“Prince Gruffydd has put your life at risk, for if you bear his child there are some who will not abide it. They would see you dead first.”

Nan almost said she knew no Prince Gruffydd. She only knew her Welshman, who would never put her in danger.

“And I would see them dead before their breath fell on me,” she answered simply.

Lady Eluned inclined her head. “I do not doubt it.”

She drank, then set a piece of bread before Nan and took one up for herself. Neither of them ate. The sun had dimmed, and the sound of a soft rain reached them as Nan looked at the bread and remembered his face when she had first set a loaf in his hands.

“I should have known he were a prince,” she said.

He had been nothing but bones and beard. What meat the thieves had let him have, he had given to the hunting birds so that they would stay in perfect health. Nan knew starvation, how it drove pity from a man’s heart and sense from his head. Most anyone starving would eat whatever they could, no matter the consequence. But he had seen past his own suffering and kept the birds alive. Not only because he knew if they died, he would die too, but because his duty to protect them was more important. That was what the truly great lords did, at least in all the tales she had heard: in times of crisis, they could see what sacrifices must be made, and took the cost on themselves.

“No matter who he is, if you have sworn vows to each other – even if they were spoken in secret with no witness – I will see that he holds to them, if you wish it.” Lady Eluned’s voice was gentle, her face stony. “And if you would deny those same vows, I will hold him to that as well. It is for you to say what the truth of it is, or what it will be.”

Nan blinked at this offer to shape reality to her preference. But the truth was sufficient.

“We said no vows. He made me no promises.”

A wellspring of misery and remembered joy sprang up in her. The way his face had filled with happiness when she said they would go to Aderinyth together – it would be in her mind forever. Now he would go alone. Or the king would kill him, or chain him up. She did not know what would happen to him, because these were the matters of great people who built castles and led armies, and what did she know but how to stir a soup and throw a knife?