Desire Lines (Welsh Blades, #3)

by Elizabeth Kingston

  “Tell me now,” came Nan’s voice. She spoke low, but did not whisper. When no answer came, she said, “I would know if she is dead, and no matter the shame of it, I would know the manner of her death.”

  “May God forgive me, but it were better that she died years ago than become what she is.”

  He could hear Nan’s sharp intake of breath, and the painful hope in her voice when she asked, “She lives?”

  He knew that hope, how it pierced the heart, the anguish it brought. He had clutched it to himself desperately for a time, and sometimes still felt it prowling in the forgotten corners of his heart. It was the Fiend’s own torture, the terrible punishment for loving.

  “Aye, she lives. In sin.” Mary’s whisper grew fainter, as though saying it aloud was another kind of sin. “She is become a bawd, Nan. A common whore herself and keeping a brothel full of them.” She seemed to wait for some reaction, but she obviously did not know how long Nan could hold a silence. “It killed your father, it did.”

  “He killed himself with drink,” came the swift reply. “And when he done it, he abandoned her to an evil fate. Haps he is redeemed now in death, if God is merciful. But I will not leave her redemption to chance.”

  “Oh sweet Nan, you were ever too good-hearted. Will you not understand? She don’t want redemption, nor to be saved in any way. I begged her to come away and live with me here. But she said she would do as she pleased, and what pleased her was to open her legs for any man passing. She spat full in my face, do you hear?” There was another long pause. “You are so different from her that none would believe you were sisters.”

  It was a very long time until Nan’s voice floated through the darkness, filled with a quiet conviction. “But we are. We are sisters.”

  After that there was no more talking. There was only a hard silence that settled over the room. He could taste the anger and sorrow that filled the air all the sleepless night.

  1282

  On Palm Sunday, Prince Llewellyn’s brother Dafydd attacked an English stronghold, and yet another war was begun.

  Gryff made the mistake of laughing when he first heard of it. Dafydd, of all people, to start an uprising. It seemed to him a farce that someone so like himself – loyal to the English crown, living among the Normans for so many years and from such a young age – would pretend to care about Welsh independence. Gryff said to Will that he thought it must be simple greed and maneuvering, that there must be some other motive than rebellion. Hadn’t Dafydd once plotted to murder Llewellyn, in hopes of gaining his brother’s lands and power? That old Welsh way of rival brothers. No one could seriously think such a man was committed to any cause but his own advancement.

  But then the Welsh attacked more English castles, and Prince Llewellyn raised an army, and no one was laughing – least of all King Edward. Wales was in open and earnest rebellion.

  “Who else has joined Llewellyn?” Gryff asked Will, who always knew every alliance, every political whisper. He knew as well exactly what Gryff was asking.

  “Deheubarth.”

  Will did not say more, because that one word told him the only thing that mattered. If the southern realm of Deheubarth had joined Llewellyn’s north in rebellion, his own family’s fate was inevitable.

  Gryff looked at the hawk’s lure in his hands. He was repairing it, replacing feathers and attaching a stronger cord. Like the Welsh nobles, he thought: put the pieces together into the semblance of a bird that almost looked like it was flying free, but really it was only a target for the bird of prey. The hawk would strike it over and over, and one day soon it would fall to tattered pieces again.

  “My father has joined the cause of Wales, then.” The alliance between families was ancient, and still strong after the last uprising. His father always chose Llewellyn’s fight over everything else.

  “The Welsh have won many battles these past weeks. Many more than Edward would like.”

  “Ever do they win for a time, before they lose. And when they lose this time, what will be my father’s punishment? Will he be forced to give his lands, or his other sons?”

  Gryff might be reunited with his brothers after all these years if they too were made hostage. They would be fellow sacrifices to his father’s politics.

  But the look on Will’s face put fear into him.

  “It is not like the fighting of years past, Gryff. No more is it a mere nuisance to be tolerated by the king. Edward means to win at last, no matter the cost.”

  Gryff had no illusions about King Edward’s skill at war, nor his capacity for ruthlessness. “My father will lose both, then. His sons and his lands.”

  “And his life.” Will was only fifteen, but he spoke with a gravity and intelligence that belied it. “Your brothers’ lives too are forfeit, even young Owain, if they fight against the crown. There will be no treaties this time, nor any Welsh rulers great or small left to challenge Edward. He will conquer Wales entire, and has sworn to leave no treasonous Welshmen alive.”

  The blood had turned cold inside him as Will spoke. Strangely, he did not think of his brothers and their fate. It was the thought of Philip Walch and his sons, and what might happen to them, that brought a great despair into his heart. And others he remembered fondly – Madrun who brewed the mead, and Tuder who kept the hounds, and Father Ifor in his tiny village church.

  They would be conquered entire. They would be ruled by Normans who despised them, thought them godless savages, and sought to stamp out all the ancient and most beloved Welsh ways.

  “Aderinyth.” He had to stop and clear his throat of emotion. It was rare for him to speak the name of his homeland. “It lies so deep within Wales that there is hope it will be spared the worst.”

  Will looked at him as though he could not believe he was so slow-witted. “And you are not deep within Wales, but here in the household of the king’s brother. Think you that you will be spared, Gruffydd ab Iorwerth?” He pronounced the name like it was the most damning detail of all – because it was. “You are here as surety for your father’s obedience, and he has joined a war against those who hold you.”

  Gryff wanted to scoff at this concern, but could not quite manage it.

  “Edward will not want me dead, Will. I am a pawn.” He pulled the new cord too tight on the lure and the seam in the leather was torn asunder. “I am meant to be used. He will use me, just as my father has used me.”

  Will nodded. He had that look he got sometimes, brow furrowed, lips pulled tight as he put his mind to work. He was too clever for one so young.

  “I dread the day he has more use for your death than your life.”

  “Who? My father or my king?” Surely both could make good use of his death.

  But Will disregarded this cynical query and said Gryff must increase his worth to the king. Advise the king’s commanders on how best to fight against the Welsh, he said, and Gryff agreed. Remind the king that Gryff had sworn fealty to the crown, Will suggested – so he did. He sent messages to his father and his brothers, telling them they must submit to Edward, that they were traitors, that he condemned their actions and was shamed by them – and Will did his best to ensure everyone at court knew of these messages and sentiments.

  All the while Gryff reminded himself it was true: he was ashamed; the Welsh should submit; rebellion was treason; Edward was destined to win.

  And all the while, he and Will never spoke about the other truth – that his life was more valuable to a king he had barely met than it was to his own father.

  Chapter Seven

  1288

  He dreamt he and his brothers had found the fairy in the lake. She stood at the edge of the water, lent-lilies and snowdrops in a carpet at her feet, with the mountains all around. She wore a coarse brown dress and Nan’s face, a cloud of golden hair spilling free across her shoulders. They were waiting to see which of them she would name a king.

  You must give the sword to one of us, said Rhodri, though Rhodri had never come with them to search
for the fairy in real life.

  But she had no sword, so she took the knife from her bodice. She held it in her outstretched hand, looking at each of them in turn. She was going to give it away to one of them, only because she had been asked. It sent a terrible dread through him. He knew it would mean disaster for her, and for him.

  “No.”

  It was barely more than a mumble as he jerked awake. He must have been restless in sleep, for she was already kneeling beside him. Her hand was on his shoulder, her face a little troubled as she looked down at him.

  He swallowed down the dream fear and tried to speak naturally.

  “Do I wake the house with my cries?” he asked.

  She shook her head and lifted her eyes briefly to the window where light streamed in. After another day spent in labor to make her aunt’s home more fit, he had slept the night through to full morning. They were to leave for Lincoln today.

  He could still feel the mountains of his dream around him, smell the lake, taste the beginning of danger. His own hand came up to cover hers at his shoulder, and hold it there while he willed his muscles to unclench. They stayed that way for a quiet moment, tension draining from him while she waited patiently, radiating calm as his breath steadied.

  He waited for her to pull her hand away. She didn’t. His heart gave a sudden hard beat, a jolt that was not fear.

  She was looking at his face. His mouth. Fixedly.

  It was only a matter of turning his head to let his lips just barely touch her wrist. He waited for her to reach for a blade, but she remained still, watching him, fascinated. Her pulse sped up beneath his mouth. He did not dare even to breathe as her hand moved beneath his, turning over and moving closer. Haps it was yet another dream. It must be, the way her fingers curled against his jaw in a faint caress while he tasted the sweet skin inside her wrist.

  She stared at the place where he kissed her as though entranced. Her fingers spread out against him, holding his face as his mouth opened over her pulse. He thought he might die from the pleasure of seeing her lips part, of feeling the gentle rush of air escape her when he moved his tongue over her skin.

  Five years. Five years since he had tasted a woman. And never one like her.

  Her eyes met his, startling blue, and still she did not pull away or reach for a blade. She wanted this. The certainty of it caused his body to throb painfully, aching for more. He thought his breath must scorch her, that he would be burned to naught but ashes on the ground from this one touch.

  In the same moment he began to reach for her, her aunt’s voice called her name softly through the door. Nan jerked her hand away as though he had burned her in truth, her eyes turning to the door as she rose swiftly.

  At the threshold she paused in the square of sunlight that fell into the house. She turned her head over her shoulder, in profile to him but not looking directly at him. A high color was fading from her cheeks.

  “I would leave within the hour, if it please you, so we may enter Lincoln before night falls tomorrow.”

  The words were courteous, impersonal, as though there had been no touch between them. She stepped outside, leaving him alone with the aching memory of it, his mouth full of her heartbeat.

  To his amazement, Nan insisted on leaving the mule with her aunt. When Mary protested it as too generous, Nan only said the animal would be a hindrance to her in the journey ahead and that Mary did her a great service by keeping it. At least for a time, she said, for she was sure to come back.

  “And until I do, your Edmer can go to the well and bring back more than enough for a day of cooking and washing and anything else besides,” she said. He could also do as they had done yesterday, bringing rushes to the old woman who made woven mats and rush lights that could be sold at market – as she had used to do before her husband died. With one simple gesture, Nan gave them the means to better care for themselves.

  It only made them yet more humble toward Nan, who was obviously uncomfortable with this deferential manner. She had changed back to the coarse gown yesterday, and replaced the linen fillet with a simple kerchief while she pounded grain in the mortar and her dog rousted out nests of mice. Nothing she did made her aunt look at her with less admiration, as though this lovely girl in a peasant’s dress was a very great lady who condescended to serve them. And though they embraced tightly upon saying farewell, it was easy to see that there had been a disagreement between them.

  “Don’t go to her, Nan,” he heard her aunt say. “She’s naught but a slut, and unworthy of you.”

  Nan ignored this. She kissed her aunt on both cheeks and said, “You must send word to me if ever you need aught. So long as I live, I live in your debt. God bless you for it. God bless you.”

  With that, they set off down the road toward town. Gryff searched for a way to ask about her sister, but could not find words. In truth, he knew there were no words – she would only tell him if she wanted to, as with everything. He wanted to tell her that though she was not a great lady, she was better than most he had known and deserving of her aunt’s admiration. But she would think he said it only in hopes of touching her again, so he bit his tongue.

  It was market day in town, and she stopped at a stall to sell a bundle of belongings: her finer gown, the embroidered fillet, a shallow pan. Without the mule, she must reduce the baggage she carried. He would have liked to hear Nan haggle with the merchant over price, but the market at Wragby was as popular as had been promised and he found the press of people overwhelming. He felt like a falcon unhooded – too much to see, and everything that moved caught his eye and put him on guard, ready for attack.

  He moved to where the crowd was thinner, and found a man who sold him a long leather strap that would allow him to carry the falcon’s cage on his back.

  What he wanted was a sword. He hadn’t handled one since his days in Lancaster’s household. It would make him a target for thieves on the road, though, and he did not have enough money for a decent one in any case. Long gone were his days of chivalry. He was no one now – in the muck, as she said. Useless in every way that mattered.

  “She’s a pretty one.” A man with an impressive scar down the middle of his face was standing near. “Would like to get my hands on that, I would.”

  For a moment Gryff thought he meant the falcon. He glanced down at the cage he held, but then saw the man was looking at Nan. She had moved a little closer now, finished with her selling and examining the leather goods.

  A part of him wanted to urge the man to try it and see what happened. But the irrational fear was creeping over him again, turning his limbs cold. The way the scarred man looked at her was too like Cuddy, the one of Baudry’s men who had to be held back from raping every woman who crossed his path.

  He told himself that nothing like that would happen here, in a crowded town square. Even if it did, she could more than defend herself from this man. Just as she could defend herself from a different man who now stepped too close to her side. It was one of the merchants who leaned in to speak to her, and she leaned away.

  Now the scarred man beside him was saying she was a small bit of flesh but enough for the both of them. He was expecting Gryff to join in the leering and when he did not, he could sense the shift in the other man.

  It was the swift calculation of how best to take advantage of someone weaker, the look of the well-practiced villain. How easy it was to recognize, after weeks of living surrounded by such men. How it filled him with this frozen panic.

  Gryff kept his eyes on Nan. Even as the man beside her pulled the kerchief from her hair and reached for her, she appeared untroubled. Somehow she evaded the outstretched arm, the groping hand. There was no knife in her hand, only one of the long nails she carried in a pouch on her belt. Likely she could kill with it as easily as with a blade, and all while Gryff stood here useless, watching.

  Then he felt a tug at his hand. The scarred man was trying to pull the falcon’s cage from him. His other hand was reaching for Gryff’s wrist.r />
  One moment Gryff was wondering why her dog had appeared at his feet barking, and the next moment he was plowing into the man’s chest, pulling the cage from his hand and throwing him to the ground.

  It happened too fast to think, and then it felt too good to stop. He did not need a sword. He did not reach for any weapon. He used his fists, as he had dreamed of doing countless times, and relished the crack of bone, the feel of flesh giving way beneath the impact. It felt glorious. When the man stayed on the ground, Gryff used his feet – once, twice, and the third time it came to him that the man did not shout in protest anymore. There was only a feeble groaning.

  Something – some dim memory of what his life used to be – made him stop before he beat the man senseless.

  He was not a brute. He was not. He would not be.

  He repeated it to himself as he caught his breath. Finally he looked up to find Nan was now standing by the falcon’s cage, calmly watching him amid a mild chaos. Gradually he became aware that bystanders were arguing amongst themselves, over whether the constable should be called. The man who had been reaching for Nan was on the ground, clutching a foot that dripped blood. More often she maims, the knight of Morency had said, a hand or a foot.

  “Go on then, get ye gone from here. It’s a respectable man you’ve attacked.” A townswoman with a basket full of onions jabbed a finger at Nan, scowling. “We’ll not abide it. Be gone or you’ll see a punishment.”

  Color flamed in Nan’s face, but she did not move from the spot nor take her eyes from Gryff. With a tilt of her head she indicated the man he had beaten, and looked at Gryff with brows raised as though to ask if he was finished. He nodded, and she picked up the cage, snapped her fingers at the dog, and led the way out of town.