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Page 29
it is very amusing that it is foretold so differently for me on each side of the border. My family sent me here because they believed I could not be content with the tame ways of Sussex. Now you tell me I will soon tire of the wild ways of Wales. I do not think so. I do not think I will ever wish to leave my lands, except for some small times to be with those I love."
"You are too young to know what you believe," Rhiannon said sharply, as if she were trying to convince herself.
"Ah, grandmother," Simon teased, "your gray hair and wrinkles make me sure the wisdom of great age infuses the words you speak. How old are you, Rhiannon? Sixteen? Seventeen?"
"I am one and twenty, and women are always older than men." She paused, bit her lip, and said even more sharply, "And when did I so shame myself that I have descended from Lady Rhiannon to Rhiannon alone?"
"I beg your pardon, my lady." Simon bowed deeply and without mockery, but his eyes still twinkled with mischief. "No affront was intended. You so enchanted me with your time-won knowledge of men that for a moment I lost my sense of propriety and spoke as a man to his loved one, without formality."
"You never had a grain of propriety to lose," Rhiannon snapped, but the corners of her mouth turned upward. "Do you not know it is highly improper to ask a woman's age? And do not bother to find another smooth reply. I am not your beloved"
"Yes, you are," Simon interrupted. "You may refuse to love me, but you cannot stop me from loving you."
At which point, Rhiannon gave in and began to laugh again. She put out her hand. "Come, let us be friends. I would like to be the friend of a man who does not fear the voices in the winds around Dinas Emrys, and who has firmly decided he is in love with me after half an hour's acquaintance."
But Simon would not take her hand. "I do not wish

 
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