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Page 263
have talked the king around already. It is unfortunate that Rhiannon and Simon were not here sooner.''
"How could they have come sooner?" Ian protested, leaning forward to pat Rhiannon's shoulder protectively. "Simon needed to go to Llewelyn first. Then, it is slow traveling through the hills of Wales."
I am not blaming Rhiannon, Ian," Joanna assured him, smiling. "It was the same as if I said, 'It is too bad it is raining.' But it is too bad. If we could have presented her sooner, she could have said this and that to remind Henry that Winchester led him wrong in Wales."
"Wait, now," Simon said. "I do not mind being a cat's-paw myself in a good cause, but I do not think I like the idea of Rhiannon incurring Henry's wrathand I do not think that was what Prince Llewelyn intended."
"Nor is it what Joanna intended either." Gilliane's silken soothing voice somehow smothered Joanna's indignant retort. "To the contrary, Rhiannon's theme must have been of Llewelyn's regard for Henrythey are, after all, related by marriageand of his regret that bad management and bad advice had caused the king's discomfiture. She could have said, with perfect truth, that foreign mercenaries are useless in Wales. It was Winchester who proposed the use of mercenaries, was it not, Adam?"
"Yes, it was." Adam's bright eyes fixed on Rhiannon.
"Yes, and I could sayalso with perfect truththat my father even dangled me as bait to keep the young bucks at court and prevent them from raiding. Only, of course, once Henry crossed onto Welsh lands, nothing would hold them back."
Alinor tsked with irritation. "You could have indeed, but it is too late. Winchester has had ten days and more to explain his failure and blame it elsewhere."
"Yes," Geoffrey sighed, "and I fear that Llewelyn is not so far off in his guesses as I would like. If the

 
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