Page 277

Gwen was too busy cursing herself to take proper note of her surroundings.

It was a regular ship, strung with a spider’s web of ropes and riggings, instruments with unaccountable functions scattered here and there.

Pedr’s compatriots reached into the yawl and heaved out two small firkins, the half-sized casks used for ale.

Gwen’s stomach jumped as she recognized a mark on the side.

The casks came from St. Sefin’s, and they held the brew Pen had made with the infected darnel seeds.

She’d carefully marked the firkins so no one opened one by accident and drank the poisoned brew.

What was it doing here, with Minikin so cheerfully rolling a cask before him, as if he hadn’t a care in the world?

“Master wants to see you.” He whistled as if calling a dog. “Come along, fair ladies, come along.”

Gwen, herded by the much larger and clearly armed men, had no choice but to follow.

Anne trailed behind her, whimpering and fretting.

Lydia marched with her head up, going to the gallows with pride, and Pedr caught up the rear with a groggy Prunella in his arms. Minikin pointed to a short stair at the back of the deck leading downward.

“There. Try not to anger him, chick. He’s in a foul temper to begin with. ”

Where was Pen? What would he do when he learned what had happened? For that matter, what did the Hound want with them? Gwen’s courage quailed as she stepped down the short, dark stairwell into the unknown.

The captain’s cabin spread over the entire rear of the ship, and a more sumptuous boudoir Gwen had never seen.

Half a dozen narrow arched windows let in a buttery spring light, and on a small raised platform tucked against them stood a large feather bed clothed in silk damask.

Shelves and cupboards with polished brass handles lined the walls.

In the center of the room stood a large walnut dining table draped in a crisp white linen cloth, and around it sat several Gillow armchairs in gleaming walnut.

Comfortable chairs, with shepherd’s crook arms and tapestry seats.

Nestled in one was an older man dressed head to toe in black, save for a flash of startling white at his shirt collar and a red silk cravat.

“Y Gwyllgi.” Gwen said it like a curse.

He rose and bowed. He was a large man, stocky, and he wore his own hair, white and cupped around his ears.

His cheekbones stood out like knobs, his mouth was a thin straight slash across his face, and his eyes were so deep-set beneath heavy coal-black brows that Gwen at first couldn’t discern the gleam of malice in them. Altogether, he was terrifying.

“The Black Hound, is that it? I didn’t choose the name for myself.

My real name, if you want to know, is Bryan.

” He moved around the table to regard them.

He was very tall. “But I believe the Black Hound suits me, for all that. I am single-minded in my pursuits. I enjoy a fight. And I never give up until I have what I want.”

“Hardly a fair fight when you hire thugs to beat a man senseless, or kidnap ladies,” Gwen said.

Pedr and Minikin left, but other men stood guard in the tiny stairwell.

These were the rough men they’d heard reports of roaming Newport, causing fights and hassling merchants.

Who was this man to command a small army of henchmen, all to do his will?

“Gwenllian ap Ewyas,” the Hound said softly, regarding her intently.

He spoke English but with an accent she couldn’t place, lilting and rhythmic, but not Welsh.

“I’ve heard of you. Princess of an ancient kingdom that no longer exists.

Warrior in a world where females are meant to be gracious and silent.

” His thin lips flattened in a sneer. “I cannot think of a worse torment for a woman of pride. It must be purgatory on earth.”

“Where is my brother?” Anne choked out, stepping forward. Behind them Lydia and Prunella clung together, wide-eyed and silent, their skirts rustling like a pair of dainty stonechat.

“Why, he’s right here waiting for you.” The Hound gestured toward a shadowed corner where a chair sat before a built-in desk.

Daron Sutton sat bound to it by long thin ropes.

His blue coat was torn, his cravat rust-stained, and his head hung heavily on his chest, his golden hair matted with blood at one temple. Anne rushed to him with a low cry.

“Is he dead?” She looked at Gwen with anguish.

Gwen’s heart twisted despite herself. She hadn’t wished Daron dead . Mauled by corgis, perhaps, but not blotted from the earth. “Check his pulse,” she said roughly.

“I don’t know how to do that.” Anne gazed on her brother forlornly, touching his shoulder as if fearing to find him cold.

Heaving a sigh, Gwen stepped forward and pressed two fingers beneath Sutton’s fleshy chin. “Alive.” She dropped her fingers, loathe to touch him, and instead snatched a linen serviette from the table, snapped it open, and bound the length around Sutton’s head. “Does he owe you money, too?”

The Hound grinned. The expression resembled the gape of a skull removed of flesh. “He approached me with a bargain. I’m ensuring he maintains his end of it.”

“What bargain?” Gwen swallowed a sour taste in her mouth.

The Hound nodded towards the two viscountesses, watching white-faced and silent. Gwen had to commend Lydia’s ruthless self-control. She appeared outraged at the indignity being done her. Poor Prunella looked prepared to faint again.

“These two,” the Hound said, “bring the viscount to me. He owes me a debt. He,” he nodded toward Sutton, “keeps you.”

“And me?” Anne gave a soft yelp.

The Hound watched her with his tiny, piercing eyes. “I fancy a wife,” he said. “I’ve always been partial to those English blue eyes and that skin, like a—what’s that white flower you see in the spring?”

“Wood anemone,” Gwen said shortly. “Penrydd owes you nothing. He is not responsible for his brother’s debt.”

“He is if I say he is,” said the Hound, his gaze still on Anne. She gave another small cry and ran to hide behind Gwen.

“What happens next?” Gwen asked through a throat gone dry with fear.

The Hound gave his rictus smile. “My message has been sent, so now we pass the time until his lordship calls. Do you enjoy ombre? Vingt-et-un? I am fond of faro.”

He seated himself at the table and gestured the ladies forward. “Come, I’ve sent for refreshments. We’re not savages, even if we do live in Wales.”

“You beat that Jewish man from Merthyr Tydfil until he died,” Gwen said. “An act of savagery if I ever heard of one.”

The Hound shook his head. “Ach, Daniel. Such a stubborn man, so hard to persuade. I regret that some of my men like their work too much. I pay better than the mines, you see, and less risk of life and limb.”

A knock sounded at the door. “Spot of tea for the ladies!” It was Minikin, bearing a polished salver with a pitcher and tall pewter goblet. “Ha, only jesting. It’s small beer for you, drewgi .”

Gwen watched in amazement as Minikin advanced to the table and slid the platter onto the linen cloth. The Hound didn’t look up from the deck of cards he was shuffling, apparently not realizing that his minion had just called him a smelly dog.

“Does he not speak Cymraeg?” Gwen asked in Welsh.

“Na, he’s Gwyddelig ,” Pedr spat.

Irish. Just as the English considered the Welsh uncivilized, many Welsh thought of the Irish as barbarians. Iolo Morganwg, the self-appointed modern Welsh bard, said the Irish loved only violence, deception, and poetry.

“But you serve him,” Gwen said, still in Welsh. The Hound looked sharply at her but said nothing. No one else understood their conversations. Anne knew only a few words that Gwen had taught her, mostly the names of flowers and birds.

“We serve the man with no name,” Pedr answered in a slow rumble.

“A gift from the publican at the King’s Head, your Houndship.

” Minikin switched to English and poured from the pitcher into the goblet.

Gwen swore she detected the sharp, sour scent of darnel.

“The men are enjoying a dram or two, and there’s more at the Head if they nip in there tonight whilst going about their business. ”

Gwen’s heart raced with sudden hope. Pen was the man with no name.

He said he’d been working with their attackers from the bridge.

He had brewed the darnel and if Pedr and Minikin served it here, they would disarm the Hound’s men.

Mr. Trett at the King’s Head had the only thing in Newport that served as a lockup, a rickety lean-to in his stable yard.

Though she seemed to recall Pen and Evans, in their work at the stables, had reported reinforcing the lean-to with new timber and a great new iron padlock.

Pen meant to lure the Hound’s henchmen to the pub, lock them up, and have the constable deal with them. The rough-hewn army, dispensed with in one blow. But what, then, of the bombs he had Evans and Ross making?

“What are we to do?” Gwen whispered in Welsh. What was the rest of Pen’s plan?

Minikin gave her a reproachful look, speaking out of the side of his mouth. “You was supposed to have the sneeze weed.”

Gwen almost laughed. They had counted on her not walking into the trap, yet here she was, in the Hound’s lair, with three helpless women and a wounded Sutton still unconscious in his chair.

Could she overcome the Hound if he drank the poisoned beer?

Could Pedr and Minikin alone help them escape if their cohorts grew drunk and rowdy?

Sounds of revelry spilled from the main deck where, she assumed, the first firkin had been tapped.

But the side effects of darnel were unpredictable.

Who knew what a man prone to violence was capable of under the influence of intoxication, much less hallucination?

The Hound didn’t glance at the goblet. “I dislike beer, Morys. Open a bottle of wine.”