“It would please me much.”
Alexander inclined his head, then led Reinhold away.
Orrick took a deep breath. “What of the money I owe the king?”
“What money?” Draven asked.
“The money I?—”
“My Lord Orrick,” Simon interrupted. “You misunderstood my brother’s question. What money?”
Tears gathered in Orrick’s eyes as he cleared his throat. “You would do that for me?”
Draven didn’t answer, instead he turned on his heel and left the room.
Orrick sat down and wept.
Emily sat there in silence as Christina comforted her husband.
Knowing Orrick didn’t appreciate an audience for his tears, Emily excused herself and went to find Lord Draven.
He’d returned to the council room across the hall. She pushed open the door he’d left ajar and stepped tentatively into the room.
He stood with his back to her, closing up the ledgers he’d been reviewing.
“Milord?”
He paused at her voice, then continued closing the books without looking at her. “Aye, milady?”
“Why did you do that?”
Draven returned the books to the shelf on the far wall. “He’s a good man who loves his family. Why should I see him dead for it?”
In that instant, she realized something. This was not a man who would raid a village and slaughter innocent people in their beds. Her father was sorely wrong about Draven. “You didn’t attack my father’s village, did you?”
He turned around to look at her, his face aghast. “You think I would do such a thing?”
His look was too sincere to be feigned. “Nay, but my father thinks so.”
“Don’t take this the wrong way, milady, but your father is a fool.”
“Tell me, milord,” she asked with a smile. “Is there a right way to take that?”
He didn’t smile back. Instead, he turned back to the books and finished putting them away.
Emily moved to help him. She saw the dark pain in his eyes. Something about all this troubled him.
“What is it?” she asked.
“What is what?”
She tilted her head and looked up at him with a frown. “There is a thought on your mind that you haven’t voiced.”
“There are many thoughts on my mind that I never voice,” he said evasively.
“This one troubles you.”
“They all trouble me in one way or another.”
