Angie Arms - Flame Series 03 (12 page)

He turned so that he faced her.  His eyes were black orbs as he studied her
, but she would not be daunted out of this decision.  “If they did it to you, they will do it to another.”

She stared at him
, and in the pit of her stomach she knew he was right.  “I do not wish you to be the one to do this,” she whispered.

Garrick did not move a muscle as he studied her.  “If I do not do this, who then would I choose?” 

At the moment he did not appear to be an approachable man, but she moved toward him, and wrapped her arms around his ramrod straight back.  He was so hard, so strong, but she knew no human could be as strong as her husband tried to be.  Slowly she felt him lift his hand and rest it on her head, a few breaths passed before his hand awkwardly stroked her hair.    After a moment of silence stretching, he stepped an arm’s length away from her. 

“Why do you worry for me?” he asked
, with no malice or irritation in his voice, only the curiosity to know the answer to a question he could not comprehend.

“You are my husband, my family.  Is it not my duty to worry after you when you are not near
, and to care for you when you are?”

He studied her for a few moments
, as if he had to weigh her words.  “Do not fear for me.  It must be done.”  He frowned at her shivers, then unclasping his cloak, he pulled it from himself and settled it on her shoulders.  The warmth of the man before her was still held in the fabric, as she pulled it closer about herself.

If Garrick had not stayed near her it was a task she did not think she could complete.  Only two of the men were there
, and after a short debate with herself, despite their conversation, she pointed them out.  Garrick’s men pulled them away and she received some satisfaction seeing their fear.  They felt the fear they had created in her, but the satisfaction quickly faded to guilt.  Despite they made her suffer, she did not wish it for them, for she knew firsthand what it was like.

She turned to Garrick, tugging
on his sleeve as he turned away.  He paused as if he did not wish to hear another plea from her.  He turned back, his cold eyes boring into her.  “Quickly?” she asked in a whisper.  The only word she could get out, and she hoped it would be enough. 

His dark eyes searched hers
, and finally he gave a slight nod before turning away.

Chapter 8

Before dawn
, a drizzle began that had everyone ready to break camp before the sun started to brighten the cloudy sky.  Ryann questioned her decision to sleep outside the walls for only a brief time, she could not bring herself to leave Daley’s side, nor ask him to return inside the place of his nightmares.  After she requested her tormentors receive a quick death, she did not see Garrick for the rest of the evening.  Marcus saw to her needs and ordered the camp made comfortable, then he and Alena remained with her, along with Daley and Winford. 

This morning Daley appeared better recovered
, and his friend Winford was close by his side, as if by giving him a minute by minute accounting, it would seem, of their time apart, he could keep his mind from what had happened.  As they mounted their horses and prepared to return to Kilkenny, she spotted Garrick with Damien, his hooded brother, and the man named Roland, she was not sure she liked.  Damien’s army separated themselves from Garrick’s, and began moving in a different direction.  Fleet quickly moved to her husband’s side in time to hear Damien’s departing words.

“Lord Damien,” she called
, before he could turn away as she sidled Fleet next to Malik.  “I wish to thank you for your help in returning Daley.”

“Don’t thank me, I may call on you to rescue one of my kitchen maids one day,” he said with a grin. 

“Would you make the journey to Kilkenny with us, and we will present you with a feast in your honor, to show our appreciation.”

“No my Lady, I must decline.  I have a wife who eagerly awaits my return,” he said
, with a broad smile that lit up his eyes.  Was this man such a warrior as her husband?  She smiled back and couldn’t help the sidelong glance at her husband, to see his attention was on her, and not his friend.  She had the fleeting notion she should have asked about the feast before inviting the man.  “Have a safe journey,” Damien said, offering a slight bow from his saddle, as he turned and rode away with his two men flanking him.

Suddenly she found it difficult to swallow as she turned to look at her husband.  It was not his friends he watched depart
, but her.  His gaze was so intent she nearly gasped under the heat of it.  There was nothing cold about it, but was like a flame, making her cheeks flush and heat rush through her, all the way to her toes.  “I will give you until we arrive at Fenton to heal.  Then I will have you.”  His words thrilled her, and frightened her.  That they were said as a matter-of-fact, as if it had been etched in stone and was a decree she could not be released from sent a chill up her spine.  It was time for her to become a wife, time for her to put the brutality of the other men behind her, and open herself to her husband.  Yes, it was a time to fear, and a time to anticipate.

Before he turned from her
, the shield was back in place.  His eyes cold, his face hard, as he rode away from her.  The weather made the journey a miserable one, but it was made within a day, with Garrick pushing man and beasts to their limits, so they would not have to sleep outside the dry protective walls of Kilkenny.

As they called to the guards on the walls
, the gates opened and the keep became a flurry of activity as torches were lit, their flickering flames hissed in the falling drizzle, as they cast away the shadows of the courtyard.  Warily Ryann pulled Fleet to a stop and prepared to slide her stiff body to the ground.  Then Garrick was there, reaching for her, wrapping his large, strong hands around her waist.  She allowed herself to slide toward him, his strength lifting and easing her against him.  He pulled her to him so she felt every tight muscle of his body as he slid her downward, until her feet were firmly planted on the ground.  He steadied her, his features showed her nothing, his dark eyes even less, and finally he stepped away from her, releasing her to the cold rain.  She was left wondering if he had pulled her from her horse to deliberately touch her, or if it was just a man helping his exhausted wife.

“To bed with you, all things can wait until morning,” he ordered, and then he was gone.

It was not because she was following her husband’s order, but because she was far beyond exhaustion.  She climbed the stairs to her chamber, changed from her travel wrinkled clothes, slipped on a fresh shift, and promptly slipped into the embrace of her bed.

~ ~ ~ ~

Garrick sat upon the knoll overlooking the land spread out before Kilkenny.  He would feel bett
er if he stayed a few more days.  He would feel more secure knowing all was put into place, so his property would be as well cared for as it had been up to this point.  He assured himself it was being run as it always had, the only difference was it would be run without Ryann, because she would be at Fenton with him.  He suddenly wished he had chosen a better last name for himself, not the name of the first castle he took.  He wanted her to have a real name, a name to be proud of.  The image of her warming his bed, baring his children, invaded his thoughts and he could not deny that was why he was in such a hurry to be on his way.

It would take a day for Ryann to leave her old home for her new.  If it were not for the children, who would be left behind, he would have left at dawn because he found himself prowling the wall before the sun had even risen.  Thoughts of his wife’s small body pressed against his.  He felt he would go mad if he did not possess her.  He did not like the feeling, for he was a man used to putting actions to his desires but not now, not where the delic
ate woman was concerned.  He felt apprehension in the past, but never a fear that resided in him as his fear of bedding his wife.  He knew last night, as he lifted her smallness in his arms, he would hurt her when he finally did take her to his bed.  Any man would hurt something so fragile, but especially a man such as he, who knew no tenderness. 

He turned his horse back toward the keep, he could not put it off any longer.  He had to ask Alena.  He found her in the armory, a fact that did not surprise him
, and one he had to order his armorer to allow.  Though he was not accustomed to giving in to the requests of his men and their women, Alena was a good warrior, so she was one of his warriors, for he fed her as he did Marcus, or any of the other men, so everyone had no choice but to respect his word on the matter.  Or any matter, he thought with the usual feeling of contented accomplishment that he was here, and not some dirty gutter in some dilapidated village.

“Garrick,” she said
, acknowledging his presence as he came to stand beside her.  It annoyed him she did not call him Lord Garrick, but it was a fight he did not find the need to begin.  He had a niggling feeling in the back of his mind each time he felt the familiar annoyance that it might be a battle he would not win. 

“
Lena, I seek your help,” he said, without preamble.  He had no need to seek out the tall warrior woman, and she would know this.  Delaying the reason for his visit would only show the weakness he felt in the foreign ground he was stepping onto where his wife was concerned.

“You know Donald makes the finest blades,” she said
, lifting a wicked looking knife.  At the praise the big burly man in question smiled proudly, and the woman beside Garrick smiled that feline smile that would harden any man, and offered Donald a flirtatious wink. 

He felt irritated by her game.  “Outside,” he ordered
, and turned to leave the stifling confines and heat of the building.  Out into the courtyard he paced, and he had doubt that she would follow his order.  These women were going to drive him mad, he thought fleetingly, a moment before she stepped through the doorway and into the struggling light of day.

“What can I do for his majesty?” she asked
, as if she were genuinely addressing his royal highness, but he could see the laughter in her tilted, green eyes.  If it wouldn’t displease Marcus he would have cast her out long ago.  With that thought was the one that he would not, because he liked her.  Despite her lack of respect and obedience, he liked her, though he did not understand why. 

“It is my wife.”

“She run away?” she asked, as if she were not surprised as she sheathed her new blade at her waist.

“She’s not a whore,” he stated
, hoping it would stop her snide comments and they could get to the reason for his visit.

He watched her perfectly arched black brows draw together, confused by this statement.  “Who would say she is?” she finally asked
, with no weariness in her demeanor that she was to be punished.  A reaction foreign to him from the fairer sex.  After all, when did he ever even speak to a woman, unless it was to have a question answered or a task completed?  Yes, he was on shaky ground indeed.

“I have been with no one but whores.  Will she expect certain things?”

Alena laughed and Garrick scowled.  He wanted to order her to shut up, but he was sure it would only increase her mirth.  “She most definitely will,” she said, pulling herself back under control.

“What are these things?”

She looked at him as if he had just said something preposterous, but mercifully she did not laugh again.  “She will expect you to pleasure her.”  She studied him as he sat quietly, hoping his silence would be enough of a request for her to continue.  Making a great show of exasperation, she rolled her eyes.  “Have you never even pleased a whore?”

His brows drew angrily together and he could feel the storm within him brewing.  “I do not know, it was not my concern
, for I paid them to pleasure me.”

“It would stand to reason,” she said
, after staring at him for a moment.

“What do you mean by that?” he snapped.  He wanted to reach out and ring her neck.  Like her?  What the devil had he been thinking?

“It means you are married now and you have to stop thinking about only yourself.”  She fell silent as her eyes tilted a little more, and a slow smile danced across her full lips.  “Pleasing a woman begins before you even get her in the bed.  Give her little trinkets to show her she’s special.  Pick her flowers.  Take her for a walk and look at the stars.  Be a gentleman and help her on and off her horse.  Pull her chair out for her at the dinner table.  These things will get you far.”

“That is all?”

“No, but you do those things and charm her, then I will share more of my wisdom with you.”

“Your wisdom only comes from your experience lying beneath a sheik.”  As soon as the words came out of his mouth he felt sorry he had said such a thing to her. 

Her furrowed brow and narrowed eyes made him want to give anything to take them back.  He saw beneath the hard surface she always presented, the hurt the words caused her.  “I did not mean to say that,” he blurted out.  She froze and studied him intently for several breaths.

“Why would you say such a thing?” she finally asked, the pain evident.

“Because I’m a gigantic ass,” he replied, still feeling the guilt that made his words true. 

She offered him a smile, though it still held some bitterness for him.  He had once bought her with every intention of ma
king her his whore.  But she got her scars, and he tossed her to the side.  She suspected it was only because he had inadvertently contributed to the injury and he could not handle the guilt or fear of hurting her again.  She knew there was more to the man before her than the bleak, intimidating man he wanted everyone to see.  She hoped Ryann would bring out the man’s softer side.  She had already seen he was not an evil man.  He did deplorable things, things she knew she never wanted to know, because they had made Garrick what he was.  Now it was time for his life to be shaped by a gentle and caring hand, which is what she saw in Ryann. 

“You and I, we aren’t so different,” Alena said
, in a voice that mirrored her regret. 

The scar around his eye crinkled with his scowl.  She had seen enough of the man without his shirt on to
know he bore more scars than she, had fought harder than she, but still they were one and the same in more ways than one.  He shifted position and turned so they stood shoulder to shoulder, looking out on the busy courtyard. 

“We are survivors and it’s hard to let them get close.”  After a moment of silence she cast a glance over at Garrick’s face.  He did not look at her
, but she saw the tightness in the lines of his face, and the intensity of his gaze upon the empty wall several paces away.  “Marcus, Ryann,” she shrugged.  “Everybody.”  After a few more moments she continued, “I don’t think it is so much we are afraid they will hurt us, but we will hurt them.  Perhaps even that they will be taken away from us.”  Alena shrugged again, casting another glance Garrick’s way.  “I am beginning to think it would be better to let them get close enough we can help keep them safe.  Close enough that we will know them, and they will know us.  If they know what we have done, yet they still want to be near, who are we to judge them?”

Garrick turned to her, his eyes searching hers as if he could reach inside her and find the answer.  For the briefest instant she thought she saw
sadness enter those black orbs before the wall was back.  He turned away then, and Alena was left alone pondering her own words.

~ ~ ~ ~

Silver combs, that would be his first gift to his wife.  He had them now tucked safely away
within his tunic.  It took some doing to have the two glowing creations completed.  Each exhibited a horse head, each different and in the shape of her two horse’s.  The anticipation was disconcerting.  He looked forward to the look on her face when he gave the gift to her, as well as how they would look in her golden hair.  He found himself nervous, what if she didn’t like them?  He entered the hall, and as usual did not have to search for his wife, but his eyes were automatically drawn to her.  She stood with another woman, a baby lifted above her head as she made funny faces at it.  The baby giggled before Ryann dropped the baby downward, safely gripped within her gentle hands, as she swooped it back up to the delight of the child.  The baby squealed and kicked its legs, a fist going into its mouth, before it arched its back with another mighty kick.  Again Ryann swooped the baby downward, and it squealed all the way until it was held again over its lady’s head with another giggle.