B00CGOH3US EBOK (27 page)

"Are you chewing on mint leaves?"

He didn't answer. But the tell-tale bob of his throat muscles as he struggled to swallow whatever he had in his mouth gave him away.

She was right. He was chewing mint leaves. She recalled the callous remark she'd made about his dragon breath the other day and a shiver ran through her body as she wondered, was he doing it because of her…or for her?

Jill became aware of how her entire body conformed to his, chest to breast, stomach to stomach, hip to hip. She looked from his mouth to his eyes and watched in fascination as they changed from a warm chocolate brown to golden amber. They glowed from the dragon fire within him, proving he was just as aware of how close she was—and just as affected.

Darn those butterflies. There they go again.

She let go of his shoulders and stepped back, now more embarrassed at her impulsive actions than he was at getting caught.

"Come, Gosforth," Roderick called out. "My armor will rust upon my body if I must wait much longer for you."

Jill breathed a sigh of relief. Leave it to Roderick and his overblown ego to lighten the mood—and prevent her from doing something stupid, like kiss the daylights out of Baelin in the middle of the field.

They both turned in the knight's direction and the look Roderick sent their way said he'd witnessed every bit of what had just passed between them. She couldn't tell was if he was jealous or amused. That's all she needed—two men driving her crazy on top of everything else.

But she couldn't resist one more look at Baelin. Bad idea. He stood there, tall and silent, watching her with that fire still smoldering in his eyes.

Forget butterflies. She had giant lunar moths break-dancing inside her now.

Jill turned and hurried away before she became a casualty on the battlefield herself.

"Aye, the battle at Termes was a nasty one. Have a scar here where an archer's arrow skewered my arm and came out the other side."

Roderick pulled back the sleeve of his tunic to show there was, indeed, a wicked-looking puncture mark on both sides of his left forearm.

"You call that a scar…" Baelin sneered and proceeded to document the various wounds and gashes he'd received in his lifetime. He had quite a few to boast of, seeing as his lifetime was somewhat longer, and thus more injury-filled, than a normal man's.

Apparently beating the crap out of each other had induced a weird kind of bromance. While Jill wouldn't call them bosom buddies, Roderick and Baelin seemed to have graduated from silently hostile to mutually tolerant of each other since their clash of the tin men this morning.

Tired of listening to battle tales of the maimed and mutilated, she rummaged through her satchel and pulled out a fresh gown. "While you two trade gruesome war stories, I'm going to go take a bath."

All conversation stopped instantly. Roderick's mouth hung open, stalled in mid-sentence. Owen visibly cringed at the thought. Baelin didn't look too happy with the idea either.

Jill shook her head at all of them. "Don't be so shocked. Where I come from, bathing regularly is considered good hygiene." She made an exaggerated show of sniffing the air. "Quite frankly, it's a habit two knights who sweat buckets in their armor and a young squire-in-training who reeks more of horse than boy should consider taking up. A little soap and water never killed anybody."

As she walked away, Baelin bolted up and rushed around the campfire to block her path. "My lady, you bathed but two nights ago."

"Right, and I'm going to do it again. I'm used to having a bath every day and as long as we continue to follow the shore of the-lake-that-never-seems-to-end, I'm going to take advantage of mother nature's bathtub."

"But 'tis not safe."

"Oh, please. Let's not argue over this again. I'm not going to run away and as long as the Loch Ness Monster doesn't nibble on my toes, I'll be fine."

"'Tis not monsters in lakes that concern me," he said in a hushed voice and she saw his glance dart back to the campfire.

"Oh, you mean Owen and Roderick?" she replied back in an exaggerated whisper. "There shouldn't be a problem as long as they stay by the fire and don't come sneaking around to watch me skinny dipping."

She caught him glancing again to see if Roderick had overheard them. He had nothing to worry about. The other knight was too busy sniffing at various parts of his body to notice.

"I'll be quick. I don't have a choice—that lake is like jumping in the Arctic Ocean." The mischievous streak in her couldn't resist torturing him just a little bit. "Unless you could heat it up for me like you did back in the cave?"

Baelin's head whipped back around and he nearly choked on the gulp of air he inhaled. "My lady, there is not enough breath in my dragon lungs to warm the entire lake for you."

She gave a dramatic sigh. "Too bad. You know how I like hot baths."

What are you doing, Donahue? Are you actually flirting with him? Are you out of your twenty-first century mind?

His eyes flashed gold and he groaned, as if the thought gave him physical pain.

Okay, if he was remembering the same thing she was—her naked and wet, him just as gloriously nude, firelight and a certain bearskin rug—it was probably not the best image to put into his male brain. Especially not after that brief zing that had passed between them this morning.

With Baelin thoroughly distracted, she turned and made a beeline for the lake before he could stop her—or act on the heated promise simmering in his eyes.

Bad Jill
. She should know better than to tempt a dragon.

"The dragon has left its lair."

Isylte slowly lowered the white swan's quill in her hand, but did not look at the man standing on the other side of the table. Instead, her gaze focused on the paper before her, the words she'd written blurring into black streaks before her eyes.

"Of course he has. He passed one of the challenges. He could not do so otherwise."

"He is traveling with a girl, my queen."

"I am aware of that." She closed her eyes against the image of Baelin with another woman, but it did no good, faceless though the girl was. "'Tis the maiden foretold of in the tapestry. Tell me something I do not know."

She heard the warrior shuffle in place. "They are not alone."

"Really?"

"The dragon and the maid are traveling with another knight." The warrior cleared his throat. "A dragonslayer."

Isylte's gaze pierced the knight, causing him to retreat a step back.

"Baelin is keeping company with a dragonslayer?" Now that was an interesting turn of events. "How unwise of him."

"Aye, we thought so, too. What could it mean, my queen?"

Alarmed, she rose and tore aside the curtain now concealing the ragged tapestry. It remained as it had for the past two days, unraveling no further.

Her anxiety eased, but still the question remained. "What is he up to, that he would risk so much?"

"They appear to be in no hurry, to get wherever it is they are going."

"No, they wouldn't be, for they know not where the next test will take place."

"Tell me where, my queen," the man's voice brimmed with determination, "that we might reach it before them and prevent them from succeeding."

"Would that I knew," she murmured, more to herself than to the knight.

"Do you not know what the next challenge is the maiden must pass to break the spell?"

She whirled about, angered the man would dare question her magic. "Of course I do, you idiot! I am the one who cast the enchantment." She gritted her teeth at his audacity. "However, like the dragon, I do not know in what form the challenges will present themselves. Only the whim of fate determines when and how they shall come to be." She stared at the tapestry, the only thing tying her to him. "And so long as the maiden of the tapestry is with him, that time may come all too soon."

"What would you have us do, my queen?"

She paced in front of the tapestry, a plan playing out in her mind.

"Baelin must have both the maiden and the tapestry if the curse is to be broken. Without one or the other, it cannot be done." She stopped and smiled serenely at the knight.

"Go. Follow them. If you cannot separate the dragon from the tapestry, then separate the maiden from the dragon."

"Will she be safe, do you think?" Kendale asked.

Baelin had returned to the fire, still uncomfortable with Lady Jill going off by herself. But he couldn't deny her the chance to bathe, not if he wanted to avoid another battle of wills like the last time.

"She will be fine as long as another dragonslayer does not happen upon her like the last time."

The knight gazed off in the direction Lady Jill had taken, his face akin to a fox dreaming of a fat, juicy hen.

"Ah, had I but come through the woods only a moment or two sooner that day, what a vision I might have seen." At Baelin's stern look, he laughed and held up his hands. "And then promptly turned about and shielded my eyes, so as not to dishonor the lady."

"Somehow I find that hard to believe."

Kendale casually draped his arm over a bended knee. "I am not the complete knave you think me to be."

"Are you not? Is that why Lady Jill finds herself rebuffing your unwanted attentions at every turn?"

The knight chuckled. "Merely testing the boundaries, just as I was testing yours this morn."

Baelin found himself momentarily surprised. "The sword practice?"

"Aye. If I am to be in the company of a man, it behooves me to know if he is skilled enough with the sword should I ever have need of him to stand at my back."

"And what if that sword should instead turn against you?"

Kendale smiled. "Then I want to know what I shall be up against should that situation ever come to pass."

Baelin studied the other knight, trying to judge the sincerity in his words. "You would trust me to fight at your side?"

He shrugged a shoulder. "Trust only comes with the test of time. But after this morn, I know now we are well matched. Yours would be a worthy sword arm to have by my side in battle…and at the same time, I would not be fool enough to underestimate your skill should you turn out to be my foe instead."

Little did the knight know how close his words were to the truth. Baelin could easily go from ally to enemy in the span of a heartbeat, if the dragonslayer ever discovered the truth of what he was.

Still, he couldn't deny how enjoyable it'd been to spar with a flesh and blood man and not some imaginary opponent. It had been exhilarating, to practice the skills of battle, and he'd been delighted to know they were not nearly as rusty as his mail.

'Twas strange, to feel this obscure bond with a man who could inspire both annoyance and camaraderie in one breath.

He didn't have long to think on the puzzling situation before Lady Jill stepped out of the twilight, toweling her wet hair with the edge of her cloak. The tresses hung in dripping waves to her shoulders, dampening the linen of her saffron kirtle until it was nearly transparent against her skin. For a long, silent moment, every male eye around the fire stared at her, even the young lad too green to do naught about it.