Chapter 2
The wind let up to where Juliana allowed her tensed shoulders relax. The snow blew with less ferocity, so she was able to turn her face up and look straight ahead. One could even have a conversation—if one had a companionable partner. Sir William, riding ahead, turned to look at her. That glower was still on his face. Gone were the broad smiles of yesterday.
“Try not to lag behind!” he shouted. “We’ve already lost time with the delay you’ve caused.”
She nudged her horse forward so she rode next to him. “All this talk of delay! If we had left yesterday when you wanted, we’d have had only a couple more hours before dark. We lost very little time.”
“If we’d left when I said, we’d be that much farther along. Probably been ahead of the storm.”
“The storm started yesterday. We’d have been in the thick of it.”
He lifted one gloved hand in warning. “I know when the storm started, as I had to spend the night out in the open, while you got to sleep one more night in your warm bed. A roof over your head.”
This was the first conversation they were able to have since meeting up this morning. She had little control over the situation she found herself in, but one thing she was able to do was to steer the knight away from her home. He saw the sense in not being seen, which she was grateful for. But, now they were past the storm and able to talk in normal tones, she felt uneasy.
“Where did your men go?” she asked.
“I sent them home.”
“Why?”
He glanced over at her, his mouth twisted into a stiff smile. “So I could have you all to myself... Nay, don’t look so horrified. I jest. The less people who know where you’re going, the safer you’ll be.”
“Where are we going?”
“If I told you, that would be one person too many. I know where we’re going and that’s enough.”
Looking around at the empty landscape, she realized how vulnerable she was, alone with this stranger, far from home and getting farther with each hour. She bit back the angry retort which had sprung to her lips and tried to sound conciliatory instead. “Can you at least tell me how long is the journey?”
“The journey will be one day longer than anticipated as we’ve started one day late.”
Juliana huffed. “My father is a frail old man who has already lost much. ’Twould kill him if I simply disappeared one day while out on the moors.” She had to stifle a giggle at the idea of the robust man she left at home being characterized as frail.
His head snapped around. “What did you tell him?”
The truth, as I always do. “I told him I had to visit my sister who is in the last days of her confinement.”
“Your father lets you ride by yourself in this dreadful place? I really don’t understand...If you were my woman, I would not allow it. I thought it strange when you agreed to meet me where we did by those stones—a thing made by ogres! And now it seems you make a habit of it.”
“Ogres?” She glanced over to see if he was serious.
As a merchant, her father had traveled far and wide, and was a knowledgeable man who was skeptical of many of the notions his neighbors held.
Sir William looked straight ahead, a serious expression on his face. “Of course, who else but ogres could move those stones? You put yourself in peril of many things riding around by yourself.”
“I like to ride by myself, so I’d be sorry to be your woman.”
The corner of his mouth quirked up. “If you were my woman, you’d have nothing to be sorry about. I’d make sure of that.”
Her stomach made an odd flip. “Anyway, ’tis not a dreadful place. I think ’tis beautiful!” She swept her arm over the vast land, now dusted with snow. “Mayhap winter is not the best season to see it in. In the summer ’tis all purple with heather—”
“And, are you not afraid?”
“Nay. ’Tis like it’s part of me. It gives me peace.”
He turned and looked down his nose at her. “I don’t care for this landscape. ’Tis prickly and cold.”
“Prickly?”
“Yes, the very plants look like they’d inflict a wound if touched.”
“I would think prickly and cold would suit you.” ’Tis how I’d describe you.
“Nay! I prefer a gentle landscape with proper, big trees and rolling green hills. And, ’tis so open here. We can be seen from miles away.”
“As we would be able to see others approaching.”
He took a moment to scan the area around them. “’Tis true. I’ll give you that. We should be looking for a place to shelter for the night, though. I’d wager you never spent the night out on the moors.”
“Nay, ’twill be an adventure.”
He chuckled. “An adventure, is it? Sleeping outdoors with a strange man.” He cocked his eyebrow. The smoldering look in his eyes made her scalp tingle.