Page 13 of The Quest for Excalibur
As the pipe music rose to a crescendo, her long chestnut hair flew, until, with sudden abruptness, the music stopped and the girl stood motionless, transformed into a statue of a dancer. Her curls hung forward in a tangled veil over her face, and her long fingers extended eloquently. Only the sound of heavy breathing broke the silence.
A ripple of clapping began, joined by a few whistles and catcalls. Notably from the men rather than the women. I wouldn’t have wanted to lay odds on most of the wives here suspecting their husbands of liking what they’d just seen a bit too much.
The girl shook her head, righting her curls, and a wide smile split her face. Not such a good idea– her teeth had grown overcrowded and crooked, and spoiled her beauty. But of course, the men weren’t looking at her teeth.
“I wish I could dance like that,” Reaghan said, her voice wistful. A sturdy child, like her mother, she’d never have the willowy, elegant physique of this wild girl. Not that her mother would have wanted her to, of course.
Ruan bowed to his audience. “If we can unhitch our horses in a corner somewhere, and beg food and cider from you, we’ll entertain you all again this evening, in your hall.” His pronunciation sounded good, but I detected a certain forced nature to the way he spoke, as though he were an actor reciting a speech.
Goff the blacksmith, who’d emerged from his forge to watch, indicated the space where he often parked wagons or carts that needed repairs to their ironwork. “You can park it here if’n you like. ’Tis a warm spot aside o’ my forge.”
Ruan bowed again. He was a little too free with his obeisances for my liking. “And is there room for my tired horses, Bran and Branwen, in your stables? They’d appreciate a feed of oats and a bite of hay, outta the cold wind and the snow. Hard workers, both o’ them.” Yes, when not expounding to an audience, his speech slipped a little.
Eoghan, the retired, one-armed warrior in charge of the stables, stepped forward from amongst the audience who’d watched the show. Eyeing the girl up and down with a lascivious leer, he nodded at Ruan. “Aye, bring ’em in when you’re ready. I’ve room.” He looked back at the girl. “An’ you can tell me what yer girl’s name is, too.”
Ruan grinned. “Why, she’s Hafren, and she ain’t my girl. She’s her own girl, ’tis sure.” He nodded at the older woman. “And this be Heledd, though I see plain that you’re more interested in my dancer than my musician.” He gave a little knowing chuckle, probably having seen it all before.
Ribald laughter echoed from the men in the crowd, who’d not wandered off as the women and children had, but had hung around to spectate these newcomers. They moved in closer to get a better look at Hafren. As more than half of them were happily married, their wives would not be pleased.
I gave Archfedd and Reaghan’s hands a tug. “Come on, back to the Hall and something to eat for you two, I think.”
“Do I have to go back to my house?” Reaghan asked. “Can’t I stay with Archfedd again tonight?”
Cei and Coventina had moved back to their own home, now our supplies of wood were no longer under threat of running out, but Reaghan had still not joined them.
I shrugged. “We’d better see what your mother says.”
*
“Who are thosepeople I saw by the stables?” Arthur asked, standing naked in the middle of our chamber, halfway through changing out of his mud-splattered hunting garb and into something more respectable for the evening meal in the Hall.
From my position sitting on the bed, I had a pleasing view of his rear, lean and muscled as ever, one thigh still slightly thinner than the other, thanks to the nasty wound he’d received nine years ago. I was so busy ogling my handsome husband in the buff, I quite forgot to answer.
“I said, who are those people in the wagon?” he repeated, huffing, but not getting any further on with his dressing.
I jumped. “Oh, yes. Ruan the Rhymer and his two women– a musician and a dancer. By the looks of her, what I’d call anexoticdancer.”
He pulled on clean, dark blue braccae. “I saw the girl when I was unsaddling my horse– she’ll be the dancer, I imagine.” He paused. “Definitely exotic.”
From over the wall in the hall came the sounds of preparation for the evening meal. Many of the warriors and their wives would be there– possibly more men than usual thanks to the promise of further dancing by such an attractive, and underdressed, girl.
As he picked up his clean shirt, a chuckle shook him. “Llacheu’s already spotted her. As have his friends. They all hung around outside the stables instead of going back to their houses to change their muddy clothes.” He chuckled again. “Like bees around a flower in summer.”
Arthur’s attempt at a father to son talk with Llacheu a few months ago had not gone to plan. Llacheu had shied away from the suggestion of marriage like a horse from fire.
“None of my friends are married,” he snapped at his father, anger bubbling close beneath the surface. “And I refuse to be the first to get tied down. If Ariana doesn’t want me, I’ll be going down the hill to have some fun with the village girls, like all my friends do.” As far as he was concerned, it seemed, Ariana and her father could go take a hike. And so could his father.
This was the first time they’d ever argued, and Arthur had come away from it rather shellshocked. Considering Llacheu was eighteen, I’d only been surprised they’d not clashed before. But Llacheu had been living in one of the barracks houses with his friends for the past few years, so there’d not been much opportunity for angry words. Until now.
“Uh oh,” I’d said, when Arthur recounted the results of his parental chat to me, and left it at that, heartily glad Amhar was still so young.
Arthur pulled his tunic on over his tempting torso and fastened a tooled leather belt around his waist. “What it is to be young and in love, eh?”
I laughed. “You make us sound like an old married couple.”
He came over to the bed, standing over me. “Well, we are, aren’t we?”
I had to put my head back to gaze up into his eyes, his face plunged into shadow by the light of the clay oil lamps behind him. “You think?” I put my hands on his narrow hips.
