Rhiannon

by Roberta Gellis

  Simon hesitated, sensing some kind of game, but then agreed. He had to bend his knees to make himself short enough for Rhiannon to pull the mail shirt over his head. When he stood up again, the cool breeze of mid-September was like a shower of cold water. He breathed deeply with refreshment, watching Rhiannon fold the heavy steel rings of his mail into a long bundle that could be carried over his shoulder. Now the slight nip in the air became chilly rather than refreshing, and his sweat-wet woolen under-tunic lay clammily against his body. Simon dropped to a squat beside Rhiannon where the wind could not be so free with him.

  “I love you,” he said softly. “You know what I desire before I know it myself. I gave no thought to our meeting. I was too taken up with eagerness to think. Yet if it had not been thus—perfect—it would have cast a shadow.”

  “Perfect? That we should run into each other like two oafs or wild children…” Her voice faded, and when she spoke again the jesting sharpness had gone out of it. “I did give thought to it.”

  “Then I am of import to you?”

  Rhiannon left the bundle of mail and lifted her eyes. “You know that. I have never tried to deny it.”

  “You do not care for me as—as a brother? A friend?”

  “No, Simon. I desire you as a lover. This, too, you know. Why do you ask?”

  “Do you dislike me, Rhiannon?”

  She stared at him, utterly perplexed. “I am beginning to think you a little mad. Of course I do not dislike you. If I desire that you be my lover, how could I dislike you?”

  “I have desired women that I disliked very much,” Simon said. “The two things have little to do with each other.”

  “Not for me!” Rhiannon exclaimed distastefully.

  “You must love where you desire?”

  “It seems so—yes,” she admitted.

  “Then you love me,” Simon insisted.

  “Yes, but…”

  “But what?” he asked eagerly. “Rhiannon, tell me.”

  She dropped her eyes. “I cannot bear to hurt you.”

  Simon sighed and sat down on the ground, stretching his long legs to ease the pinch of the mail hosen.

  “Let me take those off also,” Rhiannon suggested.

  She reached for the ties that held the hosen up, but Simon caught her hands. “It is ridiculous to say you cannot bear to hurt me and yet refuse to marry me. What can hurt me more than that? Perhaps if you tell me why—”

  “I have told you why.”

  “You do not trust me? Or yourself?”

  “Both.”

  But Rhiannon’s voice was uncertain. Over the month that Simon had been away, Rhiannon had looked closely into her own heart. She was no callow girl. Many men had paid court to her—for the sake of her beauty, her father’s power, the dower he implied he would give with her, perhaps even for the strangeness that had attracted Simon. None had interested her until this man with the leopard’s grace and swiftness had struck at her heart. Truth was that she did not think any other man could touch her while Simon lived. It was him she did not trust, not herself.

  “Are you so light of purpose?” he asked. “I do not think so. Your father and mother do not think so. I have heard you accused by others of stubbornness, by yourself of carelessness—never of wavering purpose.”

  “It is so great a thing to hold a heart in one’s hands, not in jest or light words, but truly,” Rhiannon murmured. “Even if my purpose never wavered, a moment’s carelessness…”

  “One is not careless about great things,” Simon pointed out, “and I am not a fool. Do you think I would break my heart over a smile or a teasing look? I might well grow angry and let you feel my hand, but I would need to know that you loved me no longer before real hurt was done.”

  “Yes.”

  The simple admission told the tale completely. “Then it is I you do not trust,” Simon went on. “Well, that is a relief.”

  “A relief?”

  He smiled at her. “I can give sureties to you for myself, but how can I give sureties to you for you?” He released her hands and added, “Yes, take off the hosen. They pinch abominably when I bend my knees.”

  As Rhiannon leaned forward to undo the ties at the back, however, Simon caught her in his arms and kissed her passionately. At first, both ignored the awkward position they were in, but the discomfort grew more and more acute and finally Simon broke the kiss. When the metal leggings were neatly laid atop the folded hauberk, he spread his cloak on the ground and settled down again with Rhiannon leaning against him.

  “We could be happy as lovers,” she suggested.

  Warmed by her kiss and the admissions he had drawn from her, Simon replied, “Perhaps I could be because I trust you. If you say to me you will be mine and mine only, then I will believe you and I will be content. But how would you be happy? I have already said I would be thine alone—and you call me a monster of deceit.”

  “That was in jest!”

  “Then you do not think me a liar in general?”

  “Only to women.” Rhiannon sighed, and before he could speak again she went on, “I will say this to you, that I will be thine alone while you are mine alone—but no longer.”

  Simon pulled her closer and tipped her chin up. “With all my heart I will agree to those terms.”

  He lay back against the cloak, pulling her with him, and he was surprised at how warm it was. The wind still whispered through the trees above the hollow, but it seemed to pass right over them. The sun beat down like a featherlight comforter and the thick grass trapped under Simon’s cloak made a resilient mattress. Rhiannon smelled of the sweet grass and the musky earth. Aware, too, of the acrid odor of his tunic, Simon sat up and pulled off the tunic and shirt. Rhiannon sat up too, her eyes wide. She had never seen his body bare.

  Seeing her look, Simon was about to ask whether he had offended her, but she put out a hand and stroked his breast. Like his father, Simon was nearly hairless, except for a faint shadow that ran along his breastbone and down to the navel. A thicker shadow descended from below the navel to be lost in the pubic bush, but Rhiannon had not yet been attracted to that. She was examining the dark, satiny skin, distressed to see the lines of knotted white scar tissue here and there.

  Simon laughed at her. There were not many marks. He was strong and swift—and lucky. Nonetheless, he was excited by the attention she paid him and by the breeze-soft touch of her fingers sliding over his shoulder. Hardly thinking, he undid her belt and unlaced the neck of her cotte. Rhiannon did nothing to impede him. She scarcely seemed aware of his actions, watching instead the path of her own fingers as they stroked his body. He captured one hand and undid the sleeve, then the other.

  That seemed to make an impression. Rhiannon’s eyes moved from Simon’s body to her own loose sleeves, and she smiled and pulled at the string of his chausses so that the bow came undone. She was aware where they were going now, and raised her eyes to Simon’s as she placed her hands on his hips to pull the chausses down. His face was a surprise to her—not the flush that had come up under the dark skin or the lips that were slightly fuller with the turgidity of passion, nor the knitted brows and rigid expression of desire. She had expected his eyes to be bemused, glazed. Instead they met hers fully, alert and demanding.

  “Wholly mine, only mine, so long as I am solely thine,” he said huskily.

  “As you are faithful, so shall I be,” she swore.

  The oath was sealed by a kiss. If it was not quite the passionless kiss of peace that usually seals a contract, it served the purpose equally well. Rhiannon even managed to slide Simon’s chausses down over his narrow hips. He had reached his cross garters and untied them so that a few more contortions left him naked. He allowed Rhiannon to stroke him and examine him while he caressed her face and throat and hands. It would have been possible to lift her skirts and deliver more intimate caresses, but it never occurred to Simon to do so. Such behavior was for common hedge-whores or a serf girl in the fields. Those were acts of ph
ysical relief in which the woman was not a partner but nearly an inanimate vessel.

  Although most casual sexual encounters took place out of doors, Simon had no association of those acts with what he was doing with Rhiannon. One never bothered to bare either body for a swift, impersonal coupling like that. In any case, that was the smallest part of Simon’s sexual experience. He had a strong distaste for low whores and stinking serf girls. Most of his associations with coupling were in the dim light of a shuttered room or in the stuffy darkness of a curtained bed.

  To lie with a woman he cared for in the open light of day was new and thrilling. To do so with Rhiannon was somehow “right”. She was a creature of field and forest; hall or keep were only temporary shelters for her. Suddenly Simon was washed with urgency—not to take Rhiannon, but to see her body white and bare, glinting in the sunshine.

  Simon broke the long kiss they had held and lifted Rhiannon to her knees. Her hands clung to his body, slipping from shoulder to waist to thigh as he raised her more upright. Gently he disengaged her skirt and lifted her dress. She had been reluctant to change positions at first, but now she understood what he wanted and rapidly pulled off her gown and the simple shift she wore beneath it. She had been barefoot when she left the house, so there was nothing else. Simon drew a breath at the strong, lithe perfection of her body framed by the green, waving brush behind her.

  Now he touched her, stroking berry-brown cheek, smooth tanned throat, golden satin shoulder, and on down the white velvet breast with its warm, brown nipple.

  Rhiannon sighed, sat back on her heels to let Simon look at her. His admiration and growing eagerness were apparent, but she held back a moment to caress the entirety of his male magnificence with her eyes. While she looked, he cupped her breasts in his hands, stroking the areola gently with his thumbs. Rhiannon shivered, and her nipples, already upright, thrust forward harder.

  With any other woman, Simon would have pulled sharply to make her lie beside him. However, Rhiannon could not be driven or compelled. That knowledge wove through Simon’s passion, became part of it, heightened it. He released one breast so that he could lever himself upward until his lips took the place of his fingers. Rhiannon sighed, and her eyes closed. Simon released the other breast and put that arm gently around her, and began to ease himself down again.

  As he expected, Rhiannon leaned toward him, following the draw of his lips. When they lay together and he no longer needed to support her, he slid his hand from her waist across her belly and gently, very gently, between her thighs. Rhiannon moaned and twitched, pressed her lips against his hair; her hands fluttered distractedly over his body, seeking, but not certain what.

  Simon made no attempt to guide her searching fingers to more erotic zones. Now, this first time for Rhiannon, Simon wanted no spur to his passion. It was impossible for him not to be excited by what he was doing, and Rhiannon’s natural response was intensifying that excitement. He tried to draw his mind away, but each thing he fixed on only led back to the strong, silken body pressing itself more and more frantically against him.

  A finger slipped between her nether lips. Rhiannon cried out softly and thrust forward. Simon judged her as ready as any virgin could be. For all her eagerness, it was not easy; Simon was a big man. It was very fortunate that he was not a green boy driven by his own desire. The many couplings he had experienced made him able to be slow and patient, penetrating, then pausing to reawaken the desire that pain diminished before he entered her farther. This coupling took a long time, but Simon was young and strong and able to endure—and his patience was rewarded. On the taking of her maidenhead, Rhiannon’s lover had the joy of hearing her beautiful voice trill her infinite pleasure.

  Simon had felt her climax coming, felt the tremors sweeping through her, her hands clawing blindly at his back. He dropped the walls in his mind to let in the images of her body, her writhing pleasure, his own actions, and he gained an ultimate success in bringing on his own climax so close after hers that he did not need to inflict further pain on her to achieve satisfaction.

  Finished, Simon braced himself on his elbows so that his weight would not crush Rhiannon, and waited. Slowly the tilted green eyes opened, the fingers that had clawed at him now tenderly stroked his hair, his neck, drew his head down for a gentle kiss, infinitely sweet.

  “I thank you,” Rhiannon murmured. “You have given me a gift to treasure for my whole life.”

  Startled mute, Simon merely stared at her until she tilted her head and looked questioningly at him. Regaining his power of speech, he said, “I swear to you it grows easier and more pleasant each time—”

  Rhiannon hugged him so suddenly that his arms gave way and he collapsed on her. She gasped with a mingling of laughter, having had the breath briefly squeezed out of her. “Oh, poor Simon,” she exclaimed when she could speak, “did you think I meant I would never make love again? No, dear one, that would be a cruel reward for your gentleness and patience. I only meant that I would remember this for all time with joy. The other times will blend together—it cannot be otherwise—but this I will have forever.”

  He sighed with relief and slipped off her to the side. “I, too,” he assured her.

  Rhiannon laughed again. “You, too, what?” she asked. “Surely you do not mean this is your first time of having.”

  “Not by several thousand times,” Simon replied merrily, “although I assure you I have kept no real count and only reckon by the years of such doing. No, you are the first maiden I have ever lain with and will be—God willing—the last.”

  Rhiannon was surprised. “Am I?”

  “Yes, of course,” he insisted. “Do you think I am a customary raper of babes or seducer of young girls? Where would I have come by a maiden?”

  “Castellans and vassals have daughters,” Rhiannon pointed out dryly, wondering why Simon should think her so innocent.

  “We do not treat our liegemen so in my family,” Simon said angrily. “One does not win loyalty by dishonoring a man’s womenfolk.”

  “What dishonor?” Rhiannon asked, genuinely puzzled. First Simon gaped, and then laughed. He had forgotten the Welsh custom whereby “the son of the handmaid shall be heir with the son of the free”. In Wales there was no illegitimacy with respect to the inheritance of property, and it was reasonable that a vassal would not think it a dishonor if his daughter should be deflowered and conceive a child by his liege lord.

  He said, “In England it is a dishonor,” and explained. Rhiannon was somewhat confused by the legal technicalities Simon described. Property rights did not loom very large in her life, for the people of the hills of Gwynedd were essentially hunters and herders rather than farmers. Their nebulous clan right to graze their cattle in a certain rather large area or hunt over several hundred square miles of trackless forest was all they knew. In the southern and eastern parts of Wales—where Norman influence had been strong for over a hundred years and where the terrain was not so difficult—agriculture was advancing and property right was better known. Even there, however, there was much confusion, and inheritance did not always go by primogeniture.

  It did not matter that Rhiannon did not understand the actual conditions, however. What she did understand was that Simon did not look at the wives and daughters of his subordinates as potential bedmates. Her father had never forced unwilling women nor meddled with women whose menfolk would object to his action, but many men had thrust their daughters—and sometimes even their wives—at the Lord of Gwynedd. And, when he was younger, Llewelyn had taken freely the ones he fancied. Those women he bedded were acknowledged in his Court and accorded honor there.

  As Rhiannon thought over what Simon had said, she relaxed more against him and laid her head on his shoulder. Perhaps if he still desired marriage, she would consider it. If what he said was true, at least she would never need to smile and be courteous to her husband’s mistresses. The confiding movement touched Simon, and he put his arm around her.

  “Are you cold
, love?” he whispered.

  “No, not cold, but I think we must dress in a few minutes anyway.”

  “Must we? You are so beautiful and so… I do not know exactly how to say what I mean, but you belong here, naked and free.” He sighed. “I have never done this before. I think it is much better to lie here under the sky than to be closed inside. You have given me something no other woman could give.”

  “Why?”

  Simon smiled. There was no challenge in the question, only a pleased, slightly flattered curiosity. “Because with any other woman it would be false, an unnatural thing. They belong in their cushioned chairs and their pillowed, scented beds. Only you belong here, with the perfumes of the warm earth, the crushed grass, and the sweet wind.”

  For a little while Rhiannon was silent. She was deeply pleased that Simon found something special about her, and she did not doubt his sincerity. Still, her irrepressible sense of mischief could not long be submerged. “But Simon,” she said, “if you think it will be unnatural to make love to me in a bed, we are going to find it very inconvenient. You know how often it is rainy for days at a time here, and in the winter when it snows— Ugh!”

  The last guttural sound was not an expression of distaste for making love in the wet, cold snow but an involuntary grunt forced out when Simon flipped over and landed on top of her with a thud.

  “Wood nymph!” he exclaimed triumphantly, without difficulty defeating her effort to cast him off. “That is the thing that was in the back of my mind. And it is true, too. You have no heart. Wood nymphs were said to have had no souls and to be very lecherous. That was the purpose of capturing them, I suppose.”

  This sounded very severe, but since the words were interspersed with kisses, Rhiannon was scarcely crushed, except by Simon’s weight. “Better call me a river nymph,” she said in a rather muffled voice, “for if you do not get off me, I will be squashed flat as a rush.”