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N an paused before the little house, and leaned forward until her forehead touched the doorpost. She needed a moment to gather herself. Just a moment. She could feel him behind her, heat all along her back, like he was fire and not flesh. He stood well away, but she could feel him.

The Welshman distracted her. So much so that she could not think of him by his name.

Him. He. The Welshman. She had tied his life to hers by feeding him, traveling with him.

She bound them further by giving him her story.

It felt right, all of it. But it did not feel right to call him by his name.

Not when her skin would not forget the brush of his hand.

It did not matter. What was behind her mattered less than what was before her, waiting beyond this door.

She put a hand to the rough wood, trying to forget the Welshman, trying to prepare herself for this long awaited moment.

The village priest had directed her here, sniffing in disapproval despite the paper that bore the seal of Morency.

Nan had handed it to him, hearing Lady Gwenllian’s voice in her memory, reading it out to her before it was sealed so she would know what it said.

Take her to her Aunt Mary, it said. And that was the power of a great name like Morency, that though the priest looked at her like she was naught but a whore who traveled alone with a man she did not call husband, still he did as the paper told him.

The Welshman did not like the contempt in the priest, but he had not shown anything more than displeasure.

She was waiting every minute for his anger to burst forth.

It would. It was the only thing missing.

For days she had expected it, tensed at each spark of temper that appeared and then vanished, amazed at his lack of rage.

Her own fury still pressed under her breast, dulled with time but always beating.

It is a rare anger in you, Nan , her lady had said, and it was true.

But that was years ago and she had since learned how to pour the hot anger into steel, to hone the edge of it and confine its damage to the path her blade traveled.

She could see no such fury in him yet. When the village priest had sneered at them, the Welshman only stood taller and spoke haughtily.

Like one who had imitated it his whole life, he summoned the arrogance of the highborn and wielded it easily, until the priest was scraping and scurrying to placate him.

The Welshman had served a lord, or was born to one, she was sure of it.

A bastard son, perhaps, but more likely a master falconer to a great lord – they were among the highest members of any household, that would account for his airs.

But she did not care to know, and pushed the thought away.

She was always pushing away the thought of him.

Even now when what she searched for waited just inside this door, her thoughts were on him.

How well he looked now that the edge of starvation was gone from his face, the soft and longing way he spoke of his home in Wales, the smiles he gave to Fuss, the searching looks he gave to her – it all crowded her mind, and she pushed it away.

Mary. Mary was inside, with answers that would break her heart. She was ready to hear them. She would never be ready.

At her back there was the heat of his lust. Within it, she felt the pull of his fascination with her. But over it all, the buffer to these potent forces, was his infinite patience.

That was the one thought of him she did not push away now: his face as he waited for the falcon while it moved through the sky, diving and missing over and over again. How he stood serene and untroubled, like time had no meaning, calmly waiting for the moment to arrive.

She gathered that calm to herself, willed it to seep beneath her skin and to her bones, and raised her hand to the door.

G ryff did not know if he was meant to follow.

He had felt the tension gathering in her all morning, and had bitten his tongue against asking why today was different.

She had taken extra time to clean herself, put on fresh linen and her finer gown, and emerged with her hair carefully coiled into neat braids at the sides of her head, crowned with a crisp white linen fillet.

Her forearms held no weapons now, the split in the sleeves tied closed.

When she led them into the town and headed for the church, he thought she meant to attend mass.

Instead they stood before a house so humble it was little more than a hut.

The place was called Wragby and, despite the priest’s fulsome description of its weekly market, it was no more impressive than this tiny home at its far edge.

Nan stood before the door, so still for so long that he was sure she had frozen to the spot.

If he had been able to see the letter from Morency, he might know her business here.

But he knew only that she had journeyed to meet whoever was inside, and it did not endear her to the ill-mannered priest.

He watched her move at last, heard her call softly to ask for entry and open the door.

Her mood had infected him – his breath was held, his heart hammering as she stepped inside – and suddenly he found himself there on the threshold.

Though he thought she did not want him and knew she did not need him, he could not resist following.

She stood in the gloom of the hut, her hair reflecting what little light there was, before an old woman seated on a crude bench.

The house was only a single room with a hearth at the center, the wooden beams above black with soot.

The woman sat with her hands gripping a shallow bowl in her lap, work of some sort, and squinted up at Nan.

Her eyes have seen better days, the priest had said.

“Come closer,” said the old woman, setting the bowl aside and gesturing her forward. “I won’t know you if I can’t see you.”

Nan took a deep breath and swallowed. She knelt before the woman and whispered, “Aunt Mary. I’ve found you, Aunt Mary. I’ve come to you.”

There was a hitch in her voice on these last words, and the old woman’s face softened, crumpled. Her hands came up to hold Nan’s face.

“Oh bless me,” she exclaimed softly. She drank in the sight of her niece. “If it ain’t our own sweet Nan. You live.” Tears dripped down her face. “I did not dare to hope you still lived.”

It was the sight of tears forming in Nan’s eyes that made Gryff turn away.

He was not meant to see this. Now the old woman was saying that when the priest claimed he had received word from Morency that her niece searched for her, she had thought it must be a cruel trick.

She wept and laughed as she said it, patting Nan’s cheek.

He should wait outside, or walk all the long way down the lane until he reached the center of the town.

Something, anything to avoid the pain of seeing this love overflowing, this homecoming, this joy he would never know for himself.

But as the old woman was saying, “You’ve your mother’s beauty, you always did,” the dog began to howl. In a corner of the room it had discovered some chickens, evidently a very alarming sight that called for a great deal of noise.

Gryff stepped past Nan and said, “Bran!” in the same moment she cried, “Fuss!” This had the advantage of confusing the dog, who immediately paused in his outcry to look at them both in turn.

Before he started up again, Gryff crossed the floor and knelt down to distract him amid a cloud of feathers.

At the edge of his vision he could see Nan pressing the tears from her eyes.

“Is this your lad?” asked the old woman. “Oh aye, you’re of an age to be married now! Come let me see him.”

She held Nan’s hand tight and beckoned Gryff to come nearer. He looked to Nan, unsure.

“Nay, Aunt Mary, I have me no husband. We only journey together for safety on the road to Lincoln.”

She said no more than this, whether from circumspection or her natural disinclination to speech, and dismay came into the old woman’s face. She looked as if she might begin to weep again, but for different reasons.

“You were ever a good girl, Nan. I did my best by you, and if you have been brought so low that you must prostitute yourself then all I would hope–”

“Nay, goodwife, never would she dishonor herself or your good name. I beg you will not slander your niece for the charity she has shown me.” He came to her so she could see him well, his words striking a jarring note even in his own ears.

They spoke so plain and humble, and he did not.

“So urgent was her need to find you that she would not be delayed in waiting for the safety of a larger party, yet did she take pity on me in my distress and allows me to accompany her to Lincoln. By my hope of heaven do I swear there is no dishonor in it.”

He bent lower to be sure she could see him. She squinted up at him, the disapproval fading from her face as he spoke. Her eyes went round, and she gave a little gasp, turning to Nan.

“Oh he speaks fine words, and I’ve been forgetting you are a favorite of the lady of Morency!

” She sat up straight but lowered her eyes, suddenly meek.

She patted the grimy kerchief that covered her hair, as though a worried touch could turn it into a silk veil.

“You won’t be in the habit no more of humble ways, though I’ll welcome ye as best I can.

The winter stores are all but gone now, but Edmer will bring a bit of cheese. And there’s always the chickens–”