His chin grazed the top of her head. ‘Even if we had nowhere to live, I wouldn’t care,’ he replied. ‘All I want is the woman that I love, by my side.’ He glanced along the table, across the shining faces of the knights and their ladies who had gathered to celebrate their wedding, across the sumptuous fabrics of their clothes, the sparkle of their jewels in sword hilts and circlets. His heart swelled with happiness, overflowing with hope for their future together, but most of all, with love for the woman in his arms. Eva, his darling wife, whom he would cherish for a lifetime.
* * * * *
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ISBN-13: 9781488021602
The Warrior’s Damsel in Distress
Copyright © 2017 by Meriel Fuller
All rights reserved. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, M3B 3K9 Canada.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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A maiden for the mercenary
Mercenary knight Rhain is living on borrowed time. With a vengeful warlord pursuing him, he has accepted his fate—though first he must get his men to safety.
When he rescues mysterious and deeply scarred Helissent from her attackers, Rhain soon wishes he wasn’t marked for death. He can never be the man she deserves—his scandalous lineage alone dictates that—but Rhain can’t resist the temptation to show this innocent maiden how beautiful she truly is…
An unearthly growl resounded as a man leaped out of the darkness.
“Let her go!”
His cold voice raised the hairs on the back of her neck. Terror gripped her even harder and the two men tightened their hold. Through her watering eyes, she saw a supplicant expression now masked Rudd’s face. She knew that unctuous curve of his lips when he wanted to appease a customer.
“Here now, this is none of your concern,” Rudd said. “We only want a bit of privacy.”
“You harm a woman. You’ll get no privacy except in death.”
The words were menacingly calm.
There was a whoosh of breath, and a sharp thump of one captor’s body as if someone had kicked him down.
She watched Rudd’s smug face draw white with fear as he ran toward the trees and disappeared.
The man crouched near her, his elbows resting on his legs, his hands hanging between them. Empty hands, his scabbard bare and no sword at his feet.
“You’re safe now. They’re gone.”
Nicole Locke discovered her first romance novels in her grandmother’s closet, where they were secretly hidden. Convinced that books that were hidden must be better than those that weren’t, Nicole greedily read them. It was only natural for her to start writing them—but now not so secretly.
Books by Nicole Locke
Harlequin Historical
Lovers and Legends
The Knight’s Broken Promise
Her Enemy Highlander
The Highland Laird’s Bride
In Debt to the Enemy Lord
The Knight’s Scarred Maiden
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The Knight’s Scarred Maiden
NICOLE LOCKE
Ode to a house right next door. So handy to pop over for nibbles, a chat, copious amounts of champagne.
Ode to a stairwell landing propped with pillows and treats. For my kids, made comforting like a warm hug; adventurous like a magic carpet.
Ode to David and Cydonie. This book wouldn’t have been written but for you and those chats and champagne.
I treasure our friendship more than the longest of hugs and the grandest of adventures. More than all the bubbles in every raised fluted glass that ever was…or will be.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
CHAPTER ONE
He was here.
Helissent let out a breath and rearranged the flagons on the tray. Again. This was the second night he’d come in, which wasn’t the only reason she’d noticed him.
‘Hurry up, girl, customers are thirsty.’
Helissent didn’t glance at Rudd. She never glanced at the innkeeper’s son, now owner. She tried not to notice him at all, but it didn’t help. His eyes grew more calculating every day as if she was in a trap and he was merely fattening her up.
‘If you stand there much longer,’ he said, snapping a towel in the air, ‘I’ll add another flagon to that tray and make you carry it over your head.’
If he put one more flagon on the tray, she’d make sure to dump it on his head.
Then where would she be? Out in the streets.
Pasting a smile that only deepened her scars’ appearance, she gave him her most guileless look. ‘I’m simply ensuring that everything is in i
ts place, so the customers have what they need.’
Rudd didn’t have any reaction to her scarred and distorted smile. And that fact frightened her most of all. The fact she couldn’t frighten him. Her deep scars that spanned the entire right side of her body from her temple to her feet made everyone frightened. It’s how she kept the travelling customers away.
‘If you give me any more grief I’ll ensure you give them what they truly need…’ he answered, twisting the towel around his fist.
She lifted the tray and suppressed the anger and fear she couldn’t afford to expose. Her village didn’t have many streets to live on and there were certainly no others who would take her into their homes.
The only reason her tiny village survived was that it was on the road between London and York. People mostly travelled through and never stayed. If only she didn’t have to stay. But she had nowhere else to go.
Here, at least, they knew why she was disfigured. Any place else, people could think she was cursed. Or worse, they would pity her.
Here, she was just ignored. Except for Rudd, the prodigal son, who had returned a month after his parents’ death. He didn’t ignore her at all.
It was up to her to avoid him and focus on the inn’s patrons. Some travelers, mostly regulars…and now him, who she could feel watching the altercation between Rudd and her.
Sidestepping the narrow counter, she dodged a stumbling patron on her way to the patrons by the large window and set the tray in the center of the table. For a brief moment, she closed her eyes to soak up the bit of warming sun slanting down. Often it was the only sunlight she felt during the daytime.
Then she gave a genuine greeting to the patrons at the table. Regular customers, who met her eyes and exchanged pleasantries. Patrons, who knew her family and the former innkeepers, John and Anne, who’d taken her in after the fire destroyed her home and killed her family.
She’d take any kindness thrown her way. It was probably why she kept skirting her eyes to him. He, who sat at the shadowed table in the rear. Sat in shadows, though he never lowered his cloak’s hood.
He watched her, which usually made her angry, made her tilt her chin so that those gawking could see every grueling angle of her physical and personal pain. She liked it better when they winced or flushed and turned away.
She liked it not because it hurt them, but because it reminded her of her shame, her cowardice, and all the hurt she deserved.
But she didn’t tilt her head with the man in the shadows because he’d told Rudd her honey cakes were exceptional. It was why he’d returned today. He’d ordered more and paid in advance. He was here to collect them.
Unaccountably nervous, she passed him to get to the kitchens out the back. His head was partially bowed and she still did not see his eyes, but she nodded her head in greeting. She woke up early this morning to make twenty-five cakes. She often received compliments on her baking, but was never requested to make this many cakes before. She’d never known a man with such a sweet tooth and she’d dared to ask Rudd about him.
Rudd didn’t know the man’s name, but he did know his business. He’d come in a couple of days ago and was staying in the lodgings at the edge of town, him and almost twenty other men. Travellers, but two had spurs. This man with his hood, and another man, who was immensely tall and ducked his head to avoid the ceiling rafters.
The first day, he and the other men sat at the different tables. There was much talking, sometimes in languages she didn’t know. All of them addressed the man in the hood. She never saw his face nor heard his voice, though the men did.
Whatever he said made them laugh, made them nod in agreement. They deferred to him. Fascinated, she watched when she could. She wondered who these men were, where they were going next. Not for her to know, but it was a small bit of entertainment she made for herself.
On the second day, it was only him and the giant. On that day, she swore he watched her.
She didn’t see spurs when her shadow man came in, but she thought he must have been a knight. His travel clothing wasn’t particularly fine, but it was his bearing that he couldn’t hide beneath his cloak. Tall, with a lean grace not many people possessed, and certainly none in this mostly farming community.
He couldn’t hide the sword he carried, like it was a part of him, either. Natural, predatory…lethal.
He returned alone on the third day. On this day to retrieve his order. Carefully placing the cakes in the travelling sacks, she turned again to the inn. She wondered if this time, he would raise his head so she could see him.
* * *
Rhain peered at the customers in the ramshackle inn. Nothing made this one any different than the hundreds he had occupied over the last five years. For a mercenary like himself and his men, only location and information mattered.
This inn had neither. What it did have was sheep…lots of sheep. Even with a stiff breeze, there was no mistaking the smell or din.
A few days’ ride north of here lay the comfortable Tickhill Castle, a strategic motte and bailey now held by the King himself. He and his men would be welcomed at such a castle, and when he started this journey, it was his intention to oblige himself of their company, sumptuous bedding and fair.
Castles had location…they also had information, but he could no longer indulge himself of such. Not any more.
Instead, now, he opted for obscurity. An obscurity that had nothing to do with his occupation as a mercenary. Hence he’d stopped at this wreck of village meant to accommodate the local farming community and the occasional poor traveler.
The lodgings down the street were adequate protection from the rains, but this inn—
Rhain lowered his head as the woman passed by his table. Even so, he noticed her greeting. It was difficult not to notice her. When he first came to the inn two days ago, he almost lost his protective hood.
She’d been standing at the counter, arranging cups. He’d opened the door and the sunlight had hit her. He only had a profile of her, but it was enough to stun him and his men had slammed into him before they’d stumbled around him. She was absolutely exquisite. The pale perfection of her skin, the thick eyelashes. The room’s light wasn’t bright enough to see the exact color of her hair, but it was close to chestnut and waved luxuriously down her back. Then she lifted the tray and he could see the curves of her body, the graceful way she moved. In this hovel of a tavern was someone who belonged in a king’s bed.
And he should know, having grown with wealth and privilege, knowing the King himself, he knew the quality of the woman. But that wasn’t all that surprised him.
It was the wide berth of patrons around her. The inn was crowded at that time of day and a beautiful woman should have been pressed against, or been fighting, some of the more inebriated customers. If nothing else, if she was some wife, or sister, there would have been some camaraderie, some familiarity with her. Instead, she was ignored…
No, in a crowded inn, she was ostracized, the berth continued though she was done arranging the goblets, had lifted the tray and was turning to serve them. Everyone’s back was to her. As the door behind him closed, she hoisted the tray and then he saw what he had not from the profile of her left side.
As she turned to feed the customers behind her, he saw her right profile. Then he understood why, while in a crowded bar, she was left alone. Scarred beyond any repair. Old and healed burns from what he could tell. She had suffered some time in her past and suffered greatly.
He watched her. It was as if that moment had locked something inside him. She made him…curious. He didn’t know what side of her compelled him more. It wasn’t just her physical differences, it was her personality. Wary with the innkeeper, friendly with regulars. Defiant as if she insisted on showing her scars to travelers like him.
So he watched her while he sat in the back of the inn and drank poor a
le, but waited for food that should never have been produced in such a hovel.
The innkeeper was a giant oaf of a man, whose unctuous manner grated on Rhain. Though he’d seen enough cruelty in the world, the innkeeper taunting the woman angered him. More than once he found himself reaching for his dagger to throw. A disquieting impulse, since he’d been able to shrug off such behavior before.
Yet he came back since he and his men enjoyed food he’d never expected to taste here. The cuts of meat in the stew were poor and often the vegetables were not fresh. But instead of grease and gristle, herbs and flavors had been added. Fine, arduous sifting of flour had been done to the rolls, which also had a sprinkling of herbs, making them both light and delicious.
It was a tiny village with no information. Completely useless to him for his business. No one would expect for him to be here and his men could be dry and fed well. More to the point, none of them protested when he said they would stay a few days.
And that was before he ate the cake which was light, but dense with honey that dripped and glossed over the top. He might be a giant oaf of an innkeeper, but the man’s cooking was unmatched.
Two sacks set on the table in front of him. It was the woman who delivered them, one hand perfect, the other gnarled with scars. Ravaged from fire like the entire right side of her face, neck and no doubt, by the way she moved, her body as well. One side exquisite, the other disfigured.
Slowly, he tilted his head up so as not to dislodge his hood, but enough to meet her eyes, which were a color he could not guess—green, grey or brown. He couldn’t determine their exact color, but they were clear, straightforward with intelligence, wariness and just a bit of pride. The fire had tilted down the corner of her right eye, and marred just a hair of her full lips. Her nose was left perfect, but her cheek and ear were deeply grooved.
Marriage Deal With the Outlaw & the Warrior's Damsel in Distress & the Knight's Scarred Maiden : Harlequin Historical August 2017 (9781488021640) Page 47