Chapter Two #2
He was grinning at her. “Then ye’ll have tae wait until I have the time tae find ye some real ones.”
“Or we could hunt for them now.”
He lifted his eyebrows at the excellent idea. “Aye, we could,” he said, holding out his hand to her. “Come along, my little demon. Let’s see what we can find.”
With her eggs in one hand, Isadora reached out with her other to take Cam’s hand.
The moment his big, warm hand closed over hers, Isadora truly thought she might faint.
The mere touch of the man sent bolts of warmth shooting through her body, lifting her feet off the ground until she was certain she was walking on air.
Together, they began to follow the path into the vale.
For a few stolen moments, neither spoke.
They simply enjoyed each other’s company, back in the place where they’d first met.
It didn’t look different to what it did eight years ago, except for the fact that now, one of the demons wasn’t so wicked any longer.
There was attraction in the air. Cam kept glancing over at Isadora, who was starting to flush bashfully.
“Do the demons still come tae this vale?” he asked her.
Isadora shrugged. “I’ve not come here in years,” she said. “Ever since I realized that stealing from terrified men was not something I wanted tae do with my life. As a child, I suppose it was different. I dinna care much for others. But now…”
He finished for her. “Now ye’d rather trap hares and sell their skins,” he said. “And what else?”
She felt him give her hand a squeeze and her heart leapt with the thrill of it. She’d never been this close to a man who wasn’t her father or a brother, and who made her heart sing. It was a struggle to keep her head and not melt to the earth in a giddy puddle.
“There is always a great deal tae do,” she said. “Skin hides, tend the horses, milk the cow. I am never idle.”
He was gazing at her intently. “Those are duties,” he said. “What about ye, Isadora? I used tae help my grandfather with his birds, but what do ye like tae do when ye’re not tending tae yer duties?”
He was probing her, personally, and the normally reserved woman caved in without a fight. “My brothers and I have swords and pikes,” she said. “I like tae fight with them sometimes, though I fight better than they do. They dunna like being beaten by a woman.”
“So ye like combat, then?”
“I do. When I win, that is.”
Cam laughed softly. “Ever the warrior woman,” he said. “I seem tae remember that from when we first met and ye told me I needed tae learn tae fight. Ye spoke as if ye had cause tae learn yerself.”
He was starting to venture into a subject that she’d already made clear was forbidden.
To speak of fighting might lead to whom she might have fought, and Isadora didn’t want to tell him her history of skirmishes and battle.
She knew he was loyal to Lindsay; being from Netherton, that was established.
But he still didn’t know where she was from or whom her loyalties were with.
He didn’t know she hated Lindsay and everything about them.
For all he knew, she was simply a lass from a village in the hills.
Perhaps it was wrong of her, but she wanted to keep it that way.
“Anyone in the Highlands of Scotland has had cause tae fight,” she said. “Are ye saying that ye’ve never had a cause tae fight since I last saw ye?”
If he thought she was being evasive again, he didn’t let on. He pondered her question. “A smithy doesna have much cause tae fight unless a man willna pay ye for the work ye’ve done,” he said. “I’ve only had that happen a couple of times.”
“What did ye do?”
He shrugged. “I hit one man over the head with an iron rod,” he said. “But I only did that because he threw a horseshoe at me. He’ll not do that again.”
She chuckled. “And the other man?”
“He had my grandfather by the neck,” he said, sobering dramatically as he thought on that particular dispute. “No man will touch my grandfather. I whacked him across the back of his head with the hilt of my hammer and tossed him out intae the street.”
Given the sheer size of Cam’s shoulders, arms, and hands from his years at a blacksmith’s forge, Isadora was quite sure he meant that he literally tossed the man. It was an exciting thought.
“Did he get up?”
“Painfully, after my grandfather went tae the street and kicked him a few times where it hurt the most.”
Her laughter grew. “Ye see? Ye can fight.”
He shook his head. “But I dunna like tae,” he said. “Fighting never seems tae solve anything. I’ve only done it as a last resort.”
There was a flash of that gentle young man she’d met those years ago. He believed in peace; he was still peaceful. Still, he wasn’t afraid to use force when there was no other choice.
“Sometimes men dunna give ye a choice,” she said quietly. “Sometimes… sometimes they’ll accept nothing less than violence.”
There was something in her tone as she spoke, the tone of a woman whose clan had seen some violence over the years.
In her case, it was from a man named Drostan Lindsay.
It was always Drostan Lindsay, the chieftain of Clan Lindsay of Kirkburn Castle.
Though the fortress was less than ten miles away, Drostan and his animals might as well have been in Isadora’s lap, for it was the Lindsay who prowled Keith lands, looking for men to kill and women to assault.
But Cam didn’t have to know that.
It wasn’t his fight, anyway.
Still, that fear, that constant fear, was in her tone as she spoke and Cam looked at her, sensing something more than just a comment on the nature of men. Gently, he squeezed her hand.
“Tell me of the men who have been violent against ye and I’ll whack them on the head with my hammer,” he said, smiling at her when she looked at him. “I’ll not have anyone being violent against my little demon.”
She smiled wanly. “I’m capable of using a hammer, too, and a few other things,” she said. “It seems as if ye and I live in different worlds. Ye live in a busy village… I live in the hills where life is more difficult.”