‘You alright?’ he asked. Sweat beaded his brow.

‘Aye.’ Gwenn held up the purse. ‘Yours?’ He nodded. Lip curling, she chucked his no doubt ill-gotten gains onto his chest.

‘My thanks,’ he gasped, white about the face. He made no move to pocket his coins.

‘What’s the matter?’

Her dark saviour stretched taut lips into a grin. He was a stranger to Gwenn, but she would recognise excruciating pain on the face of the Devil himself. ‘You’re hurt!’ she exclaimed, dashing away a hot tear.

‘Aye. It was me who was too big,’ he gasped, and winced. ‘I think my leg has broken.’

Because the mercenary had saved her, and she did not like to see even a devil in pain, Gwenn moved towards him. Her grandmother was beyond her help, but this man was not.

Chapter Eight

The hamlet of Kermaria perched on the eastern bank of a marshy river tributary which wandered lazily through vast unchartered tracts of forest to the north, and flowed south through the wetlands, eventually seeping into the Small Sea. To the south the village was bounded by a flat, boggy area; the western approaches were protected by the river; and the woodlands screened it to the north. From a military point of view Kermaria needed little to make it defensible, it could be reached easily only from the east – the route to Vannes.

Its population was small. Neglected by their lord this past two years, a few stalwart villagers managed to scrape a meagre living from the marsh. They either cut wainloads of rushes and sedge for thatch and carted them to Vannes, or they netted fish and eel as well as the wildfowl which gathered in flocks on the reed-edged waters.

Riding into Kermaria along the main trackway, with her clothes sodden from the steady drizzle, Yolande tried to appreciate the forethought that had gone into the siting of this isolated manor. Her children would be secure here. Nonetheless her heart sank. It was a desolate, unlovely spot and her first sight of it, with the landscape reflecting back the oppressive, unremitting grey of the clouds, was enough to depress the spirits of the hardiest soul. A spine-chilling shriek, like that of a wild pig, whipped through the damp air. ‘What was that?’ she demanded.

‘Water rail.’ Jean’s smile mocked foolish fears. ‘An insignificant, timid bird.’

‘With a large voice.’ Shivering, Yolande drew her cloak about her shoulders though the dripping garment could not possibly warm her. ‘It almost had me out of the saddle.’

‘I’d forgotten what a townswoman you are. You’ll become accustomed to the birds, there is an abundance of them here.’ Jean’s eyes wandered along the approach road, and Yolande followed his gaze.

The avenue was protected on either hand by a stone wall two yards high. Ahead of them at the end of the avenue, loomed three stories of squat, drab building. Jean’s manor was a dumpy tower. Built on a square base, it was solid, grey and ugly. Green-grey lichen clung to the walls. Several window slits were visible, but only one of them, the larger central opening, would allow more than the slenderest spear of light into the interior. Pigeons nested in the sagging roof. All grey. Ivy-hung walls skirted an unkempt yard, in the midst of which a tumble of stones marked the spot where once there might have been a well. There was no well rope, the iron mechanism having rusted to dust. The outbuildings were in a similar state of disrepair and spoke of a lifetime of neglect. Rooks swirled on the horizon above the edge of the forest, black shapes against leaden clouds. Grey. Grey. Nothing but grey.

‘What do you think?’ Jean asked, a half-smile playing about his lips.

Yolande dredged her mind for a positive comment. ‘It...it looks very...safe, Jean, very sturdy.’ She eased her damp veil from the skin at the back of her neck.

‘You don’t like it,’ he said, lips twitching.

Yolande blinked through wet eyelashes at the pile of weathered stone. What could she say?

As they drew nearer, the dilapidation grew more apparent. The stones of the manor were broken and eroded; the mortar was gone in places; the stairway leading to the door had subsided, and some steps were missing. There was a gap between the top step and the door. A garden of weeds and moss was flourishing on the flat roof. If the building was left untended much longer, it would crumble back into the ground completely. Yolande knew her lover had rarely even visited the place since he had inherited two years ago, but to give him his due, the neglect was not all his; his father before him had let the place go to seed after Jean’s mother, Lady Anne St Clair, had died. God only knew what horrors lurked inside.

‘It has...possibilities,’ Yolande got out, hardly daring to look her lover in the eye. ‘But there’s much to be done.’

‘Aye.’ His dark eyes were smiling, teasing. ‘Go on, say it, my love. Admit that it could hardly be worse, and then we can laugh and have done. I’m lord of a bog. Do you understand now why I was loathe to bring you here?’

Yolande’s mare picked her way along the walled trackway towards the manor, and suddenly a woman materialised as if out of nowhere, work-reddened hands wrapped firmly round a sedge scythe. Yolande’s mare skipped sideways. Thin as the reeds in the riverbed, the woman stared at Yolande in unsmiling silence, hostile eyes lingering scornfully on Yolande’s soaked finery. The woman clutched her scythe to her scrawny breasts as though it were a talisman to ward off evil. The scythe moved, fractionally.

Biting her lip, Yolande reined back. There was no doubting the challenge in the woman’s mien. ‘Jean?’

His mount brushed past her. ‘It’s only Madalen, my love. They are unused to strangers, but I think she’ll remember me.’ He nodded at the woman, who stared sullenly at him before a reluctant smile tugged the disapproving features into a semblance of friendliness. The woman called Madalen returned Jean’s gesture, bobbed him a curtsy, and melted back into the wall.

Recovering her composure, Yolande straightened her back and spurred both her mare and her own flagging humour. ‘I hope there’s nothing else skulking in the stonework, Jean.’ She wagged a finger at him. ‘I think you’d best tell me the worst–’ She broke off, for her horse had drawn level with the spot where the woman had been, and the wall was pierced by a door. Further down she saw another. ‘By my faith, are all their houses built out of the wall? Look, there’s a window.’

‘The wall was begun in my grandfather’s time, as a defence,’ Jean said. ‘But it was never finished, and when it fell into disrepair, some of the villagers propped their cottages against it. You’ll see them more clearly from the window in the solar. They’re lined up on the other side, wooden shacks leaning against the wall, nothing but hovels really.’ Jean drew in a deep breath, and grimaced ruefully. ‘I’ve let my holding fall apart at the seams. When my father died, I was daunted by what needed doing, and by the lack of funds. My name will be mud when I make a start. The cottages will have to be rebuilt elsewhere and the doors bricked up – they’re a liability where they are.’ Jean trotted briskly over a small bridge spanning an overgrown ditch.

The moat would have to be cleared. A portcullis should be erected by the courtyard entrance. It would all cost a pretty penny, but his first task must be to arrange for a steward to set down how many bondmen he had at his disposal, and whether any freemen had remained in the village. More used to hawking and hunting and dining in comfort with the Foucard household while he ‘courted’ Louise, Jean was aware that he would not find it easy to shoulder his responsibilities.

‘I hear Brittany’s in the area,’ Yolande said.

‘Aye. My father was sworn to the old Duke, but since he died I’ve not renewed the oath. Perhaps if I swear fealty to Brittany and apply for further revenues, he may grant a sum to tide me over until I knock this place into shape.’