by Nicole Locke
And the more she did, the more his tension eased, the more his body shook, his head dragging lower into whatever it was that had got them here. Desire. Lust. Want.
‘That’s it,’ she said, reaching between them, feeling along the hard planes of his stomach that rippled to the arrowing of his hips. When did she get so bold?
‘I can’t get enough,’ he said. ‘I can’t.’
She both loved and loathed that he was being so careful with her.
He opened his eyes that had somehow closed. ‘Cressida, you can’t know. This isn’t how it is between... This is different. We need...words said tomorrow.’
She didn’t want to hear of others, she didn’t want to talk. Somehow he made her want even more. ‘Please.’
He gripped her thigh that bit tighter, pressed that much more weight of himself against her and everything between them fell. It was almost easy after that.
As if all the waiting, and need, all the longing and desire made the decision for them. As if they were, indeed, inevitable and fortune was finally satisfied.
* * *
‘God’s most private of body parts, Cressida.’ Eldric nuzzled her throat, kissed along the tender parts of her shoulders and neck. ‘That was...everything.’
She knew. She knew what he meant. She felt that difference.
Over the years, she’d accidentally stumbled on others. The most embarrassing was a couple using the very tree she’d hid in.
She’d once thought that she might love Eldric, thought what she felt was love. But this between them now. The sharing, the touching, the tenderness in his blue eyes. It was everything...
He pulled away. Flopped on his back, his arm thrown over his eyes. She felt the same languidness, the inability to have any sort of grace. If someone charged in to harm them, her reflexes would be slow and he was right. She didn’t care where her clothes had gone.
But that fact wasn’t what alarmed her. It was the fact that, despite the absolute ease with which Eldric moved his body, a certain tension was there in the way he breathed, too fast and laboured, in the jerky movement of his legs as he untangled them from hers.
She’d given everything to this man, everything. All her secrets, both of her body and her heart. True, he had them all along, but he hadn’t known that until they came pouring out of her.
At his soothing touches and understanding words, her anguish and pain, need and longing had spilled out, more than she was aware of, and that still didn’t deter him. He drew her closer, his touches turned to caresses, to kisses, to...
Her body, though so recently sated, wanted more. But Eldric did not talk, his laboured breath now turning uneven as though he couldn’t breathe at all.
And there, under his arm that stayed across his eyes, slipped a single tear towards the bedding they shared.
‘Eldric?’
‘You’re unhurt, aren’t you? Please tell me I didn’t harm you.’
There was a soreness that hadn’t been, but the rest of her... ‘No harm.’
He rubbed his arm against his eyes a few times, let out a harsh breath and he sat part way up. One hand by her head, one arm holding up his entire torso as he turned to her.
He was beautiful. The various shades of brown in his hair slipping down over one shoulder towards her. Some so dark they were almost black, others so light they looked like streaks of sunlight. The dark stubble of the beard he’d grown since he captured her highlighted the brutal angle of his jawline, the softness of his lips. The blue of his eyes held every colour of the sky and all the promises of a new day.
Everything about him perfect, except for the look of doubt just behind everything else he showed in the depths of his gaze.
With his free hand he took one of her curls and wrapped it around his finger, the heat of his hand welcome after she felt the chill. She leaned her head in his palm, watching the quirk to his lips.
But that contact did not ease the troubled look in his eyes.
‘I’m pleased, Eldric,’ she said. ‘Oh! Your shoulders.’
He looked to his right where her nails had dug in, a small smile to his lips before he turned to her again. ‘Everything’s changed now, Cressida. You know that, don’t you?’
She could feel it, feel it, but instead of the elation she expected since she’d bound herself to this man, she only felt that troubled worry he held in his eyes.
She shook her head, not knowing or liking where the conversation was headed.
He threaded a few more of her strands through his fingers, not so much a caress now, but as if he was unknowingly pulling her to him. ‘Your secrets. You...your father...these missions he used to send you on. This child he stole.’
Pulling away, she sat up, drew the bedding to cover her when his eyes slipped down and the heat, newly awakened, flared again.
‘Is this your idea of later? I thought we were to talk in the morning. I didn’t expect it so soon.’ Nor did she want to go from such happiness to this uncertainty.
‘I know,’ he repeated. ‘But my heart, what I feel, I can’t contain. My thoughts are overflowing.’
She knew how that felt. ‘You have your own secrets. Is that what you want to share first?’
He dropped his hovering hand. ‘I can’t help you if you don’t tell me everything.’
She truly didn’t like where this conversation was leading. ‘I’m not asking for your help.’
‘We go to France, we confront your father...’ He huffed. ‘You don’t expect to confront him, do you? You want to simply steal the child from him?’
She wanted very much to confront her father, to rage and rail at a man who could hurt her so much. She also intended not to do it with the warrior in front of her. She would, until the end of her life, protect him.
If it came down to simply sword skill, Eldric would defeat her father, but with his alliances, his love of games and surprises, no one stood a chance against him, at least not for very long. For as long as she could, she wanted Eldric to avoid him, though her now lover seemed intent on not letting her free. But she had ways of subduing even the most stubborn followers.
‘You expect to go without me.’ His expression turned to forbidding. ‘I won’t allow it. You need me against him, if nothing else as a distraction so you can slip out with the child.’
‘How do you know what my father would do? You’re not even certain you can provide a distraction to him. I’ve told you nothing of his personality.’ She was sure of that.
‘I know you and, if he raised you, he’ll fight with everything he is to achieve his aim. Just like you do with those arrows of yours.’
She felt the point of an arrow now. One he aimed at her whether he meant to or not. It was as if that weapon was merely lying between them at the ready for him to throw. There was truth to that, they hadn’t resolved everything.
Her own emotions began to roil, as Eldric caressed along her hairline, his eyes roaming her face. They went from wondering, to wonder, from a tenderness to something troubled. And on that troubled look he asked, ‘How?’
So much between them, but the past hurt and she wasn’t quite prepared to talk of it now. Even like this, in the sanctuary that was his arms. In the firm knowledge that it was different between them. That Eldric was good and it was right to trust her secrets and her body with him. But still something inside her doubted, that something that kept talking while he touched her. Asking how it was possible they were together.
‘How what?’ she said.
‘Out of everything. It’s the one... I can’t seem to rectify it with who you are, with what’s between us. It’s tearing me apart inside.’
The tear. She should have guessed what that meant. ‘Your friends.’
He closed his eyes, took his hand away. She wished she could move out from the bedding without revealing her very naked scarred body. Instead, she l
ay there, waiting for the question she expected him to ask. After all, they did talk and had shared. He said he couldn’t rectify that she’d killed them...now he’d ask who did.
Oh, it wouldn’t make her perfect. There was still a part of her that felt she could prevent it, she could have in the past not released the other arrows her father requested, but in this...in this, Eldric would—
‘How could you have aimed, knowing what would happen when you released the arrow? How could you, knowing it was their death?’ he said.
That arrow between them wasn’t merely pointed at her. Now, she felt the full prick of the iron. If he asked this question, after all she had told him, it meant there wasn’t the trust she thought between them.
But that couldn’t be. In this she must be mistaken. This was Eldric. Her Eldric. He would—should—understand even these darkest parts of her. She sat up and he did the same. She immediately felt the cold, but her feet still rested on his legs. In that there was still warmth between them. She took heart in that.
‘I haven’t been a good person, Eldric, but I’ve tried. To do that, along the way, I’ve made...difficult choices.’
He brushed his fingertips against her hand pressed to the floor. ‘You’ve told me a bit of your father, how he controlled, demanded.’
This conversation hurt. Knowing now what role her father had made in her life, hearing the truth was still too fresh.
She looked behind her, grabbed her flung tunic. Her breeches had been tossed the other way. Eldric’s clothes were spilled even further than that. The entire room was in shambles. If they had to rush out now, there would be a strong trail.
He shoved his own tunic over his head. She was fascinated by the way his muscles shifted as he did so. When his head poked free, something in her expression must have given her away for he gave a slight knowing quirk to his lips, but the blue of his eyes still held the troubling look.
‘I don’t want to talk of my father, not now.’
‘We must,’ he said. ‘We’ve docked in France, and we must plan for his protection, where he could be.’
‘I’m thirsty,’ she said. ‘Do you want some mead?’
‘Perhaps that would help.’ He stood, then thumped across the floor to retrieve his strewn clothing. His back was to her, so she kept her back to him to prepare the drink. Eldric would understand in the end. The tiny vial of liquid she kept strapped in her boots wouldn’t be enough to kill him. Not a man his size, but it would be enough for him to sleep. He’d still be angry, but she’d apologise for the rest of their lives if she had to.
Moreover, she wouldn’t be gone for long, she already suspected where her father would go on this side of the water. It was where he usually went, to a house hidden between many others that had an attached building to house his men.
She spun around just as Eldric was at her back. She handed him the mead, watched as he took a drink.
‘You have to know I’m not planning anything.’ She took a drink of her own and swung the goblet around. ‘I think you should stay here on the ship. It’s not safe for you and—’
‘It’s not safe for you!’
She relished his words. He must care for her if he wanted to protect her. He cradled the goblet between his hands, his brow furrowed. Her heart flipped as he drank the remainder of his laced mead.
Then he looked at her. Just looked at her and she knew nothing would be the same again. Something. She felt it. Had she betrayed his trust? She shouldn’t have given him the herbs!
‘You’re...strong, Cressida, so strong,’ he said. ‘I can’t understand the hold this man has on you. How he forced you. Was it the pain of the whip? Did he threaten you another way?’
She had aimed and released those arrows to save him. She had laced his mead with a sleeping draught and she’d do it again. Eldric was good and must stay safe on the ship. She had to make him understand. When it came to Eldric, she always had a choice. Always. He was hers. Her secret, her longing. She had kept him safe for years, she would continue to do so.
‘When it comes to you, my father has never had any control.’
He frowned. ‘Explain.’
‘He ordered me to kill you because he heard you agreed to spy for Edward. My father knows all of Edward’s spies. There are few who survive. He doesn’t like them.’
He gripped the empty goblet. ‘This is treason. Something we must tell the King.’
‘Must we?’ she said, holding up her hand. ‘I am not privy to all my father’s secrets, but I’m not absolutely certain on the reasons he does things. He’s...cunning.’
‘Duplicitous. But your father was devoted to you.’
‘For most of my life, until...’ She purposefully trailed off. ‘I don’t want to talk of my father.’
‘Your father must be committing treason and the King knows of it. He...ordered me to bring you to him.’ He shook his head. Pressed his fingers to his brow. ‘My head is hurting. I—’
The draught was working fast. She needed to talk because, when he woke, she wanted him to understand. ‘Please, Eldric, listen to me. My father never had control over me with you. He ordered your death, I wouldn’t comply. I pretended. I released my arrow to make it look as though I had tried. I marked your arm so that you’d feel the pain, so you’d veer away from it and out of my range. And you did. You always did. I protected you.’
‘But you killed the others.’
She parted her lips, readied to argue how killing Thomas was an accident, how her father had killed the others, trying to reach Eldric.
But again there was that something that held her back. That doubt that would not end when it came to him. Maybe she felt this was a dream because it couldn’t be true. And...she wanted him to love her even if she had killed men. Because Thomas might have been an accident, but it was still her arrow that felled him.
And there were others, when she was younger, when her father wanted her to practise. He’d point to men. Bad men, he’d called them, and she believed him as she notched her arrows.
When she was older, her father stopped asking her. No reason given, perhaps because he knew she’d question it. Or maybe he lost confidence because she ‘missed’ killing Eldric.
In the end, it didn’t matter that she hadn’t truly killed his friends, she wasn’t a good person. She was trying to do better. Eldric knew her. He would understand.
But not for very long. His blinking was increasing as the draught took over. ‘I killed them instead of you. To protect you. Maybe I’m selfish by doing so, but do my deeds make me a terrible person?’
He’d have to say no. Have to. He had to understand she was nothing but a weapon all her life, releasing her arrows with no thought just as her father wanted. Then she heard Eldric whistle and she knew there was beauty in life, something lighter.
Brows drawn in, certainty like flint in his eyes. ‘Yes. Because you had a choice! You had a choice! What would your father do to you if you disobeyed an order? Chopped off your fingers? You could have made the choice to not end others’ lives. What is the loss of a hand compared to another’s life!’
She felt his anger, watched him shake his head to stay awake. She’d caused all of it, but suddenly she wasn’t prepared to face it. She’d lose. She knew that now, unless she told him how difficult the decision was. He’d kissed her so tenderly. Surely, he’d comprehend the choices she made.
‘And you believe I didn’t think that?’ she said. ‘A hand for a life? What would have happened then, hmm? My fingers would have been gone. My father would have assigned another mercenary to kill you. I had to stay alive, to be useful, to protect you.’
He blinked rapidly. Set the goblet on the table. It wobbled a bit and he frowned at it before returning to her. A steeling anger in his eyes. One of accusation. Judgement. ‘You don’t understand. They were my friends! I would have died for them! I should have died fo
r them.’
Merely the thought of Eldric dying caused her more pain than losing her father. He couldn’t die. He was what was good with the world. He was what she strove to be. Kind. Generous. He had not minded her scars, or her lack of dresses.
‘What choice did I have?’ she said.
He pointed at her. ‘If I were you, if my father had asked me to kill others, those who were innocent, I would have killed myself first.’
His words struck like hot iron arrows through her heart. ‘Then that makes you a coward.’
He stepped forward, unsteadily. Shook himself. ‘A coward!’
‘Yes, a coward. Because I stayed alive to make the difficult decisions, Eldric. Ending my own life wouldn’t resolve anything, I would have done it if I thought it would make any difference. But it wouldn’t have. I would be dead, your friends would have died and so would you!’ She drew herself in, prepared for the rest of the damning argument.
He blinked. Staggered. ‘What have you done?’
She had done it out of love for him. Because she’d do anything to protect him, she’d put the sleeping draught into the mead, knowing he’d drink, he’d sleep, and she would take the risks instead. Confront her father, steal the child. Keep everyone safe.
‘I did what was necessary,’ she said.
He shook his head, fell back into the chair, his great body sagging. ‘You poisoned me.’
She had. Was doubly glad for it now. First to protect him, now to protect herself. She was wrong about him. Just as she was wrong about her father. There were no good people in the world. No one to make the great sacrifice for. Not her father, not Eldric.
He didn’t love her. Didn’t care for her, didn’t trust her or know her. Didn’t understand she had made the decisions she did even when her heart broke each time she did it. Her father ordering her to kill those men—men her father said were evil—but even then she’d had to find a sanctuary and cried afterwards.
When it came to Eldric, when it came to her accidentally killing Thomas, she’d shed torrents of tears she couldn’t hide from anyone. The agony she caused Eldric, the agony she felt for killing a human being. Afterwards, for days, her father looked upon her with disgust and she had learned to hide her emotions more effectively ever since.
