Under the onslaught of her charm, he felt his mask slipping. “’Tis best to be on the safe side. These old floors can be tricky, ye ken.”
She giggled deliciously as he led her down to the next landing and the chambers she had been banished to. They halted outside her door.
“Did ye enjoy our outing today?” he asked, craftily managing to maneuver her so she was leaning against the wall by the door and placing his arms on either side of her, so she could not escape. He was half hoping she would invite him inside.
Her cheeks turned a delightful pink, and it excited him to know he was making her nervous, but he could not seem to stop himself.
“Aye, I did. Thank ye, it was fun,” she answered with only a little tremor in her voice, looking up at him with her melting brown eyes.
He leaned closer, looking down at her cleavage.
She has nay idea what she does to me! Thank God she cannae read me mind.
“Did ye have a nice time?” she asked demurely.
“Aye, I did, thank ye.” Then, before he could stop himself, he blurted out, “We have only three dates left.”Before ye give yerself to me like ye promised.
“I dinnae need to be reminded. What do ye think we’ll do on our third outing?” she asked, looking at him with a shy smile that made his belly flip.
“Dinnae worry yer head about that. I have an idea or two up me sleeve, but it’ll be a surprise, like always,” he told her, close enough to kiss her again, breathing in her light, floral scent.
He was already planning to take her somewhere secluded, where they would be completely alone. No Zander, no villagers, no one to see what they got up to. The kisses they had shared so far held so much erotic promise that he could hardly wait to see what would happen.
Stop! Stop before this goes too far, ye fool!
“’Tis a good thing I like surprises then,” she replied and slipped out from under his arm before he could stop her, opening the door to her chambers and stepping over the threshold. “Sleep well, husband,” she said, disappearing inside and shutting the door firmly behind her.
Damn! I should have kissed her again.
Despite his frustration at having let her slip away so easily, another part of him was thankful that she had so cleverly eluded him.
’Tis better this way,he told himself as he made his way to his chambers, for another night of solitude.
Once in bed, he lay with his arms behind his head, his long legs crossed beneath the covers, unable to help picturing himself peeling her clothes off her one by one, to finally reveal the luscious curves he had only glimpsed beneath her nightdress. It aroused him so much that he was forced to take himself in hand before he could rest.
It was her he was thinking of when he finally snuffed out the candles and lay in the red glow of the fire. Perhaps that was the reason why he dozed off without feeling afraid to surrender to sleep as he did most nights.
He fell into his familiar hell. What light there was to see by was dim and red-tinted. Where the sky should have been was a beaten sheet of blue-grey pewter that pressed down on him like a dead weight. Vizor down, the world reduced to a slit, he was deep within the melee as he always was, gripping his bloodied sword in one fist, his shield and dirk in the other, dripping with gore.
The very air around him trembled as if from thunder, alive with sound, filled with roars, shouts, groans, curses, prayers, and the agonized screams of the fallen. Smashing, crunching, slicing, grunting, thudding, shrieking, bones cracking, metalclashing, shields splintering, blow after blow after relentless blow. He was just another warrior on the eternal battlefield, slogging on, trading blows, fighting for his life, with no choice but to suck in the air that was thick with fine crimson droplets and the stink of butchered bodies.
He smashed his shield into his enemy’s, and with a flick of his wrist, he slit the man’s gullet open with his concealed dirk. The man gasped and collapsed at his feet, trying in vain to hold his entrails in. Edan stepped over him and stood for a second, panting for breath.
Glancing up, he saw the black outlines of the crows wheeling above, cawing excitedly, eager to gorge themselves on the man-made carnage below. The sight filled him with fear. He did not mind a quick death so much as a slow one. He had witnessed many men go down and the birds come and feast on their eyes while they were still alive.
He looked down at the ground, and his terror heightened, for beneath his boots was a filthy, squelching mixture of mud and blood and bone and body parts that pulled at his boots with every step, threatening to engulf him like quicksand if he made one wrong move. One slip would be fatal.
His limbs felt weighted with rocks, his bones saturated by exhaustion, but foes still crept up on him, an endless procession of shadowy warriors with devilish faces who hacked and smashed at him in the battle that raged endlessly in his wounded mind. He had to keep fighting, or he knew he would die and be consumed by the hungry morass beneath him.
11
Then, cutting across the roar of battle, came Olivia’s voice, screaming, “Edan! Edan. Help me, please! Come, I need ye. Save me, Edan save me!”
Her cries galvanized him. He shook himself, threw back his vizor, and scanned the field around him. Through the hellish haze, Olivia was nowhere in sight.
Then, a cold wind whipped at him, and a clear view opened up to the far end of the field, beyond the hazy fringes of the battle.
There she was!She was on horseback, riding like the wind towards the forest, skirts and hair billowing behind her, desperately screaming his name. “Edan, hurry! Please, save me!”
