She should follow Thora and apologize, but what Rowena really needed was a moment alone in the trees. There would be time later to make amends.
Finding a secluded spot, Rowena answered nature’s call. She could hear voices and the muted shuffle of restless horses, so she wasted no time. After straightening her clothing, Rowena tried to appear casual as she picked her way back to camp.
“Do ye think she realizes what they’ve done?”
The question brought Rowena up short. She didn’t recognize the man’s voice, wasn’t certain why she’d stopped, but she waited for the voice to speak again.
“What you think they’ve done, more like it,” a different man replied.
Rowena crept toward the sound of their voices. They spoke English, a language most noblewomen couldn’t understand.
Were they speaking of her?
“There’s no thinking about it, man,” the tall one said. “Dominic makes no secret of his ambition. He intended to secure a holding and now he has one.”
The trees offered some protection, but Rowena kept to the shadows, moving slowly, deliberately, placing each foot carefully as not to make a sound. They were tending the horses. She’d heard Ezra call the taller one Hubert, but she didn’t know the other man’s name.
Hubert continued. “No year-long siege, no bloody battle, just a wedding. What could be easier?”
The other man turned suddenly, and Rowena ducked behind a clump of bushes. Her heart pounded as anxiety stole her breath. Had he seen her?
“If a woman’s involved nothing’s easy.” Both men laughed at the comment and Rowena began to relax. She moved a leafy branch aside to better her view.
“Besides, if she proves to be too difficult, Dominic knows how to deal with unwanted women,” Hubert said.
His companion laughed. “Aye, snap their necks and toss them down the stairs.”
Shifting her weight onto her knees, Rowena slowly exhaled. They were laughing again. How could they find humor in such violence, even in jest?
“Don’t let him hear you talk like that. He’s still prickly about what happened,” Hubert cautioned.
“I’m not a woman, so what do I care? He only kills men on the battlefield, and I fight at his side.”
Hubert cuffed his companion playfully on the shoulder. “Just keep your wagging tongue between your teeth when Dominic is around.”
A lump formed in the pit of her stomach. These men honestly believed Dominic had murdered someone. Their conversation moved on, and Rowena carefully backed away into the darkness.
She had been the victim of vicious lies, so she tried not to pay heed to whispered rumors. Still, their words echoed through her mind. What did she really know about Dominic? He had William Marshal’s ear. If he wanted something he could persuade the regent to act on his behalf.
Her steps sped as her anxiety escalated. William Marshal told her Dominic was the only man he would accept if she were carrying his child. Had the regent offered Dominic a secret encouragement? Had he approved Dominic’s plan to…to what?
She collided with something huge and solid and screamed. Large hands clasped her upper arms and she screamed again.
“My lady.” Ezra’s voice cut through her fear. “What is amiss?”
A ragged sigh escaped Rowena and Ezra released her arms. “I…I lost my way.” Dominic and one of his men came crashing through the underbrush, swords drawn, expressions fierce.
“What? Who screamed?” Dominic demanded.
“Lady Rowena lost her bearings. She is well.” Ezra took a step back, his gaze narrowed with speculation. “Why were you running?”
Rowena felt like a fool. She glanced from Ezra’s concerned face to Dominic’s dark visage and swallowed the lump in her throat. “I thought I saw something. As you said, I am well.”
Dominic sheathed his sword and came closer, his penetrating gaze searching her face. “Why did you leave camp?”
“It was a rather long ride.”
It took a moment for him to understand the meaning in her expression, but then he nodded. “Are you hungry?”
He reached for her arm, and Rowena shrank away.
“What is wrong with you?” His tone was hushed and confused.
Rowena glanced beyond him. The other two had departed. She was alone with Dominic. “I want to go back to camp.”
He raised his hand slowly, as if to soothe a spooked horse or a frightened child. “What frightened you so? You’ve never pulled away from me before.”
“It’s just the darkness. Please, take me back to camp.”
With a resigned sigh, his hand left her skin, and he motioned her in the direction the others had gone.
The camp was bustling when they returned. Several rabbits had been spitted and were roasting over the fire. Thora chatted away as she helped Ezra rotate the meat. Rowena found a log near the tournament tent and sat. She stared off into the darkened forest, gradually becoming oblivious to the activity around her. Shock and disappointment kept her from feeling anything stronger.
“Are you sure you are well?”
Rowena looked up and found Dominic standing directly in front of her. Warm awareness melded with a tingle of uncertainty. For one sparkling moment she had believed there was good in the world, that a man could be brave and true. But now the moment was past and she must protect herself again.
“There’s no reason to fret.” She forced calm into her voice. “I’m tired, but it’s nothing a good night’s sleep will not heal.”
“Good.”
She wasn’t sure he believed her, but it no longer mattered.
“I find myself once again entrusted with your safekeeping. Are you going to be as difficult to protect as you were before?”
“Do you believe I need protecting? Could Edwin be nearby, waiting to ambush us?” She tried to sound lighthearted, but the thought had crossed her mind.
“I believe Edwin scurried home. You should be perfectly safe unless you wander off into the woods alone.” He offered her a challenging smile.
“I will behave.”
His smile disappeared, and he leaned toward her, his voice soft and low. “But I will not.”
Feeling vulnerable with him towering over her, Rowena stood. “You will not, what?”
“Behave.” He reached out and stroked her cheek. She managed not to shrink away this time. “I vowed not to touch you before, Rowena. No such vow binds me now.”
The wind caught the filmy fabric of her wimple and tangled it around his hand, trapping his fingers against her skin. “Is that a warning?” She tried to ignore the irrational ache low in her belly. She couldn’t still want this man!
“Warning. Promise. Solemn vow. It is whichever you prefer.”
Before she could respond, he withdrew his hand and walked away.
Chapter Seven
“It looks like Sir Dominic won that round.” Thora returned to Rowena’s side.
“It wasn’t a verbal joust, Thora, just a confusing exchange.”
Thora handed her the hindquarters of a rabbit, and they sat on the log, side by side. Rowena nibbled absently, licking the grease from her fingers and her bottom lip. Ezra handed her a leather pouch of nuts and dried fruit. She poured a small pile onto her lap and passed the pouch to Thora. A wineskin followed. Rowena did her best to pretend nothing was wrong.
Hubert and his uncouth friend sat directly across the fire from Rowena. She couldn’t look at them without feeling her skin crawl. When she raised the rabbit to her lips, her stomach heaved. With a pang of guilt, she tossed the half-eaten leg into the fire and brushed the last of the nuts into the dirt. Food was precious, but her appetite had deserted her. Hubert wolfed down his portion, conversing casually, as if he hadn’t disrupted her entire world.
Thora prattled on about the Pendragon curse, and Rowena glanced at Dominic. His strong, harsh features captivated her. Why was she drawn to this man? How could she still find him attractive? He tore off a chunk of meat and raised it to
his mouth. His hands were large and capable. Capable of breaking a woman’s neck? Rowena shuddered and looked into the fire. It was a rumor, nothing more.
“So, if Lady Rowena can produce a male child, the curse will be broken?” Ezra asked Thora.
“Nay, the barrenness of Pendragon ladies is a result of the curse, but not the curse itself. It’s the Lady’s happiness that must be won for the curse to be truly lifted.”
“’Til the Lady finds the fate that once I sought,” Rowena quoted ominously. “Disappointment, pain and death shall be thy lot!”
“What fate was Fiona seeking?” Hubert asked.
“Happiness,” Ezra echoed Thora’s sentiments.
“Nay, ’tis more than that,” Rowena said. “Fair Fiona was searching for a heart true and honorable enough to deserve her love. I think the Lady, whomever she may be, will have to find true love.”
“And if true love doesn’t exist?” Dominic challenged.
“Then Pendragon Castle is doomed.” Rowena glanced off into the darkness.
“Even if the Lady can manage to find true love, she will still have the riddle to contend with,” Thora reminded, drawing the men’s attention back to her.
“Riddle?” Ezra asked.
“Of course.” Thora’s gaze glistened in the firelight. “My…er, Grandmother said that it’s a vital part of freeing us from the curse. To vanquish the curse, the Lady will have to unravel the riddle.”
Rowena laughed. “It’s odd that this riddle is not part of the original ballad. No one remembers when or how the riddle became part of lifting the curse.”
“How does it go? Can you recite the riddle?” Ezra encouraged, obviously captivated.
“What is always lonely but never alone? Possesses nothing but has riches untold? Speaks only silence but shares tales far and wide? Remains hidden forever in the shadows of night?”
A long silence followed Thora’s oration. Rowena watched their expressions turn distant as they struggled through the questions, trying to find some common element.
“What does it mean?” Hubert asked.
“No one really knows.” Thora was in her element with every eye fixed upon her. “Only the Lady will be able to find the meaning.”
Another hush followed and Rowena chuckled, deciding to amuse herself just a bit. “I think it is referring to Fearsome Dragon.”
“Really?” Hubert’s gaze shifted to Rowena’s face. “Explain, milady.”
“Well, if you are a dragon, you cannot be seen by most mortals, so that would make you lonely. You would own nothing, yet even the dragon on the Pendragon standard has jewel-encrusted wings. A dragon cannot speak, but tales about dragons are known far and wide. And like many other mythical creatures they are hidden from our world like a shadow.”
“She doesn’t believe a word of it.” Thora glared at her across the fire. “This is the fourth solution milady has concocted since first she heard the riddle. Our present Lady Pendragon does not believe in the legend.”
Rowena shook her head. “Not so. I know that powerful forces are at work over Pendragon Castle. Fairies are real. I have seen Fair Fiona. But the legend has evolved over the years, becoming more complex and darker. The riddle was not part of the ballad, and the ballad does not mention the treasure. I think the legend has been twisted ’til it is hard to know what is real and what is—”
“Real?” Sir Ezra interrupted. “You believe that fairies are real?”
“Treasure?” Hubert asked before she could respond. “There be a treasure promised to the Lady?”
Ignoring Hubert, Rowena answered Ezra. “I know that fairies are real. Whether they have the power to control the lives of men, I can only suppose. But generation after generation has fallen to the curse. What other explanation could there be?”
“Ill fortune, war, treachery, disease,” Dominic listed. “These seem a bit more feasible than a Fairy curse. Gaston was killed in a tournament, was he not? There is nothing mystical in that.”
Thora looked at her expectantly, but Rowena held her peace. She should be used to others mocking her belief in the legend, but somehow it still stung.
The conversation turned to the tournaments recently held in the North of France, and Rowena stopped listening. She had no patience for men and their foolish games.
Without thinking to explain her actions, she stood and slipped away into the darkness. A narrow trail led to the brook, which wound its way down through the forest. She could still see the fire in the distance and hear an occasional voice.
With a frustrated sigh, Rowena sat on a flat rock near the water’s edge and drew her legs up under her tunic. She wrapped her arms around her knees and stared out over the rippling water.
What in the world was she going to do? Her world had shifted from agony to bliss and back all in a matter of days.
Moonlight danced on the surface of the brook and the crisp scent of pine gently perfumed the air. She should be soothed by the tranquil night, but she wasn’t. Half of her wanted to close the gates to Pendragon Castle and never allow another male within the curtain walls. The other half wanted to pretend she had never heard the hateful things Hubert and his friend had said. To believe Dominic was noble and true. That his only motivation for misleading William had been to protect her from Edwin.
“Am I intruding?”
Dominic.
She unfolded her legs and slipped to the ground on the far side of the rock. She couldn’t let him touch her. Rational thought abandoned her whenever he touched her.
“Will you leave if I say you are?” She slowly turned to face him.
“Nay.” He smiled. “I think you want me here.”
“Do you now?” She crossed her arms over her chest, hoping to hide their trembling. “You think I crept away into the night, hoping you’d follow?”
“I didn’t say that. I know you intended to be alone with your thoughts. But thoughts are far easier to decipher if you have an objective assistant.”
Her lips were suddenly dry and she found it hard to swallow. “You don’t want to decipher my thoughts just now. I have no use for anyone of your gender.”
He moved toward the rock. Rowena wasn’t foolish enough to feel protected by the barrier.
“Then don’t think of me as a man but as a friend.”
There it was again, the false gentleness, the counterfeit caring that made her want to trust him. She drew in a deep breath and nervously licked her lips. “You’re far too much a man to ever be my friend.”
“Then let me be your lover.”
It was a velvet temptation, a honeyed lure. She dug her fingernails into her palms as she struggled to resist. “I cannot.”
“Aye, you can.” He reached across the rock and took her wrist. “You should.” He pulled her around to stand before him. “You will.” He wrapped his arms around her.
Rowena felt as if he cast a spell. Her rational mind was screaming Beware!, but her body went willingly into his embrace. Heat radiated off him, beckoning her, attracting her. “I will not lie down with you.” She turned her face aside.
“Then we will not lie down.”
He lowered his face, but she twisted away, shoving against his broad chest. “I will not be your lover. Not tonight, not ever!”
Slipping under her wimple, he grasped the back of her hair. His eyes burned into hers, and his expression promised no mercy. “We will be lovers, Rowena. If not tonight, then soon.”
Before she could argue, he kissed her. His lips pressed against hers, moved over hers, molded and contoured until she finally opened to him. His tongue sank slowly into her mouth. It was an act of possession, a deliberate penetration that clearly staked his claim.
Rowena trembled, overwhelmed by the sudden onslaught. Her hands clutched against his shoulders, neither pushing him away nor drawing him near. Every nerve in her body hummed with awareness and anticipation.
His face shifted, his lips angling so he could stroke her tongue with his, dance along her teet
h and taste every surface of her mouth. Rowena allowed his intimate exploration for a time, but soon she was returning each caress, stroking and curling and learning his taste.
He wouldn’t let her breathe except from his breath. Her head spun and her legs wobbled. He threaded his fingers through hers and pushed her arms behind her, pressing their joined hands down against the rock.
Rowena couldn’t think. She needed more of him. She needed all of him.
She arched her back and murmured his name.
“I could take you now, Rowena,” he whispered against her moist lips. “But I want more than a frantic moment, stolen in the shadows. I want to see you and touch you and taste you. I want to take you over and over until we are both too weak to move.”
His words cut through the haze and Rowena opened her eyes. He was right. She would have wrapped her legs around his waist and allowed him anything.
Shame and fear intertwined. Rowena dragged great gulps of air into her burning lungs. He still held her hands interlaced with his. “Let go of me.”
“Not yet.” He moved in closer, crossing her arms behind her back. “I would have your word first.”
“My word?” she echoed, shaken and confused.
“Tell me I am welcome in your bed.”
She glared at him. Why was he pushing her like this? “Release me.”
“Nay. I would have this settled between us. We are meant to be lovers. You feel the fire, I know you do. Can you deny it?”
She stared at him in mutinous silence. “Why did you defend me to Sir William?”
Even in the darkness she could see confusion in his eyes. “Would you rather I didn’t?”
“Nay. You rescued me from Edwin, and for that you have my gratitude, but I’ll not allow you to take his place.”
He made a harsh, scoffing sound, and Rowena arched away.
He leaned in closer, pressing her against the rock. “I am not Edwin. Do not ever compare me to him again.” His grip eased and his expression changed. “This is not about your holdings. It’s about the fire you ignited the first time you touched me.”
His mouth hovered above hers, part promise, part threat.
Tears of the Dragon Page 11
