Lara tilted her head as if changingher view of him would explain this man who swore his disdain forchildren, yet made toys for Wyatt and melted at the sight ofWilric.Her musing led to other things that melted, like herinsides as she took in his hands holding the Black’s reins andremembered the feel of them on her skin.
If he’d been cursed by her, then she’dbeen cursed by him as well, for she couldn’t look at his lipswithout tasting their bruising nectar, or at the broad expanse ofhis chest without feeling his muscled heat beneath her fingers, thenarrowing of his hips without feeling them pressing againsthers.
She gave Honey’s harness a gentleshake.“Sophie’s hip has been bothering her.”Talon urged the Blackinto a trot as well.“I want to get home to her.”
“How bad is it?”he saidwith genuine concern in his voice.
“It pains her enough shecan’t walk far on it for the first few days the cold sets in, untilthe teas and poultices start working.In truth, the pain’s gottenworse and comes earlier each year.Last winter we moved her beddown next to the hearth fire and that seemed to help.”
“Tree and I can move itdown for you,” he offered.“Anytime you wish before winter setsin.”
Before the garrison left CrossroadsKeep.
“Have you received ordersto join the king?”
“No, not yet.”His eyespierced hers.“I don’t expect them for another month ortwo.”
Lara turned the wagon up the path toher house and pulled Honey to a stop.
The door stood wide open.
“Sophie?”Lara dismountedand went up to the house.An eerie silence greeted her, and withher heart pounding a little harder in her chest, she ran past Talonto the barn.Only Gaea and the goats grazed in thecorral.
“Sophie.”She bolted backout into the middle of the yard.“Sophie.”
“Could she have gonesomewhere?”Talon tied the Black to the post in the yard and joinedher.“Maybe to tend a villager?”
“No, she couldn’t walk anydistance, and Gaea’s still here.”Lara tried to think, but all shesaw was Sophie’s face from her dreams, blanched and unseeing withwater swirling around her.Lara’s heart dropped to her feet.“Theriver,” she whispered hoarsely.“She’s in the water in mydreams.”
She turned for the river and managedto take two steps before her legs gave out.Talon caught her beforeshe hit the ground and propped his shoulder under her arm, holdingher up as they walked to the dock, where they found Sophie’s staffand the handle and shards of a broken water pitcher on theplanks.
Lara turned her face into Talon’sshoulder, her entire body shaking as the image of Sophie tangledamongst gnarled roots came to her from her dreams.“The old oak,”she rasped.“She’s in the old oak.”
“Stay here.I’ll golook.”
“No.”Lara lifted her headand squared her shoulders.“I need to be there for her.”
On the river’s bank, Sophie layentwined in the roots of the old oak, her face as white as herhair, her eyes dulled, unseeing.A blood-leeched gash gaped aboveher left ear.Lara walked into the river without uttering a sound.She stood staring into Sophie’s lifeless eyes.The woman who hadbeen her mother, sister, teacher, and friend, and who had raisedher and loved her for twenty-two years.Gone.
***
Talon
“Let me.”Talon waded hipdeep in the freezing water and carefully untangled Sophie’s bodyfrom the roots that had kept her from floating fartherdownriver.
He carried her sodden body back to thehouse, Lara walking beside them as pale and silent as a ghost.After laying Sophie on the table, he brought the hearth fire backto life as Lara collected a washbasin and cloths, a pair ofscissors, and a tub of oil that smelled of rosemary.Lara set themdown beside Sophie and a shiver ran through her.
“You should change intodry clothes, before you catch your dea…” Talon trailed off.If Larawas aware of what he’d almost said, she didn’t show it.He took herby both shoulders and gently led her to the loft’s ladder, thenstood by the fire, drying his own clothes until Lara came backdown.
“Is there anything youneed me to do?”
She shook her head, and Talon stoodhelpless to do more than rub Wolf’s ears as Lara cut Sophie’ssopping gown away and rubbed her body dry.She massaged the oilinto the old healer’s blue-tinged skin in an intimate dance thatTalon felt privileged to witness, her hands saying their farewellto the woman who’d known her better than anybody, lingering lastlyover the deep blue bruise on her temple that had been her deathblow.
Sophie must have gone to fill thewater pitcher, slipped on the wet pallet, hit her head, and falleninto the river.Whether she’d grasped the oaks roots to saveherself from drowning or the oak caught her already dead, Talondidn’t know.But he did know that knock to the head had killed her,and he was fairly certain she’d passed quickly and hopefully hadn’tsuffered much.It all seemed an ignoble end to Sophie the Sixth,who he’d always had a vague notion of going outfighting.
“Will you help me dressher?”Lara startled Talon.It was the first she’d spoken sincefinding Sophie.
They dressed her in a gray velveteengown, and then Lara cut sprigs of rosemary from the garden beforeshe sat in a rocking chair beside the hearth to weave the sprigsinto a wreath without saying another word or shedding a singletear.When the wreath was finished, she stood over Sophie and ran ahand down the old healer’s arm.With a heaving sigh, she drewSophie’s death shroud up over her and laid the wreath around herhead.Standing there staring down at her shrouded body, Lara hadgone to a place where Talon couldn’t follow.A place he knew toowell too young.
