Gwenn went cold as she thought about it, as she numbered her sorrows. Her eyes skated about over the beaten earth floor, and her mind sought for another way out. She had no option but to hide the gem and get rid of the statue, for while she kept it she was a marked woman, potential prey for every mercenary who had ever heard about the Stone Rose and what it was meant to contain.
She gripped Agnes’s arm. ‘And what about Alan? What do I tell him when he discovers a horseman has been creeping around, asking questions? Do I tell him about the gem? Dare I put it in Alan’s keeping? What if he–?’
‘I think, Gwenn, you should trust Alan.’
Gwenn’s laugh was wild and bitter. ‘Trust Alan? Are your wits addled?’
‘I am his aunt, Gwenn. Never forget that,’ Agnes said. Alan was due a measure of loyalty. And while Agnes knew her nephew had done more than his share of evil, she could not help loving him. And so, she believed, did Gwenn. This would be a test for Gwenn as much as for Alan, but Gwenn was yet to realise this.
Agnes was wrong. Gwenn had realised. Dropping her eyes, she murmured, ‘My apologies.’ She sat silently for a space, thinking. She wanted to trust Alan. She wanted him to love her. But she had never been able to put out of her mind the fact that he had once attempted to take the diamond. If he knew she had it, would he still covet it? Would he affect to love her for it? Did she love Alan enough to trust him, unreservedly? She sucked in a breath, opened her eyes fully, and gave Agnes a direct look. ‘I’ll hide the gem and take the statue to the river.’
‘Aye.’
‘And I’ll take the gamble with Alan. Win all, or lose all.’
Agnes thought it a shame that Gwenn realised how much hung in the balance, for her decision was difficult enough without concerning herself over Alan. Agnes could not help her there. Gwenn had put her finger on it. It was a risk. But if her gamble paid off...
‘At least I’ll know where his loyalties lie,’ Gwenn said, steadily. She squared her shoulders. ‘The waiting will be over. I’ll get rid of it, Agnes, and tell Alan everything. It’s the only thing to do. Then there will be no more wondering. It might even be a relief.’ She moved swiftly to the door.
‘God speed.’ Agnes blessed her with the sign of the cross.
The latch clicked. Light streamed briefly into the farm’s one-roomed cottage and then all was plunged into dimness as the door closed.
***
Agnes sat, patiently waiting for Gwenn to return. She thought about her daughter-in-law.
Agnes no longer had the vigour of her youth and until Gwenn had arrived at Sword Point, she had been lonely. She thought she was dying. Unlike Gwenn, who had her life in front of her, Agnes was not afraid of death. But Gwenn’s arrival had given her something to live for. She liked Gwenn. Ned had proved himself a good judge of character when he chose her to be his wife. Agnes looked forward to meeting her grandchild. The Grim Reaper would come for her soon, but in the meantime she could fill her last days cobbling together some baby linen. Agnes had once sewed court dresses for a duchess, but this simple task was all her weakened eyes could manage now. While she waited for the final sleep to claim her, she would watch her grandchild grow and die content.
***
In the night, the Yorkshire dale had been refreshed with rain. Now the sun was climbing and the meadow grasses shone lush and green. Sheep ambled across the pastures below Sword Point, fluffy white blobs grazing on the rich grasses like slow-moving clouds drifting across a rain-washed sky. While the landscape was beautiful, the farm’s buildings and outhouses were not. They had not been maintained since Ned’s father had died. A mournful air of neglect hung over the place.
Having decided to rid herself of the statue and the evil that had dogged her for years, Gwenn hooked up her skirts and dashed along the pathway which ran between two wooden farm buildings. She stopped at the tall oak whose foreshortened shadow pointed up the hill, pausing only to twist the walnut base from the statue and thrust the pouch deep within a fork of the oak’s spreading roots. She had been quick to learn her way about Sword Point, and headed straight for the River Swale. As she passed the outhouse where Dancer had been hastily stabled, her horse greeted her with a friendly whinny, and such was Gwenn’s state of mind that the familiar sound set her heart thudding. Clutching the statue, she pressed on, working her way round the worm-eaten farm buildings and onto the track. Her mind was a confusion of fears and wishes.
Panting, she checked the path which cut across the dale to the river. It was empty. High in the blue heavens, so high she could not see them, skylarks sang. Closer to earth, a flock of lapwings tumbled into view, vying with each other in athletic, aerobatic displays. Gwenn hurried on, keeping the Stone Rose close to her breast. The mysterious horseman who had ridden in from Brittany could be a messenger from the Duchess as Agnes had suggested, but Gwenn did not think so. If the horseman was fair as an angel and as fierce as St Michael, he sounded very like de Roncier’s Viking captain.
Was he after the gem? Did all of Brittany know her secret? When Alan had questioned her about the Stone Rose, Gwenn suspected he knew. But he had left her with Agnes and the gemstone had remained in her keeping, and Gwenn had concluded that he knew nothing.
If only he had come back to visit her lately, she could have had it out with him. But she had not set eyes on him since he left for Richmond. His neglect was a clear signal of his lack of feeling for her. Agnes believed she should trust him. But Agnes was Alan’s aunt – she looked to see the best in her sister’s son. Gwenn stumbled towards the river. If only Alan was more like Ned, who was, even without the dubbing ceremony, more the perfect knight than any man she’d known.
A couple of bow shots ahead, Gwenn could see beeches and ash trees stretching over the Swale. She could hear the water brawling over the rocky bed as it surged through the dale towards the gully where the waterfall bubbled and frothed like so much brown ale.
Someone gave a shout, and she whirled round. A lone horseman on a great grey was cutting across the pasture; the horse’s hoofs were gouging scoops of emerald turf and throwing them high in the air.
Her mouth went dry. It was not Firebrand, but at this distance Gwenn was unable to make out whether the horseman was fair or dark. Sunlight sparkled on a shiny helmet. Her heart dropped to her belly. A long, fair beard tumbled across a wide, mail-clad chest and the canon’s words came back to her. Fair as an angel and fierce as St Michael.
Stricken with panic, she whirled towards the river, desperate for somewhere to hide, but she would never reach the beech trees in time. She could not outrun that brute of a horse. She halted, turned, and stood her ground. The worst the Viking could do was kill her, and death no longer frightened her, for out of her spinning thoughts one single strand stood stark and clear. The worst had already happened...
Since Gwenn’s arrival, Agnes had expressed a desire to live out the first few days of her grief quietly. Apart from Gwenn’s lonely dawn rides, they had only left the farm to go to Easby village, where they had conversed with the White Canons, no one else. To Gwenn’s knowledge, the only person in Richmond to know she was lodged at Sword Point was Alan; and the only way the Norseman could have found her so quickly after seeing the White Canon was if Alan had betrayed her. Alan must have betrayed her. Set against this, nothing was important; not her life, not even – may God forgive her – the life of the babe in her belly. Gwenn had wanted to trust Alan, had wanted him to be an honourable man. So much for her dreams. She loved a ruthless bastard of a man and he had betrayed her.