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“Maybe he’s not wrong,” I said saucily.
“Oh, he’s not wrong.” Vesper pulled me to a halt and kissed me long and hard. “But that’s why it’s so good, Pen. Everything wrong is.”
When we got back to the campsite, Draven didn’t seem to have moved. I slipped into my tent and fell instantly asleep.
The next day we enteredthe Bloodlands. At first, there was nothing particularly ominous about the landscape despite the off-putting name. And the long list of monstrous creatures Draven had so inconveniently dropped into my imagination.
But as the day went on, the landscape grew more stark. The trees still loomed around us, but they had thinned out, grown darker and more twisted. The lush moss and grass that I was used to seeing disappeared, replaced by hardened soil and scattered rocks. Even the air was thick with a stench that pricked my nostrils and made me wince, reminding me of the decayed scent of Draven's poisoned wound.
Only the smooth white stones of the fae road stayed mercifully the same.
Perhaps the Bloodlands were not blighted or cursed, but they were not particularly welcoming. I understood why travelers avoided the land, despite the treasures that might lie just on the other side. I wondered if this was what Valtain would look like. Desolate and abandoned.
That night, Vesper went into the forest and emerged with a brace of rabbits. They were gangly, scrawny things but once spitted and put into his famed stew, they were tasty enough. After supper, he picked up his lute and strummed softly, playing wordless melody after melody, his eyes never far from my face.
I sat with one of my books, pretending to read, but listening to the music instead. Every night that Vesper played his lute or sang, I fell spellbound. My heart raced with each passing note. As he ran his fingers over the lute strings, I felt as if they were dancing over my very skin instead, stoking and igniting a fiery longing.
The music had no such similar effect upon Draven. He would stalk away from the fire each night as if the music pained him to hear. Decidedly not a music lover, I concluded. Perhaps if the lute strings had sounded like the crossing of steel blades, Draven would have been as mesmerized as I was.
Later that night, as I lay down on my rocky bed, I felt troubled. I was so far from home and somewhere along the way, I had apparently forgotten who I was, what my purpose was.
I tried to remind myself that Vesper could have no place in my future.
My duty lay in Camelot. If not to Arthur, then certainly to Kaye. My bond to him pulled on me like a compulsion.
I had to complete the task. Find the sword. Bring it back. And then things would return to the way they had always been.
That last part I had my doubts about. After all, I was conveniently avoiding what I had done to Florian.
Murdered the son of the king’s advisor in cold blood.
Would Arthur care that I had only been defending myself? Or did a harsh punishment lie before me, whether or not I returned with the fae sword?
Still, for a long time that promise to myself had been the only thing getting me through the long days and nights of travel.
Now I let myself briefly imagine a different future. One where Vesper returned with me to Camelot. I strode into the Great Hall with the minstrel-warrior on my arm, my shimmering silver hair and strangely marked golden skin immediately setting me apart from all those around me even more than the gray hair ever had.
And then? A minstrel rogue would never be permitted to wed the king’s sister. Even if he wanted to, a voice in my head whispered, and what if he did not?
I had eliminated the threat of marriage to Florian.
But that still left me with only one remaining option. The temple.
Nevertheless, the memory of Vesper’s lips against mine lulled me to sleep each night and the touch of his hands on my body, my hips, my breasts filled my dreams with a heat that lingered even when I arose in the morning.
