Visions of her popping into the kitchen out of some mystery hole in a storage closet filled his thoughts as he made his way through the back halls and down the stairs, until he stood on the bottom step in the main entry hall of Tordenet.
“Here, now! Where do you think yer going?” Cook stood in the entryway to the great hall, a cloth-covered basket on her hip. “What are you doing here at this hour?”
“Kitchen,” Chase blurted out, the first word that came into his mind upon seeing the cook. “I’m starving this morning.” Not too far off the mark, come to think of it.
“Get back to yer kitchens, Cook. I’ll see to him.” Ulfr descended the staircase at the back of the hallway, his arm around a smaller figure whose features remained hidden in the recesses of a heavy cloak. “And as for you, Noble, you’ll wait for the morningmeal like everyone else. Or in yer case, you’ll eat what’s in yer pack as you ride.”
Chase dipped his head respectfully, grateful he’d made it this far unnoticed, considering how many people apparently wandered the halls at this hour.
“Whatever you say, Captain. But it’s a damn shame a man can’t find some bread or fruit or something fit to put in his belly around here.”
His stomach chose that moment to rumble loudly. He really was hungry, having missed his evening meal in favor of something much more appealing.
“It’s yer arse, no yer belly, what will get the workout this day. Even now Artur assembles the men to accompany us to the Sinclair. So be off with you. It’s time you were readying yer mount for the ride. We leave as soon as I see this one home.” Ulfr growled the last, shoving his companion ahead of him.
The woman gasped as a cold burst of wind buffeted her at the open doorway, tossing the hood of her cloak back.
Chase recognized her as one of the servers he’d seen in the great hall at mealtime, a small, dark-haired woman who, from the back, he’d more than once confused with Christiana.
No confusing her now, not with her eyes swollen shut and blood oozing from the cuts to her lower lip.
“What happened to you?”
“Best you move along and forget what you’ve seen here,” Ulfr warned quietly, pulling the hoodback up over the woman’s head. “This concerns none but our laird.”
Torquil had done that to her?
Walking back to the barracks, Chase sent a silent thanks to the Fae that he’d soon have Christiana out of this place, even as his mind scrambled to figure out some way to make the beast who ruled this castle pay for what he’d done to that poor woman.
HE’D SAID HEloved her.
Christiana bent to the floor to retrieve her chemise and dropped it over her head.
I love you.He’d said those very words not five minutes past.
Neither her physical exhaustion nor her concern over Chase’s obvious lack of belief in the power of the Norns could steal this joy from her. She wouldn’t allow it.
Instead, she’d consider how to keep him safe in spite of his erroneous belief that he could control what was to come. The future was woven and could not be undone. She was confident in that knowledge, though the memory of the gaping hole she’d seen in the distance did trouble her a little.
What if, as Chase claimed, the Faerie’s interference had changed everything?
“No,” she whispered aloud, crossing the room to pick up her overdress.
She couldn’t lose faith now. It was much morelikely that the alternative Chase had devised was waiting there in Skuld’s world, a path already woven, simply obscured by the Mysts.
With a sharp snap of the cloth, she shook the overdress in an effort to eliminate a few of the wrinkles caused by the garment’s lying in a crumpled heap upon the floor.
“Worth every wrinkle,” she murmured, a smile returning to her lips.
She would not waste her energy on this worry. It could all be resolved easily enough when next she traveled to Skuld’s world.
A glance at the deep gray light around the shutters assured her the morning’s sun hadn’t yet pushed its way above the horizon. Even now the cook’s helpers would be buzzing about the storage rooms, like bees at a hive, gathering all the ingredients for the morning meal. She had a good half hour or more before she could slip unseen through that exit.
Plenty of time to spread the blanket back over the bed so it wouldn’t be obvious anyone had been here. Plenty of time to lie down for a moment or two, just to rest her eyes while she held to her breast the pillow that still carried Chase’s scent.
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Thirty
