Elizabeth Chadwick - The Running Vixen

‘It’s all right,’ Guyon said quickly in that same language. ‘No one is going to harm you. You are here to be healed and returned to your family.’

The youth shook his head, panting hard, his eyes on de Mortimer.

‘You say you do not know him, but he certainly seems to know you, and well enough to be afraid,’ Adam said, drawing Warrin away from the bed while Guyon continued to soothe the patient.

‘I’ve never seen the whelp before in my life!’ Warrin snapped. ‘It’s obvious. He’s taken a blow to the head and his wits have gone wool-gathering. Anyone who looks even remotely Norman is fodder for his nightmares.’

‘Perhaps,’ Adam said noncommittally and eyed the prisoner who had subsided against the pillows, his eyes once more closed. He was either exhausted, or too frightened to look upon Warrin de Mortimer again.

‘What are you going to do about him?’ Guyon asked as they returned to the hall. ‘You’re due to leave for Windsor within the fortnight.’

Adam pursed his lips. ‘I don’t know. Perhaps ask your father to come here. He’s acquainted with most of the Welsh families of the region — related to half of them come to that. He’s competent to deal with whatever arises, and I can leave Jerold here with him. If the lad’s family come to negotiate, they can take the first steps without me, and I should be home by January’s end to conclude them.’

Guyon nodded agreement, eyes thoughtful.

‘What was all that gibberish he was babbling?’ asked Warrin as the men gathered to warm themselves at the hearth.

Guyon’s tone was neutral. ‘He said he never meant to eavesdrop and that if you let him live, he would not tell a living soul.’

‘Tell a living soul what?’ Warrin looked blank. ‘What does he mean?’ A pulse throbbed hard in the base of his throat.

‘I suppose we’ll find out in good time,’ Adam said evenly, then turned away to view another black-haired young man in shirt and chausses who had just collapsed on to a trestle bench at the side of the hall dais and now sat groaning and rumpled, his head clutched between his hands.

‘Your heir, my lord,’ Adam grinned to Guyon, ‘safe and sound.’

Despite the sables lining her travelling cloak, Heulwen shivered as she stood beneath an overhang and waited for the grooms to lead her saddled palfrey out from the stables. The snow had become sleet, needling silver and white from a sky the colour of a dirty hauberk — and hauberks were in evidence everywhere as the final preparations were made for the journey to Windsor — and from the look of the weather, a wet, uncomfortable journey it was going to be.

Renard squelched across the bailey, furred cloak already mired at the hem, armour glinting as he strode. She was about to call out to him, but a young woman came running out of one of the bailey buildings and accosted him. Renard glanced round, set his free arm about the girl’s willowy waist, and whisked her into the darkness of a doorway, where Heulwen saw his cloak swirl around her to enclose, and his head bend to her offered lips. The falconer’s daughter, she thought with the glimmer of a smile. Amazing what prowess in war did for a man’s standing with women. Renard’s pretence at manhood was swift becoming reality.

Heulwen had been hysterical with relief at his safe return, but only a portion of it had been on Renard’s account. The thought of Adam sprawled somewhere in a frozen puddle of his own blood, like Ralf a victim of the Welsh, had terrified her beyond all coherent thought. Nothing had been the same since. She was still reeling and uncertain, balanced on a see-saw of want and denial. She clenched her fists and fixed her gaze upon Warrin’s broad, solid frame as he stepped out into the sleet, his face twisting into a grimace of discomfort. He was her betrothed in all but the pledge now that she had consented. All that prevented their union was the formality of the royal yea-say and there was no reason for that to be denied.

He came towards her, blowing on his hands, caught her gaze and smiled. She managed a wan response.

‘Chin up, doucette, you look as dismal as this godforsaken weather!’ He stooped and kissed her cold lips, then stood back to look at her.

‘This journey is hardly going to be a jaunt to a fair,’ she responded, trying to draw some inner glow of feeling from his presence, but the only warmth that came was because he was shielding her from the wind.

‘I’ve brought you a present,’ he said with a smile and placed a small drawstring bag in her hand. ‘It won’t ease the misery of this weather, but it might lighten your heart, and it will certainly gladden mine to see you wear it. Call it your betrothal gift.’

Heulwen loosened the string with fumbling, frozen fingers and slid a circular cloak pin on to her palm. It was an ornate, spectacular piece, wrought in gold and inset with glowing jewels of sapphire, ruby and rock crystal.

‘Thank you, it’s beautiful!’ She turned it over, thinking to herself that it was also ostentatious and indicative of her future husband’s attitudes and tastes.

‘Here, let me pin it on for you.’ He reached eagerly to pluck loose the pin that already held her cloak. It was a simple thing by the standards of the gorgeous object she now held, a braided silver circlet given to her by her father on her seventh year day. It made her feel uneasy to see it so summarily dismissed. Carefully, tenderly, she dropped it in the empty leather bag.

‘Is it not a risk to display such wealth as this on a long journey?’ she asked doubtfully. ‘Surely it would be more sensible for me to wear it when we reach Windsor — perhaps when you ask the King for me?’

Warrin snorted with patronising indulgence, making her feel in truth no more than seven years old. ‘You worry too much over trifles,’ he said, as he forced the new brooch through the thick Flemish cloth. ‘We are armed to fight off any chance attacks on the road. We could even deal with a horde of Welsh if they came at us. No, beloved, it pleases me that men should see the high value I set upon my prize.’

‘Not your prize yet,’ she reminded him, nettled at his superior tone.

‘Well then, my future prize.’ He finished securing the pin and lowered his hand, as if by accident brushing the curve of her breast. ‘My future wife.’ His voice thickened and his mouth fastened on hers, demanding. Feeling like a whore who had been paid in advance to show gratitude, Heulwen responded with the unthinking expertise taught to her by Ralf, her heart numb and her fingers frozen as she linked them around Warrin’s neck.

The Welsh prisoner opened his eyes to full consciousness and stared in bewilderment at the limed white chamber walls surrounding him. Rushlight flickered. Beneath his fingers he could feel the grainy texture of a linen garment, and under that, the rapid beat of his fevered body. His throat was as dry as scoured parchment and when he tried to speak, no words emerged.

‘He’s awake,’ Adam said softly, and touched his companion’s knee.

Miles grunted and his head jerked up from his chest. Rubbing his eyes, he turned to the youth on the pallet and saw that, despite a slight fever, he was lucid and aware. Miles reassured him in Welsh that he was meant no harm. The youth’s dark eyes remained puzzled and suspicious, but he drank greedily of the watered mead that Adam set to his lips. He listened in silence while Miles introduced himself in the proper Welsh fashion, naming all his antecedents and relatives before telling him of Adam’s identity, where he was, and how seriously he had been wounded.

‘It was foolish to attack Lord Adam’s troop,’ Miles added with a shake of his head. ‘He might not speak the Cymraeg beyond a smattering, but that does not mean he is an idiot in matters of border warfare.’

The youth’s mouth twisted. ‘I don’t need lecturing,’ he said. His voice was hoarse and rusty from lack of use.

Miles nodded benignly. ‘Perhaps not from me, but your kin will be only too delighted to point out the error of your ways, once they know you are alive, I am sure.’

The down-turned mouth was joined by a heavy scowl.

Miles translated what had been said so far. Adam put the mead down. ‘Ask him who his kin are.’

Miles began to speak but the youth cut across him and said in halting French, ‘My brother won’t be delighted, he’ll be furious. You needn’t have gone to the trouble of saving me. He’ll murder me with his own hands when he finds out.’

‘Your brother?’

‘Davydd ap Tewdr.’ He looked down again. ‘I’m Rhodri, and younger than him by ten years. We’re born of different mothers.’

A slow, beatific smile lit up Adam’s face. ‘Worth your weight in Welsh gold then.’

‘Or a peace treaty,’ Miles said. ‘He’s ap Tewdr’s heir as matters stand.’

‘Yes, gloat,’ said the youth miserably. He shifted angrily in the bed and his body jerked taut, his breath locking in his throat.

‘You’ve made a regular mess of that leg, lad,’ Miles pronounced. ‘You’re lucky it’s not festering.’

‘I’ll send to your brother.’ Adam offered him the mead again. ‘There’s a Welsh carrier plies his trade through here once a month. He’s due next week and he’ll know where to take word. And I’d be an innocent if I did not know that your brother has his own ways and means of discovering your whereabouts.’

The youth drank and said nothing, but colour crept up into his face.

Adam frowned, eyeing his captive. ‘Tell me how you come to know Warrin de Mortimer.’

The colour vanished from the youth’s complexion. ‘He was really here then?’ he said hoarsely. ‘I thought perhaps it was just part of a bad dream.’

Adam’s mouth twitched. ‘So did I,’ he said half under his breath. ‘No, I am sorely afraid he was here, but he said that he did not know you.’

The lad shivered. ‘It may be so.’ He looked down at his fingers and interlaced them on the sheepskin coverlet.

‘You said something about eavesdropping?’ Adam pressed. ‘That you promised not to tell a living soul?’

Rhodri dug his fingers into the springy fleece. ‘He came to visit my brother under a banner of truce. They spoke together for some time. ’

‘And you overheard?’ Miles guessed.

‘Yes.’ Rhodri swallowed and looked at the older man. ‘Davydd never gives me any responsibility. He sends me out hunting or on petty scouting trips like a child.’

‘Sometimes it is hard to know when a fledgeling is ready to fly,’ Miles nodded sympathetically.

‘And sometimes a fledgeling’s wings are clipped!’ the boy snapped. His mouth compressed to a single narrow line.

Adam folded his arms. ‘So,’ he prompted, ‘what did you overhear?’

Rhodri continued to work on the fleece and watched his fingers in motion. ‘De Mortimer offered my brother silver to kill one of your barons — Ralf le Chevalier. He said that he had a loose tongue and had to be silenced. Davydd agreed. Le Chevalier was no friend of ours, and on more than one occasion he had trespassed with our women. I…Is there any more mead?’

‘Yes of course.’ Adam exchanged shocked glances with Miles as he poured a fresh measure into the cup and gave it to the lad.

Rhodri swallowed deeply and then leaned back against the pillows, his eyes closed and his hair sweat-soaked. ‘De Mortimer arranged the ambush and set le Chevalier up to be killed by us — but only Davydd knows that — and me, but I’m not supposed to. The rest of the men all thought it was sheer good fortune when we encountered them in the woods. De Mortimer was watching us, waiting until le Chevalier was down from his horse and bleeding his life into the ground before he made his move. He came down on us with his full force. If Davydd hadn’t been expecting just that kind of treachery, we’d have been dead too. Rhaid wirth lwy hir i fwyta gyda’r diafol.’

‘One needs a long spoon to sup with the devil,’ Miles translated grimly.

‘My brother was furiously angry about losing the chestnut stallion,’ Rhodri added. He darted a sheepish look at Adam. ‘I was going to gall him into a red rage by returning from this raid astride the very same horse he had missed, and instead he’s got to ransom me and thank his enemies for saving my life.’

‘Perhaps under the circumstances, he’d prefer to let you rot,’ Miles said drily.

Rhodri parted his lips in an expression midway between grimace and smile. ‘Brotherly love usually wins by a hair’s breadth,’ he said.

Adam paced across the solar until he reached the brazier, held his hands to the warmth and looked at Miles. ‘You know what this means?’