A trill of laughter from the child startled him halfways sober again. “Mam, do you mean to wash our guest’s feet before the water gets cold?”
Enid gave a startled glance down at the ewer and basin in her hands as if they’d appeared there by magic.
“Aye.” She took a step toward Con, then hesitated. “If you wish it, that is. I only heard secondhand that you’d accepted the offer of water.”
“With pleasure.” Con set his harp aside and pried off his boots, wondering if he’d only imagined the shadow that had dimmed her features. Had she hoped he’d change his mind about accepting the water? “After a day’s brisk walk, your hospitality is most welcome. The young lady’s music has already lightened the weariness of my spirit. Such a jewel is a mighty credit to you and her tad.”
Enid had dropped to her knees on the rush-strewn floor, and begun to pour gently steaming water into the basin. At Con’s tribute to her daughter, her slender form tensed.
“Myfanwy, cariad, will you go check how Auntie Gaynor is coming with the last rinse of the wool? That’s a good girl.”
When the child had made a subdued exit, Enid explained, “My daughter does mighty credit to her father’s memory. She’s much like him in many ways.”
“I’m sorry.” Con chided himself less for the compliment gone awry than for the envious curiosity that flamed in him. By the tone of Enid’s answer, he might guess how much or how little she had loved Myfanwy’s father.
It should not matter to him…but it did.
“Was it very long ago you lost your husband?” At the last instant he managed to stop himself from adding the Welsh endearment, cariad.
“In the fall.” Enid pushed the basin toward him. Though her curt reply told him she didn’t want to dwell on the matter, it gave no real clue about her feelings for the man. “There was some trouble with the Normans, so Howell joined the muster of Macsen ap Gryffith. He took sore wounds in the fighting. They brought him home where he lingered until the first snow.”
Con eased his feet into the warm water as he digested this intriguing scrap of news about Macsen ap Gryffith. If the border chief had lost men in an autumn skirmish with the Normans of Salop, he might not need much nudging to retaliate in the spring.
“What brings you to the borders?” asked Enid, her head bent over the basin. “Did you grow tired of plying your sword for hire to the Normans?”
Her question caught Con like an unexpected thrust after a cunning feint. For a moment his glib tongue froze in his mouth. If he told her he’d come on a mission from the very people who’d killed her husband, she’d likely turf his backside out the gate, traditions of Welsh hospitality be damned.
“You might say I’m taking a rest from it.” No lie, that—not a bold-faced one, anyhow. “I mean to go back to the Holy Land, though.”
As Sir Conwy of Somewhere, riding at the head of an armed company of his own men. The dream sang a most agreeable melody in Con’s thoughts.
“In the meantime, barding lets me enjoy a bit of adventure without the danger. Mercenary or travelling bard, both make good jobs for a vagabond.”
“You’ve always had itchy heels, haven’t you, Con?” Enid mused aloud as she washed his feet. “I suppose you’ll be on your way from here tomorrow morning?”
The water was no more than tepid, but Enid’s touch set flames licking up Con’s legs to light a blaze in his loins. He could almost fancy it searing the itch of wanderlust from his flesh…but that was nonsense.
Though part of him longed to stay and visit, that tiny voice of caution urged Con to go while he still had a choice.
“Tomorrow.” He nodded. “Before Chester dogs arise, if the weather holds fair. I don’t want to wear out my welcome.”
A quivering tension seemed to ebb out of Enid as she dried his feet. For all her show of welcome, she clearly wanted to be rid of him. The realization vexed Con. He wasn’t used to women craving his absence.
Enid raised her face to him then, and Con struggled to draw breath. In the depths of her eyes shimmered a vision of the playful sprite he remembered from their childhood—so close and physically accessible, yet as far beyond the reach of an orphan plowboy as the beckoning stars.
“I’m surprised to see you whole and hale after all these years. I feared you wouldn’t last a month as a hired soldier.”
She’d worried about him. The knowledge settled in Con’s belly like a hot, filling meal after a long fast. He hadn’t expected her to spare him a backward glance.
“White my world.” That’s what the Welsh said of a fellow who was lucky, and Con had been. “I’ve had the odd close shave, but always managed to wriggle out before the noose drew tight enough to throttle me. I’ll entertain your household with some of my adventures tonight, around the fire.”
He leaned forward, planting his elbows on his thighs. “That’s enough talk of me, though. You never did say how you came to Powys from your father’s maenol in Gwynedd. From time out of mind I heard nothing but that you were meant to wed Tryfan ap Huw, and go to be the lady of his grand estate on Ynys Mon.”
Enid scrambled to her feet and snatched up the basin so quickly that water sloshed over the rim to wet the reeds on the floor. “You ought to know better than most, Con, life has a way of turning out different than you expect.”
Which was exactly how he liked it. How tiresome the world would be without those random detours, bends in the road, hills that invited a body to climb and see what wonders lay beyond.
But Enid had never thought so. More than anyone Con had ever known, she’d longed for peace and security. She’d craved a smooth, straight, predictable path through life, content to forgo the marvels if that was the price for keeping out of harm’s way. What calamity had landed her here on the Marches where turmoil reigned?
Enid flinched from the memories Con’s question provoked, in much the way she would have avoided biting on a sore tooth. Once in her life she’d taken a risk, hoping to gain the only thing she’d ever wanted more than a safe, ordered, conventional life. She’d rocked the coracle and it had capsized, almost drowning her. That ruinous venture had taught her a harsh but necessary lesson about leaving well enough alone.
The man who had cost her so dearly spoke up. “Did this turn in your life bring you happiness, Enid?”
How dare he ask such a thing, as if he had any business in her happiness after all these years? And how dare he pretend to be taken by surprise over the unexpected direction her life had taken? He’d been there when the road had forked, after all. Then he had wandered away, lured by the fairy-piped tune of adventure, leaving her to bear the consequences.
A sharp answer hovered on her tongue, but died unspoken.
If Con ap Ifan had forgotten what happened between them thirteen years ago, on the eve of his departure from her father’s house, she did not wish to remind him—could not afford to remind him. For then he might guess what had become of her, and how it had all fallen out.
“It brought me my children.” She measured her words with care, anxious not to disclose too much, nor rouse his curiosity further with blatant evasion. “They are the greatest source of pride and happiness in my life.”
A grace she’d ill-deserved.
Con’s face brightened, as if she’d told him what he wanted to hear. “No wonder you’re proud of them. They’re a fine pair, though I only saw the little fellow for a moment. Your last yellow chick, is he?”
“I beg your leave for a moment,” she interrupted him, “to toss this water out.”
Somehow she knew that after inquiring about the baby of the family, Con would next ask if she had any children