Simon snorted. “Aye, I’m told even a monkey can be trained to?—”
Draven cut his words off with a sharp elbow to his stomach.
Simon sucked his breath in between his teeth and rubbed his belly.
Draven stepped away from Simon and gave her a pointed stare. “What troubles you?”
Emily looked about uneasily. “Who says I am troubled?”
“I can tell.”
What good would it do to hide her feelings from him? Indeed, she suddenly felt a strange urge to confide in him.
“Did my sister seem strange to you?”
“Since I have never met her before I would say she seemed fine to me.”
“She didn’t seem stressed, or nervous?”
“Her wedding is on the morrow. I would imagine nervousness is typical.”
“Perhaps.”
And yet....
Emily shook her head. “I’m no doubt being foolish. Come, milords. Let me see you fed and then taken to your chambers.”
Draven allowed her to lead him across the hall, all the while damning himself for not leaving. He should never have come here. Hugh was his mortal enemy and everything about the man screamed that they weren’t welcomed here.
So much for his sense of chivalry. Better he be flogged than surrounded by so many who would see him fall.
Unlike Emily, he could well understand her sister’s misgivings about such a crowd. Who wanted to be a spectacle?
After they were fed, Emily left them for a time to socialize with her family.
Simon handed him a goblet of ale and Draven drained it in one gulp.
“Lord Draven, Earl of Ravenswood?”
Draven turned at the unfamiliar voice to see a knight only a few years older than himself, standing behind his chair. “Aye?”
“Niles, Baron of Montclef.” He extended his arm. “Soon to be bridegroom. I heard from my betrothed that you were here and I wanted to shake the arm of the man so well famed.”
Draven shook his arm, but was immediately on guard. Those who flattered him were most often those to be watched the most closely. Especially when his back was turned.
And there was something about this man that he liked not at all, though for his life he couldn’t lay finger to what it was. Just something about Niles’ demeanor that set him on edge.
Emily and her father walked past.
Without thought, Draven’s gaze trailed after them.
Montclef laughed and clapped him on the back.
Draven did his best not to strike the baron. He could barely tolerate Simon doing such, but a stranger....
It made his blood boil.
“You have good taste, milord,” Montclef said with a laugh as he, too, watched the sway of Emily’s hips with more than just a passing interest. “Tell me, though, is there anything better in life than bloodying your sword on a virgin field?”
