Here Be Dragons - 1, Sharon Penman [e novels to read online txt] 📗

that so intrigued Llewelyn, small islands scattered about in a sea of plough-furrowed fields. But Llewelyn's people were pastoral, tribal, hunters and herdsmen rather than farmers, and these commonplace scenes of domestic English life were to him as exotic as they were unfamiliar.It was midday before he was within sight of the walls of Shrewsbury Castle. He drew rein, awed. Castle keep and soaring church spires, a fortified arched bridge spanning the River Severn, and the roofs of more houses than he could begin to count. He kept his distance, suddenly shy, and after a time he wheeled the gelding, without a backward glance for the town he'd come so far to see.He did not go far, detouring from the road to water his horse at YokethulBrook, and it was there that he found the other boy. He looked to be about nine, as fair as Llewelyn was dark, with a thatch of bright hair the color of sun-dried straw, and grass-green eyes that now focused admiringly uponLlewelyn's mount.Llewelyn slid to the ground, led the gelding foward with a grin that encouraged the other boy to say, in the offhand manner that Llewelyn was coming to recognize as the English equivalent of a compliment, "Is that horse yours?""Yes," Llewelyn said, with pardonable pride. "He was foaled on a Sunday, so Icall him Dydd Sul."The other boy hesitated. "You sound . . . different," he said at last, andLlewelyn laughed. He'd been studying French for three years, but he had no illusions about his linguistic skills."That is what Morgan, my tutor, says too," he said cheerfully. "I expect it is because French is not my native tongue.""You are not. . . English, are you?"Llewelyn was momentarily puzzled, but then he remembered. The people he thought of as English thought of themselves as NormanFrench, even though it was more than a hundred years since the Duke of Normandy had invaded and conquered England. The native-born English, the Saxons, had been totally subdued. Unlike us, Llewelyn thought proudly. But he knew the Normans had for the Saxons all the traditional scorn of the victors for the vanquished, and he hastened to say, "No, I am not Saxon. I was born in Gwynedd, Cymru . . . what you know as Wales."The green eyes widened. "I've never met a Welshman before," he said slowly, and it occurred to Llewelyn that, just as he'd been raised on accounts ofEnglish treachery and tyranny, this boy was likely to have been put to bed at night with bloody tales of Welsh border raids.

"I'll show you my cloven hoof if you'll show me yours," he offered, H the other boy looked startled and then laughed."I am Llewelyn ab lorwerth ..." He was unable to resist adding, "Ab OwainFawr," for Llewelyn was immensely proud that he was a randson of Owain theGreat, proud enough to disregard Morgan's oftfepeated admonition against such bragging.But the younger boy did not react, and Llewelyn realized with a distinct shock that the name meant nothing to him. He seemed to want to respond to Llewelyn's friendliness, but there was a certain wariness still in his eyes. "I amStephen de Hodnet." He hesitated again. "You do not live in Shropshire, do you? I mean, if you are Welsh ..."The implication seemed clear: if he was Welsh, why was he not in Wales where he belonged? Llewelyn was more regretful than resentful, for this past fortnight had been the loneliest of his life. "I'm staying at Caus Castle," he said coolly, and reached for Sul's reins."Caus Castle!" The sudden animation in Stephen's voice took Llewelyn by surprise. "Lord Robert Corbet's castle? You're living there?"Llewelyn nodded, bemused. "For now I am. My lady mother was wed a fortnight ago to Sir Hugh Corbet, Robert's brother. You know them?"Stephen laughed. "Who in Shropshire does not know the Corbets? They are great lords. My papa says they have more manors than a dog has fleas. In fact, he hopes to do homage to Lord Robert for the Corbet manor at Westbury." And he then proceeded, unasked, to inform Llewelyn that he was the youngest son ofSir Odo de Hodnet, that the de Hodnets were vassals of Lord Fulk Fitz Warin, holding manors of Fitz Warm at Moston and Welbatch, that he was a page in FitzWarm's household at Alberbury Castle.Llewelyn was a little hazy about the intricacies of English landholding, but he did know that a vassal was a tenant of sorts, holding land in return for rendering his overlord forty days of military service each year, and he was thus able to make some sense of this outpouring of names, places, and foreign phrases. What he could not at first understand was Stephen's sudden thawing, until he realized that the name Corbet was his entry into Stephen's world. It was, he thought, rather like that story Morgan had once told him, a tale brought back by the crusaders from the Holy Land, of a man who'd been able to gain access to a cave full of riches merely by saying the words "Open Sesame!"This realization gave Llewelyn no pleasure; it only reinforced his conviction that English values were beyond understanding. How else explain that he should win acceptance not for what truly mattered, his

r blood-ties to Owain Fawr, the greatest of all Welsh princes, but for a marriage that he felt should never have been? All at once he was caught up in a surge of homesickness, a yearning for Wales so overwhelming that he found himself blinking back tears.Stephen did not notice, had not yet paused for breath. ". . . and my papa saysCaus is the strongest of all the border castles, that it could withstand a siege verily until Judgment Day. Tell meis it true that Lord Robert has a woven cloth on the floor of his bedchamber?"Llewelyn nodded. "It is called a ... a carpet, was brought back from the HolyLand." He could see that Stephen was on the verge of interrogating him at