Charlie spat his mouthful of cola over the virgin carpet. He gave Tudor a look, wrong footed by the lack of respect, torn between pulling him up on it and enjoying the joke. Tudor didn’t give him the opportunity to respond.
‘I’m going to check the rest of the building. There are three key cards to this apartment. You have one, the concierge holds one, and I have one.’
‘So you can just walk in here any time you feel like it?’
‘Trust me, I won’t feel like it. You can have your mates up here, impress them with your father’s money, get pissed, whatever, I’m not your babysitter. I have two rules.’
‘Oh? You get to make the rules?’
‘Where your security is concerned damn right I do. One, no drugs. Non-negotiable. Two, parties by invitation only. No-one gets through that door if you don’t know who they are. No friends of friends, no pick ups from your favourite night club, no exceptions.’
‘Aw, come on… that means…’
‘That means you might have to actually form proper friendships, get to know a girl instead of dragging her home by the hair. Yup, consider your caveman style of dating screwed, as it were. No internet dating, either.’
‘I don’t need fucking Tinder!’ Charlie made a gesture with his hand, indicating both the seductive properties of his wealth and his own good looks.
‘When you start uni I’ll want a list of everyone on your course, students and lecturers.’
‘I’m hardly going to be kidnapped by someone studying with me, am I?’
‘Just get me the list.’
‘Anyone ever tell you to your face you’re a fun sponge? ‘Cos trust me, they are saying it behind your back.’
‘Yeah, well, this fun sponge is paid to keep you alive. Sorry if that cramps your style.’
‘You know I actually thought it might be kinda cool having my own bodyguard?’
Tudor had his hand on the door, about to leave. He paused, taking in the glamorous apartment, the limitless money, the charmed life the boy led. He shook his head sadly. ‘Isn’t life just full of disappointments?’ he said, before heading out, resisting the urge to slam the door as he went.
The Black Mountains, Wales 1084
Theirs was not a grand house, but it was large and comfortable, set apart from and a little higher up the hill than the small cluster of buildings that formed the village. It was even positioned above the small wooden church and graveyard. The house was constructed of sturdy Welsh stone, hewn from the mountain, its roof was timber framed and thatched with reeds. The west window of the solar, which was the main, private room on the upper floor, afforded a fine view of the valleybordered by the hills, opening to follow the great river beyond. It did not sit well with Gwen that they should look down upon all others. When her grandfather had seen the house built it was clearly of importance to him that the family were elevated in all respects. He considered that the Lord of Cwmdu - or the Dark Valley - should be entitled to use the foothills of the Black Mountains that shaped his land to secure a lofty vantage point. She did not enjoy that separation. As a child she had felt keenly the distance between herself and the other girls and boys in the village and kicked against her position. Her mother’s explanation that all had their place, and that this order brought comfort and protection did not fit with what she knew to be true. They had space and comfort, certainly, but the children she climbed from her window to play with went home to humble cottages, all living cramped, with straw beds and earth floors where she had goose feather mattresses and woollen rugs. And when there were lean years with poor harvests the village children often went hungry, while Gwen and her parents merely satisfied themselves with more mundane fare than was their habit. She never once saw her father go without his wine, which came at great expense.
So it was that she had become expert at slipping out unnoticed, a bundle of bread or cheese or a chunk ofmutton wrapped and tied to her side as she scaled a wall or tiptoed through the dark night. Her friends and their families would not go hungry while she ate. It seemed to her that her parents held their differences close, imbuing them with a value that was in truth worthless. And more than this, they never ceased to remind Gwen that a woman must know her place, and it was ever and always one step behind a man. She chaffed against constraints of being part of a noble family, preferring the fun and freedom that was to he found outside her home, enjoying the laughter she shared with her friends.
She thought then about what had taken place at the carter’s cottage. It was only three nights since, and yet it felt as if she had been a different person; one who was bold, and brave and fast, and had discovered a strength and speed new to herself. What had sent her to save Bronwen and Dafydd? How had she been able to defend them as she had? She had lain awake nights pondering these questions but as yet had found no answers.
‘Gwen?’ Her mother entered the room, her lips already pursing in disapproval. ‘Daydreaming again. You will not improve your stitching by gazing out of that window. You would do better to sit elsewhere.’
‘The light aids my work,’ she told her, smiling, lifting her needlework as if to demonstrate but taking care not to let her see how little she had progressed.
Lady Olwen was not a convincing scold, her love for her daughter softening the somewhat stern woman she presented to the rest of the world. Gwen was her only child, long awaited, and she and her husband were wont to spoil the girl. Lady Olwen’s next birthday would be her fortieth but she was yet a handsome woman. In common with Gwen she was blessed with a lithe figure and glossy black hair, though her own now shimmered with threads of silver. She dressed soberly, but with an attention to fine details that marked her out as a woman of wealth, the wife of a man of status. When she sat upon the tapestry cushioned stool she did so with a straight back and hands neatly held in her lap. Gwen knew that she had tested her mother’s patience as a child, with her love of climbing trees, scampering over the hills with her playmates, or playing with the wild ponies. Try as she might, she had never succeeded in turning her offspring into a genteel young lady.
‘Do not forget, daughter, that we have guests arriving two days hence.’
Gwen sighed, wishing she was able to put from her mind the fact that father had invited yet anotherpossible husband. Her demeanour did not go unnoticed by her mother.
‘You would do well to make the best of yourself this time, child. Your father chooses for you with such care and yet on each occasion you have at best presented yourself as dull and at worst rude and unworthy of a fine husband.’
‘Mother, I have no desire to become someone’s chattel…’
‘What empty words you utter! As a young woman your duty is to your father; when you marry that duty will be to your husband.’
‘So my freedom is but an illusion?’
‘Freedom? You prize something that would see you without standing, without a protector, without purpose?’ When Gwen began to protest further she raised a hand. ‘There is nothing you have to say on this matter I have not already heard from you, more than once. The world is as it is. We must all do what we can to ensure the security of the family, and in these uncertain times, with war never far from our door, allegiances are vitally important. You are already nearly eighteen. When I was your age I had been married a year. As a daughter, this is the one thing you can do for your father.’
