Chapter 5 #4
Viktor and Bavel were sitting in front of the fire, smoking from pipes and drinking ale as they chatted together. Lysander was off to the side of them, lying down with his arms crossed over his chest, and appeared to be dozing while Catarina was making dinner.
It was a strangely cozy scene.
Catarina waved her over while Ewan left her to join the men around the fire.
“So, he found you,” she said as Nora drew near.
“Aye.”
“He was worried about you.”
“That’s what he said.”
“Nay, my lady,” she said, her eyes burning her with a deep sincerity. “I don’t think you really understand what I mean. He was extremely concerned for your welfare. Have you not noticed the way he looks at you?”
Nay, she hadn’t really paid much attention. “What way is that?”
“Like a beggar before a banquet. He has hungry eyes where you are concerned.”
Nora scoffed at the idea. Ewan barely noticed her and when he did, he seemed always to be peeved by her very presence. “You are mistaken.”
“He watches every move you make.”
Nora glanced around to where Ewan sat with Viktor and Bavel. True to Catarina’s words, his intense gaze was on her, but as soon as he realized she was looking, he averted his eyes.
“See,” Catarina said.
“You make too much of it.”
“Perhaps. But what do you make of it?”
“I make nothing of it.”
“Nothing?” she asked incredulously. “Then you’ve no wish to claim him as your own?”
Nora was slightly aghast by the thought, though to be honest, she wasn’t as aghast as she would have been the day she met him.
“Nay, never,” she said quickly. “I’m bound to my aunt’s in England. Ewan is...well, I’m sure he’d like to return home and forget the day he ever awoke to find me in his cave.”
Catarina cast a speculative look to him. “He would make a fine husband to some lucky woman. He’s a handsome one to be sure.”
“Aye, he is.”
“Strong. Quite charming, I think.”
Nora frowned at her gushing praise. Just what did she mean by that?
“Not too charming,” Nora said as she helped stir their stew. “Rather moody and quiet to be truthful. He can be rather rude when the mood strikes.”
“They say still waters run deep...”
Nora paused as she watched Catarina’s face while the woman looked on to where Ewan sat with the others. The woman’s beautiful features were dreamy and glowing.
Speculative one might even say.
Nora didn’t care for the look of her at all. “What are you thinking?”
“Just that if you’re not interested in him, perhaps I should give it a try. I haven’t found any man to equal one like him. He is one of a kind and I happen to be fascinated by his earthy ways and rugged bearing.”
Nora’s heart shrank at the thought of Catarina and Ewan embracing. Of the thought of Catarina doing anything with Ewan.
“The thought bothers you?” Catarina asked as she looked back and caught her gaping stare.
Nora closed her mouth and started to lie, but couldn’t quite manage one. It bothered her much more than it should and it made her want to do nasty things to Catarina for even hinting she was interested in Ewan.
Catarina smiled. “Tell me, Nora, have you ever heard or read the works of Rowena de Vitry?”
“Aye! The Lady of Love is one of my favorite troubadours.”
“Then you are familiar with the Romance de Silence?”
“Nay, is it new?”
“Fairly.” Catarina added the vegetables she had been cutting, then took the ladle from Nora and stirred them into the pot.
Catarina tapped the ladle twice against the pot, then set it aside.
“It’s the story of a woman in love with a man she sees every year at a fair.
She watches him as he grows to love another and as the years pass, she sees him with his wife, his children and such until he is an old man.
On his deathbed, she goes to him and tells him of her love.
That she has been dreaming of him since he was ten and eight and she just a bright-eyed maiden.
That because of him she never married and never knew any happiness except in her dreams where she could pretend he was hers. ”
Nora’s throat tightened in sympathetic pain. It was a tribute to Rowena’s wonderful imagination that she had written such a tragic tale. “How sad.”
Catarina wiped her hands on her skirt. “Aye, but the saddest part of all is that right before he dies, he confesses to her that he always loved her as well. That he would go to the fair every year just so that he could watch her from afar, but since she refused to even meet his gaze, he assumed she felt nothing for him. So the two of them spent the whole of their lives aching for what they could have had had they just talked to one another.”
“How tragic.”
“Aye and you’re not following where I’m going at all, are you?”
“What do you mean?”
Catarina nodded at Ewan. “Don’t you think it odd that you feel jealous when I speak of wooing him?”
Nora stiffened at what she was implying. “Nay,” she lied.
Catarina laughed. “You like him, admit it.”
“I do not,” she said primly, picking the ladle up and returning to stir the stew. She didn’t dare admit her feelings aloud to anyone. She could barely acknowledge them to herself. “He is entirely not the type of man who interests me.”
Catarina looked aghast. “My lady, you set your sights too high. What more could you ask for in a man?”
“Refinement. A man who is decorous and mannerly. One who is—”
“Boring.”
Nora gave her a peeved look. “How so?”
“Have you ever been around such men? They’re mewling. Fussing over their hair, their clothes.”
Catarina indicated Ewan with her head. “Give me a man who isn’t afraid to get a little dirt on his hands any day. Think you your gentleman would have gone after you because you tarried in the forest? He would have feared for his own life and given no thought to yours.
“Do you think such a fanciful, prim man would have laughed off what we did to him? Or would he have demanded our lives for daring to muss his hair and clothes? Ewan has been a very good sport, all things considered. Any other man would have Viktor’s head for what we’ve done.
Instead, Lord Ewan travels with us as a friend and equal. ”
“He is a bit odd which confirms what I’m saying.”
Catarina shook her head. “Sometimes, my lady, a person needs to look at someone only with their heart and not with their eyes.”
Nora glanced over to where Ewan sat. The other men were joking and laughing. He sat with his face stern. His eyes troubled.
How she wished she could make him laugh. “He’s always so sad.”
Catarina concurred. “You know, my mother has a saying. A jovial man can be happy with anyone, but when a sad one laughs, he treasures the one who brings him the sunshine.”
Nora thought about her words. There was truth to that. No one should live with the guilt Ewan did, especially when he hadn’t been at fault.
Kieran had made the choice to end his life. Ewan had done nothing more than make the mistake of believing a lying tongue.
Nora had no real designs on Ewan romantically. No matter how appealing he was or how good he kissed. At the end of the day, he wasn’t what she wanted for husband. But she wouldn’t mind helping him if she could.
No one deserved to be relegated to a cave without family or friend.
She had a few days with him. Mayhap a little reprieve would help him see that life was better when one participated in it.