‘No,’ he repeated, but more gently this time, seeing my wide-eyed shock. ‘I will wed the lady under my own name, not some bastardised form to allow the English to master it. I am Owain ap Maredudd ap Tudor.’
Father Benedict looked at me. ‘Is that what you wish, my lady?’
‘Yes, Father,’ I said. ‘That is what I wish.’
With commendable fortitude, Father Benedict began again, making as good a case of the Welsh syllables as he could.
And we stood hand in hand as I waited for Owen’s reply. Would he? By now my nerves were entirely undone, jangling like an ill-tuned lute. Would the danger prove too great at the eleventh hour? But there was no hesitation. None at all. Owen’s fingers laced with mine as if, palm to palm, the intimate pressure would seal our agreement.
Father Benedict turned to me.
Footsteps!
All froze, breath held. The noise of the door pushed open, creaking on its vast hinges, and the clap of shoes on the tiles echoed monstrously. More than one person was approaching. Father Benedict closed his mouth, swallowing the Latin as if it might preserve him from retribution, plucking nervously at his alb. All eyes were turned to the entrance to the choir. The tension could be tasted, the bitterness of aloes.
Not Gloucester, I decided, not a body of soldiers to put a stop to what we did. But if Father Benedict was ordered to halt the ceremony, would he obey? I glanced at him. He was sweating, his eyes glassy. His words hovered on his lips. Owen’s right hand released mine and closed round the hilt of his sword.
‘Father,’ I urged, as his eyes remained fixed on the doorway, as if he still expected Gloucester to march through it.
‘Forgive me, my lady.’ He cleared his throat and blinked, picking up the strands of this unorthodox marriage.
We exchanged rings. Owen gave me a battered gold circle. ‘It is Welsh gold. A family piece. One of the few pieces of value left to us, and all I have.’ I gave him Michelle’s ring—because it was Valois, not Plantagenet, and mine to give freely—pushing it onto the smallest of his fingers. And there it was. We were wed. We were man and wife.
Owen bent his head and kissed me as he had promised.
My hand in his, where it now belonged, we walked from the choir.
No bride gifts, no procession, no feasts with extravagant subtleties. Only a hasty retiring to our chamber where Owen removed my gown, and then his own clothing, and we made our own celebration.
‘What did you say?’ I whispered, when I lay with my head on his shoulder, my hair in a tangle. ‘When you spoke in Welsh and promised me the world?’
‘I couldn’t manage the world, if you recall.’ I heard the smile in his voice as he pressed his mouth against my temple. ‘My Welsh offerings were poor things: I love you. My dear one, my beloved.’
I sighed. ‘I like that better than the world. Why do you not use your name?’
He hesitated a moment. ‘Can you pronounce it?’
‘No.’
‘So there is your answer.’ But I did not think that it was.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The effect on my household in the Rose Tower was immediate, and in a manner that I had never considered. We gathered in my solar at noon before making our way in informal manner to eat in the inner hall. I walked to the table on the dais, as I had done a thousand times before, taking my seat at the centre of the board. The pages began to bring water in silver bowls and napkins, the servants bustling in with jugs of ale and platters of frumenty. I had not given even a moment’s thought to the practicalities of our new situation. Now forced to consider the reality of it, I felt my face pale with irritation. How thoughtless I had been for Owen in his new status, how blindly insensitive.
And Owen? He had envisaged it all, of course. He had known exactly the problems we had created for ourselves, and had made his plans without consulting me. Perhaps he thought he would save me the burden, the heartache that it would bring me. Or else he knew I would object. I discovered on that day that I had acquired a husband of some perspicacity.
