WINDKEEPER (21 page)

"But in the morning, Milord?"

Conar shrugged, his lips stretching into a leering grin. "Liza-love, it is most unseemly to arouse a man and then leave him aching with need."

Liza’s eyes opened wide. "I have done nothing to arouse you!" she flung back at him and resumed her effort to free her breast from his light grip.

"You are lying naked in my bed, Lady. That is reason enough to arouse me." Withdrawing his hand, he moved with a liquid grace and settled on top of her, grinning in her startled face. "And I have an appetite not easily filled."

"So I have noticed. May I suggest having Dorrie bring you up something?"

"She has nothing to offer that I need to fill this appetite, Sweeting." He lowered his head and captured her lips.

* * *

Watching Conar as he dressed, Liza admired the smooth curve of his lean flanks as he pulled on his breeches. The creamy tan cords settled with a snug fit over his hips and thighs and high-rounded rump. Stretching, she stared intently at him as he pulled the light blue silk shirt over his tousled blond hair, tugging it down his broad chest and tucking it into his breeches. Her knowing grin as he slid his wide leather belt through the thick loops of his waistband and then fastened the heavy brass buckle made him glance at her with a cocked brow.

"Am I entertaining you, Mam’selle?"

Liza nodded slowly. "Not as much as when you removed your clothing, Milord."

Conar chuckled. "Brazen hussy."

Liza remembered something she had wanted to ask him earlier. "Where did you come by those marks on your back?" she asked, thinking of the thin, almost transparent, crisscrossed lines all along his shoulders and waist. She had thought he must have been pitched from his horse into a bush of brambles. She wasn’t at all prepared for his curt answer.

"Kaileel Tohre’s belt," he answered calmly, glancing up as he drew together the laces of his shirt. He looked away again, searching for his missing boots.

"That priest who was at Norus? Why would he whip you?"

"Because I disobeyed him," he answered and then stooped down to retrieve a boot that was hiding beneath Liza’s discarded gown.

"By what right did a priest have to whip you?" she asked, hating anyone who would hurt this beautiful man.

Conar came to sit on the bed beside her to pull on his boots. "I really don’t want to talk about this, Liza. It was a long time ago when I was a small boy." He tugged on one shiny brown boot; his mouth set in a stubborn line she had come to recognize all too well.

Sensing she should change the subject, Liza brought up her knees and locked them together within the perimeter of her arms, resting her chin on top.

"You do have the most uncommonly perfect body, Milord."

Conar snapped his head around and stared at her. He laughed at her wistful expression and raised one golden brow. "And just how many naked men have you seen, my pretty?"

Liza shrugged. "A few."

"And where was this?" he asked as he drew on his other boot.

"About," she answered and grinned as he ruefully shook his head at her.

"You give away no secrets, do you, Mam’selle?"

"I have no secrets, Milord," she answered brightly, lifting her head to look him in the eye.

Conar guffawed, sending her a disbelieving look.

"Well," she corrected, drawing out her answer, "only a few."

"Such as where your home is." He stood.

Liza pursed her lips in a pretend pout. "Just why is that of such major import to you, Milord?"

He shrugged his wide shoulders into his soft leather jacket. "Because I am curious about you, Mam’selle."

"You know what they say about cats, don’t you, my sweet Prince?"

Conar chuckled and headed for the door. "Be up with you, lady. We ride within the hour."

"What?" She threw him a disbelieving look.

"I changed my mind about the weather. ’Tis a fine day for riding my horse, too!" He grinned; shutting the door behind him as a pillow came flying across the room.

He skipped down the stairs two at a time, a wide grin of contentment on his handsome face. He felt alive and his heart was as light as the sweet rays of sunlight playing over the stair treads. He thrust his hands into the pockets of his breeches and whistled. It was, indeed, a very fine day for riding.

Gezelle looked up as her Overlord came down the stairs. She stood, curtsying as he joined her, swinging one long leg over the back of a chair and sliding down. She was amazed he would lower himself to sit at table with a mere servant.

"How do you feel this morn, ’Zelle?" he asked, grinning at the girl’s bright red nose and watering eyes. "If you don’t feel like traveling with us, you can stay and I’ll send one of my Elite back for you in a coach."

Gezelle shook her head. "I’m well enough, Your Grace." She did not miss the self-satisfied look on her Prince’s face any more than she had missed the unused bed in which her mistress should have passed the eve before. "Did you sleep well, Your Grace?"

"I slept very little," he answered, winking audaciously at her as he motioned for her to sit with him.

Blushing to the roots of her hair, Gezelle quickly settled opposite him, dipping her burning face so he could not see.

"Are you sure you feel well enough to travel?" When she nodded, he eyed her carefully. "You’re really sure?"

She looked at him and could see true concern, not a hope that he and the lady might travel on alone. "I am well enough, Your Grace."

Conar nodded, picking up his fork as the serving wench placed a platter of pork chops before him. He ignored the girl even as she deliberately brushed her left breast against his arm as she straightened.

But Gezelle had not missed the action and turned a glare of disapproval to the tavern maid who still stood expectantly beside their Overlord. A protectiveness Gezelle meant for not only Prince Conar, but Lady Liza, as well, put steel in the former Norus servant’s backbone.

"We’ll not be needing anything, Dorrie," she hissed in an authoritative voice that surprised the Prince Regent. He glanced up at Gezelle’s militant face.

Dorrie made no move to leave. Her frosty eyes glared at Gezelle with warning and she placed clenched fists on flaring and curvaceous hips. "Is that so? Who says?"

Conar lowered his head, his lips twitching with humor. "Thank you, Dorrie," he said, cutting a chunk of pork chop and spearing it with his fork. When the tavern wench still did not move, he looked up at her. "That will be all." He looked away again, dismissing her. As Dorrie stomped away, he did not missed Gezelle’s hurmpf of finality. He had to take a hasty gulp of chilled apple cider to keep from laughing.

For a long moment, silence filled the common room. Conar ate his morning meal with all the gusto of a man whose carnal appetites cried out for energy-giving sustenance. When he became aware of Gezelle’s worried face, he stopped eating. "Is something wrong, Mam’selle?"

Gezelle started in embarrassment and shame. "I shouldn’t have given that girl orders, Your Grace."

"Why not? You’re no longer a servant, ’Zelle. You have been given your freedom. You’re a lady who now serves as companion to the Lady Liza." He laid down his fork and took up his napkin. "You are above that tart in social standing. It was well within your right to give her orders, and she had best heed those orders or I will know why." He wiped his mouth on his napkin and placed it beside his plate. He laid his hand over Gezelle’s, feeling her flinch. "And I thank you for handling a situation I found most uncomfortable." He withdrew his touch. "I did not wish the wench’s attention or her overture."

Gezelle’s face turned redder still beneath his close scrutiny. "I knew you did not, Your Grace."

He stood and thrust his hand into the pocket of his breeches, digging out some gold coins. "I’ll settle up with the innkeeper and see to having our mounts readied. Would you go see what’s taking my lady so gods-be-damned long?"

Gezelle smiled at her Prince’s unconscious possession of the lady. Her heart was light as she climbed the stairs to the upper rooms. They made such a fine pair, this god of sunshine, and this lady of the midnight hair. Sighing with dreamy regard to just how right these two beautiful people were for one another, Gezelle tapped lightly at the Prince Regent’s door and smiled as Liza bid her enter.

* * *

Conar looked in on the innkeeper’s wife as she sat beside her cooking pot, peeling potatoes for the noon meal. He motioned for the rotund lady to stay seated.

"I wanted to compliment you, Madame Ruck, on the wonderful meals you have always prepared for us. If I stay much longer, they’d have to send a barrel maker’s wagon to cart me home." He came to stand beside her then hunkered down, pilfering a chunk of potato from her large bowl.

"That’s not good for you!" Meggie Ruck said automatically, swatting at the young man’s hand. Her eyes widened as he looked at her with surprise. "Your Grace, I am…" she began, but he covered one rough, work-reddened hand with his own.

"You sounded just like my mama." He laughed and squeezed her fingers. "She wouldn’t let me eat raw spuds, either."

"Her Majesty was a great lady."

His face darkened with memory. "Aye, Meggie, that she was." He patted her hand and laid two gold sovereigns on the table beside her. "That should cover our room and board." He added another sovereign. "And the furniture you were forced to burn."

Meggie stared at the coins. Three gold sovereigns were more than she and Harry would see in six month’s time. She shook her head, scooping up the gold and extending them to her Overlord.

" ’Tis too much, Your Grace!" It wasn’t mannerly to be sitting in the Prince Regent’s presence and she tried to stand, but the young man put his hand on her shoulder to prevent her.

"I want to." Bending over, he placed a light kiss on her plump cheek, hugging her to him in a warm, compassionate embrace. "Thank you for making my stay so wonderful, Meggie."

Meggie Ruck could only stare as her Prince straightened, winking at her with that little-boy charm she had come to adore. His smile as he turned to leave would be forever stored in her memories.

"The Wind be always at your back, Meggie Ruck," he whispered.

Meggie sat frozen to her chair as she watched him leave. It took her a long time to be able to bring her hand, trembling as it was, to her cheek to touch the tingled flesh. He had kissed her, she thought with dazed wonder. Her Prince, her future King, had kissed her. She could still feel the feather-soft caress of those sensual lips, lips women were known to fight for, on her flesh.

"The Wind be always at your back," she said in a breathy whisper and felt a tear ease down her weathered cheek.

After paying the innkeeper for housing their horses, a tribute Harry Ruck had not wanted to accept, Conar whistled as he walked to the stables. He declined the stable boy’s help in saddling Seayearner and set about the task himself, crooning to the great black beast as he slid the saddle over ’Yearner’s broad back. He moved then to Liza’s little gray mare and wasn’t in the least surprised when the filly allowed him to saddle her with nothing more than a nuzzle of his cheek.

He could see the stable boy gawking at him with wonder. The boy no doubt thought his Prince had taken leave of his senses. Royalty did not saddle their own mounts when there were servants about to do it.

Conar grinned wickedly to himself. There were many things the old Conar wouldn’t have done, he thought. With his mind on the lady in the tavern, he knew there were going to be a few things the new Conar might do that would make the world think him crazy. He didn’t care. His world was right for the first time in his life and he would be damned if he would ever let it go dark and bleak again.

Gezelle was sitting on the stairs, her hands clenched tightly together between her knees. Her face was pale and pinched as she glanced up at him.

Conar’s heart began to pound and he felt a wicked cold seep into the pit of his stomach. "What is it?"

Gezelle began to cry.

"Why in the hell are you crying?" He felt as though his world was grinding to a halt and he could feel the blood rushing to his ears.

"She’s gone, Your Grace," Gezelle whispered. "Our lady’s gone."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Alarm filled his blue eyes as he glanced up the stairs, expecting to see Liza standing at the top. He took a step toward the stairs.

"She left, Your Grace." Gezelle’s voice was filled with misery. Tears slid down her cheeks and she broke down in heaving sobs. She barely felt him push by her as he took the steps at a near-run. She could hear him calling the lady’s name as he opened and shut every door above.

His shout echoed through the still tavern as he thundered down the stairs. He grabbed Gezelle’s arms and drew her to stand.

"Where is she?" He shook the girl. "Where did she go?"

"She said to tell you…to say…" Gezelle couldn’t finish, for her throat was closing with tears.

He shook her again. The girl’s head wobbled on her fragile shoulders and she grunted with pain, but Conar did not heed her soft whimper. "Tell me what?"

"To say goodbye for her."

"Goodbye?" Conar’s voice lowered to a stunned whisper. Confusion, pain, even wounded pride filled his pale face.

"She left you a note, Your Grace." Gezelle dug into her dress and produced a white sheet of folded paper. She extended it, flinching as he jerked it out of her hand.

Conar glanced at the parchment, then, without reading it, crumpled it and stuffed it in his pocket. "Did she say where she was going?" At Gezelle’s shake of her head, he clenched his teeth to keep from bellowing. "Did she say where her home was?" When the girl shook her head again, he wanted to smash something.

"Damn it!" he yelled and spun around to face the four people who had gathered at the kitchen door, having all come at a run when his angry cries reached their ears. His anger swung from the innkeeper, to the serving wench, to the stable boy, and finally came to rest on the innkeeper’s wife.

He opened his mouth to scream at the woman, but stopped before he could. He shook his head to clear away the anger, but the fury within him was boiling over. He doubled his hands into fists.