Chapter Twelve
Those foolish boys weren’t going to keep her contained forever.
Melusine had managed to sneak away from the sons of Peter de Lohr as they slept around her in a circle.
It was before dawn, and she had been awoken by the sounds of the army around her mobilizing.
When she tiptoed around the sleeping boys and stuck her head out of the tent, she could see that the army was packing up to leave.
At least, some men were. There was a good deal of commotion going around them that should have woken up those spoiled English lads, but they slept through it.
And that was Melusine’s cue to depart.
She had only seen Elle twice since the English won the victory at Brython Castle.
Both times, her cousin seemed to become irate with her, and both times, they had been separated.
She’d hoped to stay with Elle and help her in this strange new world that she found herself part of, but that didn’t seem to be possible.
And now, there was a marriage involved. That wasn’t something either Melusine or Elle had ever considered.
Marriage to an Englishman was like a death sentence to women like them, women who made the resistance of the Welsh their life’s blood.
In fact, it was a particular problem for Melusine because she was used to having Elle’s ear.
She, too, was related to Llywelyn because she came from the matriarchal side of the family.
Elle’s bitter, old grandmother had been Melusine’s grandmother, as well.
She and Elle had both been raised by that rebellious, vindictive woman, and they had both spent their lives advocating for an independently ruled Wales.
Ruled by Llywelyn.
Gruffydd had long wondered why his sister had been so resistant to any English alliance, and the truth was that Melusine had a big part in that opinion.
She was the one who whispered in Elle’s ear, telling her how horrible and greedy the English were while fostering a rabid devotion to the Welsh cause.
She was also the one who convinced Elle that Gruffydd and Gwenwynwyn were weak in their alliance with the English.
Because Elle had been listening to it for so long, she didn’t really realize that Melusine had been stoking the fires of hatred started by their grandmother.
But now, Elle had been forced to marry an English Lord, and Melusine was concerned that her days of controlling her cousin were over.
Curtis would figure her out fairly quickly if she remained.
It was therefore imperative that she escape captivity.
She wasn’t entirely sure where she would go, except that perhaps she would escape to Tywyl Castle, where Gruffydd was in residence.
The English had shown him significant mercy in allowing him to return home, and since Melusine had nowhere to go, she thought she would go to Gruffydd first and then figure out where to go from there.
She couldn’t stay in the household of a man who was loyal to England.
So, she fled the tent just as the sun began to rise, leaving the lazy English boys behind.
They had been charged with guarding her, and she smiled at the thought of the punishment they would receive when it was discovered they had failed at their task.
Fortunately, no one was paying much attention to her as she quickly moved through the encampment, heading for the east end so she could continue her trek into the heart of Wales.
The smell of smoke was heavy, held to the ground by the mist that had developed in the early-morning hours.
Cooking fires had been started, and the smell of food filled the air as she approached the outskirts of the encampment.
The western wall, the one so badly damaged by the war machines, was immediately to her right as she came through the cluster of tents.
The dead, mostly Welsh dead, had been moved to this area, and the smell of death mingled with the smoke gave the entire area the feeling of hell’s back acre.
Because the trees and the land in general were stripped, the sense of desolation was heavy here.
Melusine was eager to get through it.
It was like walking through purgatory.
Just as she started to head toward the deforested area to the west, someone grabbed her hair from behind.
“So you think to escape, do you?” A Spanish accent was heavy in her ear. “You little cow, you belong to me now.”
Melusine shrieked as Amaro pulled her back into the encampment with him. He wasn’t gentle on her in the least, and continued to hold on to her hair to force her into obedience.
She knew she was caught.
Amaro had been up before dawn, separating some of the men from the de Lohr army to remain at Brython, when he saw Melusine sneaking through the encampment.
Curtis had been back for about an hour after a night spent away from the encampment, and he was in Christopher’s tent hammering out the details of Hereford’s departure back to Lioncross Abbey Castle.
Amaro didn’t know why Curtis and his wife had left the night before, but he’d heard through the rumor mill that all was not well with the newlyweds.
Frankly, Amaro didn’t know what Curtis expected, having married a Welsh chit as he had.
He might as well have married an animal.
Amaro went about his duties as the de Lohr men gathered in Christopher’s tent.
Hugo was off supervising the rebuild of the western wall, which had begun in earnest yesterday, along with Asa, leaving Amaro to handle the army along with several sergeants.
But when he saw Melusine trying to make her escape, he left the men to the sergeants and pursued the Welsh bitch.
Spy.
She had to be a spy.
“Where were you going, woman?” he demanded.
Melusine was in a great deal of pain from the way he was holding her. “I was leaving,” she said. “Let me go!”
Amaro ignored her as he continued to drag her through the encampment. “I think you were running off to tell your Welsh rebels that Hereford is leaving today,” he said. “Isn’t that where you were going?”
Melusine yelped as he yanked on her. “Nay!” she said. “I was going home!”
“Home to your den of Welsh animals?” Amaro said. “Filthy, barbaric, mindless fools. And what else do you do for them, Miasma? Do you warm their beds with your skinny body?”
She gasped in outrage, trying to pull away. “Who is Miasma?” she said. “Release me. You’re hurting me!”
“Good,” Amaro said, yanking on her so hard that she ended up falling into him. His severe face was inches from her own. “Now you’ll have to face Hereford’s justice, and you know what the man will do to spies. He will torture you and then he will kill you. And I will have the pleasure of watching.”
Terrified, Melusine tried to push away but ended up hitting him in the throat as she did. His response was to slap her, as hard as he could, on the side of the head.
Dazed, Melusine gave up the fight as he towed her all the way back to Christopher’s tent.
*
She knew she had a stupid smile on her face.
Elle knew and she didn’t care. She couldn’t stop smiling as she organized the chest in Curtis’ tent, the one she’d taken the tunic and hose from. She’d jumbled everything the night before in her haste to find clothing, so as he went to see his father, she carefully organized the trunk.
This is what it’s like to be happy.
That thought kept rolling over and over in her mind.
Happiness she’d never thought she would feel.
She didn’t recognize it at all. Ever since last night, and on the return home this morning, she’d had this feeling of lightness in her heart, the same lightness that was reflected on Curtis’ face every time he looked at her.
That was when it occurred to her that what she was feeling was joy.
Evidently, they were both feeling it.
But it was a very new sensation, so new that neither one of them could put it into words.
Perhaps they didn’t want to because happiness, like anything else, could be fleeting in their world.
They’d had such a difficult introduction and, up until last night, a marriage that was destined to end, so no one wanted to jinx this newfound sense of bliss.
All Elle wanted to do was enjoy it.
But she felt like an idiot because she couldn’t get the smile off her face.
Perhaps she really didn’t care in the long run, because it was a smile that was only meant for Curtis, and he wasn’t here.
He was with his father, who would undoubtedly be ecstatic that they had been able to hash out their differences.
Perhaps she’d have the same stupid smile on her face when she spoke to Christopher, because undoubtedly, he would want to talk to her, too.
Just to make sure the joy wasn’t one-sided.
Before they left the village, Curtis had procured bread and cheese from the inn’s kitchen as it began to prepare food for the morning meal.
Elle had ridden behind him all the way back to Brython, bread in one hand and cheese in the other, wolfing it down as she told him about the nearest town to Brython on the Wales side of the border.
Because that village was relatively close to her brother’s castle, she had spent a lot of time there.
She knew the people and they knew her. She and Curtis had a good discussion about the town and its functions and the people in general.
It had been the first real conversation they had that didn’t involve angst or torment or terrible reflections.
It had been… normal.