Roark woke curled around Alina’s soft, warmbody, his morning wood, as she’d called it, snug against herbackside.He lay there sharing her body heat and burying his nosein her nape, breathing in the heady scent of green grass, coolearth, and warm woman.Prolonging his exquisite torture.A torturehe’d only suffer for another fortnight if everything went accordingto plan, which nothing had since the moment he’d laid eyes on herracing her mare along the beach.
He nuzzled her nape and she stirred againsthim.“Time to wake up, my sleepy owl,” he rasped.“The sun is aboutto rise and so should we.”
“Unnnh.”She burrowed her nose into thebedroll and nestled her backside into him and he grit his teeth.Hebacked away from her, missing her soft heat instantly, and when shetried to wiggle close to him again, he threw the blanket and ottercloaks off them and stood abruptly, staring down at her petal pinkcheeks, rosy lips, and tousled mane of burnished cedar.Shestretched and rolled her lithe, lean body from side to side andthen lay on her back and blinked sleep-filled eyes at him.“Why isit I sleep so much better on the cold, hard ground with you than Ido in a soft bed without you?”
“Why?”Because our hearts and souls callout in recognition of the other’s.“Because our bodiesinstinctively seek out the warmth and comfort of another livingbeing,” he said, choosing the practical explanation over thepoetic.Determining then and there to continue being a practicalcompanion rather than a moonstruck fool.One would get Alina homesafely, the other could get her killed.
“Oh,” she said, and though she flashed him aquick smile, it didn’t reach her eyes.“I suppose you’re right.”Heoffered her his hand, as he had every morning they’d woken togetheron the ship, in the stables, on the road, yet instead of acceptinghis hand as she had every other time, she stared at it for a momentand pushed herself up and stood.“I, ah…” She lifted her chintoward the hedgerow and then strode over behind it for her morningrelief.
When she returned, she eyed the coldbreakfast of bread and cheese and cherries he’d spread out on theirbedrolls.
“There should be wild blackberries andbilberries to pick once we make the foothills,” he told her.
“That’ll be a nice change,” she saidimpassively.
As the sun shone high overhead, they rode inthe same uneasy silence since morning, crossing the narrow waterwayflowing between the Loch of Bracken and the Loch of StandingStones.Following the northern shore of the loch for anotherleague, they came upon the ceremonial circle of seven stones, whichstood as high as two men standing one on top of the other.
“Can we stay for a bit?”Alina spoke for thefirst time since they’d woken.
Roark pulled out his spyglass and scanned thearea.All he saw were sheep grazing on a far hill.“We can stay fora short while,” he said.
Alina dismounted and walked from stone tostone, laying her palms flat along their smoothed sides, runningher hands up and down them then pressing her ear to them, listeningto their secrets with her eyes closed and a beatific smile on herlovely face.After she’d done this with each and every stone, shestood in the middle of the circle and dropped her head back,lifting her face and arms to the sky as she twirled in slowcircles, a graceful, elemental goddess of the earth praising theheavens.
It took every bit of Roark’s sorely testedwill to keep from laying her down in the grassy circle and claimingher body and soul in the primal ritual of man and woman.
“Keep ahold of yourself, ye randy stag,” hemuttered.He put the spyglass to his eye and scanned the areaagain, as much to distract himself as anything else, and spied ashepherd coming up over the hill to the west.“Alina, we need togo.”
***
Alina didn’t know why Roark was acting socold and distant, but she knew she didn’t like it.She missed thefriend who teased her and talked with her about anything andeverything, and she ached for the man who kissed her with suchbone-melting heat they’d both jumped into the freezing cold riverto douse their passions before they ignited.
Most of all, she missed his slow, easy grinand those rain eyes pouring into her.
Eyes that kept sneaking glances at her asthey rode away from the stones across fields, staying off the roadand avoiding the villages, which grew fewer and fewer as theyneared the foothills of the Mounths.
They made good enough time to stop for thenight along the Garadh River—famous, Roark told her, for itssalmon.Being spring, it was the best time to catch the biggestfish.
Alina watered the horses and staked them in agrassy area while Roark grabbed the net Logan had given him andsurveyed the river for the best fishing spot, picking a pool formedby large rocks upriver from their camp.She gathered wood for afire, and to make a cooking spit with, and then she walked up theshoreline, gathering sorrel and dandelion leaves along the way.Atthe pool, Roark had already netted two large salmon and was pullingin a third.
“You seem to have found a good spot,” shesaid, sitting down on a grassy hillock.
“Aye.”He climbed over the rocks anddeposited the fish next to the other two on the ground.He grinnedfor the first time that day.“I swear I fished this verra same poolwith Bryce the summer of my ninth year.”
“When is your birthday?”she asked, glad tobe having a friendly conversation with him.
“I was born on the seventh day of the seventhmoon under the Crab,” he told her.“A child of the moon andwater.”
“That explains your rain eyes.”
“My rain eyes?”
“I was born on the first day of the fifthmoon,” she said, ignoring his question.
“A child of the earth and growing things,”Roark said, sitting down beside her.He met her gaze and held it.“With eyes the color of new spring grass.”
That grow greener every time your eyesrain on them.Alina’s cheeks flushed hot at her unspoken words.She grabbed her bundle of greens and stood.“I’ll go start a firewhilst you clean the fish,” she said, walking away from aperplexed-looking man.
She struck the flint and lit the dry leavesand kindling while peeking surreptitious glances at Roark, who hadfour crows strutting and cawing around him for the fish guts hetossed them.He carried the scaled and gutted fish over, spit them,and then hung them over the fire while Alina washed the greens inthe river, which she set aside in the pot.
