could see the height of that window and she trembled at the thought that she and Isabella had been up there, so high above the ground. She turned away, the raven forgotten almost at once. Today she had a more important appointment.
Thomas saddled the charger, taller and rangier than the average battle horse, built for speed as much as weight, his dished head betraying the traces of Arabian blood amongst his ancestors, his huge dark eyes kind in the chestnut head. Thomas lifted her high on to the horse’s broad back, then swung himself on to one of the palfreys. They had nearly reached the castle gates when Eleyne heard Rhonwen’s cry.
‘What do you think you’re doing? Get that child off that horse!’ Rhonwen had seen her from the doorway to the tower.
Eleyne glanced at Thomas, tempted to kick Invictus into a gallop, but Thomas had put a steadying hand on her rein.
‘Sir William said I could,’ she said defiantly as Rhonwen ran towards them.
‘I don’t believe you.’ Rhonwen tightened her lips. ‘No one would give permission for a child to ride that animal. That horse must be seventeen hands.’
Eleyne smiled. ‘Yes, isn’t he gorgeous? And he’s as gentle as a lamb, really.’
‘Get off!’ Rhonwen’s eyes were flashing dangerously. ‘Get off him this minute. You are not going to ride him!’
‘Why not, pray?’ Behind her Sir William had appeared in the courtyard. As he strode towards them, they could see his father standing in the doorway in the distance watching them. Sir Reginald was leaning on a stick, his face grey with pain in the bright sunlight. ‘I gave her permission to ride Invictus, Lady Rhonwen. She’ll be safe with him.’
‘I don’t want her on that horse.’ Rhonwen stood in front of Sir William, her fists clenched. ‘Eleyne is my charge. If I forbid her to ride, she will not ride.’ She loathed this man with his easy arrogant charm, his assumption that every female near him, child or adult, would succumb to his smile.
‘Eleyne is my guest, madam.’ William’s eyes were suddenly hard. ‘And this is my castle. She will do as she pleases here.’
Eleyne caught her breath, looking from one to the other. Without even realising it, she had wound her fingers deep into the stallion’s mane. She was torn. She was passionately loyal to Rhonwen and she didn’t want to see her bested, but this was a battle she wanted Sir William to win.
Rhonwen’s eyes had narrowed. ‘You would risk the life of this child? Are you aware, Sir William, that this girl is the Countess of Huntingdon. She is a princess of Scotland. The alliance and friendship of three nations rests in her!’
Rhonwen had never looked more beautiful. Watching from the back of the stallion Eleyne viewed her with a sudden dispassionate pride. She was wonderful – her head erect, her fine features tightened by her anger, her colour high, the gold braids coiled around her head gleaming beneath her veil. Eleyne straightened her own shoulders imperceptibly. Sir William too, she noticed intuitively, was very aware of Rhonwen’s beauty. Nevertheless he frowned. ‘Lady Huntingdon,’ he emphasised her title mockingly, ‘is my guest, madam, I shall let nothing harm her under my roof.’
‘Lady Huntingdon,’ Rhonwen retorted, ‘is her sister’s guest, under your father’s roof.’
‘And her sister is my father’s wife.’ William’s voice was silky. ‘And does as he commands. Shall I fetch her, Lady Rhonwen, and ask her to confirm that the de Braoses give their permission for this ride?’ He held Rhonwen’s gaze.
She looked away first. ‘There is no need,’ she said, defeated. ‘If you’re sure the horse is safe.’ Her voice was heavy with resentment.
Eleyne found she had been holding her breath. She glanced at Thomas. He was waiting, his eyes on the ground, the perfect servant, seemingly not listening to the altercation, except that, she knew, it would be all round the castle within an hour of their return.
She looked at Rhonwen pleadingly, not wanting her to be hurt, but Rhonwen had turned away. Her head held high, she walked back across the courtyard and, passing Sir Reginald without even a nod of her head, disappeared into the west tower.
Sir William winked at Eleyne and smacked his horse lightly on its rump. ‘Have a nice ride, princess,’ he said cheerfully, ‘and for pity’s sake don’t fall off, or we’ll have three nations at each other’s throats.’
He watched as Eleyne and Thomas rode off, followed at a discreet distance by an escort of men-at-arms. He frowned; he had made an enemy of Rhonwen and the thought made him uneasy.
VII
Rhonwen stood for a moment inside the door at the bottom of the new tower, trying to control her anger. Leaning back against the wall, she took a deep breath, then another, feeling the rough newly lime-washed stone of the masonry digging into the back of her scalp. Only when she was completely calm did she make her way slowly up the winding stair towards the bedchambers high above. At this time of day they were deserted. She stood for a moment looking down at the bed the children shared, then she walked across to the window embrasure and sat down on the stone seat. The forested hills beyond the Wye were crystal clear in the cold brightness of the sun, but there was no sign of any rider.
She wasn’t afraid; Eleyne could ride any horse, however wild. She would cling along the animal’s neck, whispering in its ear, and the horse would seem to understand. What worried Rhonwen was Eleyne’s defiance, encouraged as it had been by de Braose.
She clenched her fists in her lap. She hated him as a man and she hated his family and all they stood for. To have to stay with them for however short a time, even though Gwladus, a daughter of the prince, lived here, was torture to her. They represented the loathed English who had insinuated themselves into the principalities over the last century and a half, and she could see no good coming of the prince’s desire to be allied to them. Her knuckles whitened. William had publicly challenged her; he had overruled her authority over Eleyne, an authority vested in her by the prince himself. For that, one day, she would make him pay. The de Braoses had fallen once from their power and influence in the March. Why should they not fall again?
VIII
It was many hours before Eleyne returned and when she did she was careful to avoid Rhonwen. Exhilarated, tired, her face streaked with mud thrown up by the thundering hooves, her hair tangled and her gown torn, she was happier than she had ever been. Leaving the stables with considerable reluctance, she looked around the courtyard. There was no sign of Isabella or her sisters. They had been there when Eleyne rode in so proudly at Thomas’s side, and they had swarmed around as Eleyne dismounted. Then a maid had come to fetch them. The Lady Eva, their mother, wanted them indoors.
As the shadows lengthened across the cobblestones she stood for a moment watching the builders swarming over the castle walls. Wisps of hay danced and spun in the wind; a rowan tree, heavy with fruit, tossed its branches near the smithy.
She was seeing everything with a strange intensity: she noticed every detail of the stones the hod carriers lifted up the walls; the flakes and holes in the rough porous surfaces, the old dried lichen. She noticed the details of the men’s faces, the different textures of their skins – some rough and weatherbeaten, one soft and downy as a child. She saw the clumps of primroses and cowslips, heartsease, the flowers intense purple and yellow, streaked with hair lines of black, and melissa with its glossy rumpled leaves, strays from the herb gardens, which had rooted at the foot of the walls.
Eleyne frowned. She was there again – the shadowy figure – watching the masons at their work. She was less distinct today, a wraith against the stone, fading, then gone.
Rhonwen was watching Eleyne from the shelter of the wall with its forest of scaffolding. She had watched the
