She gave him a small, cool smile. ‘Your son?’ she laughed. ‘What makes you think he’s yours? I’d have swallowed black-spurred rye before I’d have given life to a child of your siring.’
‘Olwen, enough!’ Owain commanded as Ranulf ’s colour faded and he began to shake as though he had an ague. The grinding of his teeth was audible.
‘He owes it to me,’ she replied. ‘And he always did want to know. Well, now he does.’ Her hand twitched. Responding, the cream mare broke into an ambling trot.
Ranulf coughed and spat. ‘Whose?’ he croaked as if he was being strangled. ‘Tell me, you conniving whore!’
She kept on riding, did not answer.
‘Mine now,’ said Owain as he followed her. ‘By right of conquest. You Normans understand all about that, don’t you?’
Olwen lay across Owain’s chest and played an idle game with the wiry mat of curls beneath her fingers. The glade where they dallied was sun-dappled, warm as a caress, and silent except for the sound of their horses cropping the grass.
‘Woman, you’re dangerous!’ he chuckled ruefully.
Olwen tasted the salt in the hollow of his throat with a pointed tongue. ‘Why is it that men always accuse or blame the woman for their own weaknesses?’ she demanded.
‘We’re hardly going to accuse or blame ourselves, are we!’ he retorted, the laughter deepening. He wound a silken coil of her hair around fore and middle fingers and held it up to watch it sparkle in the sunlight. ‘I suppose that we should be on our way,’ he added, but made no effort to move.
‘Will you do as Ranulf de Gernons asks?’ She lowered her eyes to her gently playing hand and watched the rise and fall of his chest. Neither breathing nor heartbeat changed, but she was aware of the intensity of his gaze. When she flashed a glance at him, he was admiring the lock of hair between his fingers.
‘Was your passion just now by way of bribery?’ he enquired of the tress. ‘If so, you are wasting your time.’
It was Olwen’s breathing that changed, and hearing it, he said, ‘I do not respond to that kind of bargaining,
Olwen bit her lip. ‘It wasn’t bribery.’
‘Not entirely,’ he allowed, ‘but you are like a falcon, my Olwen. You only come to my fist because I feed you. It is not unconditional. You want me to refuse the Earl of Chester, don’t you?’
‘It matters not to me, my lord,’ she shrugged indifferently.
Owain saw through it immediately and laughed at her. ‘Oh, I think it matters very much indeed,’ he contradicted and half sat up, bracing his weight on his elbows. ‘What he proposes is an excellent idea in principle,’ he said, ‘but Ranulf de Gernons is about as genuine as a piece of the True Cross bought from a huckster at Ravenstow Fair. If I helped him to take that keep, he’d have it re-garrisoned faster than I could say the paternoster, and he would use it to raid into my territory. FitzGuyon’s use of it so far has been defensive. I leave him alone, he leaves me alone, and at least his blood is part Welsh.’ He slanted a thoughtful glance at Olwen. ‘Perhaps you still hold him in some degree of affection,
‘He was good to me by his code — more than I deserved.’
‘Then why in Christ’s name did you leave him for a toad like Ranulf de Gernons? … No,’ he said as she flounced away from him. ‘I truly want to know.’
Olwen tugged at the moist blades of grass beneath her fingers. ‘I wanted Renard because he was different, a challenge, but the only way to win that challenge was to lose. I had heard all about Ranulf de Gernons — how import — ant and powerful he was. I wanted to show Renard how high I could rise if I so chose, far beyond what he could give to me. The pleasure was never important, except when it got in the way.’ She tossed her handful of grass into the air and watched the green blades scatter down.
He was silent for a time, digesting this and seeing a glimmer of the reasons for her flying to his fist like a lost hawk sighting a falconer’s glove. ‘And the child that came of this challenge?’ He sat up further and linked his hands around his upraised knees. ‘Does Renard of Ravenstow know that he has sired him?’
Olwen laced up her shirt and picked her hat off the grass. They had rolled on it in their passion and the jaunty peacock’s feather in the brim was broken. She shook her head. ‘No, he doesn’t know.’ She plucked at the feather.
‘Do you want him to?’
Olwen gnawed at her bottom lip, then shaking her head, raised her eyes to meet his. ‘Jordan is mine,’ she said. ‘Perhaps when he is older …’
Owain arched his brow. He watched her dust off the hat and set it back on her head. No stranger to women, he found her exquisitely beautiful, intricate and intriguing, worth every moment of the time he had spent coaxing her to the lure. His gain that the other two had been fools. ‘He’s better fostered in my household than in any
He saw that her eyes were bright with tears.
Chapter 28
‘John!’ Elene hastened to embrace her brother-in-law as he dismounted from his palfrey in Woolcot’s courtyard. ‘This is indeed a welcome surprise!’ She hugged him hard, cheek pressed to the rough wool of his habit, then stood back to look into his eyes, fear present even in the midst of her delight lest he bear evil tidings. His face, however, was open and smiling, the only lines on it those around his eyes from constantly narrowing them in order to focus.
‘Where’s my nephew?’ he asked as she led him across the bailey towards the keep.
‘Crawling after dog bones in the hall and leading Alys a merry caper! You won’t recognise him.’ She looked along her shoulder. ‘Have you ridden far?’
‘Only from Ravenstow. Mama told me that she thought Renard was here?’ He squinted around as they walked. She had to grab his arm and steer him to avoid a pile of dirty rushes that had recently been forked from the hall. He said ruefully, ‘When I write letters for Lord Leicester, I look through a glass orb of water to see the page better. If there was some way of carrying such a thing around on the end of my nose, I might be able to see where I was going.’
Elene laughed at the image he conjured and patted his arm. ‘You’ve missed Renard by less than an hour. He’s gone up to Caermoel to sift reports and sit at the manor court. I’m here to supervise the wool clip, and then we’re travelling down to Ledworth for the Lammas feast. He’s due back at the end of the week. Do you need him urgently?’
They had reached the hall. John stared myopically around. He had seldom visited Woolcot and was unfamiliar with its layout. It was much smaller than Ravenstow and Ledworth, but sturdily built for all that and made comfortable by Elene’s domestic wiles. Bright hangings abated some of the damp from the walls and the central hearth was well tended so that it burned cleanly without enveloping the hall in a smoky miasma. ‘Yes, I do,’ John replied.
‘So urgently that you cannot stay to dine?’ She propelled him in the direction of the dais.
‘Oh plenty of time for that, Nell,’ he assured her, patting his stomach, ‘but I won’t stay overnight.’ He gave her a smile. ‘There’s no need to look like that. It’s urgent, but cause for relief, not alarm.’
She raised her brows at him, but did not pursue further. She left him and went down the hall, returning a moment later with Hugh, whom she deposited in his lap. The baby took his usual exception and yelled.
‘He’s definitely louder than I remember from Christmas,’ John said wryly, ‘although even then I marvelled at the power of his lungs.’
‘Renard says that even if you put his cradle in the undercroft, you’d still be able to hear him on the
