Prince Harry met William’s eyes with a hard look of his own. “I am your prince, FitzAlan. I answer to no man, save the king. Still, I will tell you what you want to know. But listen well, for I’ll not speak of it again.
“I care too deeply for your lady wife to dishonor her by making her my mistress,” the prince said, enunciating every word clearly. “And Catherine would never consent to it. She respects me as her future king, but she loves me as a brother. Ayoungerbrother.”
“And you, sire?” William asked in a tight voice. “May I ask the nature of your feelings for my wife?”
“I will not tell you I’ve never felt desire for her,” Prince Harry said, meeting his eyes with a steady gaze. “But I have known since I was twelve I could not marry her. While a woman as astute as Catherine would be an asset, I must make a marriage that is an alliance for England.
“Since I could not make Catherine my queen, and I would not make her my mistress,” the prince said, “I remain her friend. And happily so.”
With his speech finished, Prince Harry considered the question settled and the subject closed. He moved at once to the problem before them.
“ ’Tis useless to ask the king to trade Gruffydd for her,” the prince said, rubbing his chin. “I am not certain my father would give up Glyndwr’s son even if it were me the rebels held.”
William did not disagree.
“So we must think of another means to gain her safe return,” the prince said. “Stephen says she remained with Glyndwr’s army, traveling west, when the Tudors split off to deliver him to Monmouth.”
In the end, they agreed Prince Harry would send a message to the rebel leader advising him that the king could not be persuaded to release Gruffydd. The prince would enclose a letter from William offering a monetary ransom.
“In the meantime, we must discover where Catherine is being held,” William said. “Glyndwr may refuse to ransom her. I cannot rescue her if I do not know where she is.”
Prince Harry made the astonishing suggestion that William talk with Abbess Talcott.
“You never know,” Prince Harry said with a smile, “what news might come to the good abbess.”
Like most Northerners, William was related to half the nobility—and knew the rest—on both sides of the Scots-English border. Hostage-taking was so common in that region that it was almost a sport. If his wife had been kidnapped there, he could have found out where she was being held in half a day.
But he was at a loss as to how to find her in Wales. The language was different, the people hostile. Hostages taken deep into that country were not found until their ransoms were paid.
He did not know how a nun in an isolated abbey could help him discover where Catherine was, but he had no other notion what to do. He and Stephen set off for the abbey as soon as the prince was out the gates.
As they made the short ride, William could not help thinking of the last time he had ridden this path: the day he retrieved his bride from the abbey. Had he driven her to run from him again?
“Please, God, keep her safe,” he prayed. “Whether she went willingly or not, bring her back.”
This time, he entered the abbey grounds quietly and waited in the courtyard for one of the nuns to escort him and Stephen up to the abbess’s private rooms. When he reached the doorway to her parlor, he was too surprised to speak.
It could not be! There, chatting amiably with the abbess, his long legs stretched out before him, sat Catherine’s troubadour.
“Good afternoon, Lord FitzAlan,” the abbess greeted him.
William stared at the troubadour as Abbess Talcott exchanged greetings with Stephen.
Gesturing toward the troubadour, she said, “May I present Robert Fass?”
“We have met,” William bit out.
“After a fashion,” Robert said, an amused smile lifting the corners of his mouth. The man evidently was counting on William’s forbearance while on abbey grounds.
Abbess Talcott invited them to sit and passed around a tray of honey cakes. To William, she said in a low voice, “I’ve assigned another sister the task of baking.”
All the same, William waited until Stephen devoured two with no obvious ill effects before taking one himself.
When the abbess made no move to send the troubadour away so they could speak privately, he stated his business. “My wife has been taken hostage by the rebels. She was captured while on her way to visit you here, at the abbey.”
The abbess’s face showed deep concern but not surprise. “I only just heard the news from Robert.”
“In God’s name, how did he know of it?”