The Reckoning

by Sharon Kay Penman

  Edward’s grin widened. “No, sweetheart,” he said innocently, “I have the entire afternoon free to spend with you and Llewelyn.”

  “Ned. Dearest Cousin. Go away,” Ellen said, giving him a playful push toward the door. He leaned down then, whispered something in her ear, and at last made a jaunty departure, leaving behind a trail of laughter.

  Llewelyn was not often disconcerted, but he was now, caught off balance first by Edward’s surprise, and then by the surge of emotions it set free. The pendulum had swung too far, too fast, from fury to astonishment to joy to wariness. When he’d envisioned his first meeting with Ellen, he’d never imagined for a moment that she might not be to his liking. But that was indeed his first, instinctive reaction. Watching as she exchanged quips with Edward, he found himself wondering suddenly if he’d not made a great mistake.

  She was beautiful, one of the most beautiful women he’d ever seen. But her nonchalance, her perfect poise in an admittedly awkward situation struck uneasy echoes deep within his memory, bringing to mind another woman from his past, one he’d bedded briefly and long since forgotten, or so he’d thought. The name came back now—Arwenna—and so did the memories. She’d been just as lovely as Ellen, just as worldly, as sure of her power to enchant. And she’d also been shallow, selfish, and frivolous. That did not sound, he knew, like the Ellen de Montfort he’d been led to expect. But then, he’d not expected, either, to find her on such intimate, affectionate terms with her cousin and captor, the English King.

  Ellen shut the door, and when she turned back to face Llewelyn, he found himself looking at a different woman altogether. The bright, brittle pose fell away; even her voice changed timbre. “Can you ever forgive me,” she said, almost in a whisper, “for all the trouble and grief I’ve brought upon you?”

  “Ah, no, lass, there is nothing to forgive!” In three strides, Llewelyn was at her side, taking her hand in his. “I’ll not deny that this war wreaked havoc upon my homeland. But you were one of its victims, Ellen, not its cause. This I can tell you for an utter certainty, that all my regrets were for your abduction, your suffering, and our separation. Never for our marriage.”

  Ellen’s eyes never left his face; her fingers had entwined with his. “I so needed to hear you say that. This has been one of the worst mornings of my life, and it should have been one of the best. But the longer I had to wait, the more nervous I became. No woman ever had more reason to be grateful to the man she married, and whilst on that cog, I vowed that you would never be sorry. By now I ought to have borne you our first son. Instead, you had two years in Hell. I kept telling myself that I could not blame you if you did regret our marriage, but I think it would have broken my heart.”

  Llewelyn’s hand tightened upon hers. “You could as easily have blamed me, for a wife has the right to expect her husband to keep her safe. But I failed you twice-over, in letting you be taken, and then in not being able to win your release.”

  She shook her head. “I am Simon de Montfort’s daughter,” she said, with a sad smile. “Who would know better than I the might of the English Crown?”

  After that, a silence fell, but not an uncomfortable one, for they were rapt in their discovery of each other. They were standing close enough for Llewelyn to catch a faint hint of violets. It was a fragrance that he had never fancied—until now—breathing in Ellen’s perfume, a scent of spring twilight on a day of drifting December snow.

  Ellen had the advantage of Llewelyn, for she’d not been taken by surprise. But now she found herself doubting the evidence of her own senses. “For nigh on half my life,” she said, “I’ve been holding fast to a memory of you. It was not my memory, of course, although it came in time to seem as if it were, as if my mother’s recollections had somehow become mine, so vivid was your image to me, so real. I saw you through her eyes, tall and dark, with a smile that she called ‘sudden.’ When you walked in that door, it was as if you’d walked out of my own past, for you were just as I’d envisioned you. I suppose that is not so surprising, but…but you also sound exactly as I imagined you would, your voice low-pitched and husky, with a wonderful Welsh lilt. How did I know that? Have I been stealing into your dreams? Or have you been invading mine?”

  Llewelyn was intrigued by her candor, and by gold-flecked cat eyes, long-lashed, as clear as crystal. “I might be what you expected,” he confided, “but you, my lady, are a surprise for certes!”

  “In what way?”

  She was flirting with him so obviously now that he grinned, tilted his head to the side in a very approving appraisal. “Well…you are more beautiful than I expected, more worldly, more assured, and best of all, you are not still thirteen!”

  She looked so puzzled then, that Llewelyn could not help laughing. “We have an odd history, you and I, twelve years in the making. I cannot say that you haunted my dreams, as you aver, but you did claim a corner of my brain and took up residence. You were so young then, and you’d been hurt so much. I did what I must, I disavowed our plight troth, but I was troubled by that lost little girl, more than I realized. If someone had asked me today how old you are, I would have answered without hesitation: that you are twenty and five. But that little lass of thirteen was a most persistent ghost, always hovering close at hand, in need of all the protection I’d denied her after Evesham, and in some strange sense, it was she I expected to find.” He laughed again, this time at himself. “Does that sound as mad to you as it does to me?”

  Ellen was touched by his admission. But she was not surprised that he should have felt so responsible for that “lost little girl,” even after severing their betrothal bond, for it seemed to bear out her own secret, heartfelt hope, that their marriage was fated to be, that just as they’d defied the odds and somehow survived the ruination of Evesham, so, too, would they be able to prevail over Edward.

  “It does not sound mad at all,” she said softly. “I do not mind in the least being a surprise, as long as I am not a disappointment?”

  Llewelyn grinned again. “A woman surpassingly fair instead of a timid child bride? What man would not be disappointed?”

  Ellen was quite unrepentant and not at all abashed at being caught out. “Mea culpa,” she said, “I was indeed fishing for a compliment. But I had no courtship; would you begrudge me a bit of flattery?”

  “I think,” Llewelyn said, “that I would begrudge you very little in this life.” He still held her hand, and drew her now toward the window-seat nearest the hearth. They settled themselves side by side on the cushions, joined at once by Ellen’s little dog. Llewelyn watched as she sought in vain to push the animal away, for he was unable to take his eyes off her. “I cannot begin to count the people who told me you were a beauty, starting with Simon. I assumed, though, that you’d resemble Nell, and you do not. You have the most astonishing eyes; they catch the light like gemstones. That color is rare in my homeland. I’ve seen it but once that I can remember, and she was a kinswoman of yours—my grandfather’s wife.”

  Ellen was delighted. “My aunt Joanna! It is one of the great regrets of my life that I never knew her. Are my eyes truly like hers?”

  “The color is the same, water over mossy rocks. But I doubt that her eyes could change as quick as yours do. What of your hair color? Is it as dark as Joanna’s was?”

  “See for yourself,” she said, and reaching up, she removed her veil. She began to unfasten her wimple next, and Llewelyn found himself staring at the slender white throat she’d just bared, wanting suddenly to touch her, to see if her skin was as soft, as smooth as it looked. But she was an innocent, he must not forget that, must go slowly for her sake. She’d withdrawn the last of the wimple’s pins, revealing a crown of bright hair, a shade Llewelyn had not seen before, a deep copper-gold midway between blonde and red.

  “Your hair is like your eyes,” he marveled, “a color all your own,” and she smiled at him, then unpinned her fret, the fashionable net of gold mesh binding her hair. She smiled again, then shook her head, and
Llewelyn caught his breath, for as her hair swirled about her shoulders and cascaded down her back, framing her face in provocative disarray, she looked suddenly and wonderfully wanton, looked like a woman just risen from a lover’s bed.

  “Good Lord, girl,” he said, with a shaken laugh, “do you have any idea what you just did to me?” To his surprise, she flushed deeply. “Ellen? I did not mean to discomfit you. But in truth, you did not seem shy.”

  “Shy—me?” Ellen’s smile was wry. “That very suggestion would have sent my brothers rolling onto the floor with laughter.”

  “You may not be shy, but you are flustered,” Llewelyn said, and when she did not deny it, he reached for her hand again. “Can you tell me why?”

  She hesitated, but she had to be honest; with him, there could be no other way. “I am not sure I can make sense of what I am feeling, for I’ve never felt like this before, so…so anxious. You said I was assured, and you were right; usually I am. That is what being pretty does for a woman, for I learned early on that I could turn male heads without even trying. What I did not learn was how to play the role of the proper modest maiden, to keep my eyes downcast and my speech demure. I always spoke my mind.”

  “That is hardly surprising for the daughter of Nell de Montfort,” he said, and made her pulse jump by turning her hand over, pressing a kiss into her palm.

  She focused her thoughts with an effort. “Moreover, I had five doting brothers, in whose eyes I could do no wrong; it amused them enormously that their little sister could swear like a soldier, that I could tell a bawdy joke and keep their guilty secrets. And so, when I began to attract men in earnest, at the French court, I saw no reason to guard my speech, to pretend to be what I was not. In truth, the hypocrisy of it all seemed ridiculous. Women are supposed to be daughters of Eve, born temptresses, or so the Church would have us believe. But virgins are expected to act as timid and skittish as newborn fawns.”

  He laughed at that, and she said reproachfully, “You know I am speaking true. Men want their wives to be nuns before marriage and concubines afterward. At least the men at the French court did. I never fretted, though, that I might be giving the wrong impression, for none of those men mattered to me. They would flirt, try to get me into bed, fail, and I’d forget them. I never truly cared about pleasing a man…until now. When I let down my hair for you, I knew full well what I was doing. I wanted you to want me. But when you jested about it, I was of a sudden assailed by doubts, by the fear that I might have seemed too…too brazen.”

  Llewelyn was awed by her utter honesty. Just as she’d bared her throat, now she was baring her soul, and he knew better than most men the courage that took. “Ah, lass,” he said, “you do not realize just how dangerous you are.” When he lifted her hand, she thought he meant to kiss it again. Instead, he held it against his cheek, a gentle gesture at variance with what she read in his eyes. “I do not think you are brazen, cariad, only that I am luckier than I deserve.”

  He smiled, then leaned toward her, and she closed her eyes, raised her face for his kiss. But they’d forgotten they were being watched by jealous eyes, and as Llewelyn took Ellen in his arms, the dog went into action, squirming between its mistress and the intruder with ferret-like speed, so that their first kiss proved to be memorable in a most unexpected manner; they found themselves sputtering, inhaling mouthfuls of fluffy white fur.

  “Blessed Lady Mary!” Ellen gasped, at the same time that Llewelyn said something in Welsh, which by the tone of it, sounded suspiciously like an oath. Rubbing the back of her hand against her mouth, she glared at the dog, then looked apologetically at her husband. No sooner did their eyes meet, though, than they began to laugh.

  The dog had staked out possession of Ellen’s lap, daring Llewelyn to trespass again. But there was a leather lead on the table, and before the little creature could rally its defenses, it found itself tucked under the enemy’s arm, being carried across the room. Looping the leash over a chair, Llewelyn said, “This dog has got to be an agent of the English Crown,” sending Ellen into a fresh fit of giggles.

  “My God, how did you guess? Ned gave her to me!”

  Again it jarred, the easy familiarity of “Ned.” But this time Llewelyn shoved it aside, back into the shadows where it could be ignored. A handsome pair of deerskin gloves lay on the table, and picking up one, he handed it to the disgruntled dog as a consolation prize. “I’m sure,” he said, “that Edward would not begrudge a glove or two in the interest of marital harmony,” making Ellen laugh again. But as he reached for the wine flagon, she said something so unexpected that he spun around to stare at her, the wine forgotten. “Say that again,” he demanded.

  “I said that I’d given her a Welsh name, that I’d called her ‘Hiraeth.’”

  Llewelyn came back to the window-seat, pulled Ellen to her feet, and into his arms. “How in the world did you know about that?”

  “My aunt Joanna. She once tried to explain to my mother why it was that the Welsh sickened when they were uprooted, banished from Wales. She said the Welsh had a special name for it—hiraeth—that it meant a love of their homeland, a sadness for what had been lost, a yearning for what could be—”

  She got no further, for it was then that Llewelyn kissed her. Their second effort was much more satisfactory than their first, and Ellen felt bereft when he let her go, not wanting the embrace to end. He smiled at her, then retrieved the wine from the table, and brought it back to the window-seat, where he kissed her again. She knew she was being foolish, but it bothered her to see how deftly he’d tilted their wine cup as he embraced her; it was too smoothly done, the sort of trick a man learned only by experience. How could she be jealous of his past? That would be madness, for he’d lived almost half of it ere she was even born. But she wanted him to feel what she felt now, the wonder and newness of it, and that was impossible, for there were twenty-four years between them, and God only knows how many women. She accepted the wine cup, watching him as she drank. Well, she could never be his first love, but by all that was holy, she’d be his last.

  “How long do we have ere Edward sends you back to Windsor?”

  She’d been worried that he might think her presence here meant Edward had relented, and she was glad that he seemed to read her cousin so well. “Only a few days,” she said, wondering how she could endure being parted from him now. He’d begun to kiss her throat, and she shivered, for he was evoking the most amazing sensations. How wonderful that their lust was sanctioned by Holy Church, so she could give in to it without guilt! He was stroking her hair, brushing it aside to kiss her throat again, and she pressed closer, sliding her hands up his back, thinking that if only she held him tightly enough, mayhap the world would go away.

  Llewelyn was the one to break free first. “Ellen…” No more than that, just her name, but it was enough. Ellen felt a surge of triumph, sure now that he wanted her, too, just as much as she wanted him.

  “Llewelyn…is it always like this between men and women?”

  “No,” he said, discovering that she liked being kissed on her ear lobe. “The flame burns hotter at some times than others, cariad.”

  “And with us? Is this one of those times?”

  He seemed to be considering. “Well,” he said at last, “I think we’re kindling a fair amount of heat.”

  She knew she was being teased, did not mind at all. “How much heat? Enough to melt a candle? To start a bonfire? Could you be more precise, please?”

  By now they both were laughing. “Enough heat to set half of Wales ablaze,” he said, drawing her across his lap so that her head nestled into the crook of his arm and her long hair swept the floor. “I think you’re right. It is a pity we had no courtship. Then I could have told you how very fair you are. I could have compared your hair to autumn bracken and your skin to silk, said all the foolish and fanciful things smitten lovers have said down through the ages.”

  “Why can you not say them now?”

  “Alas, it is too late,
two years too late. No man ever says things like that to his wife.”

  “No? We shall see about that,” Ellen promised, and entwined her arms around his neck, pulling his head down so she could kiss him. This time it was different; the passion flared up between them so fast that Llewelyn was caught by surprise, and he stopped thinking, yielded to it. So did Ellen, shifting so he could unpin the brooch closing the neckline of her bodice, stroking his face, his hair, gasping as he licked the soft hollow between her breasts. He was murmuring Welsh endearments she could not understand, but the sound of his voice stirred her senses almost as much as his breath on her throat, his hands on her body. “Oh, love,” she whispered, “love, yes,” not even knowing what she said, wanting only to taste his mouth on hers, to feel the weight of his body pressing down upon hers, and when he lowered her back onto the cushions, she looked up at him with starlit eyes and a smile to make him forget everything but the here and now, the woman under him in the window-seat.

  He was never to know what stopped him, whether it was simply a lifetime’s habit of control, or a protective urge stirred by her utter trust, or even the insistent whimpering of the dog. It took an intense effort of will to pull away from the soft body straining against his, but as he sat up, he became aware that the dog was no longer whining; it had begun to growl. His reaction came without thought, came from instinct honed sharp as any sword. Grasping Ellen’s wrist, he jerked her upright on the seat, just as the door opened and Edward entered.

  Edwards smile froze, and for one of the few times in his life, his sense of humor failed him; instead, he experienced something oddly like embarrassment. Ellen’s hair streamed down her back in tangled disorder. Clinging to Llewelyn as if she needed support, she gazed up at him with glazed, unfocused eyes; it was a look he’d often seen upon his own wife’s face, but only in the privacy of their marriage bed. Edward knew that he was staring. He couldn’t seem to help himself, though, unable to believe that this disheveled, desirable wanton was his proper, staid little cousin, Ellen the untouchable, the ice maiden. But whatever had been happening in here, it was for certes not rape.