Daggerspell - Katharine Kerr [88]
“She’s with child, is she?”
“She is, and not married either, as I’m sure your Grace can guess, or I’d hardly be troubling Your Grace about it.”
Across the hall, the warband went stock still and listened in desperate suspense.
“Come along,” Lovyan said gently. “Name the father out.”
“Well, Your Grace.” Ysgerryn paused for a deep breath. “The little minx swears it’s your son.”
The warband sighed in relief, and Lovyan in weariness.
“She really does swear it” Ysgerryn said miserably. “I doubt me you believe—”
“Oh, I believe it well enough, my good man.” Lovyan glanced around and saw the page snickering under the spiral staircase. “Caradoc, run find Lord Rhodry and bring him to me.”
For a profoundly uncomfortable five minutes they waited while the warband whispered and snickered, Ysgerryn studied the pattern of braided rushes on the floor, and Lovyn did her best to look dignified instead of furious. A lord who treated his free citizens’ daughters as his private preserve was a lord who caused grumbling at the best of times. Now, when Lovyan’s rule was being challenged by some of her noble vassals, the last thing she wanted was for her townsfolk to feel sympathy for the rebels. Finally Rhodry strode in, whistling cheerily. Just twenty that month, Rhodry was filling out at six feet tall, a man so handsome that Lovyn felt no scorn, only sympathy for the soapmaker’s daughter. When Rhodry saw Ysgerryn, his good cheer disappeared so fast that Lovyan’s last doubt vanished with it.
“So there you are!” Lovyan snapped. “Our good Ysgerryn here claims you’ve gotten his daughter with child. Is it true?”
“And how would I know the true or false of it? She could have had another man as well as me.”
“Indeed? Do you really expect me to believe that you’d stand by and do nothing if another man trifled with your lass?”
“Uh, well.” Rhodry started poking at the rushes with the toe of his riding boot. “Truly, I’d have slit his throat.”
“So I thought.”
“Your Grace?” Ysgerryn put in. “Truly, she was always such a good lass until this. It’s fair broken her mother’s heart, it has, but who was I to say his lordship nay, even when I knew he was riding our way often and twice often. I knew he wasn’t there to collect Your Grace’s share of our soap.”
Pushed beyond human endurance, the warband laughed and elbowed each other. When Rhodry spun around and glared, they fell silent.
“My poor Ysgerryn,” Lovyan said. “Well and good, then, I’ll make provision for the lass. I’ll settle a dowry on her, and with coin in her pocket doubtless shell find a good husband even though the whole town knows the scandal. When the baby’s born, bring it to me if it’s healthy enough to live. We’ll find a wet nurse and fosterage.”
“Your Grace!” Ysgerryn’s eyes filled with tears. “I never expected so much, Your Grace. Truly, I—”
Lovyan cut him short with a wave of her hand.
“The bastard of a noble lord can be very useful, provided it’s been raised to be useful. Tell your daughter that her child will be well cared for.”
Bowing repeatedly, stammering out thanks, Ysgerryn backed away from Lovyan’s presence, then ran out of the hall. When Rhodry looked inclined to run himself, Lovyan grabbed his arm and hauled him toward the staircase.
“I wish to speak to your lordship. And right now.”
Like a whipped hound Rhodry followed her to her private chambers on the second floor of the broch. The reception chamber was a little room crammed with memories of the long line of Maelwaedd lords-moth-eaten stag’s heads, old swords, a dusty ceremonial mace, and a row of shields with devices no longer current. In one corner stood a lectern, carved with grappling badgers, which had been the Maelwaedd device before the clan came to the gwerbretrhyn of Aberwyn, and on the lectern was a copy of a book written by the first Maelwaedd, Prince Mael the Seer himself. As soon as they were inside, Lovyan slapped Rhodry across the face.
“You little beast!”
Rhodry flung himself into a chair, stretched out his legs, and stared moodily at the cluttered wall.
“It aches my