The Warlord's Bride. Margaret Moore

immediately turned his horse to follow, but once at the top of the hill, he discovered a mist covering the slope just beyond the ridge, like a white curtain.

      Cursing aloud this time, Madoc slipped from his saddle. His black gelding snorted and stamped, as anxious to give chase as his master. Unfortunately, from here it would be too dangerous to ride at a gallop, or even a canter. There could be hidden holes and loose scree that could cause a horse to slip or fall.

      “Steady, Cigfran, steady,” he murmured, running a hand over the horse’s strong neck as his men caught up to them.

      “Should we go after him, Madoc?” Ioan asked when he and the others reached the top of the ridge and dismounted.

      “No.”

      Trying to give chase on foot would be just as risky as on horseback. Besides, although he and most of his men had lived all of their lives on these hills and could run like deer, Trefor was just as familiar with the land and as fleet of foot.

      Madoc’s curt answer brought at least one groan of frustration from his men. Ioan, no doubt, for he was young and anxious to fight because he was good at it. Or maybe Hugh the Beak, who had the biggest nose in Llanpowell and was an expert with both sword and bow.

      “I said no,” Madoc repeated. “He’s gone to ground like a fox. We’ll never catch him.”

      “Madoc!”

      Taking hold of Cigfran’s reins, Madoc followed the call of his name, his disgruntled men behind him. He soon found Emlyn, the oldest and best of his shepherds. The gray-bearded man held a lamb in his arms as if it were a child, and at his feet lay a larger white shape splashed with violent red.

      A ewe dead and a lamb left to starve, or be the prey of fox, wolf, eagle or hawk.

      It was a cruel thing to do, and something new for Trefor.

      “A fox?” he asked the shepherd, although he already knew the answer. A fox would have killed the lamb, too.

      “Men for certain,” Emlyn replied.

      “Only the one ewe dead?”

      “No,” Emlyn replied. “Five more—and the big black ram is missing.”

      Madoc called Trefor an earthy Welsh epithet as he looked across the brow of the rise to the higher land, where Pontyrmwr, Trefor’s small estate, lay. He’d been counting on that ram to build his flock. Trefor would recognize the value of it, too. No wonder he’d taken it, the vindictive, disgraceful lout.

      Maybe he’d gotten more vicious and aggressive because he’d heard of Lady Roslynn’s dowry and assumed Madoc meant to have it, although that was still no excuse.

      “Not a broken branch, not a hoof-or footprint,” Emlyn noted. “Like magic it is, how they come and go, invisible as demons.”

      “Aye, like demons, but no magic,” Madoc said. “Trefor knows these hills as well as we do.”

      Emlyn sighed as the lamb in his arms continued to pleat plaintively. “Aye, that he does. I never thought he’d use that knowledge against us, though.”

      “He’s not the man he was,” Madoc muttered. Indeed, once he’d thought his older brother the epitome of a noble warrior—handsome, brave, skilled with weapons, irresistible to women but too honorable to take advantage of it. He’d trotted after Trefor like an admiring puppy and tried to imitate his brother in every way.

      Until his brother’s wedding day, when Trefor had disgraced not just himself, but his family, and nearly destroyed an alliance that had held for three generations.

      Madoc turned to the man who’d met his patrol yesterday to tell him the Normans had come. “Dafydd, take ten men and get me six sheep in kind from Trefor’s flock and try to find the black ram. No killing any of his animals, though. My quarrel is with my brother, not his livestock or his people who depend on him.”

      Dafydd nodded, then fingered the hilt of his sword. “What if them with the ram put up a fight?”

      “No killing, not even for the ram.”

      Madoc saw his men’s displeasure and ignored it, as he always did. His brother was still his brother, and he wouldn’t be the cause of Trefor’s death, for hanging was the punishment for theft. He wouldn’t attack Pontyrmwr unless Trefor attacked Llanpowell. He wouldn’t sacrifice other lives because of this feud with his bitter, resentful brother.

      “You three,” he said to the men standing nearest him, “help Emlyn with the carcasses. You’ll see to the lamb, Emlyn?”

      “Aye, Madoc. I’ve got a ewe lost one.”

      Madoc knew Emlyn would skin the dead lamb and put the pelt over the living one, then put it to suck at the ewe’s teat. If all went well, the ewe would accept the living lamb as her own.

      Content that he had done all that was necessary, Madoc gestured to the rest of the men to follow him back to their horses. There was no reason to linger here, and he had guests at home.

      Not that he was in any particular hurry to meet with them again.

      

      LLOYD WAS AT Madoc’s heels the moment he dismounted in the courtyard. “Was it Trefor and his men?”

      “Aye.”

      Uncle Lloyd’s face turned red and his dark eyes glowered. “I’m so ashamed of that boy, I could spit!”

      “We’ll get our recompense,” Madoc assured him, dismissing the stable boy and leading Cigfran to the stable. “He’s taken the black ram, though.”

      Lloyd cursed as he followed Madoc inside the dimmer, hay-scented stable. “He always had a good eye for an animal.”

      So he had, Madoc reflected, whether for horses, hounds, sheep or women.

      What would Trefor make of Lady Roslynn? Would he take her to wife if she were offered to him, even by John? Or would he say no woman, not even a beautiful one with a large dowry, was worth that alliance?

      As for her spirited nature, Trefor had always preferred more placid women, like Gwendolyn.

      Uncle Lloyd upended a bucket and settled himself upon it. Madoc put his saddle and blanket on the stand outside the stall, then began to rub Cigfran down with a handful of straw.

      The motions helped to calm him, and the familiar scent of horse and leather reminded him that if he had much to regret, he also had much to be thankful for. No matter what Trefor said or did, he had Llanpowell—and justly so. Whatever Trefor thought, he hadn’t stolen it from his brother. Trefor had lost Llanpowell and his title by his own selfish, dishonorable behavior.

      “I trust you’ve been entertaining our guests in my absence,” Madoc said to his uncharacteristically silent uncle, who sat twisting a piece of straw around his thick fingers.

      “Aye, I have.” Lloyd cleared his throat and tossed aside the straw. “I had to tell Lady Roslynn a bit about your troubles with Trefor.”

      That was unfortunate. Although he should have expected that some explanation of that morning’s alarm might be necessary, he would rather the Normans didn’t know about his conflict with his brother. John liked to pit Welsh noble against Welsh noble, the better to keep their attention on each other and away from whatever he was up to. “What did you tell her?”

      “Just that you’ve a quarrel with your brother and it’s nothing for her to worry about.”

      “Aye, it’s not.” Especially if she was leaving. And thank God Lloyd hadn’t said more. “Where are the Normans now? In the hall?”

      “Last time I saw Lord Alfred, he was lying on his cot, moaning, poor man.” Uncle Lloyd sighed with completely bogus sympathy. “Like all the Normans, the man can’t handle even a bit of braggot.”

      Lloyd’s false gravity gave way to a bright-eyed grin. “He’s