“What would you have me say?” Owein Meredith demanded. “She is perfectly correct. She is the lady here. I am only her husband. The land is not mine, and will most likely never be. I am not of a mind to inherit, for to do so my Rosamund must die. I am not Henry Bolton.”
“But if you allow her to ride out alone, do you not put her in danger?” Edmund asked the younger man.
“Have these borderers stolen anything belonging to Friarsgate, or even attempted to steal anything?” Owein queried him.
“Nay, they have not. They but sit upon their horses on the hills about us,” Edmund replied slowly.
“They have always remained atop the hills? They have never come down, even a little ways?” Owein continued.
Edmund Bolton shook his head in the negative.
“And other than looking back you have made no move toward them?” Owein asked.
Again Edmund Bolton shook his head in the negative.
“Friarsgate’s wealth is well-known,” Owein noted. “But so is the difficulty in escaping from here with livestock known as well. These borderers have most likely come to see if there isn’t a way around the challenges our natural defenses present them. I suspect that if Rosamund beards them face-to-face they will decide it isn’t worth it. Particularly if they learn she is a friend of their new queen,” he concluded.
Rosamund broke into their conversation. “I am curious. Have you any idea of who they might be, uncle?”
“I do not,” he admitted. “I haven’t gotten close enough to see their plaids or their badges, niece.” He stood up. “We’re beginning the harvest in the pear orchard today. I must go.” Then he smiled. “I think you will entertain each other in my absence, eh?” Then he departed from the little hall, chuckling to himself.
“I like it that you respect me,” Rosamund told Owein.
“I indeed respect your position as this manor’s lady,” he replied as he began to fondle her full young breasts. “What date have you decided upon for our church marriage, lovey? I fear I grow more lustful to possess you as each hour passes. We have already been home a full day.”
“August first,” she murmured, enjoying his hands and leaning forward to kiss his ear. “You have such beautiful ears, Owein. They are long and narrow, and I find the lobes most delicious,” she told him, nibbling upon the flesh.
“I am beginning to regret my nobility in refraining from your bed until the church has formally blessed our union with the sacrament of marriage,” he told her. The hand that had been fondling her breasts now slipped beneath her skirts. His knuckles grazed along the soft, satiny flesh of her inner thigh. He cupped her mons in his big hand and squeezed, feeling the moisture suddenly crown his broad palm. The knowledge that he was exciting her began to arouse him, and he felt himself growing hard. Their lips met, their tongues playfully teasing at each other, as the kiss between them deepened and grew more passionate. He pressed a single finger against her slit, and it slid between her nether lips. With little difficulty he found her untried love bud and began to bedevil it, the rough ball of his finger harrying and tantalizing the tiny nub of sentient flesh until he felt it swell and heard Rosamund moan against his mouth with a sound of distinct and open pleasure. She shuddered against him, sighing, and he ceased the delicious torture, moving the finger slowly over her again and again until he finally thrust the long digit into her love sheath carefully and gently.
“Oh!”She sighed again, and shifting her body, attempted to make his penetration deeper.
The finger moved swiftly back and forth within her until she gasped, and he said softly, “This is just the beginning, lovey. Now you have a sweet inkling of what is to come.” He kissed her tenderly.
“I want more,” Rosamund said demandingly.“More!”
“On Lammas Night I shall give you more than you can even anticipate,” he told her, taking his hand from beneath her gown.
“I think you are ever so mean to tease me thusly,” she complained.
He grinned mischievously at her. “I am beastly,” he agreed cheerfully. “But there will come a time when you may repay me in kind, my sweet Rosamund. I cannot explain it, but you will see.”
There would be the traditional feasting on Lammas Day, of course, but there would also be a special feast for all the manor to celebrate the lady’s marriage to Sir Owein Meredith. Twin sides of beef would be packed in rock salt and slowly roasted. There would be sweets as well, candied rose petals and pear tartlets. And of course the usual products of the first grains harvested and milled.
On the twenty-eighth of July the mysterious riders appeared on the hill for the first time since Rosamund’s return home. Notified, she immediately went to the stables and mounted her horse to ride up the hill where not one but three riders stood. Below, Owein and Edmund watched her progress.
Reaching the crest of the hill she brought her horse to a stop even as she said, “I am Rosamund Bolton, the lady of Friarsgate. You are, sirs, trespassing upon my lands.”
“You stand on your lands, lady, but where we rest ’tis not,” the spokesman for the group said. He was the biggest man Rosamund had ever seen, well over six feet and sitting very tall upon his horse, which he gripped with legs like tree trunks. To her surprise he was clean-shaven although most borderers were not. “I am the Hepburn of Claven’s Carn,” he announced in a deep voice that seemed to thunder up from within his broad chest.
“What is it you seek, my lord?” Rosamund queried him. “Your clansmen have been observed upon the hills about my home for some weeks now. If your purpose is honest, you have always been welcome here.”
“I could hardly come courting until you had returned, lady,” the Hepburn of Claven’s Carn replied. His thick black hair was cropped close, and he had the bluest eyes she had ever seen. Even bluer than Prince Hal’s.
“Who would you court?” she queried him.
The two clansmen with the Hepburn laughed aloud.
“Why you, lady,” the Hepburn replied.
