Page 38 of The Falcon Laird
He had so wanted to touch her like this, kiss her, hold her, sense the life that flowed through her. So wanted to feelher healthy again, this beautiful, fragile yet strong woman. She moaned softly against his lips, her body swaying against him, the soft globes of her breasts pressed to him. Her hands slipped up to his shoulders. Then she pushed him.
The shove brought him to awareness like a cold air. He had been lost in a jumble of sweet yet powerful urges. He blew out a slow breath to clear his senses.
“I wish you were Scottish,” she blurted.
“I cannot change who I am.” He stood back. “Find what you need. I will bring it up.”
Chapter Ten
“Someone comes,” Johncalled over his shoulder. Shielding his eyes, he peered out over the parapet. “Four or five, walkin’ out o’ the forest.”
“Who are they?” Gavin called, leaning his axe against a wall. Wiping an arm across his forehead, mingling dirt with sweat, he looked toward the open gate but saw no one approaching.
“I cannot yet say,” John called. “But they’re coming.”
Gavin walked across the courtyard, where he and John had spent most of the day clearing burned timbers and broken stone. With help from Dominy and Will, they had burned some of the timber wreckage, and had employed two of the destriers, equipped with makeshift panniers, in transporting the heavier pieces of stone to a mounting pile of rubble.
The smoke that rose now from a corner of the courtyard came from an open cooking fire, where Dominy bent over an iron kettle, stirring a stew of barley and dried, salted fish. William was close by his mother, wielding a broom taller than himself.
“They’re closer, now!” John called.
“Dominy—Will—into the tower!” Gavin said. Dominy grabbed Will, who protested as his mother pulled him along toward the northwest tower to join Christian there.
“How many rebels?” Gavin called. With the castle wide open to attack, he and John had kept a steady vigil with weapons to hand. His sword lay nearby in its scabbard. He stepped toward it.
“Rebels?” John looked again. “They look wee.”
“A good distance away, then?”
“Close now. And wee.”
Puzzled, Gavin took up his sword and thrust it through his belt. He ran toward the broken gate. Beyond the crooked portcullis grille lay the drawbridge, wide open to the track leading from moor and forest. Three figures approached from the woodland side, coming steadily toward the castle.
Children. He relaxed his hand from his sword hilt. A girl with bright blond hair walked with two boys. She was taller than her companions and perhaps older. One boy, close to her in age, had red hair; the brown-haired lad beside him looked younger than Will. The boys carried small hunting bows.
They crossed the soot-blackened drawbridge without hesitation and walked beneath the stone entrance arch to stop inside the bailey yard just a few feet from where Gavin waited. The girl raised a hand to shade her eyes, her pale blond braids glinting in the sunlight. A delicate thing with a fearless air, she seemed unafraid to walk into a castle and stare up at its owner.
Perhaps they had been playing in the deserted castle, he thought; a dangerous habit to be discouraged immediately. Likely they would run off once they discovered he was an English knight.
Yet the girl, simply dressed in blue with a plaid over her shoulders, seemed the leader and did not appear alarmed to see him. Behind her, the boys, in linen shirts and plaids, their thin, muscular legs bare but for deerskin boots, frowned fiercely at him. The girl looked up calmly.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“Holder of this castle. This is no place for children to play,” Gavin said. “Go home, now.” He moved toward them.
The boys grabbed their bows and straightened their arms, tough, grimy little fists training two very sharp arrows on him.Gavin gently raised his hands, lowered them. At the edge of his vision, he saw John coming across the bailey yard.
“Are you the English knight who holds Kilglassie?” the girl asked.
“I am. Go home now. This is dangerous place for children to play.”
“You are our prisoner,” the taller boy called out. “Lay down yer weapon, Sassenach!”
“By the saints,” Gavin said. “Put down those bows or I shall do it for you.”
The younger boy released his bowstring so fast that Gavin barely had time to turn aside. The small arrow hit a rock near his foot and clattered away.
“Boy!” he roared. “Put that thing down!”
