Gruffydd shrugged. “More than likely,” he said. “You must understand how convinced she is that every English warlord is the devil. The only person she ever trusted—our grandmother—told her that. She believes it.”
“You are speaking more kindly of her than you did earlier.”
“She has had a difficult life, my lord. I try to remember that.”
“Even when she throws you in the vault?”
“Even then, though I could have done without that experience.”
“Then you do not believe her… wicked?”
Gruffydd shook his head. “Nay,” he said. “Elle is headstrong and bold, and in many ways she is more fearless than any man I know, but I do not think she is wicked. It is simply that she only knows one point of view.”
“And you never tried to change that?”
Gruffydd sighed with some remorse. “She views me as the brother who received all of the attention she never had,” he said. “There is jealousy there. Bitterness, if you will. But in answer to your question—nay, I never tried to change her thinking. She would not listen to me anyway.”
Christopher fell silent for a moment, but it was clear that something was on his mind. Gruffydd kept eating the food in front of him, more food than he’d seen in a month, as Christopher digested their conversation. Mostly, he was digesting what Gruffydd said about Elle. Some of it was encouraging. Some of it wasn’t. But one thing was certain—she was a tempest. But she was a tempest with a mind.
A rebel with intelligence.
That brought him great concern.
“I have orders from Henry to secure Brython,” he finally said. “But I also have orders from Henry to secure it with one of the surest ways of forming an alliance.”
Gruffydd looked up from his trencher. “What is that, my lord?”
Christopher fixed him in the eye. “A marriage.”
Gruffydd nearly choked on the food in his mouth. “It is true that is a sure way of forming an alliance,” he said, sputtering. “But I already… There is a woman I am already fond of, and—”
Christopher waved a hand at him, cutting him off. “Not you,” he said. “Your sister. I intend to marry her to an English knight.”
Gruffydd wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, his eyes wide. “Elle?” he repeated, shocked. “Married to an English…knight?”
Christopher nodded. “It seems no one has been able to tame her,” he said. “A husband will do that. He will settle her. Marriage and children have a tendency to quiet a wild heart.”
Gruffydd was looking at him in genuine horror. “Her heart isn’t wild,” he said. “It bleeds the Brecon Mountains and pumps the blood of our ancestors. It calls to Wales, and Wales answers. We are speaking of a woman who has been taught to hate the English like the church hates Lucifer.”
“I understand,” Christopher said, unwilling to give in to Gruffydd’s fears. “But she is young still. She had only been taught one perspective on life, as you have said. Let someone who is patient and firm teach her another perspective. If she is as intelligent as you say she is, then she will learn and she will understand… and Llewelyn will have lost a devoted follower.”
Gruffydd shook his head slowly. “I am not certain it can be done,” he said. “This has been her entire life, my lord.”
“We are about to change her life.”
“But at what cost? And what risk to this man you shall marry her to?”
Christopher shrugged. “As I see it, we have little choice,” he said. “What am I to do? Simply throw her in the vault and forget about her to rid myself of her trouble? Or do I marry her to a man who can help her see more than the narrow view of the world that she has? You said yourself that she is very intelligent. If she is intelligent, then she can learn there is more to life than Llywelyn and Wales.”
Gruffydd still wasn’t convinced. “I suppose the decision has already been made, my lord?”
“It has.”
There wasn’t much more Gruffydd could add to what he’d already said. He had expressed his fears and concerns, but in his opinion, de Lohr had no idea what he was getting into.
Or what he was asking.
“Then you do not need my approval,” he said after a moment. “But you should know that my father has tried to tame her before.”
