Page 38 of Bride of Fire
“M’laird! I found these in the wood.”
The lad had a quiver full of arrows and a longbow looped over one shoulder. He held up a satchel and what looked like a bundle of rags. Could they belong to the missing warrior maid?
Nay, she’d claimed to have come unarmed.
Tucking the wineskin under his arm, Morgan plucked out a length of sheer white linen and held it up.
When he realized what it was—a lady’s leine—he quickly wadded it against his chest.
“Good work, Danald,” he said. “I’ll take them.”
Once the lad scurried off, he set everything on a table to examine it more thoroughly. The bow was light but well-made, the arrows crafted by a master fletcher. There was a leather bracer tucked into the quiver. But neither it nor the quiver had identifying marks. There was no way to determine the weapon’s owner.
Rummaging through the rest of the garments, however, it didn’t take long to realize they belonged to Jenefer. He recognized the soft, earthy scent wafting off of them. Spicy. Sweet. Musky.
He blushed to think he’d been fondling her undergarment.
Clearing his throat, he moved on to the satchel. There were no weapons inside, just crumbs of whatever food she’d packed and a half-full aleskin.
Gathering everything but the bow and arrows, he bounded up the stairs.
Thankfully, Miles had ceased crying. Maybe he’d see if Bethac could slip downstairs to help with siege preparations.
First, however, he’d deliver the lasses’ breakfast and clothing.
When he opened the door, Jenefer was sitting innocently enough on his pallet. But dressed only in his leine, she presented a compelling sight.
Her long, shapely legs dangled over the edge of the bed. Her delicate toes brushed the floor as Morgan entered. And where her knees were slightly parted, shadows hid the treasure he knew was there between them.
She didn’t seem to notice that the breath had been stolen from him.
He used a moment to close the door behind him and gather his wits. Finally he dropped his burden onto the table.
“Breakfast,” he announced. Then he frowned. “Where’s Feiyan?”
“In the garderobe,” she said, jumping up to see what he’d brought.
Apparently she wasn’t going to wait for her cousin. She immediately pounced on the food like a wolf on a coney. She devoured the first oatcake at once. By the way she closed her eyes and licked her fingers, one would have thought she hadn’t eaten for days and was dining on the finest swan.
She washed it down with a swig of ale, then began to demolish a second oatcake. He wondered if she intended to save any for Feiyan.
Feiyan was right. Jenefer did eat like an ox.
But it certainly didn’t show. He’d held her, naked and squirming, against his side last night, and she hadn’t seemed overstuffed in the least.
That memory made him uncomfortably warm, and it reminded him of what else he’d brought.
“Your clothin’, I believe,” he said, offering it to her. “A lad found it in the wood.”
Chapter 21
Jenefer glanced down at the bundle of her clothes. She couldn’t decide which she’d rather do. Refuse the clothing, thus denying him his own leine? Or tear his garment from her at once, telling him it stank of the Highlands?
In the end, she was too grateful for the warm breakfast to be rude. So she simply took the bundle and placed it on the bed. Then, swallowing down the last bite of her second oatcake, she whipped the borrowed leine off over her head and held it out to him.
The flash of shock in his eyes was amusing. Was this the same man who’d picked her up and carried her naked on his hip, then straddled her to force her into his leine? He looked as if he’d never seen an unclad lass before.
A merciful woman might have lowered her gaze and modestly covered herself.
