent years, and he vows to free her from captivity as soon as he can come to her.

In fact, Isabel's kidnapping is more like a liberation, as the rebels finally allow her to be herself, to indulge in her dreams and to learn songs and stories, which she owes above all to Cadell, who always keeps a watchful eye on her until he goes on a pilgrimage to Rome to thank God for his salvation and his life. His title of Prince of South Wales passed to Maredudd, who continued the work of his parents and brothers, officially declared Isabel his cousin and from then on could count on her support in the fight against the Freinc. Meanwhile, Isabel learns from her grandmother Nesta that Ralph lives as a squire with her uncle Maurice and that he is fine where he is. She tells herself that she has to forget him and throws herself into the Welsh struggle for freedom with all her energy.

When the civil war in England finally ended in 1155, Flemish mercenaries flooded the country and plagued the Welsh people. Maredudd, who always feels with his people, wants to eliminate this threat, but is so seriously injured in an attack on a castle in Flemish hands that he dies that same night at the age of just twenty-five, leaving behind only an eight-year-old son for posterity. The princely dignity goes to the last remaining of the six brothers, Rhys , who now has to regain the freedom of the Welsh people.

Two years later, Ralph succeeds in infiltrating the rebels in order to get to Isabel and redeem his oath. As a supposed rebel, he accompanies Isabel and a group of Welshmen on one of their small campaigns against a group of Freinc ​​and moves away with them from their fighting force. Against her will, Isabel is said to be the subject of Ralph's plan to finally protect her from the sheriff, who has received information about her struggles as a rebel and will hunt her down, by marrying her himself. He wants to save her from being exposed to the sheriff's wrath as helplessly as he was after his return to Tenby, tells her what condition Isabel's uncle found him in, and although she resists her family and friends in the To let go, the remorseful but determined and much stronger Ralph wins the upper hand and takes her to a chapel. Not knowing that the sheriff who shadowed him is already waiting for him and his bride there. Isabel's marriage is blackmailed with Ralph's life, while her own uncle David marries her to William Hayt.

In the next few years Isabel can not only keep the sheriff off her bed, but also help the rebels with information about him and his troops, which she gives to Trystan, who forwards them to an allied shepherd family. When she finally learns of a planned invasion by King Henry II of England , in which her uncles Harri and Robert are also said to be involved, she wants to warn Trystan, but is surprised in his hut by Ralph, who announces that he has fallen out with Maurice and affiliated with the North Welsh rebels. He brings news of the impending invasion to his uncle Owain Gwynedd , which can then be averted. After the battle has been fought, Ralph returns to Tenby to see Isabel again and to tell her that her uncle Harri fell in battle, while Robert escaped seriously injured. Believing the news will kill her grandmother, she plans to call the sheriff for a visit the next day, in return for which she must keep the promise she made on Ralph's change of judgment. But in order not to have to sacrifice her virginity to him, she spends the night with Ralph and finally gets her husband's approval to say goodbye to her dying grandmother. Ralph asks Isabel to wait for him in Tenby until he has achieved his goal: to unite the many small and divided Welsh kingdoms in the fight against the Freinc.

In July 1159, Isabel is six months pregnant and does not know who the father of her unborn child is, as she has both met Ralph many times and was forced to continue to share the bed with her husband, who finally reports proudly that he had finally been able to find the person who had provided the rebels with information over the years. Sooner or later the bow maker will confess. When Isabel's request to spare Trystan falls on deaf ears and even beats her despite the child, she decides to free her old friend and ally herself. But Trystan, who has already been tortured and seriously injured, asks Ralph, who unexpectedly appears in the dungeon after a six-month absence, to flee Tenby with Isabel, but to kill him himself so that he cannot pass on any information. Sadly, Ralph complies, and a few hours later Isabel gives birth to a daughter far too early in the Welsh forests, who dies only moments after she is born. Ralph asks her one last time to wait for him and stay in Dinefwr , Rhys' castle, until North and South Wales are finally reconciled. Isabel hasn't heard from Ralph for five years.

In 1163 the Welsh princes had to submit to King Henry several times and hand over hostages, but both parties know: It is a temporary peace. Henry II again demands hostages, this time including Cadwgan, the son of the late Maredudd. Only a few weeks after Rhys had to leave his nephew in the care of the English Lord Walter Clifford, a messenger brings the news that Clifford had had Cadwgan murdered. To seek revenge together, Rhys wants to make peace with Gwynedd on Isabel's advice . In 1164 she accompanied him to the peace negotiations in the north, in the hope of meeting Ralph again, who soon arrived from the south, albeit accompanied by the sheriff. Under Welsh law, under certain circumstances, a woman can divorce her husband after a seven-year probationary period, and the sheriff has no choice but to obey the law.

In the summer of 1165, the most important of the Welsh princes met in Edeyrnion and sealed an alliance between the various kingdoms of the country. A long-cherished dream for Ralph and Isabel, who are starting a new life in North Wales, where Ralph holds his own land as a respected Uchelwyr ( Whale nobleman ).

Important characters in the novel

* stands for historical personality

Geraldines

  • Isabel FitzWilliam *, daughter of the Geraldine family
  • Maurice FitzGerald *, her uncle
  • William FitzGerald *, her father
  • Henry FitzRoy *, also her uncle, son of King Henry I.
  • Robert FitzStephen *, another uncle, son of Stephen de Mareis
  • Nesta ferch Rhys *, her grandmother

Deheubarth / South Wales

  • Cadell ap Gruffydd *, Nesta's nephew, Prince of South Wales, rebel leader
  • Maredudd *, his half-brother, rebel
  • Eira, Maredudd's lover, Isabel's friend
  • Cadwgan *, her son
  • Rhys *, also Cadell's half-brother
  • Niall, Cadell's Irish bard

Gwynedd / North Wales

  • Owain Gwynedd *, Prince of North Wales
  • Cadwaladr ap Gruffudd *, his brother, a temporary follower of the Freinc
  • Ralph le Walleys *, his son
  • Hywel ap Owain *, his nephew, the prince of poets

Freinc

  • William Hayt *, Sheriff of Pembrokeshire, Isabel's fiance and husband
  • Lady Hayt, his mother
  • Roger de Brabant, one of his knights
  • Henry II *, King of England

annotation

Unlike Nesta, Isabel is only a marginal figure in Welsh history and one of many Geraldines. As a result, few facts are known about her, although it can be said with some certainty that she was married to Sheriff William Hayt and was the mother of two sons, named le Walleys, which Ralph's father adopted when he left his family turned away and defected to the Normans. It is also not certain which of the men named was the father of Isabel's sons. It is possible, but not proven, that she actually participated actively and in fighting in the Welsh rebellion, but all the great events and turning points of the struggle for freedom are broadly true.

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