Not here. Tremors of anxiety snaked across the nape of his neck. Where would she go? Over the maid’s shoulder, he saw the shuttered window. Tingles danced up his spine and he hurried past her to the window. He threw open the shutters. The snow was coming down heavily, bathing the landscape in a pure blanket of white. Beyond the castle, in the clearing, he saw a dark line in the snow. His heart froze.
Images of when he was a boy flashed in his mind. Pristine snow and tracks. The tracks now were different. Larger. Deeper. They were the tracks of an animal. A horse, he realized and forced himself to be calm and rational, but some part of him was still calling to him to hurry.
Would she go out? In this blizzard? Why would she…?
Could he risk her being out there, alone?
He raced out of the room, hurrying down the hallway and took the stairs two at a time. He burst into the Great Hall just as Lord Chandos held his hands up for silence. He turned to the small child standing beside him.
The boy brushed some of his wet hair aside. “Lady Eve said fer me ta tell ya that there was only one way ta be sure. Only one way ta get ta the truth.” He looked up at Lord Chandos. “She said she would be where she was found. She would be waiting.”
Horrified and distressed, Lord Chandos fell heavily into his chair.
Gabe’s heart lurched in his throat. God’s Blood! She was out in the snow and the blizzard. In the cold! The same cold that had taken Eden. Gabe whirled toward the door.
Michael caught his arm. “Tell me where she is.”
Gabe yanked his arm free. “The truth can’t stay hidden forever.” He didn’t miss a step as he raced toward the inner ward. “Tell them the truth!”
“I’m going to find her first,” Michael growled.
“Eden!” Eve called, dismounting from the palfrey. Her slippered feet landed in the icy cold snow. It gripped her bare legs like hands. The horse whinnied, tossing its head.
The wind whipped her face and she lifted her arms to shield her face from the small pellets of snow hitting her cheeks. “Eden!”
Eden appeared before her, but not as the little girl who usually appeared. She was covered in snow and her lips were blue. I want to go home.
Eve swallowed, and tears rose in her eyes. Eden was the frozen child Eve remembered the last time she had seen her alive. Eden’s words were the same ones that rang in her guilty mind; the last ones she had uttered all those years ago.
Your angel is gone.
Eve’s chest constricted in agony. There was no angel. There had never been an angel. Her father had said it was a snow storm over the pond. That must have been what it was. Eve dropped to her knees before Eden. “I’m sorry, Eden,” she wept. “It was all my fault.”
I’m cold.
“Take me with you. Don’t leave me here alone.”
Your angel will come for you.
Eve sobbed, “There is no angel.” Great tremors of remorse shook her body.
Let’s wait by that tree.
“No!” Eve called. That was the tree that Eden had fallen asleep under and never woken. “Let’s go back to the castle!”
Eden started toward the tree.
“Eden!” Eve rose and tried to run after her, but the snow was deep and cold, and she tripped, falling to her hands and knees. “No, Eden!”
Eden turned back to her. I’m cold.
Eve realized she was trembling from the cold, too. Her teeth chattered. She looked down at her hands buried in the snow. She sat back, lifting her hands from the icy pockets of snow and realized that her right hand was whole. She gasped and looked at Eden.
You can come if you want to.
Eve was so cold she could not move. She lay down in the snow and it cushioned her body like a wintry blanket. All she wanted to do was sleep. And dream. Dream of… Gabriel. Holding her. Loving her. Kissing her. She closed her eyes.
“Eve!”
Eve opened her eyes. Blue eyes greeted her. The blue eyes of her angel. She couldn’t look away. “You came.”
“Of course I came.”
She was floating then, the white falling from the sky in tiny drops. “Eden,” she whispered.
She was pulled against a strong, warm chest. And for the first time, she saw the dark hair peppered with white snowflakes that touched his shoulders. It was her angel. “Gabriel,” she whispered.
He looked down at her, concern in his eyes. “You’ll be alright,” he promised more to himself than to her.
She sighed and snuggled against his warmth.
Chapter Seven
Gabriel rode hard, promising himself, promising her in hushed whispers, that everything would be alright. He entered beneath the castle portcullis and into the outer ward, holding her tight against him, willing his warmth into her to save her. She couldn’t leave him. Not when he had just found her. She just couldn’t. But he remembered another child he couldn’t save. He dismounted in the inner ward, whisking Eve inside the castle. As he moved into the hallway, Michael stood, waiting. Tingles of trepidation shot across the nape of Gabriel’s neck. Just like when he was a boy.
Michael reached for her.
Gabriel pulled Eve from his touch with a snarl. “I’m no longer a boy and I am not exhausted. You will not take her this time.”
Lord Chandos and Henry led a group into the corridor. Lord Chandos’s eyes widened in surprise.
“I found her this time. Just like I found her before.” He looked down at her peaceful face. “She belongs to me.”
Lord Chandos looked at Michael.
Michael’s mouth opened, and his gaze moved from Lord Chandos to Gabriel and back again. There was no explanation he could give that would explain this. This was his only chance to tell the truth and he knew it. With a small sigh, he bowed his head, relenting, and nodded. “It was Gabe. He found the girls, not I.”
Gabriel brushed past the two men, taking the stairs two at a time. “Send the physician and her lady’s maid to Eve’s room.”
He kicked open the wooden door to her room where a warm fire was dancing in the hearth. He laid her down in her bed and covered her with all the blankets he could find on her bed. He rubbed her hands briskly to bring feeling into them again. It was a moment later that he realized he was rubbing her wounded hand. It mattered not to him. To him, her hand was a sign of survival and strength.
He kissed her forehead and murmured, “Please, Eve. Please stay with me.”
Eden laughed and raced around the clearing, dodging this way and that. “You can’t catch me!”
Eve chased her through the grass, beneath the warm sunshine. She giggled as she almost caught Eden, but the small girl whirled just out of her reach.
Eden paused beneath the tree and looked up at its leafy branches.
Eve ducked beneath the branches, smiling at her sister.
“You can stay, if you want to,” Eden said.
“Eve,” a voice called from somewhere, from all around.
Eve looked at the sky for the source of the voice, but it seemed to come from everywhere.
“I won’t be mad if you don’t want to,” Eden admitted. “I’ll wait until you are ready.”
“I won’t see you again.”
Eden shook her head, her tiny curls swinging about her shoulders. You don’t need me any longer.
“Eve,” the voice called again.
Eve looked at Eden. She had wanted to be with her sister for so long, but something in the voice was drawing her away from Eden. She reached for her sister, stretching out her hand.
“Open your eyes and I will tell you a most amazing story.”
Eve gasped and opened her eyes.
Gabriel looked at her with anguish and worry and desperation.
“Gabe,” she breathed.
His arms went around her tightly. He kissed her forehead, her cheeks.
She hugged him fiercely. “I knew you would find me.” Her voice came out as a croak.
Gabe turned and took a mug from the table. He held it to he
r lips and she drank deeply of the soothing ale.
“That was a very dangerous thing you did to prove your point.” Her father stood at the bedside, his hands behind his back, a scowl on his brow.
“No one would listen to me. No one asked me what I remembered. I always told you I saw blue eyes.”
“You knew it was me?” Gabe asked.
“I knew from the first time I saw you.” She ran a tender hand along his cheek. “I knew you were the angel I was searching for.”
“No,” Gabriel shook his head firmly. “You are the angel. You are my angel.”
Eve’s eyebrows rose in surprise. She turned her gaze to her father who nodded.
“I told you that you belonged to the man who saved your life. I don’t know how you are going to pay back two lifetimes, but you belong to Sir Gabriel now. You will marry him.”
Her heart beat madly with happiness. She glanced at Gabriel and saw the smile twitching his lips. “And Michael?”
Gabriel shrugged. “Michael said he might try his luck at tournaments.”
“You’re not angry?”
“I can’t blame Michael. It was my fault, too. I should have told the truth. I should have fought for you. But I didn’t know how to at the time.” He grinned. “I guess all those tournaments did teach me something.” He looked at her, taking her hands into his. “The most valuable prize is worth the biggest fight.”
She cocked her head to the side. “Then there is only one thing left.”
Gabriel scowled.
“You must tell me the most amazing story.”
A translucent smile spread over Gabe’s face, causing Eve’s heart to miss a beat. He was so handsome, so devastatingly gorgeous and she loved him so.
“There was once a little girl who was searching for her angel.”
She joined in his merriment with a smile of her own. “And she found him.”
Gabe nodded, lowering his head to kiss her lips. “Aye. She did.”
Note from Laurel O'Donnell
My Dear Reader –
Thank you for reading A Knight Before Christmas. It was a lovely, fun tale to write. Christmas has always been a special, magical time for me filled with love and beauty. I hope that I relayed some of the magic to you.
If you feel so inclined, I would appreciate if you left a review to help other readers decide if they should read Eve and Gabriel’s tale.
Don’t forget to subscribe to my newsletter for updates on my newest novels, fun contests and so much more! https://www.laurel-odonnell.com
Welcome to my world!
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