by Jackie Ivie
Her mouth hardened. Sybil had never thought it through, but now that she had a man other women lusted for, she wanted more. She wanted a man that had not bedded every woman who caught his eye.
“Why na’?” she asked.
“Nae time,” he answered the air in front of them, and not her.
“For a bit of food?”
“’Tis unsafe.”
“Where?” she asked.
“Everywhere.”
“Everywhere.” She repeated the word, and it was still senseless. There wasn’t a soul within sighting or hearing distance, and until they reached the woods bordering Aberdeen there wasn’t much ambushing that could take place without it being spotted. In fact, there wasn’t any attack that wouldn’t be noted the moment it was started. The entire landscape looked like it was littered with faery lights and mist, and not one bit of iniquity, yet he called it unsafe?
“Vincent?” She tried again but got even less than before as he tightened his thighs on his stallion and made it lope forward, ahead of her wagon. She watched it happen and couldn’t prevent the sigh. Again.
He treated her to silence the entire day, even as it turned into sun-strewn heat waves that undulated off the rocks before turning into shadows that lengthened every boulder. He bypassed Aberdeen, as well. She watched that happen about midday. He hadn’t asked if she needed to stop, although her hands and arms and shoulders were aching from holding the reins, and her seat had been numbed for so long, she couldn’t feel her legs anymore. He simply pushed his mount over to where the other horse was plodding along, took the bridle and turned it away from the settlement.
All of which was mystifying and intriguing, and maddening. Then he changed everything by reaching into his pack, pulling out his mouth flute, and starting to play. Sybil knew then that what she’d heard earlier in the hall at Eschoncan Keep had been but a sampling of his genius. Vincent was a master. He created such soul-touching notes from the instrument that her entire being responded. The world seemed to halt in order to listen.
Sybil forgot every ill, every care. She forgot everything as she listened, following him blindly as he led them toward the fringe of wood and then entered it. He could have been leading her into purgatory and she’d have followed. It was impossible to grasp how, but Vincent was capable of making the instrument in his hands speak in the most heavenly language imaginable.
He finished as the sun was nearly to the horizon if it could be seen through the trees, making everything within the leaf-filled canopy ripe with mystery and legend. Sybil caught her breath, stretched massively as if just awakening from a spell, and then she was applauding.
That was the first time he glanced her way. He caught her gaze and held it long enough to stop her heart. And then he was looking away, halting his horse and hers, which brought the wagon to a stop. Sybil gulped at the extra moisture in her mouth and waited.
“We camp here. For the night.”
She nodded, but he didn’t see it. He was dismounting, showing a nice amount of sculpted thigh in the process, and then he was hobbling his horse with the band he’d had about his forehead. That sent lanky blond strands to cover his features as he bent down. That was bothersome, since it covered over his handsomeness. Sybil pursed her lips and watched him soundlessly from her perch on the wagon bench seat. That was when he finished with his horse and speared her with a glance from those devil-dark eyes that still looked so incongruous with his coloring. Then he was flushing a nice color that infused every bit of exposed flesh…probably at her unblinking regard. She kept the smile inside where he wouldn’t spot it before he looked away again, toward the ground.
“Is it safe?’ she asked.
“Aye. We’re near Donal land. I’ve sent word.”
“You have?”
“With my fipple. ’Tis why I played.”
The scope of her disappointment was probably etched onto her features. He wasn’t looking, so he didn’t note it.
“I doona’ play my flute simply for the noise. I send out messages with it as well.”
“Oh. I found it…lovely,” she answered.
He grunted what went for a reply, as if he were too embarrassed to make a proper one. Sybil watched as he moved then to attend to her horse, slipping the reins from its mouth as he patted it down, all the while ignoring her. Or trying to pretend that he was. All of which was even more intriguing.
Sybil stretched, finding all sorts of aches and issues with having sat atop a wagon bench for hours on end without rest. And then she was gathering her skirts and scooting toward the side step. His movements slowed at her motion, but he didn’t help. It wasn’t until she was firmly on solid ground and moving toward the trees that he spoke again.
“Where is it you’re off to?” he asked.
“Finding a spot for my privy,” she answered, as if it should be obvious.
“Wait.”
“For what?” she asked.
“An escort.”
Sybil blew a reply of sorts through her lips. It sounded irritated. It was.
“It’ll only be a moment,” he said to that.
“I’ve nae need of an escort. I’ve been taking care of my needs for many years,” she informed him.
“And I’ll still be seeing to an escort. These woods are large. Dangerous. Dense. Dark. Many a thing can happen to a tiny wench such as yourself.”
Sybil turned to face him, but he still wasn’t meeting her eyes. Tiny wench, she repeated in her thoughts. “Verra well,” she replied finally. “Doona’ tarry, then. I’ve more importance than a horse.”
Vincent gave the horse one more pat on the neck and turned toward her, looking somewhere in the vicinity of her waist. “I’ve na’ said different, now have I?” He said it aggressively, as if he were looking for an acidic word of argument or something.
Sybil narrowed her eyes. “You wish me to make camp for us, cook sup, and prepare for rest…or do you wish to argue?” she asked.
He rolled his head on his shoulders, as if relaxing out the aches of his own riding before he answered. Then he brought his head down and met her eyes.
“Argue,” he said when he finished.
Sybil sucked in a breath, held it, let it out. “Fair enough. Grant me a moment in which to relieve myself, since you have made me suffer through an entire day and night ride without stopping, and I’ll have all the words of argue you want. All the words I can find. That will na’ be an issue with us, Husband.” She emphasized the title and turned from him to shove her way through deadfall and branches until she reached the edge of a slow-moving burn. She was hidden enough that privacy wasn’t a problem. Through it all she was berating him as an oaf, a thoughtless, rude, arrogant, wasteful mass of man that had more brawn than sense.
It wasn’t until she stopped for breath that she heard what had to be his laughter. Although it was softly done, he was too close not to have her hear it. All of which was more than odd. It was mystifying and without sense. Sybil pushed escaped tendrils of hair behind her ears as she walked back to where the horses were standing. He wasn’t anywhere in sight. He’d been right about one thing, she decided. The woods were dense and dark.
“I canna’ hear you,” he taunted from somewhere behind her.
“What do you wish me to say now?” she asked.
“More words of argument.”
“More?”
“You have a problem with hearing?” he asked.
“I have a problem with you!” she answered.
“Good.”
“I’ve wed a fellow with cooked oats atween his ears?”
She heard him snort. She couldn’t tell if it was with amusement or not.
“Is that the best you can give?” he answered finally.
“Of course na’. But what man wishes a shrew for a wife?” she asked.
“This one,” he replied loudly.
“Truly? But…why?”
There was a bit of silence after her question, broken only by the sound of the burn,
and that was followed by the rustling of dried leaves, branches bending and twisting, and the general sound of footsteps across deadfall. He was moving to another location but staying out of sight. Sybil cocked her head and listened for his exact location but couldn’t quite decipher it. There was too much noise, followed by silence, followed by more rustling noises.
“I doona’ hear any camp being set up.” He said it loudly from an area on the opposite side of where he’d stopped the wagon and hobbled the horses. Sybil looked that way but couldn’t spot anything.
“I thought you wanted to argue, na’ set up camp,” she said to the clearing about her. Silence was her answer. She waited for the sounds of movement but got nothing. Sybil lifted her skirts to climb over the back gate of the wagon and found the long, curved poles that would support their tent top. It was a simple matter to slide the ends into the slots on the wagon’s side until she had the framework in place. Then she unfolded the heavy, woven fabric that was the roof of the tent and set about tying it into place on each pole. She was on the last stretch of material when he spoke again.
“I doona’ smell anything being cooked,” he announced from the trees.
“I am setting up camp. You’ll need to wait for that,” she replied.
Silence was her answer again. It wasn’t difficult to find words to toss at his head this time although she kept them unspoken. The man was a dolt. It was impossible to argue if there was no reply. She twisted on the balls of her feet and opened the sacks containing her cookpots and utensils. Then she set about finding the iron stand that could be set up atop a fire…if they had a fire.
“I’ll need a fire started!” She hollered it in the general direction where his last words had come from and got no response. Again. She couldn’t see him, she couldn’t hear him, and she couldn’t sense him. Waif was missing, too. All of which made the woods about her feel large, dark, dangerous, and dense, and a few other descriptions that Sybil forced away from her consciousness. She’d been out at night often enough to know that fear was more destructive than most things one encountered. She tossed items onto the ground and then busied herself with clearing some of the brush and grass until she reached dirt. Then she scooped out a hollow deep enough to hold coals—once she had coals. She had to resort to using the smaller of her pans in order to get the proper depth. She dropped dried deadfall into the firepit, and then she put two sticks side-by-side with a bit of dry grass in the center. There was a thick iron rod for firestarting among her belongs. It took some more time before she had a spark. It was an easy move to part the sticks and let the little bit of ember drop. Then Sybil was on her knees and blowing gently. It was getting darker by the moment, and that husband of hers was no help at all. Sybil wouldn’t have any trouble finding words to heap on his head now.
It took three more trips into the wagon and then back to the firepit with her supplies before she had the iron stand in place and her pot atop the fire, and then she had to locate the burn again to get some water to boil.
Through it all, she might as well have been alone, since Vincent hadn’t said or done anything for so long she was beginning to doubt he was still there. He was planning on treating her to isolation and solitude? He hadn’t noticed that she’d lived her entire life with those conditions? What was wrong with the man that he’d show her that heaven was available within his arms and then leave her be? He wasn’t the type to leave his new wife stranded, was he? Could that be the reason behind his argumentative nature? He had to have a reason to leave so he wouldn’t feel guilty—therefore he invented one?
What was wrong with the man that he’d think that way? And why was she so ready and willing to believe it of him without one shred of proof or anything other than her own supposition? She was usually right—but not always.
She was just about ready to call out for him when there was a loud rustling coming from directly before her. That was followed by the rush of a body through the woods, holding a live pheasant in front of him as he flailed with it.
“Quick! A skean!” He was wrestling with the bird, and it didn’t look easy.
“Why dinna’ you kill it first?” Sybil was asking it as she searched for a blade on the ground.
“Nae…time!”
“Most hunters bring down their game first,” she informed him while standing with a long knife, unsure of where to swing it or even if she should.
“Must you use arguments…now?” He panted the words out before gripping the bird’s legs with his left hand, swinging it downward while reaching for her knife with his right hand. He had the head lifted off on the return swing of the pheasant upward.
Sybil’s mouth dropped open. She’d never seen such dexterity or such a display. She didn’t think many had.
“There!” Vincent dropped the bird right beside the firepit, where the flickers of flames glistened on droplets of blood that had showered just about everything, including the bottom of her skirts.
“There?” Sybil countered, moving her gaze from the carcass on the ground beside her feet all the way up his frame to meet his eyes.
He was grinning and making her heart feel like it swooped to the pit of her belly before rising up to her throat to start beating with an intensity that was painful. She couldn’t even breathe. She watched as the absolute glee on his face slowly evaporated and changed, leaving him staring at her just as solemnly as she was him. He swallowed, but it looked more like a gulp.
“Sup,” he said finally.
“It will be…some time yet.”
“It will?”
“It’ll take a spell to pluck and skewer it. And then it has to roast.”
He grunted. “I’ll be at the burn.”
She nodded.
“Washing.”
Sybil looked down at where her skirt was soiled and back up at him. He was looking at her with an indecipherable expression, given the darkness about them and the flickers of fire that were all she had for light.
“You have something to say?” he asked.
She shook her head.
“You’re supposed to be arguing,” he replied.
“So are you,” she whispered back.
He tilted his head to one side, looked down at her, and smiled slightly. “True. All true.”
He was acting aggressive again, and his stance changed accordingly. He straightened, put his hands on his hips, and looked like he was preparing himself for the argument he was trying to create. Sybil smiled.
“Go. Wash yourself,” she replied.
He sucked in a great breath, making his chest expand with it, the movement showing all the shadows and valleys of his musculature in what firelight there was. Sybil watched and was still looking as he relaxed again with the exhalation. He was too much male and too finely formed to get any words of anger from her, especially as he had all of it displayed in little more than tartan and sweat.
“What if I say nae?” he asked.
Sybil giggled and watched the resultant inhalation of breath that made everything puffed up and large on his upper chest and well-defined since it put on display all of the ropelike tendons of his belly. That was visual, and stimulating, and causing her legs to tremble a bit as she lowered herself to the bird and started plucking at the feathers.
“Wait a bit, then. I’ll join you,” she whispered. “It would give me great pleasure to wash you—all of you.” Her voice lowered on the words, due mainly to her own embarassment at having said them. When she looked up again, he was gone.
Chapter Eighteen
The thrumming sound of a cloudburst woke him near dawn as heavy raindrops pelted the ground beside him. That was immediately followed by the smell of wet fur from the wolf seeking shelter beneath the wagon beside him, and then Vincent’s awakening was completed by the chill of being soaked to the skin by what was quickly becoming a pond as rivulets of water searched out and found where he was lying.
Vincent swore and pushed himself up out of the depression of ground that hadn’t seemed accom
odating when he’d first decided it would be the best place for him to sleep and felt even less so now. He watched the swirl of water in front of his nose as well as the amount of water that was dripping off him. He’d taken this space on purpose, and he’d vowed to make it work. He couldn’t leave her side. Not yet. He didn’t dare. No matter how inhospitable it was, or how uncomfortable. But the only other place suitable for sleeping was in the creation of quilts and covers she’d made into a bed atop the floorboards of the wagon, and was probably cacooned in now.
Dry. Warm. Comfortable.
Vincent was holding himself in a slant that his arms were guaranteeing in order to keep his nose out of the water and wondering over the why of everything. It was the best he could manage with a mind still fogged by the depth of his sleep and the abruptness of his wakening. Everything felt foreign. That was odd. He wasn’t immune to sleeping on the ground, but he rarely slept on his belly. And he almost never slept as deeply as he must have. Which was even more odd. This particular patch of ground had felt too hard for such a thing, while everything on his body had been aching and straining and desiring and angered at him for not just finding the lass and releasing himself in her honeyed depths—so much so that he didn’t even think he’d find sleep.
Vincent shook his head and watched the ends of his hair trail through what was turning into a quagmire since good earth absorbed water, and while the ground beneath the wagon had been dry, it was also very good, dry dirt. He had to ponder on all the oddity. This sleeping as he had…Vincent rarely slept so deeply. He didn’t know why. It was ingrained from his time in his mother’s womb or something. Perhaps it was self-preservation, since he never knew what threat might come at him. That was one reason he woke as quickly and moved as rapidly once awakened. And he couldn’t do that unless he slept on his back or side—never this way.
His arms were starting to itch from the chore of holding him in such a prone position. That must be due to their sleep-imbued state rather than any weakness. Vincent always kept himself in perfect physical condition. He’d been in positions requiring such strength on more than one occasion. There had even been one time when he’d been almost caught abed with one of the mighty Douglas wives and her daughter in the ducal chambers at Tantallon Castle. That had required holding himself aloft atop one of the ceiling beams until the Douglas had decided the innocence of his women and left the chamber.
