however, a less frisky mount would have been welcome.
Ranulf knew he should have retired long before he did, even if Merrick had been in a rare and boisterous mood last night. Henry would never believe the way their usually grim and silent friend had laughed and joked, especially once his grandfather—a fine old fellow—began to toast his great-grandson, the future lord of Tregellas, as well as his namesake. Peder had been justly proud and insisted they salute everyone from the king down to the maid who kept their goblets full, until they’d finally parted, Merrick helping his grandfather back to his cottage while Ranulf staggered up to his spartan bedchamber.
Not that he could remember actually getting to his bedchamber.
Once asleep, he’d had the most devilishly disturbing dreams, too, all featuring Bea. Sometimes she was making merry with him, toasting and eating and dancing, and it was Christmas. Sometimes she was undressed and in his bed, and they were making love. The most vivid dream of all, however, had taken place in his bedchamber. She’d been dressed as she’d been at the evening meal, in a lovely blue gown that clung to her shapely body, and she’d been kissing him. He’d returned her kiss with all the passion she aroused in him.
That one had seemed particularly vivid…
He wouldn’t think about Bea, or what she might have said if he’d gone to bid her farewell that morning, just as he must not think of her as anything other than his friend’s wife’s lively and pretty cousin. To believe otherwise, despite what he thought he saw in her eyes sometimes, was surely only vanity and pride. He was a knight, but a poor one, with no estate and little money. Anything he had he owed to his prowess with a sword and his friends’ generosity. What had he to offer a vibrant, beautiful woman like Bea, who could hope to win the heart of many a better, richer man?
With such disgruntled thoughts to plague him, Ranulf surveyed the windswept moor around him. Over a low ridge, the sea was just out of sight, if not quite beyond smell. In the distance, gulls whirled slowly, white and gray against the blue sky, telling him where the frothy, roiling water surged and beat against the helpless shore.
His thoughts fled from the awful open water back to Tregellas. He hoped Merrick’s injury wasn’t serious. Merrick had assured him before he’d departed that it was just a bad sprain and Constance, being a woman, had overreacted when she sent for the apothecary. No doubt the apothecary would agree when he arrived and examined Merrick’s swollen limb.
Since all the men trained by Sir Leonard had learned something about wounds, sprains and breaks, Ranulf accepted his friend’s opinion and, instead of worrying about Merrick’s leg, envisioned Bea telling everyone about the accident and pestering the apothecary with questions.
Scowling and determined to stop thinking about Bea, Ranulf drew Titan to a halt and twisted in the saddle, gesturing for Myghal to come beside him. Maybe talking about the situation at his new command would help him concentrate on what lay ahead and not what he’d left behind.
“Tell me about Sir Frioc’s accident,” he said as he nudged Titan into a walk after the undersheriff arrived beside him.
“It’s like I told Lord Merrick,” Myghal replied with obvious reluctance. “He was out hunting—”
“With whom?”
Myghal’s brow furrowed. “There was Hedyn, and me, and Yestin and Terithien—men of his household. We often went hunting with him, my lord. Penterwell’s a peaceful sort of place, so there wasn’t a lot for us to do otherwise.’ Twas no different that day— except for Sir Frioc dying, of course.”
Ranulf heard the sorrow and dismay in the younger man’s voice. “It’s never easy to lose a friend, or someone we respect. We all need time to mourn such a loss, but at least we have our memories of better days to sustain us.”
With a heavy sigh, Myghal nodded.
“Sir Frioc must have liked and trusted you, to have you in his hunting party.”
That brought a smile to Myghal’s face. “Aye, sir, he did. He was a kind man, and after my father died, he treated me…well, not like a son, exactly, but very well indeed.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t know him better myself,” Ranulf answered honestly, thinking of his own youth and the man who’d been a better, second father to him.
Myghal’s face resumed its grim expression. “And all because of a rabbit.”
“That does seem a small beast for such a chase.”
“Aye, sir,’ twas. But we’d had no luck that day finding anything bigger, and we were on our way home when the dogs started fussing and Sir Frioc spotted this big rabbit. And he was big! So my lord laughed and said he’d be damned if he’d have fish again for his dinner and spurred his horse to give chase. The rabbit took off like a shot from a bow. By the time the dogs were loosed, we’d lost sight of Sir Frioc. His tracks were easy enough to follow, though, and we come to a dip in the hill, and there he was.” Myghal swallowed hard. “He was just lying there on the ground, his eyes wide open and he looked so surprised….”
Ranulf took pity on the man and changed the subject. “It’s been a while since I’ve been to Penterwell. I assume little else has changed in the past few months.”
Rather unexpectedly, Myghal flushed. “Some things have, my lord.”
“Such as?”
“Well, sir, Gwenbritha went home to her mother.”
Myghal seemed to think Ranulf would know who this was, but no one came immediately to mind.
“Sir Frioc’s leman, sir,” Myghal clarified. “They quarreled and she left him.”
Ranulf didn’t want gossip. On the other hand, a lover scorned could mean trouble. He knew full well that honor and wisdom could be subverted by the need to regain one’s wounded pride. “What did they argue about?”
“I heard she wanted him to marry her, and he wouldn’t, so she left him. She said she wasn’t never coming back, neither.”
“Has she been seen around the village since?”
“No, sir, she’s been true to that. Sir Frioc, well, he, um, didn’t take it too well. He tried to pretend he wasn’t upset, but he spent a lot of time hunting, or sitting in the hall…thinking.”
“Thinking, or drinking?” Ranulf asked. A man in sorrow often imbibed more than he should, as he also knew from personal experience.
“Well, sir, drinking,” Myghal admitted.
“The day he died—had he been drinking then?”
Myghal shook his head. “No, sir, not so’s you’d notice. He’d had some ale when he broke the fast and a few tugs at the wineskin while we tried to find some game, but he wasn’t drunk, if that’s what you mean. He could hold his drink, too. Why, many’s the night I saw him…well, sir, he could hold his drink.”
Which didn’t mean Frioc wasn’t the worse for wine or ale when he died, Ranulf thought. But he would say no more about Frioc now. He would ask the sheriff later.
They rode over a small rise, and there in the distance, close to the turbulent sea, was the castle
