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Twenty
“I swear, if I must stay within this chamber one moment longer I shall scream from sheer boredom loud and long enough to bring down around us the walls of this keep,” Amiria ranted sullenly.
“Mayhap if you resume your stitchery, sister, ’twill soothe you,” offered Lynet whilst her fingers worked at the cloth in her lap.
Amiria quit her pacing to stare in annoyance at her sibling. “You know better than anyone that there is only one thing that will calm my nerves and taking up needle and thread is not it.”
“’Tis forbidden . . . besides, you are to rest.”
“I have rested enough.”
”Mayhap ’tis so, but our Lord Dristan has ordered you to stay within your chamber so you must obey his will,” Lynet reminded her. She frowned in concentration as she began to loosen another botched attempt at mending the garment beneath her usually nimble fingers. “He would not be pleased to find you wearing hose and tunic instead of gown and wimple. You should not test him so.”
“I will wear what I choose as I have always done!”
“Be prepared then to pay the consequences when you are staring up into his angry eyes, for I do not believe you will like the view,” Lynet predicted, focusing on trying to undo a knot that appeared in her unraveling of the mess she had made. “Please sit, Amiria, for you are distracting me with your frantic stomping about, and I must now start this over yet again.”
“I am restless, and the pacing helps my already stretched nerves.”
Lynet ignored her sister’s words and continued her chiding. “Your behavior and rambling about Lord Dristan’s untimely demise has been far from ladylike. I can almost hear mother’s voice taking you to task for it.”
“I need fresh air,” Amiria complained, as she continued traipsing from one end of the room to the other.
“Then go to the window and open the shutters for goodness sake,” Lynet proposed in irritation of being cooped up with her sister.
“’Tis not enough.”
“’Twill have to be for that is all Lord Dristan shall allow you.”
Amiria whirled around at her sister and threw up her hands in frustration. “Say his name just one more time Lynet and I swear by all I hold dear I shall thrash you for it. I will not be held prisoner in my own keep!” she yelled.
“Surely you are not a prisoner, Amiria. It also does you no good to take out your irritation on me,” Lynet said, calmly putting down her mending. “I have seen the way he looks on you when he comes to see how you fare each eve. He only means to ensure you are healed from your illness. Besides . . . I like him.”
Amiria merely grumbled quietly about the nerve of the man that he should dare to order her about as if she would listen to him. ’Twas not as if they were already wed, and even if that miracle came to pass, she was not sure she would give him the satisfaction of obeying him. Lynet’s words, however, still hovered in the air like an unforeseen shadow of what was yet to come. She made her way to the window seat and opened the shutter as her sister had suggested. The slight amount of fresh sea breeze wafting its way to her senses was like a welcoming balm to her troubled soul. She soon became lost in thought as the past se’nnight’s flashed across her memory.
Dristan had come each eve to bring her supper, assuring himself she had eaten her fill and was on the mend. The silence stretched between them had been deafening and, if it had not been for Lynet and Patrick’s chatter, there would have been no conversation at all. Her hand trembled in recollection on how each night as he left, he lifted her numb fingers and placed a tender kiss upon them. If she closed her eyes and willed it hard enough, she could still see how the torches held in the wall sconces reflected the light onto his black hair whilst he looked down upon her from his towering height. She gave a hearty sigh and wondered when she had become such a dewy eyed imbecile, who could no longer put more than two words together once in his presence.
She slammed the shutter closed in disgust. “I’ve had enough of this confinement,” she decided and went to her chest at the end of her bed. Lifting the lid, she began to haphazardly throw gowns up over her head ’til she reached towards the bottom and found what she had earnestly sought. “Help me don this,” and she began to pull her armor out with a loud clank of metal as it hit the stone floor.
“He will not like it,” Lynet advised with a grim expression.
Amiria silenced her with a stony glare of warning ’til her sister held up her hands in defeat and began to help her with the tedious task of settling the heavy armor on her small frame. ’Twas not ’til the mail coif was placed on her head that she began to feel a bit of her old self. Her scabbard missing a most vital element, she began to search every corner for her sword.
“’Tis not here, Amiria,” Lynet said carefully in answer to the empty sheath Amiria all but shoved in her face.
“’Tis mine and I shall not allow him to take that which our father gave me,” Amiria retorted, as she reached for her helmet, pushing the mail coif from her head and pulling out her braid. “Why did he see fit to take my sword of all things?”
“Given your reaction, I believe he did what he thought best in his own behalf. I think he must care for you, Amiria,” Lynet chimed in. “He declared he would keep it so as not to offer you the temptation of sending him to keep the devil company and thereby depriving you of a husband.”
“I’ll send that horses arse to the devil alright and enjoy the pleasure of performing just such a task to rid me of that vermin!” she raged.
She left her chamber and sibling behind her in a huff of righteous determination to set things straight with the lord of the keep. She would begin by finding out where Dristan had put her sword. With her helmet under her arm, she made her way down the spiral turret and through the Great Hall with an unwavering stride to begin her search for her dragon. God help his sorry hide when she found him.
