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Chapter Seventeen
Ivy
She had heard the shouts from the guardsmen that a rider was approaching and she grew excited. They did not often get visitors to Welton Manor, and it was always cause for excitement. For her anyway. Aside from the usual flow of petitioners from Elix, and a few merchant trains that passed through, nobody ever really came to see them here at the far reaches of the realm.
She and Mira stood on the ramparts of the curtain wall, watching the road. The man on horseback was approaching slowly as if he was in no hurry whatsoever. Overhead, the thunder rumbled ominously, and she felt the first few soft drizzles of rain begin to fall.
“Oh, what a fine day it is,” Mira grumbled.
“It could be worse,” she offered. “It could be snowing.”
“Do not say that,” Mira said with a laugh. “You do not want to tempt God to prove you wrong now.”
Ivy laughed softly and turned her eyes back to the oncoming rider and felt her stomach lurch. That familiar warmth formed in her belly, and her heart stuttered drunkenly in her chest.
“You know who it is, don’t you?” Mira asked.
“Why would you say that?”
Mira laughed. “Because your skin just got even paler than normal,” she said. “But, your cheeks are burning the most amazing shade of scarlet.”
Ivy laughed and looked away from her best friend quickly. She tried to control her physical reactions. Tried to keep her heart from somersaulting and her cheeks from burning. But she knew she would have an easier time forcing the rain to stop falling.
“It is him, isn’t it,” Mira said with a note of awe in her voice. “It is the Scotsman?”
Ivy smiled softly. “It is Fin. Yes, it is the Scotsman.”
“Oh my,” Mira said, feigning like she was fanning herself. “I can see why you would do the things you did to be alone with him.”
Ivy squealed and laughed hard, slapping Mira lightly on the arm. She clung to her handmaiden, watching the large form of the Scotsman growing closer and closer. And as he did, the harder her stomach churned, and the harder her heart beat within her breast.
“What is he doing here?” Mira asked.
Ivy shook her head. “I do not know.”
From the moment she had seen him on the road, she had thought he was coming to see her. That he had formed some sort of pretext to come see her. She was sure of it. She was sure that he had made up some fiction for the chance to start the conversation they had not finished yet. It was a thought that sent waves of emotion rippling through her and put a wide smile on her face.
“We should go inside and get you ready to properly receive him,” Mira offered. “You look a fright. And for a man that beautiful, you are going to want to look your very best.”
Ivy laughed. “Then come and help me.”
Together, they turned and sprinted back into the keep, shaking away the fine mist of rain that had fallen upon them. They ran back to her bedchamber, and Ivy was already stripping off her wet dress and tossing it atop the drying rack. With the busy work of trying to make her presentable for the most beautiful man she had ever known. A man that made her insides feel like warm mush.
She sat down at the dressing table, and Mira immediately went to work on her hair, brushing it out quickly and using a towel to pat it dry. Once Ivy’s hair was to her liking, Mira put it up in an intricate bun that wrapped around her head.
“You seem nervous,” Mira noted.
“It is that obvious?”
“Remember, he is just a man,” Mira said. “A beautiful man who looks like he could have been carved from stone to resemble an ancient Roman god, but a man nonetheless.”
She laughed softly. “This is silly,” she said, almost to herself. “We were friendly. But I am no more to him than he is to me.”
“If that were true, you would not look as if you were on the verge of being ill.”
“It must be something I ate this morning,” Ivy said.
“Yes, that sounds reasonable,” Mira scoffed.
