The Wind From Hastings by Morgan Llywelyn Page B

floor.
    So changed was my life from anything I had known that at first I felt like a very small child again. Prince Griffith got me tutors in the language and the Laws. The Welsh people set mighty store by the Laws handed down from King Hywel the Good. Unlike Ireland, in Wales only the Christmen read and write, so these laws are handed down by mouth from one generation to the next. But they are most strictly observed! Among the Welsh, a man’s word is his bond, and if he breaks it even in small ways he is shunned by all the community.
    My tutor in the Laws was Cynan, a cousin of Griffith and as such honor-bound to him in all things. “The tribal feeling is very strong here, my lady,” he told me. “Unlike the Saxons and the Danes, who slay one another out of hand, father against son, we believe that our strength is in the unity of the family. Kinship is reckoned exclusively through the males, but as the wife of Griffith ap Llywelyn you will be expected to know all the family pedigree and pass it on to your sons.”
    â€œAnd if I have no sons … ?” I made bold to ask.
    Cynan smiled. “You will, my lady. You are young and strong, and our Prince is very virile. He has many sons hereabout.”
    â€œHe was married before?”
    â€œNot to a great house. His children are by his concubines, but under the Laws we do not disinherit such children. And you may be assured, my lady,” he added hastily, “Prince Griffith will set aside his concubines out of honor to you when you are wed!”

    It was Griffith himself who told me of my most noteworthy predecessor. On a radiant spring afternoon, when I had gone for a ride on my gray pony with only the loyal Madog for companion, Griffith rode out to meet us and sent Madog on some made-up errand.
    â€œAre you happy in the land of the Cymry?” Griffith asked me seriously as soon as we were alone.
    â€œYes, I think I am very happy. I am a little surprised by that; I was not sure.”
    He laughed. My Griffith laughed a lot. “Neither was I sure when I asked your sire to send you to me. But, having seen you, I am most pleased. It was time for me to make an alliance outside our kingdom; I would play a part in the world that lies beyond the mountains and perhaps see my sons as rulers in all of Britain one day.”
    It was the right time. “You have sons already? Cynan spoke of them.”
    How sensitive he was, how quick to shield me from imagined hurt! “I have sons born of youth and a man’s needs, Aldith. I have no heir to Gwynedd and Wales.”
    â€œBut you were married before, my lord?”
    He gazed into far distances. “I took for wife the wife of a rival I defeated. She was beautiful, and I thought it made my victory over him complete. But it was not a good thing, Aldith; we were not suited. Had she not died I might have had to set her aside, or awake some morning to find her dagger in my back.”
    A shiver of horror went up my spine. I felt a quick sense of loss and tragedy for that killing that—thank God—had never happened.
    â€œDo you think we will be suited, my lord?” I asked, keeping my eyes turned down so that he might see the sweep of my lashes and the curve of my cheek.
    Griffith laughed again, the black mood gone from him in a moment. “I am taking time to be sure!” he said. “When we are wed I shall expect you to stand at my back, covering it, not stabbing it. So I would court you now and make a friend of you, Aldith, that I need
not fear in the future!” He put his hand on my sleeve. “And you, what do you think?”
    I could not flirt or dissemble with him. He seemed to know me too deeply; there was no way but truth. “I pray we will be suited, my lord, for the thought of marriage with you pleases me and I grow anxious for my lord father’s return!”
    â€œEverything need not wait until then, Aldith.” He was not smiling now, his eyes