“Yes, I can see that,” he murmured.
While she stood smiling wanly and swaying against his arm, he passed the reins of his horse to Roland. “Take Quill and Fletcher with you and see to the animals. Buy each beast an extra rasher of oats, then come and find us.”
Amie giggled into his sleeve. “Quill and Fletcher... not dreadfully fearsome names for outlaws are they? I should think Gut-Eater or Throat-Slitter would be more convincing and indeed, that is what I shall call them henceforth.”
Tamberlane cast a wary glance about the stable but there was no one within hearing distance. The newly christened Gut-Eater and Throat-Slitter gave off little grins, which faded when they saw the scowl that darkened the Dragonslayer’s brow.
He took hold of Amie’s arm and led her across the courtyard toward the pilgrim's hall. Flanked by Sir Boethius and Sir Geoffrey, they passed through an arched doorway into a room a fourth the size of the great hall at Taniere. Here was the common chamber, where ragged travelers and pilgrims sought to lay their heads on a dry pallet of straw for the night. There were two fires blazing, one at each end of the hall. What few benches there were had been dragged in front of the heat. They were occupied by surly men who would likely sit there all night in order not to lose the choice seating.
A monk approached, his face round and serene. “I bid you God’s welcome, my son. In His name, we bless His generosity...pater, filius, spiritus sanctus...”
Tamberlane and the two knights went down on one knee to receive the blessing; Amie followed an instant later, responding somewhat mulishly to a hard tug on her sleeve. When Tamberlane rose again, he left it to Boethius to hoist her back to her feet.
“We were told at the gate to seek Brother Ignatius.”
“You have found him, my son.”
“We seek more private accommodations than a common hall.”
“Ahh.” The friar's head tilted as he studied Tamberlane's face. “Alas, the foul weather brings many to our door as you can see.” He spread a hand to indicate the crowded floor where those who were not lucky enough to get a bench were rolled in blankets to keep warm. “We are but a small monastery and the cells fill quickly.”
Ciaran held up a shiny silver coin. “We require four.”
The monk’s eyes grew as round as the coin. “Four? Gracious goodness, you seek the miracle of loaves and fishes where we have not even one loaf or fish.”
A second coin joined the first.
The friar stared at the coins a moment and sucked on his lower lip. “One. I could perhaps arrange for one chamber. My own, by happenstance. It is smaller than a mouse hole and farthest from the Hall.”
Tamberlane dropped the coins in his hand. Leaving their two knightly companions to grumble and kick their way toward the heat of the fire, he and Amie followed Friar Ignatius along the length of the pilgrim's hall and out a rear doorway to an adjoining corridor. There they found a statue of a saint standing guard over a covered breezeway that was flanked on the left by a long row of arched doorways and on the right by a low half wall which opened out onto a cobbled courtyard.
They followed the breezeway to the end before the friar stopped and opened one of the cell doors. Inside was a narrow cot, a stand containing a jug of water, the fat stub of a candle, and a small three legged stool. On one wall hung a wooden crucifix, on another a brown woolen cassock. Covering the single small window was a wooden shutter that rattled against the stone and let in enough rainwater to stain the wall and form a small puddle on the floor.
“It is colder than Satan’s heart in here,” Tamberlane remarked. “We need heat. The lad is cold and wet right through and needs to be warmed.”
Friar Ignatius glanced at Amie, who stood swaying by Tamberlane’s side, her eyes closed, her shoulders drooping. “Unfortunately, the only chamber with a proper hearth is the common hall.”
“Is there not even a brazier? A pan in which we might burn some pine knots?”
The friar glanced at the coin glittering in Tamberlane’s hand and sucked violently on his lip again before nodding. “I could perhaps arrange for a brazier.”
“And a good supply of wood.”
The coin was plucked from his fingers and vanished under the friar’s robes. “And a good supply of wood, of course.”
When the monk was gone, Tamberlane closed the door and stripped off his gloves. The leather was wet and he had to struggle with each finger, which did little to improve his disposition.
Amaranth was standing where he had left her, her eyes closed, her head bowed. Water drip drip dripped off her cloak forming a wet circle around her feet and she looked like a bedraggled waif.
After shrugging out of his own sodden cloak, Tamberlane approached her.
"My lady?"
There was no answer, nothing to indicate she had heard him.
“Amaranth?”
This time her chin tipped up slightly, but her eyes remained closed.
“I am going to leave for a few minutes. You must get out of those wet clothes. Take them off and wrap yourself well in blankets. When you have done so, call out to me, I shall be right outside the door. Amaranth? Do you hear me?”
“So tired,” she whispered.
She swayed forward and would have fallen had he not reached out and caught her against his chest. She whimpered softly and turned her head so that her face was pressing into his tunic muffling her voice.
“So tired," she sighed. "And so c-cold.”
Tamberlane stared over her shoulder at the wall behind them. The candle threw their shadows on the stone blocks and they looked as if they were locked in a passionate embrace.
Sparing a soft curse for Marak’s potion, he slid his hands up her arms and held her away from his body. He unfastened the toggle holding her cloak closed at the neck and removed it, then tossed the sodden garment over the stool with his own. Her tunic was soaked through, and he drew a deep breath before he unbuckled her belt and lifted the hem over her head. The shirt beneath was no better off and he ordered her arms high as he lifted that off as well, leaving only a thin linen bluet to guard her modesty.
Working quickly, not pausing to either think or look, he dropped quickly down onto one knee to unwind the linen bandaging around her calves. Her legs, when he unfastened the points and peeled the wool hose down, were white as snow, her feet were pink, the toes a chilly red.
He snatched the blanket off the cot and wrapped it around her shoulders, whereupon he sat her down on the edge of the bed and used his hands to chafe some warmth into her legs and arms.
When he looked up again, her eyes were open. They were still huge and round, the centers still dilated but she had found his face and was focussing intently on it while he continued to rub her feet. Her lips were a faint blue, but at least her teeth had stopped chattering enough for her to speak.
“Your name is Ciaran,” she said.
He smiled briefly. “Yes. It is.”
“‘Tis an unusual name, I do not know it.”
“It is Celtic.”
“Ah, Celtic.” She nodded sagely, as if that explained all of the oddities in the world. “Do you have brothers or sisters with odd names too?”
“I had two brothers, but they are both dead.”
“You have my sorrow, good knight.”
He shrugged the loss aside. “I barely knew them. One was fostered at a young age to a knight who travelled to Rome where both of them died of the pox. The other was gored by a boar while out hunting and I not yet five years old.”
“Yet there is longing in your voice when you speak of them.”
Tamberlane released her foot. “The longing you hear is for dry clothes and a stoup of mulled wine.”
“Yes...” her eyes roved across the breadth of his shoulders. “You are very wet, my lord. You should rid yourself of your own garments before you catch the fever. Come, let me help you. And then I shall rub some warmth into your flesh as well. I know from experience it does not take much to get a man's blood fl
owing hot.”
Startled, he sat quickly back on his heels placing himself out of reach as she stretched her arms forward. When her hands met with only empty air, she looked at him and frowned.
"You do not wish me to rub you, good sir?"
“I am quite capable of rubbing myself. I mean, of course, warming myself," he corrected quickly.
She sighed extravagantly and settled her hands back onto her lap. The blanket did not close tight at the throat and thus the length of her neck was exposed as well as an alarmingly amount of damp linen that stuck to her skin and kept no secrets. It molded to the shape of her breasts, which he already knew were small and firm, but the chill had caused her nipples to rise into tight little peaks that held his gaze until he lifted the blanket and wrapped it close around her shoulders again.
His arms ached with the memory of holding her, his fingertips tingled recalling the softness of her cheek.
He had deliberately kept his distance since leaving Taniere. Desires that had lain dormant for so many years had taken every scrap of his considerable willpower to crush back down into submission and now here she was, all but naked, wet, trembling, and the blood was surging through his veins like wildfire.
“Why are you doing this?”
His gaze jerked up to her face. “Doing what?”
“This,” she said, glancing around the tiny cell. “Why are you doing this? You could have sent me to the convent in the care of your squire or Sir Boethius or Sir Geoffrey. You did not have to escort me yourself. Indeed,” she added, bowing her head, “I thought, because of my boldness, you wanted rid of me as soon as possible.”
She was right, of course. He should have wanted to be rid of her, rid of the temptation, rid of those eyes that seemed to haunt his every waking thought. Rid of the smile that teased him so, rid of the sound of her voice and the way it travelled down his spine like a soft caress. He should have wanted her gone and his solitude restored, and yet...
Tamberlane reached out and tucked a forefinger under her chin, forcing her to look up at him again. His thumb stroked tenderly across her cheek and he shook his head at his own inability to fight this, a bigger battle than any he had faced against an armed opponent. Swords and lances he knew how to defeat; quivering chins and watery eyes were his ruin.
"I did not want rid of you at all," he admitted softly.
She expelled a small puff of air and grew so still the air seemed to tremble between them. It trembled more as he drew slowly closer, rising on his knees again and closing the gap between them.
He had kissed before—kisses of a youth eager to prove his manliness. But that was long before God had placed a sword in his hand and he had vowed to wield it in His name. The memory of those stolen kisses were dim but he recalled their sweetness, the taste of a rushed breath, the warmth of a sigh against his cheek. His hands inched upward to cradle Amie's face between them. He bent his head and covered her mouth with his own.
He knew her head was still spinning and her senses scattered, and he should have felt shame taking such advantage. But she tasted like some exotic, rare delicacy and he wanted nothing more than to invade and explore, to shed the burden of conscience and give himself wholly to the unexpected pleasure.
His tongue traced across her lips then slipped inside, winning the softest of whimpers from Amie's throat. Her mouth was silky and warm, her tongue a shy little thing that darted this way and that. He felt a response shudder through his belly and was shocked by the strength of his growing desire. So shocked, in fact, by the sudden hard changes in his body that he sat back with a gusted oath.
She was blinking, staring at him, her mouth round and shaped in a soft O of surprise.
“Forgive me,” he said hoarsely, pulling his hands quickly away. “Forgive me, Amaranth, that was... It was...”
"Again," she whispered.
His heart was pounding so loudly he was not certain he had heard her. "What?"
"Again. Please."
Before he could even begin to find the right words to tell her how wrong it would be, how dangerous, she slid off the edge of the bed and was kneeling on the floor in front of him. Her hands reached around his neck and she tipped her face up to his, her lips lush and parted with yet another shivered plea.
Ciaran's arms went around her and he pulled her into a crush against his chest.
This time there was no hesitation, no subtle testing of the way. He sent his tongue lashing between her lips, sliding deep into her mouth like a starved man who had craved the sustenance of human contact too long.
Where the heat, the magnificent desire came from, he knew not and cared not. Images came and went, broken and unrelated, of the hours spent droning the prayers meant to rid his mind and body of unchaste thoughts. And with each new thought, each new echo of a sonorous voice charging him to rid his soul of the devil's lusts... he kissed Amie harder, deeper, wanting only to lose himself in the silky pleasure of her mouth.
For Amie's part, she had suffered mightily from a man's lusts before, been punished, and lashed, forced to endure so much, she had thought she would never be able to bear a man’s touch again. Yet this was different. There was something in the way this Dragonslayer's hands trembled; something in the impenetrable green eyes that was suddenly naked and exposed. He had made no effort to conceal the depth of his loneliness and despair, two things Amie knew all too well herself.
She cried out softly and he misread the sound. He tore his mouth away and for the longest ten seconds of his life, waited, fully expecting to hear the disgust and rejection in her voice.
Amie was sitting very still. Clear thought was still hampered by Marak’s little blue drops, but the fog was lifting and her mind was suddenly spinning at a frenzied pace. Her lips were throbbing, her body was singing. Aches and chills from a hard day of riding had been replaced by a very different kind of aching and the only chill she felt now was the chill of abandonment as he released her from his arms and pushed to his feet.
In a welter of confused emotions, she watched him rake his hands through his hair and pace the length of the tiny cell.
"Ciaran?"
He shook his head and began to gather up the wet clothing. When he had all of her things bundled into the cloak, he headed for the door.
“You are leaving me?” she gasped softly.
“You will not be alone," he muttered, "Maude and Hugo will stay with you here and I will send Sir Boethius to stand guard outside the door. No one will get past him.”
She raised her hand as if she could draw him back, but he was not looking.
“I will find a way to dry these things. Take yourself under the blankets before you shiver all your teeth loose from your head. Where is that blasted monk with the brazier? And where the devil is Roland? I'll have him bring some hot broth to warm you.”
Amaranth watched and said nothing. She rose off her knees and crawled onto the cot again, pulling the blanket up high to her chin. The heat of his kiss still tingled on her lips, the feel of his body pressed to hers was still imprinted on her flesh, but there was nothing she could say or do to ease his guilt or her own.
With a harshly whispered command to the two wolfhounds, the former priest and Knight Templar strode out of the tiny cell and closed the door firmly behind him.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Amaranth woke up several hours later, totally disorientated. Panic and confusion reigned for nearly a full minute before the pounding in her chest slowed and she recognized the wooden crucifix hanging on the wall. She remembered. She was in a monk's cell. She was safe at St.Alban’s monastery. A glance around confirmed that she was not dreaming it. She was lying on a narrow cot beneath a mountain of warm blankets and the soft hiss she heard was coming from a small iron brazier that sat in the corner of the chamber.
The two wolfhounds were asleep on the floor, sprawled out at right angles to one another, Maude’s blonde head propped on Hugo’s belly.
She stretched and shook off the remnants of sleep,
pleased to discover no new aches. The old ones were all still there, but at least she could move her arms and legs and her hips were not seized like rusted links of armor.
She pushed aside the blankets and cautiously sat upright. Her head felt a bit fuzzy and her throat was as dry as parchment. Her feet, touching on the earthen floor, were instantly chilled and she curled her toes in response. The heat coming off the brazier was minimal. Most of it was sucked upward with the thin threads of smoke and lured out the window through gaps in the wooden shutter.
She looked at the dogs again, surprised they had not jumped to attention at the first sign of movement from the bed. Looking at their sleek bodies reminded her of their master. Riding behind him she’d had little else to look at for two days but the breadth of his shoulders, the straightness of his back. The doeskin leggings he wore did little to conceal the shape of his thighs and were so close-fitting, she could see the flex and ripple of the muscles beneath. She knew he was hard and muscular elsewhere, his arms like oak, his waist trim and lean, his lips like warm velvet...
She stiffened and her eyes grew round.
Surely that had been a dream!
She pressed her lips together and stared at the wooden crucifix. The memory of his kiss was strong and real and brought a surge of heat flaring into her cheeks. The feel of his hands raking up into her hair, the sensation of his fingers spreading to hold her while his lips ravished her was as vivid now as it had been at the time. Her scalp tingled and her skin prickled under a spray of gooseflesh.
Not only had he kissed her, but she had kissed him back!
Her hand flew to her own crucifix and she clutched it tight, debating whether she should pray or swoon.
Her nipples hardened of their own accord, making her look down at the flimsy bluet she wore. The memories flooded back, unstoppable now.
He had undressed her, right down to her hose and bluet and she had offered no modest objections, had not tried to stay his hand, had... good sweet Jesu!... had even begged for a second kiss like a common slut.
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