An Alliance with His Enemy Princess
Autorzy
Lissa Morgan
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19,1K
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17
Chapter One
‘We are ambushed!’
Gwennan screamed a warning. Hauling on Tarian’s reins, she turned the great stallion on his haunches to meet the Normans who came swarming down upon them. Between one curse and the next, the quiet valley they’d been riding through became filled with the thunder of hooves, the yelling of men and the clash of steel on steel.
Her heart raging, she rushed into the thick of the fighting, swinging her sword high and bringing it down hard on the raised shield of a Norman knight. She ducked beneath his slashing parry and, as his courser plunged, thrust her point deep into a gap in the chainmail under his armpit. He fell from the saddle, but she didn’t even glance at him as she drove Tarian on into the midst of the enemy ranks.
But even as another Norman perished under her sword—Rhys’s sword, and a blazing talisman of Welsh freedom—Gwennan knew this battle was lost. Too many Welshmen already lay dead or dying around her and it was useless to fight on. They were outnumbered three to one at least and, caught as they were on open ground, it would only be a matter of time before her little band was overwhelmed completely.
She parried another attack, swinging away from the arcing weapon, and with all her might dragged her sword across the back of the Norman’s neck. As he crashed to the ground she called the order to retreat, to regroup at their hidden camp, high on the slopes of the Dysynni Mountains, to live to fight another day.
And then a blow like a falling boulder hit the back of her head. A flash of white light blinded her and everything went black.
Rolant guided his horse through the bodies of the warriors on the ground. Most were dead, and the one or two that were merely injured were being swiftly dispatched by his foot soldiers. None would be left to live. It sickened him that life, even the lives of these truculent yet courageous Welshmen, was so cheaply held.
But to show mercy, to spare an enemy, only meant having to face them again another day. And the resistance of the inhabitants of this wild, mountainous district—admirable though it was—had been a thorn in the side of his overlord for too long already.
A horse standing with its head low, just where the trees began, caught his eye. Its dark, iron-grey coat gleamed like a burnished shield, and an unusually light-coloured mane and tail flowed like silken silver.
A beautiful steed and an unexpected prize! Who would have thought such an animal to belong to a Welsh barbarian? No doubt it was a Norman animal, the property of a nobleman, either won in battle or, more likely, stolen from its rightful owner in one of the audacious raids that these people were so skilled at.
Dismounting, Rolant tethered his gelding to a bush and approached the grey stallion. It flung its head up and eyed him viciously, ears flat and nostrils flared in warning. Its reins were broken and trailed over its neck to the ground. The end of one was in the hands of a boy, who was lying face-down, a dented helmet partly covering his young head.
It didn’t take long to assess the situation. The magnificent horse, the dead Welsh warrior lying a yard or so away, and this his page, or squire perhaps, faithful to his master even in death.
Rolant glanced at the dead man. The sightless eyes were staring upwards and there was a deep and bloody gash where his throat had been. No need to linger there. The warrior had already gone to meet his creator. So instead he knelt down next to the boy. Removing what was left of the helmet, he discovered a lump the size of a lark’s egg beneath the chestnut-brown hair that fell to the nape of a slender neck.
But the skull was intact, and there was little blood, so carefully he turned him over. If this young one lived, he’d spare him for his loyalty as much as his youth. If he were too badly hurt, then a swift and painless death would save him from the scavenging wolves that haunted these remote places.
The face was even younger than he’d expected, smooth and pale, the lips full, the closed eyelashes long and soft. There was no other wound apparent but from the dent in the bronze helmet. He surmised the boy had been merely stunned by a glancing blow from a weapon and might yet live.
Rolant put a hand over the heart, feeling for a beat of life, and found...breasts? He snatched his hand away in surprise. Surely he was mistaken? He explored further and, as much as his mind refused such a thing, the male in him knew there was no mistake. Beneath the well-worn brown tunic, his fingers traced and recognised the small mounds of a young woman’s breasts. And, below the left one, a strong and steady heartbeat.
He lifted his eyes to the face, and as he stared, bemused, the lashes fluttered open. This time it wasn’t just surprise that struck Rolant, but shock too—and a startling stab of lust. For they were beautiful eyes, large and wide and the colour of dark honey, and so unexpected that his breath caught.
Dazed and questioning, those eyes stared up at him for a long moment, struggling to focus, and then the lips parted. ‘T-Tarian! Lle mae Tarian?’
Rolant didn’t understand the Welsh. Was Tarian a name? The name of the dead warrior, perhaps? He shook his head but she’d already slipped back into oblivion. Sitting back on his haunches, he cursed his luck. What the devil was he supposed to do with a girl—and a lovely one at that?
‘Ho! Rolant!’ Giles de Fresnay rode into sight. ‘Why are you idling there, man? We must be after those miserable Welsh cowards while there is still daylight. There’s no one left alive here now, anyway.’
Rolant looked up at his comrade, noting the dripping crimson edge of the sword in the man’s hand. Giles was as bloodthirsty a soldier as he’d ever known and he didn’t like him. He liked him even less as the man’s eyes lit with cunning on the unconscious form lying on the ground.
‘What have you got there? A boy, by God! Is he dead?’
‘No, not dead.’ Rolant made his mind up. If he hesitated, Giles’s blade would be poised in a flash to slit the girl’s throat from ear to ear, adding to his greedy tally of Welsh dead. ‘The boy lives and seems to have been only stunned,’ he said, his voice a warning. ‘And, since I am without either page or squire, I mean to take him for my own—the horse too,’ he added, jerking his chin in the direction of the grey stallion.
Spoils of war were hotly contested, fought over as bitterly as the battle itself, but as leader he had precedence. None of them would dare lay claim to the animal before him, but neither would any one of them spare an ounce of compassion for the girl on the ground. A girl that he had to ensure remained a boy as far as his men were concerned—at least until he could decide what best to do with her.
‘A noble beast.’ Giles’s grey eyes narrowed as they flickered to the horse and back again, his mouth curling with undisguised envy. ‘Though more fit for a king than a bachelor knight!’
Both of them had been honoured by the new King in the late rebellion, when the sons of the Conqueror had argued over who should have Normandy and who England. De Fresnay was equal to Rolant in status, but subordinate in rank—something that Rolant had soon discovered stuck in the man’s gut. It only partly accounted for the rivalry between them that simmered constantly, just below the surface.
It was a rivalry he didn’t need on this expedition into Wales. And a command that he’d accepted eagerly at first. But day by day it sat less and less comfortably on his shoulders. Conquest was one thing; the extinction of an entire race was quite another.
‘As for the boy...you’ll have your work cut out for you, Rolant. If you take my advice, you’ll slay the wretch here and now.’ Giles spat on the ground. ‘These people are savages—uncivilised. I wouldn’t trust my throat with any of them.’
Rolant ignored him and reached for the grey stallion’s reins, looping them over the pommel of his saddle. Then, lifting up the girl, he put her astride his gelding, carefully leaning her forward on its neck so she wouldn’t fall off.
As he prepared to mount behind her, the glint of a sword lying nearby caught his eye. It lay half hidden in the grass, as if flung from a stricken hand, and he crossed to pick it up.
The carving on the hilt looked ancient and mysterious, the gleaming blade not newly forged but seeming to belong to some bygone age. Rolant slipped it into his belt. No need to let such a fine weapon go to waste either.
When he turned again, Giles had ridden up alongside his courser. Leaning down, he took the girl by the hair and wrenched her head up.
‘A pretty boy and no mistake.’ Roughly, he let the head drop back again, malice twisting his mouth. ‘Make sure he warms only your ale, Rolant, and not your bed as well! If you can train him at all, that is.’
‘When I want advice, de Fresnay, I’ll ask for it.’ Any doubts he might have had as to the wisdom of taking the girl with them vanished. He was a warrior, not a murderer, and if he left her here she would perish if not by the swords of his men then by others who would come in their wake. Of that there was no doubt.
‘Now, get the men to burying these dead—Norman and Welsh,’ he added. ‘We’ll not leave any for the wolves.’
With a smirk, the man rode away, and Rolant clenched his teeth. No one dared say it to his face, but he knew what they called him behind his back, de Fresnay and his crew. How they ridiculed him for his chastity. Virgin, monk, catamite.
None of those descriptions applied, but he wasn’t going to rise to their bait and explain himself. As violent a body of men as he’d ever commanded, how would any of them understand the shame of losing your name and your honour? Having your home and your family stripped from you in one fell blow? Your heart and trust severed as swiftly and as callously as man’s head from his body?
As his head should have been, since he’d been the instrument of his own disgrace, the death of his brother and the devastation of his family. So what did that make him at the end of the day?
Rolant mounted his gelding and, with the reins in one hand, supported the girl with his free arm. She was like a sleeping, fragile bird in the crook of his elbow, and as he glanced down at her face something stirred again in his gut.
Something he banished at once, even as the bile of his own dishonour remained like a bitter aftertaste in his mouth. No, it wasn’t a vow of chastity or devotion he’d taken that day five years ago, when they’d buried his brother John, but a lesson he would never forget.
Love was a blindfold that could lead a man to wreak unwitting desolation that could never be undone. Pity the poor wretch who ever put it over his eyes—as he’d done, and willingly—and was left to live with the consequences of his blindness.
Gwennan was having a nightmare—a waking nightmare, for she knew she didn’t sleep. The torment that assailed her didn’t bring the peace of sleep with it at all. Instead, her skull seemed to have split wide open, and her body was racked with a heaving, bone-shuddering nausea such as she’d never known.
In her dream, she felt hands upon her. Gentle hands that turned her onto her side, held her head as bitter vomit gushed up from her stomach, wiped her mouth and nose clean.
And she heard a voice, too, that murmured words she didn’t understand but somehow made the nightmare less real, less frightening—until finally it stopped altogether and oblivion came and sucked her down into its dark and blissful depths.
Rolant ordered the campfires to be doused now that the meat to break their fast was cooked. Taking his ration, he returned to his place, where the girl still slept. She’d kept him awake for hours during the night, as she’d swung from a deep state of unconsciousness to half-waking bouts of vomiting until there could be nothing left inside her.
He’d done his best to ease the retching, wiped the slime from her mouth and even managed to get some drops of water between her cracked lips. And when he’d gone to get his meat he’d tied her upright to the wagon wheel, so that should she vomit again at least she wouldn’t choke.
Other than that, there was nothing else he could do. It was the blow to her head, he knew. Not severe enough to kill, but hard enough to shock the body into violent reaction. It would pass, and hopefully pass soon. He couldn’t keep his men encamped here in the midst of enemy territory any longer just for the sake of what they believed to be a worthless Welsh boy. All of them wondered, though none asked, why he was taking such trouble over a prisoner who, in their shared opinion, should be put out of his misery.
Not for the first time, Rolant rued the fact that he’d ever looked into those compelling honey-glazed eyes. Would it have been better, after all, to have left the girl where she was to take her chances?
He shook his head, silently answering his own question.
All his better instincts, such as they were, had told him not to abandon her as he’d abandoned John. Perhaps it was because he’d abandoned his brother that he couldn’t leave her behind. Either way, it was too late to regret his act of compassion, but it meant she was now both his captive and his responsibility.
He swallowed a mouthful of ale and, taking his knife from his belt, began to cut the roast boar’s flesh into strips. As he worked, he eyed the sleeping figure slumped before him and asked himself different questions—which were equally hard to find answers for. What was the reason for those clothes and that shoulder-length hair? Was she dressed thus out of necessity or deception? And what was her part in the small band of Welsh resistance they’d encountered yesterday?
Because no man took a girl as his page, or squire, and exposed her to the dangers of war—not even here in this strange and savage country.
Gwennan tried to open her eyes, but the pain behind them made the effort too much, so she gave up. Forcing her mind to work instead, she assessed her body, trying to discover what was causing the ache in her arms and shoulders, the stiffness in her legs.
Her neck ached too, as if her head were too heavy to hold, and the tingling in her fingers told her that her hands were bound in front of her. Slowly, it dawned on her that she was sitting on the ground, leaning against something hard.
Around her were sounds and smells—some familiar, some strange—all of them laden with peril. The smoke of dying fires, the stamp of horses’ hooves, the noise of men eating, the mutter of conversation from here and there...not in Welsh but in the Norman tongue. And, nearest of all, the rhythmic rasp of stone on steel as a weapon was sharpened.
Quick fear flooded all the way through her and her body jerked instinctively. Something cut into her stomach and she shuddered inside as she realised what it was. A rope, tied snugly around her waist, binding her fast to what could only be the wheel of a cart.
‘I know you’re awake, so you might as well open your eyes.’
Gwennan’s blood froze and her heart started to hammer in her breast. The voice had spoken in English but it was accented with Norman French too, like the others, which meant the enemy was all around her. Panic rose up in her throat and, gritting her teeth to silence the scream that rose with it, she braced herself for the thrust of the knife between her ribs which was surely to come.
‘Or you can pretend to be asleep and stay hungry. It’s up to you.’
As he spoke Gwennan’s belly rumbled loud, even through the fear that had set her limbs quivering. It had been a long time since she’d eaten, though she couldn’t remember how long. Hours? Days?
Then the memory of the blow on her head surged back, making her feel as if her skull had shattered all over again as the pieces finally came together.
She was alive—for now—and she was a prisoner of the Normans who had ambushed them. Her fate was sealed, but pray God the rest of her men had got away to safety.
The noise of sharpening ceased and was replaced by the clunk of metal against wood. The smell of roasted meat drifted into Gwennan’s nostrils and her mouth began to water. She pressed her lips firmly together, trying to stem the tremble of her lips that betrayed the fear inside, but the sound of teeth ripping into flesh followed by satisfied chewing was too much.
Finally forcing her eyes open, she saw, sitting cross-legged in front of her, a giant of a man. A chainmail hauberk covered a vast chest, and his head was bare to reveal thick black hair cut short in the Norman style.
‘That’s more like it.’ Spearing a small chunk of meat on the point of his knife, he held it to her mouth. ‘Eat.’
Oh, how she wanted to refuse—or, better still, take it and spit it back out, right into his face. But, to her horror, her mouth grabbed at it and she swallowed it with hardly a chew. He speared another small chunk, which went swiftly the way of the first. More followed, all of which she devoured like some starved creature. Then he put the meat aside and lifted a cup of cool ale to her mouth.
‘Drink.’
Gwennan drank, feeling the ale flow like healing nectar down her parched throat.
From beneath her lowered lashes, she studied her captor carefully. After all, one had to know one’s enemy in order to defeat him.
His fingers around the cup were long and strong, and an old scar running along the back of his right hand told her he was a soldier, not a servant. But his magnificent body and sharp alertness had told her that already.
‘Not too much. Your stomach is still raw from the purging.’ After a few more precious sips, the cup was removed from her lips. ‘The wound on your skull is not too bad, although you were stunned by it.’
Purging? Gwennan ran her tongue around her mouth, over her teeth, tasting amid the meat and ale the remnants of nausea. So it hadn’t been a nightmare after all. And if the vomiting had been real, had the hands and the voice been real too? And had they been this man’s hands and voice? This cursed Norman invader’s?
She closed her eyes again and, leaning her head back, winced as the sore place at the back of her skull proved she had indeed been stunned. But vigour and warmth began to seep into her body. If he was feeding her, satisfying her thirst, he clearly didn’t intend to kill her. So...why was she still alive?
The sound of sharpening recommenced, the rhythm grating and irritating to her ears. Swiftly her mind raced around her body again, looking for other wounds, finding none. Apart from the ache in her head and the numbness of her limbs she was whole, but tethered securely to a wagon wheel!
‘Open your eyes.’
The command was as soft as before, and yet it suggested compliance or suffering the consequences. So Gwennan obeyed and looked into a young face rather than old, although he looked to have had more summers than she did—at least five and twenty.
She saw a square chin, a full mouth, straight nose, a wide brow above green long-lashed eyes. Then, lower, she saw broad shoulders, a lean, tough body, and the muscles of the forearms flexing as he sharpened his weapon.
And not his weapon either, but hers! Rhys’s sword—Cleddyf Gobaith. The blade of hope, blessed and invincible. The weapon that was destined to vanquish their foes and win their freedom. And now this accursed Norman had it!
Clenching her teeth, she tested her bonds again as cold anger finally eclipsed helpless fear. But the ropes were tied too securely and impossible to break loose.
His head tilted slightly, catching the first dappled rays of sun just as they broke through the canopy of the trees. ‘Do you speak English?’
Gwennan glared at him. She knew the language well enough and she needed answers. ‘Where is my horse?’
‘Your horse?’
She licked her lips, found them dry and cracked, but her voice was strong and steady. ‘Where is he?’
The Norman said nothing as he put down the piece of flint and placed Cleddyf Gobaith across his thighs. Her eyes flickered down to the burnished steel and then back to his, and a shock ran all the way through her. Even in the deceptive light of dawn, they gleamed as bright and as green as the lake at Talyllyn in high summer.
‘You mean your master’s horse, do you not? He’s well, but he’s my horse now—as is this fine sword too.’ He ran a fingertip over its keen edge. ‘Your master is dead and has no need of either. Or of you.’
Gwennan’s heart jolted. Not since Rhys had a man looked at her as this Norman was looking at her now. With a frank and assessing stare that seemed to pass through her skin and delve deep inside her.
No other man had dared intrude on her love, her loyalty, or her grief for her dead husband as she carried on his fight to drive the enemy out and take back their homeland. So how did the eyes of this man—a man who was the enemy—dare to stare so boldly?
She tore her gaze away and looked over his shoulder to the camp beyond. Thirty or so men, half a dozen of them knights, the rest foot soldiers. Not a full army, just an advance guard—or a scouting party, perhaps, leading the way into the heart of her lands. She could see Tarian now, tethered with all the other horses at the far side of the forest clearing.
‘What is your name, boy?’ The Norman leaned in and, taking her chin, turned her face back towards him. ‘You have one, I assume?’
His touch was strong, yet strangely gentle. But at least he’d confirmed that her sex was as yet undiscovered. She was still fully clothed, but her helmet was gone, and it must have been he who removed it. Diolch i Dduw he’d not removed any more!
With her shoulder-length hair and attire of tunic and woollen socasau, Gwennan knew she passed easily for the boy she pretended to be, even if she could do nothing about the soft skin of her face. A face that warmed uncomfortably as he waited for an answer.
‘G...Gerallt.’
She’d lied to him. If he found out who she truly was she’d be killed on the spot—as her husband had been. Or tossed into a dungeon to rot and rage—like her parents.
‘Gerallt.’ He repeated the name. ‘And where do you hail from...Gerallt?’
The emphasis in his voice sent a ripple of discomfort along her nerves, and the next lie came far less steadily than the first. ‘C-Caernarfon.’
Gwennan’s heart began to thud as his fingers still held her jaw with that soft yet firm force, compelling her to meet his scrutinising stare. If he discovered her true sex, even if her identity remained undiscovered, she was lost. For everyone in Wales, and in Saxon England too, knew what treatment women received at the hands of these Norman devils.
She would be raped, violated—and not just by this man, but by others of his party too. Then her nose would be slit for a harlot and—if she was lucky, and if they were merciful—her throat slit too. To be left alive after such brutality and shame was no life at all for any woman.
‘And what are you doing in these parts so far from home...Gerallt of Caernarfon?’
He turned her face slightly to one side and then the other, his eyes peeling away her skin as he studied her like some sort of new species of creature he’d discovered.
‘Fighting you Norman dogs—what else?’ she spat.
His mouth stretched into a slow smile. ‘Courageous words from naught but a child...’
‘I’m not a child! Free my hands and return my weapon to me and I’ll prove that to you!’
This time he didn’t just smile, he laughed. Not a cruel laugh, but one that dismissed her challenge like an annoying insect buzzing around his head.
‘Not today, my fiery young Welshman.’
He took hold of the rope that bound her to the wheel. Gwennan shuddered as his knuckles pressed into her midriff, steeling herself for the death thrust that was surely coming. But with a deft stroke he cut her bonds and then, getting to his feet with quick grace, slipped Cleddyf Gobaith into his belt.
‘I am in need of a page, and since your master is dead, you will serve me in that office.’
Gwennan stared up at him, her mouth dropping open, as behind him the camp began to break up. Serve this Norman cythrawl? Words of contempt and refusal burned on the tip of her tongue, but she had no chance to say them as he bent and hauled her to her feet.
Her legs throbbed as the blood flowed back into them, and if he hadn’t been holding her she might have fallen down. Nausea churned again in her belly, and she grabbed his shoulders to steady herself.
The strength of him was overpowering, and the height of him towered over her. He was taller even than he’d appeared when he’d been sitting on the ground. And, to her shame, Gwennan felt her cheeks turn as hot as fire.
‘Are you faint still?’ he asked, a frown creasing his brow.
She shook her head. ‘No... But you can hardly expect me to spring to my feet like a hare from cover when I’ve been tied to a cartwheel for hours on end!’
For a moment he glared down at her, a battle between irritation and concern seeming to shimmer in his eyes. Then he muttered something in his own language, and the next moment she was up and in his arms, as helpless as a sack of corn.
Laughter rang out all around as he dumped her into the wagon, beside the supplies it bore. Then, as a final insult, he ruffled her hair.
‘I’m sorry I had to tie you up. But I have to keep you tethered for a little while longer in case you try and run—as I suspect you would at the first chance you got.’
He looked deep into her eyes, and his startling green gaze was far too keen. And then he had the audacity, the irreverence, to smile at her!
‘Because something tells me you don’t care at all for the idea of being my page—do you, Gerallt of Caernarfon?’
Fuming, Gwennan watched him stride away, buckling on his helmet and pulling on his gauntlets, Cleddyf Gobaith glinting at his hip. A man held Tarian ready for him and he hitched his shield to the saddle and swung himself up onto the stallion’s back.
Tarian reared high into the air, neck arching and hooves pawing. A lesser horseman would have been off again straight away. But this man—clearly the leader here—leaned forward, his balance perfect, and with a word and a touch of his heels brought him down again.
He laughed and slapped the stallion’s neck—not in punishment but in careless appreciation. It was the action of a man who knew and respected an animal of quality and mettle even while he mastered it.
The Normans moved out of the woodland clearing, their leader in front, heading away from the rising sun, and deeper into the Dysynni lands—her lands. Gwennan bumped along behind them in the wagon, grinding her teeth at the indignity of it. She was the daughter of Cynddylan Fawr—a princess of Wales! The last of the Royal House of Dysynni and keeper of the blessed sword of hope!
And when she was free again, and that sword was flaming once more in her hand, she’d make sure that nameless, arrogant, green-eyed Norman would be the first to die by it.
