He looked down at her where she had sunk into a deep courtesy before him, her head bowed. There was a fond smile on his face as he stepped close and gave her a chuck under the chin. It was a fatherly gesture, far too familiar to be an ordinary exchange between lord and servant girl. Gryff’s confusion at it changed to amazement when Nan raised her face. She flushed with pleasure and looked at Lord Robert with a shy kind of delight, as though she not only did not mind that he touched her uninvited, but hoped he might do it again.

“You’ve been to Lincoln?” he asked her, and she nodded. “The message?”

“I have delivered it, my lord.” She glanced quickly in Robin’s direction, and then at Gryff, clearly indicating she had more to say when they might be more private.

“There will be time enough for tales after I greet your guest,” he said.

He turned to Gryff, who realized belatedly that he should bow. It was far more restrained than Nan’s show of deference, and in any case Lord Robert disregarded it in favor of an outthrust arm, a firm shake of his hand when Robin gave his name and said he was Welsh.

“It will be Gruffydd, then.” Lord Robert smiled at him like an old friend. “Though I will call you Gryff, do you prefer it. Well met, and my lady wife will be most glad to greet you.”

Nan gave a sharp intake of breath and looked at Lord Robert with an eager hope. “Aye,” he grinned, and Robin laughed. “You will find her in the solar above.”

He nodded to a stair, and Nan fairly ran to it, so fast was her step. They followed more slowly in her wake, with Robin telling of how he had met Nan on the road and hoped Lord Robert would be at Whitting but could not be sure, and so left it to be a surprise. Gryff knew they would ask how he and Nan had met, why he was with her, and he tried to think of some simple explanation for it. These people seemed as family to her, strangely as protective of a servant as they would be of a daughter and sister. They would not simply accept that he traveled alone with her.

They reached the solar, stepping inside just as Lord Robert was saying that his lady wife was Welsh too, and that his new lordship of Darian was in Wales – information that came too suddenly and too fast, and all at the same moment that Gryff saw the face of this lady wife. His heart stopped. Everything stopped.

Lady Eluned. Will’s mother. God help him, she would know him at a glance.