“If I say yea, how will you know it for a lie or na’?”
She looked across the arm’s-length he was holding her and met his eyes. He tipped his head slightly back and then he smiled, revealing perfectly spaced, white teeth. Aislynn knew then that she was in very serious trouble, as her heart felt like it dove to the bottom of her belly and started an ever-increasing pounding from there.
“If you tell me yea, I’ll…be saddened.”
“I…have nae man.” The words were out before she gave time to think them. Aislynn wondered why she’d lost every scrap of sanity.
“Good. That is good…and just. And fair.”
He was pulling as he spoke, using his other arm to bring her against him. For a man weak with loss of blood, stewed by ale, and enduring what he had, it was surprising how easily he handled her. She was making extreme trouble for herself by further contact with him, yet hastening toward that very thing. She might as well be running toward it. Aislynn ended up clasped to his chest, listening to his heartbeat, and feeling his arms enfolding her. His chest seemed molded for snuggling against, she decided.
“You’ll receive payment…my little Lady of the Brook,” he whispered to her mantle-covered head. “You’ve eased…pain, stopped…my bleeding, and ask too little. I would…change that. Now. Right now.”
Aislynn actually registered what he meant to do, she just couldn’t imagine it. Nothing in her experience could’ve prepared her. He put the side of his index finger beneath her chin and raised her face. His eyes were such an intense clear-water color, he was probably known for that, too. He was entirely too interesting, too handsome, and too intriguing. He was also holding her gaze as easily as he was holding her. Aislynn did everything in her power to break the spell but nothing worked.
“Hmm. I sought out a place to—to hide. Pain. Hide…suffering. Hide. I found…succor. In…the woods. This morn. You’re…strange.”
“I’m a healer,” she replied.
He smiled widely, bringing small lines into place about his eyes. Aislynn noted them. It appeared he smiled. Often.
“True. A—a healer. With strange…methods and stranger…reasons. No healer does this for free. It makes light of…it. I would pay for your services…in another way, then. My way.”
She didn’t answer. Her throat closed off as Aislynn accepted her full measure of trouble. She hadn’t lied. She had no husband, although the new blacksmith held promise of it, but what she was feeling while perched atop this Norman’s lap was obliterating even Donald O’Rourke. Easily. If she wasn’t careful, she was going to believe not only in love at first sight, but the next thing she knew tales of faeries would start coming true. She shook her head to clear it. It didn’t work.
“What…is it?” he asked.
Aislynn felt her eyes sting with tears. She didn’t know where they came from or why they’d bother her. She only knew they swelled, crested to her lashes, and then hovered there. She watched his reaction as he watched her. She knew the truth, too. He may be a Sassenach and a warrior, but he was no killer.
“You’re very…beautiful,” he whispered and bent his head toward her, blocking the ray of light as he did so.
Aislynn’s eyes shut, pulled by something beyond her control as her lips pursed. She knew he was going to kiss her. She was going to receive her first one! She’d listened of them from her sister, Meghan. She dreamed of receiving one. She’d been so far off the reality it was amazing.
The man’s lips were warmth and comfort, joy and delight, and then even more. Aislynn experienced each emotion as he kept his mouth against hers, breathed onto her nose, and then nuzzled her own lips apart with his. She felt, rather than heard, the warble of sound put into existence by his moan. She nearly joined him.
The entire morning’s experience passed in the moments he kissed her, and Aislynn recollected each bit, with every heartbeat and every conjoined breath. She not only believed in love at first sight, she was well onto scripting her own faery tale when he pulled back, separating them.
Aislynn didn’t open her eyes. To do so would make it too real. Too unavoidable. Too wrong.
“You’re a…special lass. That’s a shame,” he said finally, and his voice had an edge to it, defying his inebriated sound.
Her breath halted. That was far different from his. The chest she was held against was moving her up and back down with the force and depth of his own breathing.
“Special is…bad. Very bad.”
Her eyes opened wide. “It is?”
He nodded. “Makes everything that happens…worse.”
If Aislynn had thought her eyes wide, she’d been mistaken, as they opened to such an extent the morning air felt like punishment.
“I tell you this, so you’ll know the why of what I do. Don’t…take offense. I want…more. I want…you. But I…won’t. I…cannot. I shouldn’t have kissed you. Not…like that. ’Twas unfair.”
He wasn’t smiling now, and the lines his expression brought out were going to be the ones carving his face when he was an old man. They wouldn’t detract from his features. In fact, he was going to grow more intriguing and handsome as he aged.
“You must rise,” he said. “You must leave…and not look back.”
“I ken that,” she said with a voice that rasped.
“I won’t take…you. I can’t. I will not do that to a special woman. I would force myself only onto wenches paid…for the chore.”
Aislynn blinked. I thought him capable of ravishment?
“I’ll…think of another way to pay. Stealing a kiss…was not it.”
“It…wasn’t stolen,” she replied.
His smile was sad and it was devastating at such a close range. Aislynn blinked again since moisture was making his image swim again. She didn’t know what was wrong with her. She didn’t like it. She felt, rather than saw him push her away, lifting her to her feet where she swayed on knees that felt as insubstantial as water.
“Who—what are you?” she stammered.
“I’m a troubadour,” he replied. “And that’s all…you need…know.” And then he hiccoughed. Loudly.
Chapter Three
He thought of her all day, especially when trying to bring the remembered pain back. For two days every step of his horse had brought torment, now there was nothing save numbed relief. He’d been foolish to drink the mead, let his emotions rule him, and most especially to claim a kiss from her.
Rhoenne winced against the throb in his head, ignoring the men about him. The girl may be a virgin, but she had an innate gift at kissing, he decided, as he repositioned himself again atop his saddle. Such thoughts were a waste of time and energy. They weren’t gaining him a thing. He shifted against the leather. He would welcome his hall, his bath, and a used woman; one that was barren and wouldn’t lose her life birthing another Ramhurst.
“Your hall appears unwelcoming, My Lord.”
Rhoenne lifted his hand, stopping the columns of men behind him. His senior vassal, Sir Harold Montvale, spoke the truth. There was no vivid blue banner with an emblem known as a griffon passant, waving from the tower, and no smoke rose from amidst the gray rock, either.
“’Tis early, still. Brent must be lazing.”
“You wish as much.”
Rhoenne flashed a look at the man speaking. Harold had his confidence, guarded his back, and shared his sense of humor. Or—as Rhoenne