For years, he had ignored the slow maneuverings of the civil and church courts. They thought to claim his holdings, all that had been bestowed upon him by the King’s own writ. He had not given it much thought, this assertion that his own estate in Morency should have gone to a ten-year-old child, daughter of the lord of Ruardean. Only a fool would contest the King’s right to give lands where he saw fit. A fool, or an estate as strong as Ruardean.

Their claim may have been as true as Holy Scripture, but as far as Ranulf was concerned it had no merit. Morency had commanded a price higher than honor. He had paid for it with a coin more precious than gold, and he would not have it taken from him.

“Morency is mine. Holding me here will not further your suit, but a woman would not see the uselessness of that. What has brought Ruardean so low that a woman greets me? Who rules here?”

Her calm in the face of his insult was vaguely familiar. She merely glanced to the door, as though to assure herself that the guard was there, and she was safe from any real harm. “I hold the keep in my husband’s absence, with the aid of my husband’s brother,” she answered simply.

He let her inadequate response hang in the silence between them as he looked down at her. He was kept here, under guard, refused his horse and armor; it reduced him to finding advantage in his height, which allowed him to loom over her in a satisfactory way while she flushed. A small step backward, a quick look to the side, and she answered him more fully.

“Believe me or no, my lord, we did not lie in wait for you to cross into Wales and capture you. Was happenstance that led a party out of Ruardean to find you wandering in the wilds, no more than that.”

Her words rang true, if only because reason could not have it otherwise. None knew where he traveled – even he had set out with little idea of where he went. He acknowledged the irony of it with a humored curl of his lip. It was hellish luck of a piece with the rest of this misadventure, that of all the misfortune that might befall him, it was Ruardean who stumbled upon him.

“And my lady of Ruardean turns happenstance to fortune. I would say it is proof God supports your suit against me, if the clerics did not prove that false by their endless debate on the matter.”

She forbore to respond to that, choosing a topic more near to his immediate interests.

“Our physician tells me you are healing well. I offer you the hospitality of this manor until, in good time, you are well enough to travel.”

“Pretty words,” he granted. “Your hospitality knows no bounds. Is a fine guard you set on me.”