Chapter Fifteen #3
“Lara.” Talon pushed Ravenna off, cursing. “Wait.” He hurried out
the door after her.
Fists clenched at her sides, Lara
stopped at the top of the stairs as the loud chorus. of a bawdy
drinking song rose from the hall below.
“Listen to me,” he said as
she took in the sight of him clad only in his breechcloth. “She
came to me unasked, as she did before. Nothing
happened.”
Lara snorted. “It didn’t look like
nothing.”
“I swear. I was just
curious what she would do. I wouldn’t have let it go any
further.”
“It makes no difference to
me.” She shrugged but her eyes welled with tears.
“Then why are you about to
cry?” He reached out to wipe the tear that slid down her
cheek.
She slapped his hand away.
“Don’t,” she
hissed. “You don’t ever get to touch me again. Go back to Ravenna.
She’ll give you whatever you want.”
“God’s
blood, woman,” Talon thundered, and the
singing below stopped. “I don’t want Ravenna. I want
you.”
“Then why play long enough
to see what she’d do?” she cried.
“Ravenna has nothing to do
with this, whatever this
is between us,” he snarled, and her eyes
narrowed. “You came to me once. You loved me once.” Her eyes
widened. “Why won’t you come to me again? You’re playing me just as
much.”
“My resistance is
different. I…can’t.”
“Can’t?” He stepped up and
took her by the arm as she tried to turn away. “Or won’t? Tell me,
Lara. Just tell me.”
“Won’t.” She wrenched her
arm from his grip and gave a sob. “I won’t love you again only to
lose you. I can’t.”
Talon shivered as if a ghost had
walked through him. All the nights Lara had woken crying out his
name, her body shaking and her eyes wide with fear. Fear for him.
For Sophie and Wolf and Patience. Yet her fears for Patience
mustn’t have come to fruition, else she wouldn’t have bounded into
their chamber with such a lilt to her voice as she announced that
Patience had given birth to a boy.
Her gaze slipped behind him, and he
turned to find Ravenna slinking into the chamber she shared with
her father and brother for the night.
“Will you return to our
chamber now?” Talon said gently.
She glanced down the stairs where the
bawdy singing had resumed, then strode past him back to their
chamber. As Talon followed her in, she lay down on her cot, fully
dressed, Wolf on the floor next to her and watching him with a
chary eye. Talon sat on the edge of his bed as Lara tossed and
turned on her cot. He could have told her of his and the king’s
declaring her a freewoman, but he didn’t think that would help
either of them get to sleep. He lay back and closed his eyes. If
the nights past were any indication, he’d be holding her in his bed
at some point in what was left of the night.
***
“No, oh God, no. Sooophie.”
Giving a frown, Talon rolled out of
bed, gathered Lara in his arms, then carried her back to his bed.
For a long while he sat cradling her and smoothing her sweaty curls
from her forehead. “I’ve got you. You’re safe.”
“Talon.” Her breath
tickled his chest as she burrowed her nose into his
neck.
“Aye, my rose. You had
another dream.”
“Sophie.” She clung to
Talon. “I dreamed of Sophie.”
Talon rocked her in his arms and
murmured soothing words into her hair until she stopped shaking. He
pressed his lips to her forehead, and her body relaxed with one
long, soughing sigh.
“Maybe if you told me what
you saw this one last time. It might help.”
She lifted her head and met his gaze.
“One last time?”
“You march with the king
when he leaves Crossroads Keep tomorrow.”
She pushed away from him, a wary
wildcat once more. “Why would I be leaving with the king
tomorrow?”
Damn her hide, she thought he’d sold
her wergeld to Charles.
“You’ll ride out from
Crossroads Keep alongside Charles as a freewoman who fulfilled her
season of military service,” he told her, and was instantly
rewarded with her smile, a smile he could forgive anything. “I’ll
be your hated jailer no more, though neither will I be the one to
hold you and comfort you when you wake crying out from your
dreams.”
Her smile turned bittersweet, then she
leaned in and kissed his cheek.
“Thank you, truly, for
almost everything.” Her eyes crinkled up.
He took her hand in his and rubbed a
thumb over the backs of her fingers. “I haven’t given you even a
hundredth of what I would have.” His throat constricted with the
depth of what he felt and wouldn’t say. “I have, however, been able
to give you the cloak of the king’s protection, which will reach
much farther than mine once I’m gone, most likely come winter.” He
gave her a purposely cocky grin. “Be sure to tell Sophie that, else
she think me shirking my oath.”
“Your oath to protect
me?”
“And what a troublesome
oath that turned out to be.” His voice was stern, but he fought
back a laugh.
As did Lara, then she turned serious.
“Talon? How did I curse you?”
He laughed, short and harsh, then
stood and went over to the cot before sitting down. He’d given up
the bed up to Lara and Wolf for what was left of the
night.
“You smiled my way, my
beautiful, thorny rose. And then you bled me.”