The Running Vixen Read Online Free PDF

early remarriage.’
    ‘You are willing to sacrifice her in the name of policy?’
    Guyon looked irritated. ‘Grow up, Adam. How often are matches made without a practical reason behind them? It’s hardly a sacrifice. She likes him well enough, and Warrin’s matured since those early days. Still likes his own way and has the will to get it, but that happens to be an advantage when it comes to dealing with my daughter. She’d walk all over a man of less character. You know what she’s like.’
    ‘Not the kind to live in amity with a man of de Mortimer’s ilk for long,’ Adam said thickly. ‘What will you do if he thrashes her? As I remember, it was his every remedy for those who baulked his will or answered him back.’
    ‘I told you, he’s learned control since then. People change as they mature. She is my only daughter, and precious for the memory of her mother as well as for herself. I would never put her in a situation where I thought she would be unhappy.’
    Adam said nothing, but his lips thinned.
    ‘I realise that you and Warrin hate the sight of each other, that it goes gut-deep, and I know you are tired from your journey, so I make allowances. Suffice to say the final choice is my daughter’s. I won’t constrain her to anything she does not desire of her own free will, and she knows it.’
    Adam pinched the bridge of his nose. Gut-deep, so Guyon said. Yes, it affected him thus: a quivering tension in the belly, but it also ran bone-deep and soul-deep, and was not something he would ever be able to discuss with detachment. Better to change the subject before there was a rift.
    ‘How fares Lord Miles? Is he still well?’
    ‘Fit as a flea considering his years!’ Guyon laughed with relief in his voice, equally anxious not to quarrel. ‘The damp plagues his bones and he tires more quickly than he used to, particularly since Alicia’s death. She was a full ten years younger than he was and he always thought he would go first. He’s taken William into the hills for a few days. The boy wants to learn to track like a Welshman, and my father’s obliging, although I don’t believe the lad’s capable of keeping still for longer than the time it takes to blink. They’re due home tomorrow or the next day.’
    Adam said ruefully, ‘I keep thinking of William as a babe in arms, it hardly seems a day since his baptism.’
    ‘Three months after the White Ship went down and our future security with it.’ Guyon’s expression was suddenly harsh. ‘God grant the lad a warrior’s arm and a lawyer’s cunning when he comes to manhood. He’s going to need both.’

2
    Adam snapped open his eyes and listened to the darkness with pounding heart and straining ears. The air in the small wall chamber was as thick as black wool and as difficult to breathe. Sweat crawled over his body like an army of spiders. Uttering a groan, he bent his forearm across his eyes.
    At the foot of his pallet the straw rustled. ‘Sire?’ his squire said anxiously and Adam heard the youth fumbling about for tinder and flint, then striking a spark on some shavings and lighting the candle. Jagged shadows flickered on the walls and made him think of the descriptions of hell that zealous priests sometimes fed their congregations.
    ‘Sire?’ the squire said again.
    Adam lowered his arm and saw the frightened glitter in the youth’s eyes. ‘I’m all right, Austin, nothing but a bad dream.’ Sitting up, he motioned to the wine jug.
    The youth splashed a half-measure into the cup beside it and anxiously handed it across. Adam drank thirstily, then looked over the rim at the youth. ‘Oh in God’s name, stop staring at me like that, I’m all right. With the sort of life we’ve led recently, the wonder would be if I did not ride the nightmares!’
    Austin chewed his lip. ‘Sorry, sir. It is just that you seemed troubled earlier before we retired.’
    Troubled was not the word. Adam shook his head mutely at the youth and thought of