Rhiannon (29 page)

The gossip in itself was distasteful; Rhiannon was not in
the least interested in the bed-hopping proclivities of people she did not
know, but she was accustomed to such gossip. Her father’s Court was no
different, though smaller. Where there are men and women there will be sexual
games. The difference was that now, all too often, Rhiannon herself was the target
of the tales. Although not all of the women had seen her performance, all knew
of it, and many had carefully whetted knives with which to stab her. Thus she
was the recipient of more than one broad tale of Simon’s doings, delivered with
every range of feeling from genuine concern to vicious venom.

At first Rhiannon was inclined to laugh, remembering how
Simon had said that when she was warned against him the half of it would not be
true at all and the other half, exaggerated. “Were I what is said of me,” he
complained, “I would need seven of everything a man uses to make love…” But
when she finally got into the empty bed that night, she began to wonder whether
the bed Simon was sleeping in was also empty. It was quite difficult for a
woman to be unfaithful to a man. Confined to a home and an area where she was
known, it required effort and secrecy to take a lover. That so many women
accomplished it was a tribute to female cleverness. A man, on the contrary, had
no such problems. He rode where he liked, most often to places it was very
unlikely his woman would ever go. How could she know, Rhiannon wondered,
whether Simon was true to the oath he had sworn to her?

She told herself not to be a fool. It was ridiculous to
think a man who professed love and had made love so eagerly and with such
tenderness the preceding night would betray his vows on the next night. She
knew that was true, yet she shook and burned, cold and hot with rage and grief
and jealousy. Then, when Ian and Geoffrey and Adam came home the next day,
saying that Simon had been invited to hunt and would return later. Rhiannon had
to make herself busy so that no one would see her face. Choking on her anguish,
she asked herself
what
Simon was hunting. Was he on the trail of a
four-legged or a two-legged doe? And even if he truly was hunting deer, did
that not show clearly that he preferred the company of his hunt companions to
her? Well, and if so, he could have them. She would leave him to them for good
and all.

Some time after she reached this resentful conclusion, a
squire of the body to the king came with a special invitation and request that
Lady Rhiannon come to sing for Henry and some special guests from Provence.
Since the messenger came into the hall while Rhiannon was trying to calm herself
by better fitting her French translations to her music, she could scarcely have
found an excuse not to go. In her present mood, it never entered her mind to
seek any excuse. She accepted the invitation at once, only requesting time to
dress herself suitably.

No ease or hope had been discovered in the two days of
discussions. Ian was tired and depressed. He did not wish to go to Court and to
put on a face of calm and goodwill. Naturally the squire’s instructions did not
forbid him to attend; in decency the invitation could not exclude the male kin
of any woman invited to the Court. However, the fact that they had not been
specifically invited hinted that Henry would prefer their absence. Rhiannon’s
safety had been fully provided for. In addition to the squire, there was a full
escort of men-at-arms and a promise of a full escort to bring her home safely
when her performance was over.

A hurried conference resulted in Rhiannon setting off alone
with the squire and her escort when she was ready. It was thought impolitic,
almost insulting, to send for Geoffrey or Adam to accompany her. Ian had
offered himself, but the sound of his breath rattling in his chest and the
glances Alinor had cast at him made Rhiannon’s decision very easy. By now she
was sure that Henry had no intention of keeping her by force—which was
absolutely true, the king had never thought of it at all—and her head was much
fuller of a mingled desire to spite Simon and worry over Ian than of the king’s
intentions.

Simon returned not long after Rhiannon had gone. He could
not fly into a rage with his father, whom he found surrounded by another group
of men fearful over a new batch of rumors. Ian was already gray with worry and
fatigue, and Alinor, who had excluded all the servants from the solar lest they
hear more than they should, was serving her guests herself with set teeth and
lips tight with anxiety. It would have been better if Simon had followed his
first impulse and gone to Geoffrey’s house to explode, but his second thought
was that he must get to Court before his precious prize was stolen from him.

Obviously, Simon could not rush to Court in the dirty,
dusty, bloodstained clothes in which he had hunted. Thus, it took a little time
to wash his face and hands and get into decent garments. By the time he
arrived, Rhiannon was nearly finished with her song. She had chosen a shorter
piece this time, being less positive than the king that ancient tales of magic
and adventure would interest sophisticated Provençals and Savoyards. In fact,
the reception was so enthusiastic that Simon, a very junior person and not even
a vassal of the king, could get nowhere near her.

The guests’ sincere requests for another song, to which
Rhiannon acceded with quiet pleasure, gave Simon a chance to work his way
nearer. At the end of this second song Rhiannon respectfully begged not to sing
again because she was tired. Simon tensed, but there was no need. Although the
audience was regretful, not even the king insisted. However, he again came down
from his chair of state to speak to Rhiannon. Simon could not quite get through
the crowd to reach them, but he was quite close enough to see Henry give
Rhiannon a beautiful ring from his own finger and hear him again try to
convince her to join the Court.

Rhiannon shook her head slowly, making her heavy,
jewel-laden earrings swing and flash. “I could not, even if I so wished, my
lord.”

“You mean because Simon’s lands are in Wales? But that is
nothing. I can give him—”

“No, indeed,” Rhiannon interrupted emphatically. “It is
nothing to do with Simon. I love my father, but I could never abide even his
Court for very long. I need the empty space, the hills, and the forests. My
lord, you may catch and cage a lark and it may live—but it will never sing. If
you leave me free, I will return to you, often and gladly, for you love in your
heart what I do. That is a sure lure and the mead I crave far more than this
precious ring you have given me. I beg you, do not try to cage me.”

“But if you go back to your hills, it will be very long before
you come again, no matter how willingly.”

“And that would be a very great loss to us all,” the Bishop
of Winchester added smoothly to Henry’s protest. “We must find such inducements
as will make our Welsh lark desire to nest in an English meadow. Larks fly
high, but they do not stray from their nests. Thus, Lady Rhiannon may be free
and we may still hear her sing.”

Rhiannon would have stepped back, away from the black eyes
that transfixed her, but a hard body blocked her move, and a hard hand
encircled her arm. She uttered a soft, shocked cry, but before she could pull
away from the restraint she feared, Simon’s voice identified the man behind
her.

“As I told my lord the king a day ago, there is no immediate
need for any inducement. It is my intention to remain with the Court.”

The words were civil. They might have had a better effect if
Simon’s eyes were not brilliant with challenge. He had been able to come up to
Rhiannon at last because as Winchester advanced, the people around her had
fallen back, away from the bishop. The combined effect of the withdrawal and
Simon’s expression was not at all soothing to Winchester’s feelings. Simon’s
look dried the saliva in Rhiannon’s mouth, and she stepped sideways
instinctively, although she could not flee with Simon’s hand holding her arm
like an iron band. The movement drew the king’s eyes, but fortunately he
misread the expression on her face.

“We have tired you,” he said regretfully.

Rhiannon seized on his words as a drowning man clutches at a
chance log floating by. “Yes, I am sorry,” she whispered. “Will you give me
leave, my lord, to go?”

“Yes, of course,” Henry replied at once, and added
contritely, “We should not have urged you to sing a second time. I shall take
care in the future not to ask too much.”

Winchester opened his mouth, possibly to protest or to offer
a quiet chamber where Rhiannon could rest, but Simon was prepared and spoke
first.

“There is no need to call her escort. I have my own men. I
will see my wife home.” He swept her away, hardly allowing her to curtsy to the
king and bishop. As soon as they were out of earshot, he snarled, “Fool! Idiot!
To come alone into their power. Have you no sense at all?”

Rhiannon made no reply because she had been far more
frightened by Winchester than by the king. In retrospect, his smooth speech
about an English meadow was terrifying. Rhiannon knew that the bishop had not
been at all touched by her singing. He enjoyed it in a mild way, but if he was
willing to offer inducements, it was to snare Llewelyn’s daughter, who might be
a useful hostage. He had no real desire to keep her for his pleasure.
Nonetheless, as her fear receded a little, she grew angry. Simon had no right
to insult her and call her a fool when he did not know the circumstances of her
going.

“Did I not tell you not to go to sing for the king again?”
Simon asked furiously when they were mounted and out of earshot of the guards
at the door. “It is by God’s Grace alone that I came there in time.”

“You are a fool yourself,” Rhiannon snapped. “I had no choice
but to go. Ask your mother and father. They will tell you. And you are worse
than I! You had no need almost to fling a glaive into Winchester’s face.”

“What would you have had me do? Should I have let him take
you to a private chamber somewhere in the keep and tell the world that you
found it so delightful that you wished to stay?”

“The king would not suffer it!” Rhiannon exclaimed.

“Why not? Oh, he might be angry at first, but after it was
explained how fine a hostage he had in his hands, not only for your father but
for me and my father and my brothers—”

“I did not say it was wrong to take me away,” Rhiannon broke
in hotly. “I said you were a fool to do it in such a way that Winchester
understood your suspicions all too well. And you are more the fool because I
could have got away on my own without making more bad feeling than there is
already.”

“Only an ignorant chit of a girl would think of such a
stupidity,” Simon snarled. “You might have left the hall, but you would never
have arrived at home.”

“And who would have given such an order to the king’s squire
of the body and the escort he led? Simon, you are ridiculous! Winchester would
not take me by force, and you know it. Perhaps my father loves me, but he loves
nothing so well as Gwynedd, and my life or death would not alter his
purpose—except to make him put to death shamefully and cruelly ten or twenty or
a hundred English knights to pay for my blood. Winchester must know this.”

“I tell you, you know nothing about it,” Simon raged. “You
are ignorant of the ways of this Court. In the future, simply obey me and do
not cause me so much trouble.”

“I will cause you none at all by my will,” Rhiannon hissed,
“for I will have no more to do with you than I can help—and that will be little
indeed.”

At that inopportune moment they arrived at the house. Simon
was appalled by the icy rage which gave force to Rhiannon’s words. He reached
for the bridle of her mare, to lead it on so that he would have time to take
back what he had said and calm her, but she slipped from the saddle and ran
past the gate, through the courtyard, and into the house. Simon was after her
in moments, but it was too late. By the time he caught up, she was standing in
front of the screen that shielded their bed.

“You are not welcome here,” she said softly but very coldly.

“Be reasonable,” Simon protested, also softly. “There is no
other place for me.”

“Go find yourself another woman’s bed. There are plenty open
to you, I hear. So skilled as you are, they should be far less trouble to you
than I am.”

“You hear aright, and it would be less trouble,” Simon
snarled, infuriated past good sense, “but I am constrained by my oath and I
will not so lightly release you from yours.”

Rhiannon’s lips drew back from her teeth, but not in a
smile. “You think yourself irresistible? You have much to learn about me,
Simon. We will see whose hunger conquers.” She stepped aside. “Stay or go as
you please then—but do not touch me.”

She went about her business after that as if he were
invisible, laying aside her jewels, undressing, and getting into the bed. After
a stunned moment Simon followed her behind the screen and stood watching her,
hardly believing what she seemed to mean.

“Rhiannon—” he said.

“Good night,” she replied. “I beg you not to trouble me
longer with talk. I am tired. Do not strain my forbearance.”

Simon stood a moment longer, took an uncertain step toward
the edge of the screen, and then stopped. The solar was dark except for the
pale flicker of a night candle. That meant his father and mother were asleep.
Even as he stood there, the oldest of the maids dropped the bars across the
outside door and drew her pallet across in front of it. Another was snuffing
the lights. Really, there
was
no place for Simon to go. He thought
briefly of sleeping on the floor and resentment flooded him. Why should he?
Instead he threw off his clothes and climbed into the bed, dropping flat with
an ill-natured thump. If he was not irresistible, he thought angrily, neither
was she! In truth, Helen herself would not have been irresistible to Simon that
night. He was bone tired, both physically and emotionally. Thus, in spite of
the turmoil of resentment and remorse, he fell asleep very quickly.