Sorcha squeezed her eyes shut for a split second, grimacing from the pain Sir Duncan had to have felt from the punch he took to the jaw. She knew she should have gotten to Robert before his impatience stirred to the point of a fight.
Sir Duncan stumbled back and crashed into a table. His footing steady, he managed to catch himself from falling on the floor. He pushed himself forward, raked back his light brown hair and glared at Robert like a bull ready to charge. While she didn’t care how either of them resolved their problem outside the tavern, inside she’d have to clean up their mess.
“Gentlemen, please,” she stepped between them. “Robert, sit down. Sir Duncan, if you’ll wait for me over there, we can continue our discussion.” She pointed toward the bar and then she gave a soothing stroke to Robert’s arm. She knew just how to tame the ogre that was one of her best paying customers.
“There, there, Robert. You know I don’t like it when you fight.” She pushed him to sit. “Be a good man and drink your ale.”
Once Robert guzzled down most of his ale and breathed calmer, she slipped away to the bar.
“Your husband?” Sir Duncan asked when she joined him.
“Absolutely not.”
“Good. I’d hate to bring you grief if I have to kill him.”
“Robert is harmless. He’s also very generous with his money, so I would appreciate it very much if you did not antagonize him.”
“Only if you have a drink with me.” He picked up a tankard and went to the keg himself.
“Will you consider my challenge?” she asked, hoping for his change of heart.
“I’d like to lie and say I can, but the truth is I cannot, and I’ll not show you disrespect by saying otherwise just to have a few pleasurable moments of your time.” He filled another tankard. “Shall we sit?”
He led the way and she followed.
“So, will you tell me your name or should I guess?” he asked.
“Sorcha Bronson.”
“I knew a Kell Bronson.”
“My father.”
“Ah, that is your interest in dragon fighting.” He took a swig of his ale. “You of all people should know how dangerous a sport it is.”
“Because I’m a woman?”
“Because a person can get killed by the slightest misjudgment while competing.”
“I’m skilled.”
“I do not doubt that is so if your father had a hand in raising you. However, t’would grieve me greatly to be the cause of any harm to you.”
“You and two dozen others.” She rose from her seat, weary of the arrogance of men.
Sir Duncan stood as well.
“I have to get back to serving the patrons.” She drank down her ale and wiped the back of her hand over her mouth. “They can be a rowdy lot if not attended to quickly.”
“Sorcha?” Sir Duncan touched her arm, and she turned to him. “Later, after the first round in the tournament, perhaps—”
The boisterous laughter of men drew her notice. She saw Henry the center of attention. When he turned his head, his gaze swept in her direction. She ignored him and looked back to Duncan. “You are sweet,” she said, running her finger along his jaw. “But I’ll be busy.”
“With Sir Henry?” He sounded disappointed.
“Why would you think that?”
“You keep looking over at him.”
“I told you, I need to serve him and his friends. That’s all.”
“Ah, and if only Sir Henry wasn’t looking this way so often, I might believe you.”
“Am I to blame for Sir Henry’s wandering gaze?”
“It’s more than a gaze.” Sir Duncan’s nodded to someone behind her.
She didn’t move as the heat of someone came closer to her back. The recognizable scent of Henry surrounded her.
“Stanwyck.” Henry greeted Sir Duncan over her shoulder. “I see you’re on the roster for competition today. ‘Tis a long time since we’ve met on the tournament field.”
“As a young knight, you compete early, Pembroke. You will have a lot of fights to win if you should hope to go against me.” Duncan’s comment seemed a deliberate boast.
“Don’t worry. I shall not tire before our joust. As you have pointed out, I’m young.” Henry laughed softly.
Sorcha considered leaving the men to their not-so-subtle bragging. She heard their kind of talk all the time, but she didn’t want to give Sir Duncan’s advances any encouragement. Henry helped by remaining close.
When Henry placed his hand on her hip, she silently counted to ten and then casually turned away. “Excuse me, gentlemen,” she said leaving, hoping she left a disinterested impression to both of them.
Her father’s dragons and her future relied on her entry into the tournament. The exhibition the day before at Milstead was a mere stepping-stone to the bigger event. This was where the crowds would be. This was where she would catch the attention of some of the richest and best dragon fighters in the country.
She didn’t have time for romance with handsome knights.
* * * * *
Henry left Duncan and followed Sorcha to the bar. Her mysterious departure while he was still asleep kept nagging at him. It shouldn’t have. Women had come and gone in his life before and he hadn’t give much thought to how long he’d spent in their company. But Sorcha made a difference. She stepped into his carefree life like a boulder falling into a narrow stream. That trapped feeling caught him unaware and he needed closure. He required retribution, redemption— or something—to know he wasn’t a fool for thinking there was more between them.
“I want to talk to you,” he said, determined not to let his feelings sway his decision to keep their encounters lighthearted.
“About accepting my challenge?” She began dispensing ale from a keg.
“You know I can’t.”
“What I know is that you are being stubborn.” She skillfully picked up six full tankards, came out from the bar and circled him. “I have to work.”
Henry grabbed three tankards. “I will help.”
She glanced at him with a raised brow.
“What? Tis not a hard chore.”
“Not hard?” she growled, her eyes narrowing on him.
“Bad choice of words?” He gave her an apologetic grin. “I meant not hard for me to do one time. If I had to spend the day lugging these about to this unruly crowd, I would fall flat on my face.”
“A place most familiar to you, is it not?” She spun away.
He recalled their meeting after he had stumbled out of another tavern. Lying at her feet wasn’t a bad place to be.
“Come along, Sir Henry,” Sorcha called to him as she wove a path through the room to the group he had just left.
He bumped his way around the people closing the route she had taken. Ale sloshed over the rim of the full tankards, wetting his hands, his sleeve, and the front of his tunic.
“Ah, Sorcha has herself a helper,” one of the dragon riders commented.
“Maybe we should get him an apron and a dress,” another taunted.
“Will you spread your legs for me if I give you some extra coin?” Yet another baited him.
Henry tried to get around Sorcha to set his tankards down and hit the man for his ill choice of words.
“Easy Sir Henry, you’ll spill ale all over me.”
“I don’t like their suggestions about you.”
“It’s just talk. I can handle them. You can save championing me for another time.”
“I’ll not pummel the man for his crudeness only because he’s drunk and you asked me to refrain. But I will always defend your honor, milady.”
“You’re one to talk, Sir Henry. You threw me over your shoulder and made off with me to a back room in a tavern in Milstead.”
“Duly noted, milady. Men are pigs.”
He helped her sit the tankards on the table. Ignoring the dragon riders and their continued crass remarks, he followed Sorcha back to the bar.
“
Look at him,” Reven’s voice boomed over the others. “Trailing behind the tavern wench like a pup under her skirt, hoping for a lick.”
Henry could handle the crass talk directed at him, but he wasn’t going to let Reven, of all people, besmirch Sorcha’s character. “Excuse me.” He turned from Sorcha.
“Sir Henry, no.” She grabbed his arm. “Come with me.”
He gave Reven an angry glare, warning him not to push for a fight, but Sorcha’s hand in his drew his attention back to her.
“Where are we off to?” he asked,
“To keep you out of trouble.” She tugged him through the crowd toward the door.
He found it interesting the way she acted his protector. The shouts from the boisterous men became a din of chatter. He caught a glimpse of his brother Ware. It disturbed him to have his brother’s approving nod. Was Ware thinking he went with Sorcha for a sexual tryst? Did he think he had no morals?
“Sir Henry?” Sorcha’s voice brought him back to her.
“I think I need to have a word with that group about respecting you,” Henry told her.
“Come now, Sir Henry, you have no need to defend my honor for our actions last night. I’m not ashamed of it. Besides, they’re drunk, and you yourself know how a little ale can make a man’s jaw flap with asinine comments.” She dragged him outside.
“But even my brother—”
“Henry, do you really want to go back to them?” She batted her eyelashes in a coy and sultry fashion. “Or do you want to take a dragon ride with me?”
She let go of his hand and pranced away, showing her mood had changed—it had turned flirtatious, like when she was at his castle.
“Where?” he called, as if it made a difference.
“You showed me your home, so now I will show you mine.” She twirled around and faced him.
“You don’t live in the village?”
“I have a room in the tavern. ‘Tis not my true home.
Visions of her getting naked again, this time pushing him into her bed, quickened his pace. If he was going to be a fool, he might as well enjoy the benefits.
“My dragon or yours?” he asked.
“Mine.”
“And do you have a particular reason we’re taking yours instead of mine? Like maybe you’ll up and leave me without a word?”
He watched her shoulders rise as she took a deep breath and heaved out a sigh. “I shouldn’t have left.” She apologized. “I woke, unsure whether you’d want me there or not.”
He picked up her hand and rubbed her knuckles. “I missed you,” he confessed.
Yes, he was a sap, yet proud he didn’t blurt out any other sentimental rubbish. Eventually, his infatuation with her would end, and they’d both be better off for not getting in too deep.
“As for which dragon, I don’t want to tire yours before your match today.” She took hold of his arm and they walked. “Do you know who you go up against?”
“If I’m not mistaken, I fight Reven first.”
“Then you shouldn’t have fought him yesterday. Now all your best moves will be fresh in his mind. It can never be good to give away your form without purpose.”
“I had a purpose, remember.”
“Hmmm, yes, my rescuer saving me from sleeping with his enemy.”
“Sorcha, Reven is not my enemy. While we are rivals in the games, and we seldom see eye to eye on anything, I hold no animosity against him. His father, not he, tried to kill me. I cannot hold him responsible.”
“He doesn’t act like a friend, Sir Henry. You should be wary of any alliance he offers,” she warned.
They reached her dragon and Sorcha tapped the animals shoulder to signal him to lower.
“I said we weren’t enemies, but it doesn’t mean I’d trust Reven with my life.” He helped her up.
He held her at the waist as she took the reins and commanded the flight. They rode high and took in the view for miles. Nowhere in any land did he feel as at peace then as he did soaring in the heavens. Sorcha’s presence added to his heartfelt tranquilly. She fit him like his custom-made armor and he liked that protected feeling.
Immersed in thought, Henry hadn’t noticed their descent until Sorcha landed her dragon atop a hill that looked down into a pasture with four female dragons.
“We’re too close,” Henry said, worried by the way the male stomped the ground with agitation.
“He’s happy to be home.” She hopped down to the ground.
He grabbed the reins and held them to rein in Charger should he decide he wanted himself a female.
“All of them are already bred, Sir Henry. He’ll be good.”
He looked from her to them to her again. “All of them at once?” he asked. It was rare to find a dragon so potent he could manage to breed a whole clan.
“Yes, all of them at once.”
“And what of their eggs? Surely, not more than one is produced after he has seeded the first mare?
“The first season they did well, each having a four or five egg clutch. Half the hatchlings were viable. Of those, better than half lived. We ended up with six healthy fledglings. My father raised and trained all, and then sold them. This time, if I have that many, I’ll keep one male and two females to increase my herd.”
“That’s an ambitious plan. You have enough room to house another male without him fighting Charger?”
“I’ll rent more land. Tregarth has plenty.” She took his hand and pulled him down the hill toward a creek.
At times, he saw her as a hard-edged woman, determined and strong. Then there were the moments like this when she showed him a passion for dragons and for life. It exposed a vulnerability he was compelled to try to protect. The many facets drew him closer to understanding what he felt for her. Sure, he loved to gallivant around the countryside, enter tournaments, participate in exhibitions, compete one on one with anyone who rode a dragon. Then there were his times of relaxation with a local girl. They were only meaningful for the pleasure he reaped. Sorcha made him see what his life lacked. What his brothers had and he did not—true love.
Chapter Six
Sorcha walked along the bank of the stream. The water moved slowly, meandering around the rocks lying in the creek bed. She quietly wondered what had Sir Henry in deep thought. Usually, he talked freely, his words flowing with a carefree steadiness that made her happy to listen.
“It’s peaceful here,” he commented, turning to her. “Nice pasture, good flow of water, why do you stay in the village?”
“I have a room there because I work late. Every morning, I fly Charger back here to tend to the dragons. I should be here all the time, but alas, I cannot. Some of the locals keep watch on the dragons. If there is a problem, they get word to me.”
“But you should do well raising dragons. It’s a profitable business, and you should not need to work at the tavern.”
“That was true two years ago. But my father wagered all his money on that dragon fight that killed him. Until I raise new dragons, or someone commissions me to train theirs, I have to work to pay Lord Tregarth for my tenancy.”
“What if I could make your rent go away?
“No.” She stepped back. “I want to do this on my own. If I wanted to be obligated to a man, I could have done that long ago. More than a dozen men have offered their financial assistance in exchange for my favors.”
“I make the offer with no strings attached, Sorcha.”
“You say that now. And then sometime in the future, you’ll expect something from me.” She wasn’t about to fall into that kind of trap. Her independence meant a lot more than a quick fix to her problem.
“Should you change your mind—” His sentence went unfinished.
She moved in front of him and put her hand on his chest. The vibration of his pounding heart radiated to her palm. “My house is modest, but comfortable. It’s a short walk over the hill,” she said, subtly suggesting they go there to be intimate.
“We don’t need a house,
a castle or even a bed to be comfortable.” He pulled her close.
His crooked smile gave away his thoughts. Other men looked at her with lust and it meant nothing. With Henry, she felt different, as if she were special to him. She caressed his prickly jaw and stroked his hairline along his temple, happy he wasn’t rushing to undress her. She pushed her fingers into his hair, winnowing them through his brown mane. The length was perfect for coaxing his mouth to hers.
His soft and pliant lips pressed hers tentatively. His arms slid around and enveloped her in a warm embrace. She sagged against him, welcoming his gentle hug. His kiss moved over her face, taking in her cheeks, her nose, and her closed eyelids. He squeezed her tighter so the heat of him penetrated her paltry clothing. The warmth spread through to her belly and traveled deep into her loins. She let her knees buckle, encouraging him to lower and lay her on the bed of thick bladed grass. When he did, she shivered from the contrast of cool ground on her hot back.
“Cold?” he asked, rubbing his hand up and down her arm.
“Come down here, Sir Henry.” She grasped the front of his tunic and pulled him onto her. “You’ll warm me.”
“I shall do more than that, my lovely.” He nuzzled her nose, gently kissed her cheek, and then drew back and stared at her with a warm smile tugging the one corner of his mouth up again.
She stroked his face, fascinated by the loving way he looked into her eyes. Men usually wanted what they wanted and took no time to appreciate the joy of being close. She saw Henry take a moment to study her. Would he always have that look of enjoyment?
“What are you thinking about?” he asked.
“Me? You’re the one who had a plan,” she told him.
“So I did.” His mouth crushed hers.
The full weight of his body rested on top her. She hugged him tight, caressed his back and shoulders, and resisted thinking about the future. He was a dragon rider knight from a respected noble family and she was a tavern wench with a dream of training dragons. A relationship with longevity was improbable, yet that seemed all the more reason to enjoy it while she could.
A Tavern Wench to Bed Page 9
