Dark and Bright (6 page)

Rhys heard a commotion in the kitchens. He and Annalise had arrived home from Cadair Berwyn only two days before. He was glad to be back in Powwydd, but grief hung in the air. His father and mother had been well loved.

Was it his wife’s voice he could hear? As he entered the hot, smoky confines of the foodhouse, situated between the
neuadd
and the outer buildings, he had to force down a grin. Beside the huge kiln, Cook stood like a statue, gazing at the ceiling, his teeth gritted, his hands on his hips, his face even redder than usual. Annalise was holding forth in her language, her hands gesticulating wildly. Two scullery maids looked on, their mouths open, eyes darting from Cook to their new mistress and back again.

Rhys took a deep breath. Would he be diplomat enough to handle this skirmish? A lot was riding on it. Annalise stopped in mid-sentence when she saw him. She was breathing heavily, her breasts rising and falling. He licked his lips. She put her hands on her hips and opened her mouth to speak to him. He strode towards her, his hands outstretched. “Can I help?”

She closed her mouth. Cook looked at him and opened his. Rhys shot him a glare and shook his head slightly. Cook closed his mouth.

Annalise took a deep breath and held his hands firmly. “I wanted to give some suggestions about improving the food served here, but this—this—man does not wish to listen.”

Rhys looked at Cook, who had resumed his examination of the ceiling, his arms folded tightly across his chest, and then looked back at his wife. This was a delicate situation, and he had better not laugh. “Dear wife, explain to me what it is you want, and I’ll tell him in his language. He has been Cook here for many years, and his father before him.”

Annalise glanced at the Cook and pouted, her eyes wide. “His food is bland. If he adds some herbs and spices, it will be better.”

Rhys turned to the Cook. He cleared his throat. “The Lady of Powwydd compliments you on the quality of the food we enjoy here, Emrys. However, she has a delicate digestion and requires certain herbs and spices be added to the food to alleviate her distress.”

Emrys looked at his new mistress and grinned. “Why didn’t she say so?”

Rhys again resisted the urge to smile. “Your lady is still learning our language, Emrys. Be patient. You are grieving for my parents, but they welcomed my wife with love and affection before they died.”

Emrys bowed. “I will indeed make sure my lady is provided with all she needs if she will but show me what she requires.”

Rhys turned to his wife. “Cook says he is always willing to try new ideas. You have but to show him.”

Annalise smiled at him, then at Cook. The scullery maids exhaled. Rhys left the kitchen holding his wife’s hand firmly, sure it wouldn’t be the last time he’d have to intervene in domestic squabbles.

***

Annalise left the foodhouse with a heavy heart. She suspected Rhys had used his skills to calm the argument she’d somehow started with Cook. How was she to communicate with these people? She felt isolated, alone. Rhys wouldn’t always be there to help her. She would have to learn their language. Rhonwen would be hard to live up to. It was obvious everyone grieved for their mistress.

Rhys put his arm around her shoulder. “What’s wrong, Annalise?”

She stopped abruptly and buried her face in her hands, not wanting him to see her tears. “They will never come to respect me. They hate me. I wish I’d never left Normandie.”

Rhys drew her to him and rested his chin on the top of her head. The aroma of venison from the kitchen clung to him. It mingled with his usual healthy, masculine scent that she was coming to know, and filled her senses. “They don’t hate you,” he soothed. “They are grieving for my parents. Change is hard. They will come to love you.”

But will you, Rhys?

Travel within Wales was difficult, given the rugged terrain, the lack of roads and the remoteness of many villages. For Carys to travel back and forth from Ellesmere to the family
llys
in Wales was an arduous journey, though not a great distance. Rhys wanted to lessen his new bride’s feeling of isolation and Baudoin was concerned for Carys when she travelled. Gradually over many months of discussion the two men formulated a plan to improve travel in the Marches, both firm in the belief that better roads would lead to increased prosperity.

They had little information available, but charted areas which might need the most improvement. They planned to undertake a fact-finding expedition to verify their thoughts. To facilitate their meetings, Rhys and Annalise came to stay at Ellesmere Castle, and Rhys was grateful to his sister and brother-by-marriage for giving his wife the opportunity to get to know them, and for the respite from the isolation of Wales.

He and Annalise were abed one evening, shortly after their arrival, and Rhys sensed his wife’s nervousness. She had been unwell on the journey and looked pale. He cupped her breasts in his hands and grazed his thumbs over the pebbled nipples. She groaned, but tears welled in her eyes. He sat up and pulled her to his chest. “What is it? What’s wrong?”

She took a deep breath. “I spoke with Carys today. I haven’t been feeling well.”

His heart lurched. He had known this woman such a short time, and yet she had become an essential part of his life. “What did she say?”

Annalise hesitated, clutching the linens. “She says I am with child.”

Something he couldn’t describe hit him in the gut and spread its heat all the way to his toes and back up his spine, before it settled in his heart. He was to be a father. His seed had taken root inside this beautiful woman he was married to. He couldn’t speak. His breath caught in his throat.

His wife tensed beside him, staring at the linens. “You are not pleased?”

He put his hands on her shoulders and held her away. “Not pleased? Annalise, I am euphoric.”

He rose from the bed and pulled her to her feet. They stood skin to skin, breast to chest. Then he knelt before her, smoothed his hands over her belly and kissed her there. “Thank you, Annalise. Thank you for this precious gift.”

“You’re welcome, Rhys.”

He loved the way she pronounced his name, the
R
deep in the back of her throat, the long drawn out
eee
, the soft
sss
and the indefinable little emphasis at the end, as if his name had another letter. He put his cheek to her belly and his arms around her waist. She rested her warm hands on his shoulders. They swayed together for a long while before he looked up at her and said, “There is only one problem.”

Her eyes widened and he regretted the worry on her face. He smiled and explained, “This means I will have to share the suckling.”

The reappearance of her smile spread warmth through him again as she tousled his hair. “
Méchant
,” she scolded.

He frowned. “Can I still be
naughty
now you’re with child?”

She smiled. “Carys says it is permitted.”

He rose from his knees, took her hand and led her back to bed.

***

Carys too was with child, her third, and the two women were good and supportive company for each other. Annalise told Rhys she was reassured by Carys’s calm explanations about childbirth. Gallien Rambaud de Montbryce had been born in the year of our Lord One Thousand One Hundred and Two. When he was two years old, Carys and Baudoin welcomed their second son, Etienne Robert.

Carys had assisted as a healer at many birthings and had inherited her mother’s mystical aura in her abilities to heal. She brought no fear to her experience of giving birth. She had confided to Rhys she was secretly hoping for a girl, having more than fulfilled the obligation to provide Baudoin with an heir. Baudoin doted on his sons.

Rhys was proud of his previous moderation with women, often going many months without bedding anyone. Now he found he constantly craved his beautiful wife. “It’s amazing the effect a magnificent pair of breasts can have on a man’s urges,” he confided to Baudoin one day. His brother-by-marriage nodded and laughed good naturedly.

I’m suddenly a rutting stallion. Imagine after she bears our child.

Rhys hardened whenever he conjured the image of his wife’s swollen breasts. It occasionally occurred to him his attraction to Annalise might be something more than simple lust, but he pushed the idea away. He was glad they were friends. He enjoyed their conversations, sharing with her the plans for the road improvements, and for their home at Powwydd. In friendship lay contentment and comfort.

Annalise struggled with Welsh, but her English improved rapidly and that was the language they used most often. Rhys relished the occasions when she responded to his patient teaching and was able to speak a few words in his language. He particularly liked doing this when they were abed together and he taught her words of intimacy in Welsh.

He wanted her to understand him when he told her in his own language how lovely she was, how enthralled he was by her bountiful breasts and how fulfilled he felt when he was inside her. It warmed his heart when she smiled in understanding as he whispered these words to her. She asked him to teach her how to tell him that she loved to feel his manhood inside her. When she repeated his words in her halting Welsh it inflamed his already rampant need. Why was he disappointed she didn’t ask how to say, “I love you.”?

***

It was decided Rhun and Rhydderch would accompany Baudoin and Rhys on their journey to plan the road improvements they had in mind. This would allay the fears of any Welsh villages they planned to pass through. The twins were now as well known for their patriotism as their father had been. They expressed concerns about the involvement of a Norman Earl in the plans, and possibly Norman money from King Henry.

Rhys shrugged off their hesitation. “It was Baudoin’s idea in the first place,” he retorted. “Baudoin is your brother-by-marriage. If his King wants to spend money helping the Welsh, isn’t that what we want?”

Rhun still bristled. “But he talks of building wide roads. You know why, don’t you?”

Rhydderch answered before Rhys had a chance to reply. “He wants it wide enough for soldiers to march abreast when they invade Wales.”

Rhys snorted. “Baudoin isn’t going to invade Wales! Carys would never forgive him!”

Even the twins laughed. Finally they agreed to participate. Perhaps at long last his little brothers were growing up! They were after all only two years younger than he was!

The well equipped and provisioned group set off as soon as fair spring weather allowed. It consisted of five Normans skilled in cartography, fifty of Baudoin’s men-at-arms and a band of Rhun’s Welsh bowmen. Rhun was deadly with a bow. He could nock an arrow and kill a man before his enemy had time to blink. He and his twin were amicably competitive and well matched in most things, but Rhydderch readily admitted his brother’s superiority with a bow, and wasn’t jealous of it.

They planned to travel from Ellesmere to Powwydd and thence across Wales to the coast, searching out the best route, noting where trees and undergrowth might have to be cleared. They would estimate how deep to dig trenches for the roads, and how much in the way of stones would be required to fill the bottom, and where they would procure such stone. In addition they would search for sources of gravel or cobblestones for the surface which they planned to build with a camber so that rain would run off into ditches at the sides.

“We must calculate the number of men required for the completion of the plan over a number of years,” Rhys pointed out.

Baudoin agreed. “And they’ll have to be provisioned and sheltered. It’s an ambitious undertaking we’re embarking on, my friends.”

They recognised it might not be feasible to complete the initial journey to the coast in one try, and Baudoin and Rhys both wanted to be present when their children were born. Baudoin told Rhys he hoped for a girl, though he’d said nothing to Carys. Rhys hoped for a son and had no hesitation in telling everyone. Both women wished their husbands a tearful goodbye as they departed Ellesmere on their bold adventure. Rhys hesitated as he prepared to mount. He came back to his wife, took the beads from around his neck and fastened them around hers.

“She shook her head and tried to stop him. “
Non
, they belonged to your mother. It is not fitting that I wear them.”

He insisted. “It’s more than fitting. You’re a mother now. They will remind you of me, until I return.”

She fingered them. “I will do as you wish and wear them until you come back.”

***

Despite the comparatively luxurious amenities of Ellesmere, Annalise missed Powwydd. How amazing it was that she already felt at home there, though it lacked many of the comforts she’d grown up with. She couldn’t understand it. There were still problems of communication to resolve with the servants, yet she didn’t feel at home in Ellesmere. Perhaps if Rhys was there, it might be different. It disturbed her that she missed him as much as she did.

Was it only that she missed his lovemaking, his well-muscled body, the feel of his shaft deep within her? No, she missed the warmth of his laugh, his sense of humour, his patience. The people of Powwydd loved and respected him. Why couldn’t she accept that she loved him too? Was it Norman pride that made her nurse her resentment at the
dowry
Rhys had asked? Or was it fear? Fear that though the heat in his eyes told her he burned for her, men were driven by lust and not love. He would never be in love with her. Never be the chivalrous knight of her dreams.