As they cross the river at Ludford Bridge, she looks up, following the keening of a fork-tailed kite. She squints her eye against the castle’s crenellated bulk, set alight by a lowering sun. The bird wheels against a sky that’s been blue and cloudless all day and is fingered now with pink and gold. Though her back aches and the sweat clings beneath her arms and breasts, she feels a lightening within herself. She looks across and sees that Richard, too, is looking up, his long hand shielding his view. When he turns to her, she’s surprised how easy it is to return his smile.

He taps the golden head before him. ‘Look, Edward …’ His finger points the way. ‘Ludlow.’

The nave is so newly finished that the smell of paint and fresh carved wood is headier even than the incense that clouds her view. Here too, as at Fotheringhay, they are building a gift to God. Not alone this time, for the churches of the western March are built on the backs of sheep, by merchants rich in wool. But they’ve given generous alms to rebuild Ludlow’s church and make it the finest in the March. The nave and chancel are all but finished, though the bell tower still rings to the sound of hammers.

They have come, at the request of the town’s aldermen and council, to a service of thanks; thanks for Richard’s good lordship and for the new charter that will protect Ludlow’s wealth and rights while its duke labours for the King in the wild lands to the west.

‘Do they think you’re unlikely to come back?’ Cecily had teased him.

‘I suspect they believe we will be spirited away by water sprites.’

‘More likely murdered in our beds by the native Irish. Or drowned in a rainy bog.’

Richard had grinned at that. ‘I think you will like it more than you imagine.’

He has spoken to her of his hopes. They can do good work in Ireland; work that will be profitable and raise revenues for the royal exchequer. There is no rival king there as in France, just petty lords too busy fighting among themselves to seriously threaten the Crown. So what if the Irish begin to look across the Channel and think they can do as the French have done? He will nip it in the bud. He will knock their heads together. He will give them sound administration, strong justice, and they will be content.

‘Let’s live as your brother does. As your father did. Doing good work for the King, far from court, in our own lands.’ And he is in earnest.