Page 3 of Cadell the Dragon

Cadell stopped in his tracks. What sort of a question was that? Of course, he wanted to see Johanna again! Actually, he wanted to do a lot more than see her. He wanted to talk to her, kiss her and do all the things he had dreamed of doing in the last ten years. But where to start? He didn’t think it a good idea to ride to Bryn Glas unannounced and sweep her into his arms to declare his undying love. He needed a way to meet with her that didn’t make him appear desperate.

“I think we will invite the lady to a banquet,” Siaspar said, as if he’d read his mind. “That way she can get reacquainted with the people she met when she last visited Castell y Draig. There have been many changes since then.”

Indeed. Siaspar, a mere brewer’s grandson, was now master of the place. The boy who had been fostered at the same time as Cadell had been chosen to inherit at the death of the childless old lord, who had been impressed by his dedication and level-headedness. The boy from humble origins had turned the already profitable castle into a model of comfort and efficiency. To complete his success, he had married an Englishwoman. This union with a subject of King Edward would ensure his future children’s status.

Yes, there had been many changes since Lady Johanna de Welles had last set foot here. But one thing had remained constant. Cadell was still convinced that she was the only woman for him. And now that she was no longer married, he would be allowed to convince her that he could be the right husband for her, now that he had grown into a man.

“Thank you, brother.”

A banquet would be the perfect way to see her again without appearing too eager. Because, as much as he was itching to, he could not ride into Bryn Glas as if the Devil were on his heels and demand to see her. On what grounds would he do so? Would she even remember the obscure Welsh youth with whom she had barely exchanged two words?

Or perhaps she would remember him precisely because they had been able to exchange those precious few words. Not many Welsh people shared his ease with the English language—nevermind willingness to use it. If Cadell spoke it almost as a native, it was courtesy of his grandfather, Dafydd, who had always insisted that his son and grandson learn the language as well as possible. The conquest of their country had made it imperative in his mind that they should be able to converse with the invaders. He himself had learned to do so during the expedition to Acre in 1270 when he had accompanied the prince who would later become King Edward I to the Holy Land.

It had been highly unusual for a poor Welshman to go on such an enterprise, but it had allowed him to accomplish his dreams of grandeur. His bravery and loyalty during the trying journey had caught the prince’s attention, and he had been rewarded with a generous sum upon return. That money had served to purchase a small estate that had been worth twenty times the cottage he had left behind to join the army of pilgrims.

Then the wily man had ensured his son’s fortune by marrying him to the youngest daughter of a family of wealthy landowners. Cadell’s mother, by all accounts, had been taken in by Llywelyn’s roguish charm and old Dafydd had shamelessly hinted to the girl’s father that if he did not want his daughter to be publicly shamed by a swelling belly, he had better see her married before the month was out. Whether Llywelyn had actually seduced the woman before the wedding, Cadell had never known.

In any case, he had been born exactly nine months after the hasty ceremony.

When his mother’s two brothers had died within a few months of each other three years later, she had found herself the owner of a handsome fortune and grand manor. Under her husband’s careful management, the estate had flourished, and when Siaspar, a mere brewer’s grandson, had been accepted to be fostered at Castell y Ddraig, Llywelyn, who had inherited his father’s opportunistic flair, had petitioned the old lord to take his son as well.

His request had been accepted, and Cadell had been sent to learn the art of being a knight.

On his deathbed, a few years later, his grandfather had made him swear never to compromise a position he had procured by traveling to the other end of the world and risking his life in scorching heat and gruesome battles. Of course, Cadell had promised.

But there had been no stopping what had happened the day he turned sixteen.

A retinue of soldiers had seized the domain, which had been given to the knight at their head as a reward for services to the new king, Edward II. There had been no way to fight the men, or to contest the decision. Such had been the fate of too many estates in the area. It was perhaps fortunate that old Dafydd had not lived long enough to see the son of the man he owed his good fortune to dispossess his family of all they had worked to build.

Aged sixteen, Cadell had found himself even poorer than his grandfather had been.

And it was then, when he was at his lowest, that he had met Lady Johanna de Welles.

That sunny summer day he had been in the bailey at Castell y Ddraig, oiling a hauberk with tallow when she had arrived, riding on a white palfrey like an angel straight from Heaven.

“Who is that?” the boy by his side, a groom, whispered.

He sounded…intrigued? Thunderstruck? Aroused? Probably a mixture of all three, just like Cadell himself was. His groin had come to life with shocking speed when the lady had dismounted from her horse, which was little wonder. She was unlike anyone he had ever seen.

“I don’t know,” Cadell murmured, not bothering to hide his own awe.

Her hair was a sleek, black sheet that rivaled the purest silk, her eyes two deep pools of ink, her skin the color of amber beads. To a man who had only ever seen rosy villagers and pale English ladies, she was a vision from another world. Did she have ancestors from a distant land? It was all too possible. His grandfather had told him of the beauties he’d met in the Holy Land, temptresses with skin of the deepest honey or even as dark as coal.

She was so unlike anyone else in appearance that he instinctively knew she would smell elusive and mysterious, just like the exotic spices he had discovered at Castell y Ddraig, spices that gave every dish such depth of flavor.

“She is nothing for you to worry about.” The watchman, who’d overheard the groom’s question and Cadell’s answer, barked his answer. “Evidently, she is one of his lordship’s guests, and here to see him, not you. Back to work, you two!”

Cadell did as he was told, and spent the rest of the day trying to persuade himself that the lady was not as appealing as he’d first thought. In vain. Every time he caught a glimpse of her beautiful face, or even simply of her slender back and luscious mane of hair, it was as if someone had pricked the base of his spine with the tip of a sword, causing a reaction in his whole body. That night, as he finally lay down on his pallet, he had no other choice but to grab his cock and bring forth the release that had been boiling in his veins all day.

It was not the first time he had felt that glorious explosion, but it was the first time he had purposefully coaxed it out himself and he could not help a feeling of guilt at the thought. What would the lady think if she knew what he had done while thinking of her? If she knew what he had imagined while he stroked himself? How would he face her in the morning, remembering what the two of them had done in his mind? Not that he would have any reason to talk to her, of course.

But against all odds, talk to her he did.

On the evening of her second day at the castle, the two of them found themselves alone in the storeroom. Cadell had gone to get some tallow to oil yet another hauberk and, as he was about to exit, he found himself face-to-face with the beautiful lady who, he had found out earlier quite by accident, was called Lady Johanna de Welles. She was not, contrary to what the watchman had surmised, a guest of the old lord, but merely part of a retinue of English people on their way to visit relatives further west. The morning she had arrived, two of them had been taken ill and they had begged for hospitality while they recovered from the flux that had rendered them unable to ride. Naturally, the favor had been granted. Not that it mattered why she had come. She was here, that was the important part.

He inhaled when they almost collided, and caught a hint of something spicy that made his mouth water. Dear God, he had been right. She smelled as delicious and rare as she looked.

“Forgive me, I didn’t mean to intrude, I was only—” She interrupted herself halfway through her sentence and mumbled to herself, looking down at the floor. “Silly me, you probably don’t understand me.”