Dark and Bright by Anna Markland Read Free Book Online Page B

anyone. Now he found he constantly craved his beautiful wife. “It’s amazing the effect a magnificent pair of breasts can have on a man’s urges,” he confided to Baudoin one day. His brother-by-marriage nodded and laughed good naturedly.
    I’m suddenly a rutting stallion. Imagine after she bears our child.
    Rhys hardened whenever he conjured the image of his wife’s swollen breasts. It occasionally occurred to him his attraction to Annalise might be something more than simple lust, but he pushed the idea away. He was glad they were friends. He enjoyed their conversations, sharing with her the plans for the road improvements, and for their home at Powwydd. In friendship lay contentment and comfort.
    Annalise struggled with Welsh, but her English improved rapidly and that was the language they used most often. Rhys relished the occasions when she responded to his patient teaching and was able to speak a few words in his language. He particularly liked doing this when they were abed together and he taught her words of intimacy in Welsh.
    He wanted her to understand him when he told her in his own language how lovely she was, how enthralled he was by her bountiful breasts and how fulfilled he felt when he was inside her. It warmed his heart when she smiled in understanding as he whispered these words to her. She asked him to teach her how to tell him that she loved to feel his manhood inside her. When she repeated his words in her halting Welsh it inflamed his already rampant need. Why was he disappointed she didn’t ask how to say, “I love you.”?
    ***
    It was decided Rhun and Rhydderch would accompany Baudoin and Rhys on their journey to plan the road improvements they had in mind. This would allay the fears of any Welsh villages they planned to pass through. The twins were now as well known for their patriotism as their father had been. They expressed concerns about the involvement of a Norman Earl in the plans, and possibly Norman money from King Henry.
    Rhys shrugged off their hesitation. “It was Baudoin’s idea in the first place,” he retorted. “Baudoin is your brother-by-marriage. If his King wants to spend money helping the Welsh, isn’t that what we want?”
    Rhun still bristled. “But he talks of building wide roads. You know why, don’t you?”
    Rhydderch answered before Rhys had a chance to reply. “He wants it wide enough for soldiers to march abreast when they invade Wales.”
    Rhys snorted. “Baudoin isn’t going to invade Wales! Carys would never forgive him!”
    Even the twins laughed. Finally they agreed to participate. Perhaps at long last his little brothers were growing up! They were after all only two years younger than he was!
    The well equipped and provisioned group set off as soon as fair spring weather allowed. It consisted of five Normans skilled in cartography, fifty of Baudoin’s men-at-arms and a band of Rhun’s Welsh bowmen. Rhun was deadly with a bow. He could nock an arrow and kill a man before his enemy had time to blink. He and his twin were amicably competitive and well matched in most things, but Rhydderch readily admitted his brother’s superiority with a bow, and wasn’t jealous of it.
    They planned to travel from Ellesmere to Powwydd and thence across Wales to the coast, searching out the best route, noting where trees and undergrowth might have to be cleared. They would estimate how deep to dig trenches for the roads, and how much in the way of stones would be required to fill the bottom, and where they would procure such stone. In addition they would search for sources of gravel or cobblestones for the surface which they planned to build with a camber so that rain would run off into ditches at the sides.
    “We must calculate the number of men required for the completion of the plan over a number of years,” Rhys pointed out.
    Baudoin agreed. “And they’ll have to be provisioned and sheltered. It’s an ambitious undertaking we’re embarking on, my