Fair, Bright, and Terrible (Welsh Blades #2)

The Harsh Light of Day

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I t was Meg, who brewed the finest ale to be had, who was on Robert’s mind on the morning of his wedding. When he had returned from France and seen her again, he had not recognized Meg at all. The sweet-faced seventeen year old girl he easily recalled was vanished and in her place was a sweet-faced old woman with pocked skin and very few teeth. Now he could not escape the thought that Meg was younger than he was, and he was younger than Eluned.

At first, nothing had seemed to matter at all except that Eluned had agreed to marry him. Despite the rather formal language she used in the message she had sent, he had seen her request that they be wed as soon as possible as a sign of her eagerness to be with him again. He had indulged for the last few weeks in fantasies of how joyous their reunion would be. After sobering up – and eventually climbing down from the giddy heights of being able to say her name so freely – it was borne in upon him that eighteen years was a very long time.