Page 71 of The Queen's Huntsman
“Apparently, she likes black-haired boys,” he said with contempt. “Yet believe me when I tell you that, with Ely in her antechamber, it was impossible for me to pleasure her the way she required, and… well…” His cheeks reddened. “I should apologize to you for where my tongue has been.”
“Your—” Gwendolyn began, and then hushed abruptly, not really wanting to know more. Once again, she’d been kissed by lips she didn’t want to imagine where they’d been before. “Gods,” she said again because words failed her.
She really needn’t know such things, and, as for the other revelation—the fact that no one had faith in her ability to lead… Gwendolyn didn’t like his answer, but she understood.
Bryn flicked a discomforted glance at her hair, much grown now, but still definitively ruined. It was becoming unmanageable, falling into her eyes now and again, blinding her. For obvious reasons, she no longer had Innogen’s scarf to bind it.
In truth, Gwendolyn had never looked much like a proper lady. Now, with her new armor, she didn’t precisely look like a dirty little waif any longer, but she still didn’t look like a lady—a woman perhaps, but not a lady, nor a queen.
Conversely, Ely had a way about her that was exquisitely feminine. It was no wonder the Catuvellauni’s son had immediately taken a liking to her, and Gwendolyn hoped the man was equally deserving of Ely’s admiration. “Ely will be alright,” she reassured. “I intend to prove all the naysayers wrong, Bryn. I’m meant to lead Pretania. I know it. I feel it in my bones,” she lied again, knowing intuitively that if she didn’t at least sound like she believed it, no one else would either.
Come what may, Gwendolyn must face the Catuvellauni king with the surety of a queen, not the timorousness of a child.
“I know you will,” Bryn said with conviction, and his answer surprised her.
“You do?”
He smiled then. “You are the Dragon Queen, are you not? Little did Locrinus realize that, when he joined your two houses, he would seal his own doom. The dragon banners are united, Gwendolyn. This is all the prophecy demanded—not that your union provide you with wedded bliss.”
ChapterThirty-Three
Bryn was right.
The notion struck Gwendolyn with such force that it moved her heart—not with love, but perhaps with some inkling of the passion she would need to persuade the Catuvellauni chieftain.
Those Fae never once mandated that she must rule by her husband’s side, nor that their children be the hope of this isle, only that theirdraigbanners be united to stem the Red Tide. Thus, it would not matter whether they stood united in their sovereignty.
Now Gwendolyn must find some way to wrest control from Locrinus, and, for the first time, it no longer seemed entirely hopeless.
Considering that, she drove their numbers south, settling after two days’ travel in Dobunni territory. A little further south lay Atrebates, and betwixt the two provinces stood the Temple of the Dead—a holy place Gwendolyn had long hoped to visit. But not today. She’d not disrespect that sepulcher by bringing bloodshed to its door.
Stopping short of the Temple, they made camp directly in the Cod's Wold—primitive lands said to still be as wild as its people, only disguised as gentle, rolling hills.
Here, foolish fire was said to maunder aplenty, tempting wanderers into bogs where hobbs and boggarts were still reported to abide, along with great packs of monstrous hounds boasting fangs and claws like bears. These had once been Faerie lands before they were driven north, and below—the very heart of Pretania. Forces, not entirely dark, still lingered here, and despite that travelers were not always so fortunate, the Dobunni themselves remained mostly untroubled by otherworldly mischief—perhaps in part because of their Temple, their tribute to the Ancients.
The Druids were also invested there. So, too, were the Gwyddons and Awenydds—the former with their laboratories, and the latter with their academy ofphilosophia.
No tribe—even if they had a mind to and were not frightened of the creatures remaining in the area—would ever dare to disturb the peace in this province.
The closest anyone ever came to annexing Dobunni lands was in Cunedda’s marriage to Lowenna, but that counted for little then, and less now that he and Lowenna were both dead.
Gwendolyn always marveled over the irony that this one small territory in Pretania, which cared so little about kingdoms and borders and legacies, had somehow remained freer than most, annexed by no one. Even her father’s own ambitions had left the lands untouched, and their Cornish borders had ended with Durotriges, recommencing again farther north to the Wrikon in Cornovia.
Simply by its wildness alone—its blue-green thickets so gnarled as to become impassable, its endless rolling hills, its moorlands painted in shades of pink, lavender and rose, and the bog-lands, where the unwary might be taken by the ankles and dragged down into the darkest depths of the unknown—this land proclaimed itself No-man's-land.
It was the perfect location to make a stand.
Even realizing their campfires would be visible for leagues, Gwendolyn planted her dragon pennant on the highest hill—retrieved by her Durotriges banner men. It was a bold move, but destiny did not favor the meek.
She was Pretania’s rightful queen, and she must no longer hide from her destiny.
Within a stone’s throw of the Temple of the Dead, she would mount her campaign, unafraid to face Druid, or Fae, hobbs or boggarts—let them all come!
From a seedling, a mighty trunk would grow, and this was where she would plant the seed of her sovereignship.
Those who camefrom Durotriges came with the tents and supplies.
Gwendolyn ordered the tents to be erected in the vale, with banners raised, be they dragon or other. If she would be queen of all, she must not oppress them.
