A Moment in Time

Chapter 20

Madoc returned eight days after he had left them, bringing not only Rhys, but his sister Nesta as well. The two young women threw themselves into each other's arms, weeping happily.

'I never knew how much I missed you until now!' Wynne cried.

'Nor I, you,' Nesta reciprocated. 'Now let me see your daughter! Madoc tells me she is absolutely adorable.'

'He said that?' Wynne was completely surprised. Madoc had not seemed too anxious to engender a relationship of any kind with little Averel. His attitude had pained her, especially when she remembered Eadwine Aethelhard's loving fosterage of Arvel.

Nesta immediately understood Wynne's thoughts. 'He did indeed say Averel was adorable. He is quite taken with the child, Wynne. It is simply difficult for him to reconcile his feelings for her with his knowledge that she was conceived by another man upon his wife's body.'

“ 'Tis yet another wicked wound that Brys has done Madoc,' Wynne said.

'Aye,' Nesta replied, 'but do not fear, dearest sister. Madoc will eventually reconcile himself to your lost years. The important thing is that we are now all reunited once more.'

'Madoc must destroy Brys for all time,' Wynne said suddenly.

'Aye,' Nesta rejoined. 'I agree with you. The defeat we are about to give Brys will embitter him far more than anything he has ever suffered before now. He is not a man to take such a defeat lightly. Left alive, he will seek new means of hurting us all. There is no choice but to destroy him first. Destroy him completely.'

'Now you see, brother Madoc,' Rhys of St. Bride's deep voice boomed out, 'why I am not afraid to leave Nesta in charge of St. Bride's or Pendragon. She is the perfect mate for me.' He chuckled, and took his wife's dainty hand as if to lead her forth. 'Look at her. She looks like a fairy princess, but she is as bloodthirsty as any berserker I have ever encountered!'

'Am I wrong in my assessment, my lord?' Nesta demanded of her husband, and she pierced him with a sharp look.

'Nay, my love, you are not. We must defang that snake who calls himself Brys of Cai once and for all.' Rhys then smiled at Wynne. 'Welcome home, Wynne of Gwernach!' he said, and enveloped her in a quick bear hug. Setting her back on her feet, he said admiringly, 'I think you are equally as strong as my wife, lady, to have survived your captivity. Women of the Cymri race are, it seems, like well-tempered sword blades: both beautiful and strong.'

'What a fine compliment, my lord,' Wynne praised him, her cheeks pink with her pleasure. 'I see you have learned well from Nesta how to turn a pretty phrase, but lest you turn my head with your flattery, I would know if Madoc has discussed my plan to retrieve our son, and if he has, what you think of it?'

'I think you are absolutely correct in your appraisal of the lord of Cai, sister,' Rhys surprised her by saying. 'He is a craven coward, and the best way to approach him is surprise.'

'You agree with me?' Wynne was indeed astounded.

'I do,' he replied. ' 'Tis the best way to initiate our war against him. Surprise! And I can imagine the look upon his handsome face when you stride boldly into his hall demanding the return of your son!' Rhys's deep laughter echoed through Gwernach's hall. 'He could easily choke on his own bile, and wouldn't that be a great pity! 'Twould save us the trouble of gutting him like the swine he is.'

Wynne turned to Madoc and he shrugged in agreement. 'I must bow to Rhys's wisdom and yours, it seems, dearling. I am no warrior, but a man of logic and reason.'

'And you need not be responsible for killing the devil,' Rhys said. 'I will do it in repayment for the sin he attempted to commit against my darling Nesta when she was just a wee girl. Only an evil creature with perversion bred into his very soul could seek hurt against women and children.'

Wynne paled. 'Yes,' she said, 'Madoc assures me that Brys will not hurt Arvel. What if he already has?'

Madoc shook his head. 'I know somehow that he has not harmed the boy,' he reassured his wife. 'If Brys wanted to harm or even kill our son, he would have done it at Aelfdene, making certain that we both knew. He did not. He arranged to steal the child away in secret so that you would not know immediately, and I would not know at all because I was not even supposed to find you, dearling. Nay, Brys has done no injury to Arvel.'

'We must leave for Cai as soon as possible,' Wynne said, and then she asked Rhys, 'Where is your army, my lord? You have brought no armed force to Gwernach with you.'

'My men left St. Bride's for Cai four days ago,' Rhys said. 'They travel by night only. Such a force as I am bringing would arouse suspicion, not only of our neighbors, but of Harold Godwinson over the hills in England as well. Now that he has seen to the murder of our king, he does well to fear us. Word might also reach Cai. Brys must not be warned of our coming, nor the English interfere with this family matter of ours. I sent a messenger to Raven's Rock instructing Madoc's men to travel by night as well. If we ride out tomorrow night, we will be in plenty of time to meet them.'

'Will you go too?' Wynne asked Nesta.

'Aye, I must,' Nesta told her. 'I must see the end of this and know truly that Brys can never harm any of us again.'

That evening Wynne and Madoc sought privacy in the peddler's wagon which had been placed neatly to one side of the courtyard of Gwernach's manor house. Emptied of its goods, it was quite spacious. A mattress filled with sweet meadow grass and fragrant clover had been placed upon the floorboards of the wagon to be topped with a featherbed and several sheepskins. The bleached linen that covered the top and sides of the cart gave them complete seclusion from prying eyes. Naked, they lay stroking each other's bodies to tender arousal.

'You are delicious,' he growled low, nipping at the smooth curve of her hip.

'Villain!' Wynne smacked playfully at her husband. 'Do I not feed you enough that you would attempt to feast upon my person?'

'I love feasting upon you,' he murmured low. Then he rolled her onto her back, and pouring a little wine from one of two goblets they had brought into the wagon upon her belly, he lapped it up with his tongue. 'I am drunk with my desire for you, Wynne of Gwernach,' he told her passionately.

'And as randy as a stallion in heat too, my lord,' she said, her heart beating a quick tattoo. How she loved him!

'Aye,' he admitted, and rolling upon his own back, he begged her, 'Love me, dearling! I need to feel your mouth upon me tonight.'

Rising up upon her side, Wynne looked down at him sprawled upon his back, his manhood engorged and stiff as it thrust upward. She bent and rubbed her soft cheek against it, then placed a kiss upon the ruby tip, her tongue snaking out to encircle the smooth skin of the head, her fingers clamping firmly about it.

He groaned with pure pleasure when she took him into her mouth, reveling in the warmth of her tongue against his skin. 'Dear God!' he exclaimed suddenly, 'I am nigh to exploding with my desire for you, Wynne, my beautiful wife!'

Releasing him, she raised her head and looked into his eyes. 'I feel no desire yet,' she said frankly. 'How quickly you men are ready to couple, fired by your own lusts, and by wine, no doubt. We women are not so quickly aroused. Alas, though I would give you all the pleasure that I could, Madoc, my dear lord, I am not ready to receive your wild and wondrous passion.'

What other woman of his past acquaintance, he wondered, would have made so honest an admission? Other men, he knew, would have been angered by a wife's refusal to offer instant gratification, but then it had never been that way with them. Reaching up, he caressed her full breasts hanging like twin moons above him. Seeing the pleasure begin to creep into her eyes, he smiled slightly. One of his greatest delights in Wynne had always been her enthusiasm for making love. Lifting his head, he licked at her nipples, teasing at the sensitive pinkish-beige flesh until they contracted into thrusting nubs and she murmured with contentment. His hands closed about her waist, and Madoc buried his head in the deep valley between those soft breasts, rubbing his face against the perfumed skin. The fragrance of white heather, warmed by the heat of her body, assailed him.

Gently he tumbled her back onto the soft sheepskins, spreading her wide to him. His night-black head lowering,