The horse-dealer's name was Pierre, and he dealt in war stallions, brood mares and endurance horses for distance travelling and the hunt. He was the last in a long line of dealers visited by Mauger and Julitta that morning. It was close on noontide now, the sun high and hot. Mauger wore a frown, and his eyes were heavy. He was still suffering from the aftermath of the sea journey, and the red heat of the sun, the dust and the market place smells, had all combined to give him a nauseous headache.

He had never looked at so many horses and discovered so many nags. The southern lands might be famous for their bloodstock, but he had seen precious little so far. Scrubby ponies, cow-heeled knock-kneed jades, broken-winded hacks; the parade had been endless, yet he had seen nothing to suit the tastes of Duke Robert of Normandy. The problem with looking for gold was sifting through the dross to find it.

Pierre was short and stocky, of a similar build to Mauger, but larger and softer in the gut. He had curly blue-black hair and the skin of his face was deeply pitted. Shrewd black eyes assessed his potential customers and he spread his hands towards his merchandise. 'You want warhorses?' he enquired. 'You have come to the right place.'

Julitta had heard that opening gambit several times and was not impressed; however, she kept her eyes modestly downcast and hung back a little. Pierre flashed her an assessing glance as if considering the points of a young mare ripe to be serviced.

'I will be the judge of that,' Mauger said tersely. 'Let me see what you have.'

Pierre shrugged and smiled with his mouth but not his eyes, and gestured his groom to bring forward a cream-coloured stallion.

Mauger began an examination, running his hands lightly over the horse in search of lumps and defects. He looked in its mouth, discovered that it was around eleven years old, and shook his head. A younger animal was brought forth, a skittish bay with black points. Julitta went to cast her eye over the rest of Pierre's stock. Some animals were quite presentable, but there was nothing better than what they had at Brize or Ulverton.

Her eye was caught by a dappled grey courser standing quietly at the end of the line. It was a little short of fifteen hands high, its mane and tail pure silver against the smoky grey rings of its hide. Beside it stood a smaller, chestnut mare with a white star marking on her forehead and a white sock on her offside hind leg. Julitta admired the two horses, thinking that they were the best she had seen thus far, although sadly neither was of the type to turn into a destrier. They looked extremely like her father's horses, she thought, the mare from Brize, the gelding from the grey herds at Ulverton. Suddenly, despite the heat of the day she was cold.

'Cylu,' she said softly and approached the grey.

Immediately he turned his head, and with ears pricked, nickered to her. Julitta's stomach plummeted. She had expected the horse not to respond, or to turn a different face towards her, but there was no mistaking the small coronet of hair on Cylu's forehead that grew against the grain, nor the pink splash on his otherwise dark grey muzzle.

She compressed her lips, feeling sick. Pierre's groom gave her an anxious look. 'My lady?' he questioned. 'There is something wrong?'

'That grey horse, where did your master buy him?'

The groom shrugged. 'Master Pierre bought him and the mare from a Basque trader last week. Do you like him?' He smiled and patted Cylu's smooth dappled neck. 'A fine riding horse, and still young.'

Julitta would not have called ten years old still young, but the groom's small lie was swamped by the greater tide rising in her mind. She flung away from him and marched up to the horse-trader, who was in the middle of expounding the virtues of the young bay to Mauger. 'Master Pierre,' she interrupted, her voice and expression full of urgency, 'I want to ask you about the grey gelding and the chestnut mare over there.'

The man stared at her as if she had spoken in a different language. He was not accustomed to having his deals interrupted by women, and this one looked as if she was about to turn into a blazing termagant.

Mauger's lips tightened and he frowned at Julitta. 'Can you not see that we are busy,' he growled. 'Where is your modesty?'

'It flew out of the window the moment that I saw Cylu and Gisele's chestnut mare,' Julitta hotly retorted and pointed towards Pierre's other horses. 'Look for yourself.'

Mauger opened his mouth, shut it again with a snap, and glowered his way over to the line of animals. He walked around the grey gelding, while the bewildered groom looked on, and Pierre stood frowning, his hands on his hips and his moist lower lip thrust out.

'The same age,' Julitta declared. 'The same forehead mark and pink star on his muzzle. The groom told me that he and the mare were bought from a Basque trader.'

Mauger studied the chestnut mare too, and rubbed his aching forehead. 'Perhaps Benedict sold them,' he said to Julitta.

'Ben would never sell Cylu!' she declared with certainty. 'They have been together too long!'

'You cannot know Benedict's every thought,' he snapped irritably and turned to the trader who was watching them with wary eyes. 'We know these horses. They belong to my wife's sister and her husband.'

'They do not belong now,' Pierre said sharply. 'I bought them in Arachon from another trader who gathers his horses from far and wide.' He spread his hands in a choppy, aggressive gesture. 'Even if these horses did once belong to your kin, they do not any more. If you desire them, you will have to buy them the same as any other beast at this fair.'

'How much do you want?' Julitta demanded, her own tone easily matching Pierre's belligerence.

Pierre's complexion grew ruddy and his jaw made chewing motions. 'I do not deal with women,' he growled.

'And I do not deal with the…"

'How much do you want?' Mauger's voice cut across Julitta's final word. He seized her by the arm and twisted it so that she could not break free without snapping a bone. The pain made her writhe, but it also silenced her.

Mauger purchased Cylu and the mare, abandoned all intention of buying any other horses from Pierre, and in grim mood, drew Julitta away.

'You shame me!' he retorted. 'I will become a laughing stock.' He shook her arm upon which he still retained a savage grip.

Julitta gasped at the pain. 'Is that all your care?' she retorted in a choked voice. 'Does it not worry you to find Benedict's and Gisele's horses in the care of a trader?'

'Of course it does,' he snapped. 'But I hope I have more sense than to antagonise that trader by calling him a thief. You heard him. He bought Cylu and the mare in Arachon.'

'Something is wrong, Mauger, you know it is!'

He rolled his eyes. T have come to buy horses for the Duke of Normandy, not to pursue a niggling doubt hither and yon.' He gestured brusquely. 'Knowing Benedict, whatever has caused him to part with those two, he has landed on his feet. Not even a cat could better him at that game.'

'So you are going to do nothing?'

Mauger drew her on through the throng of people and horses. 'You are quite right,' he said grimly. 'I am going to do nothing.'

'But…'

He swung her round to face him, his light eyes showing a red rim of temper. 'Enough, Julitta. Push me no further.'

People were turning to look. Amusement glinted at the sight of an argument between husband and wife. Mauger's eyes flickered. He tightened his lips and with sudden purpose, dragged Julitta out of the market place and away in the direction of the lodging house. 'I should never have brought you with me this morning,' he growled, shouldering his way through the traders. 'Until we leave, you can stay with Madame Clothilde, and mind your distaff. I will not tolerate any more of this.' He yanked on her arm and tears burned her eyes, but they were of rage and pain, not self-pity or remorse.

Mauger deposited her at the lodging house, gave strict instructions to one of his grooms that she was not to leave the premises, and strode back to the horse fair to conduct his business alone.

Clothilde looked at the young woman sitting on a stool near the neatly swept hearth. She was rubbing her arm and struggling not to cry.

Clucking like a mother hen, Clothilde approached to comfort her, thinking that she had just witnessed the end of a young couple's tiff. 'There now, there now,' she soothed, setting her arm across Julitta's shoulders. 'Don't you fret, he'll be back, and you'll soon mend things between you.'

Julitta drew a shuddering breath. She raised her head and looked at Clothilde with brimming, burning eyes. 'I don't want him to come back!' she spat.

'Oh, come now, you don't mean that!'

Julitta sprang to her feet, thrusting off the woman's embrace. 'If I never saw him again it would be too soon!'

Clothilde uttered a horrified gasp and pressed her hands to her mouth. Mauger's groom was tying Cylu and the chestnut mare to a bridle ring in the wall. Now and then he cast a dark look towards the house.

Julitta narrowed her eyes, her mind racing with the speed of her temper. She drew a deep breath to steady herself and stepping outside, approached the grey gelding and the mare.

The groom eyed her sidelong. 'Mistress, Lord Mauger said that you were to stay within,' he said doubtfully.

'Surely there is no harm in this?' She stroked Cylu's sleek, grey neck and half-contemplated making her escape across his dependable back, but she knew that she would be conspicuous in a crowd. Besides, he was not wearing a saddle so her seat would be precarious.