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“Aye.” Hugh looked grim. “There are many who would recognize Wharton and betray him for twelve gold coins.”

That made her squirm yet again. She tried to keep faith in what she thought was best, as Lady Corliss had instructed, but were there those who would wreak havoc on the abbey for sheltering these two men? Had she brought disaster on them all?

In a voice that sounded amused, he asked, “Are you really so inept the nuns wouldn’t have believed you could trap a rabbit?”

“I am not inept at all! But taking a rabbit from the royal forest is poaching, and our abbess takes a dim view of such dishonesty,” she replied.

“You could tell her it died at your feet.”

“I can’t lie to Lady Corliss. She looks at me so calmly through those blue eyes and—” At the memory of that kind gaze and the disappointment a transgression brought, Edlyn shuddered. “Nay, I can’t. Anyway, I really wouldn’t know how to explain I needed an extra helping to bring to the dispensary.”

He nodded, understanding that. “So what happened to the rest of the rabbit?”

“Wharton and I ate it.” She waited for him to snarl at her for her selfishness.

Instead his gaze swept her. “Good. You look like you could use a meal.”

A jab of gloom surprised her. She remembered a time when Robin had spent a whole day just gazing at her naked body, stroking her, admiring her. Her body was the best he’d ever seen, he claimed, and her body had been the one chain she thought would keep him bound to her.

Silly woman that she had been. His boundless delight in her physical appearance had never faded, but nothing chained Robin. And now Hugh looked at her without interest and called her skinny.

It was stupid to care or to let Hugh’s consistent indifference dig at her. After all, what had the man done but ignore her childish infatuation and go on with his life?

Reaching into her bag, she brought out a crust of bread she’d saved from her own meal and dunked it into the broth, then transferred it to his open mouth.

“Mm.” He closed his eyes and sighed as if tasting paradise.

Then he opened them, and she knew he had focused on a new problem.

“How old are your sons?” he asked.

“They have both seen eight winters.”

“Twins?”

She gave the answer she always did. “Two boys as alike as you would ever see.”

“So rare that both children survived birth.”

She didn’t answer that.

“’Tis time they were fostered.” He spoke briskly.

She answered in a like tone. “They have been fostered. Our abbot from the adjoining monastery has taken them under his wing, and even now they travel on their first pilgrimage.”

“A pilgrimage?” His brows lowered, and he chewed the new sop of bread thoroughly before he replied. “An abbot? You have placed them with an abbot?”

His incredulity galled her. “Who else would you suggest?”

“For the earl of Jagger’s sons? They should be pages in a knight’s household.”

“They don’t want to be in a knight’s household.” She pointed the spoon at him for emphasis. “They want to be monks.”

“The earl of Jagger’s sons want to be monks?”

His voice hit a note she’d never heard him use before, and she answered defensively, “They do.”

“A waste! The earl of Jagger was one of the finest fighters I ever met. Why, he almost defeated me!”