The girl looked doubtful. “Mama says noblemen hurt little peasant girls they find.”
Emily stroked her hair back from her face. “Your mother is no doubt right and you should avoid them as a rule, but this one is different from the others. I promise you he’ll not harm you one bit.”
“But he’s so big!”
Emily cast a glance at him over her shoulder. “He is at that, but I bet you’ll be better able to see through the crowd in his arms and find your mother.”
The girl bit her lip, then nodded. She let go of Emily and held her arms out to him.
As gently as he could, Draven took the girl. He froze for a moment at the odd sensation of holding a child. He’d never done such in his life. But it felt good to have those spindly little arms of hers around him and to hear her young laughter in his ear.
“He’s hard! Not soft like you, milady.”
Emily patted the girl’s back, her hand brushing his as she did so.
Longing hit him so hard in his chest, he lost his breath for a moment. ‘Twas the longing one felt from a remembered dream that had been banished and forgotten.
And for a moment, he allowed himself to think of what life would be like if he dared take a wife. Of what it would be like to carry his own child.
But as soon as the thought entered his mind, he heard the echoed memory of screams in his head. Felt the pain of his knee and knew in his heart that he could never dare take such a chance.
“Edyth!”
He turned at the cry of alarm.
“Mama!” the girl shouted, kicking her legs against him.
Draven set the girl down and she ran to the peasant woman who opened her arms to scoop her daughter up.
“Oh Edyth, I feared I’d lost you forever! I told you not to wander off.”
“I’m sorry, Mama. I won’t do it anymore again. I promise.”
Draven stood back as Emily approached them.
“Look, Mama!” Edyth held the sheepskin bag up to her mother. “The lady gave me sweet nuts.”
The woman looked from the girl’s hand up to Emily, then averted her gaze back to the ground. “My sincerest thanks, milady.”
“It was our pleasure. You have a most wonderful daughter.”
The woman nodded, took Edyth’s hand and led her away. As Emily turned back to face him, he saw the sadness in her eyes.
“What is it, milady?”
“I doubt you’d understand.” Her happiness dampened, she wended her way through the crowd at a much more subdued pace.
Draven said nothing more, but after a few minutes she spoke again. “She was a sweet child, wasn’t she?”
He shrugged. “Having never been around one before, I have no basis for comparison.”
An unhappy smile curved her lips as she again brushed a strand of hair behind her ear. “I’ve been around many. Everyone of them is precious in his or her own way.”
“Then why haven’t you married?”
“My father refuses,” she said wistfully as she walked onward. “No matter how I beg or plead, he won’t have it.”
“Why?”
