Hard Day's Knight (7 page)

“They all have,” CJ said proudly.

“Except Walker,” Veronica said with another smile.

“Yes, well . . . that goes without saying,” CJ answered.

“Why—” I started to ask, but just then a group of laughing men armed with a couple of coolers of beer rounded the end of the bleachers, called out greetings in a number of languages, cracked a few jokes at the jousters in the ring, then took over the bleacher in a swarm of beer-enlivened good humor.

“They’re the Norwegian team,” CJ whispered before I even had a chance to ask her. One of the men, a big blond Viking sort, shoved a bottle of beer in my hand and plopped down beside me. Moth flattened his ears at the man. “They’re very nice, but they do like their beer. Stay away from them after dark.”

“Why, do they get grabby then?” I whispered back, nodding and pretending to drink my beer when my seatmate asked me something in a language I didn’t understand just before downing the contents of his bottle in one gulp.

A sonic belch reverberated to the left of me.

“No,” CJ answered as I glared at the man next to me. He grinned and reached for another bottle. “That’s when they take wagers on things, like who can projectile-vomit the furthest. Trust me, you don’t want to be near their camp after dark.”

“Wagers!” a dark blond, red-bearded Viking beyond CJ cried. “Yes, we take wagers. Tomas, what do you wager that Vandal won’t keep his seat the next pass, eh?”

And so they were off. For the duration of the training session, they wagered with extreme good nature on everything—not just whether or not the jousters would unhorse their opponents, but which direction the lance tips would fly, which direction the jouster would lean after a hit, and once, whether or not Bliss’s lovely big gray mare was going to poop or not.

Veronica left shortly after the Vikings arrived, inviting us both to visit the Palm Springs team headquarters to meet the rest of the team. “We’re in the green-and-cream-striped tents with the big plastic palm trees out front,” she said, pointing vaguely toward the tent city. She paused before leaving, her head tipping to the side as she gave me another once-over. “Do come by later. You don’t live near Palm Springs, do you?”

“No, Seattle. Why?”

“You’ve got a jouster’s physique—very . . .
sturdy
. You’d probably be a divine jouster if you put your mind to it.”

“Sturdy?” I asked the Viking next to me as she strolled off. “Did you hear that? Did she just call me fat?”

He leered at my breast shelf. “Sturdy means strong, yes? Is good?”

“I suppose. At least she didn’t call me chunky. Or worse yet, husky.”

“That’s it, show’s over for the Three Dog Knights,” CJ said as Walker and his team members left the ring. “I’m going to back to their camp. Want to come, or are you and Torvald there getting it on?”

The bearded Viking leered again and grabbed my knee. I stood up quickly with Moth in my arms (staggering only slightly, which is amazing considering the cat weighs as much as a small Shetland pony). “Sorry, I have to take the cat for his afternoon walk.”

Half of the Norwegian team went off to take their turn in the practice ring, while the other half settled back to enjoy the show.

“When do Farrell and his team have their practice?” I asked CJ as she walked back to the tent with me so Moth, who refuses to heed the call of nature while he’s on a leash, could use his litter box and have his dinner. “I’d like to see him joust.”

“Oh, they use the warm-up ring. All the Americans and Canadians do.”

“How come?”

CJ unzipped the tent and did a little makeup repair while I stuffed a cold wet cloth down my bodice and sighed with pleasure. “Quarantine laws. The foreigners can’t bring their horses in and take them home again because of quarantine laws. So they get loaner horses from people around the area.That’s why they come a week early, to work with the horses and learn their ways and do any necessary training. Because they’re at a disadvantage working on horses that aren’t their own, they get the bigger practice ring to compensate.”

“Ah. I suppose that makes sense.” We chatted for a moment with people passing by, heading for their own tents to change clothing or grab food for dinner; then CJ snagged a package of hot dogs, one of frozen hamburgers, and a couple of packages of buns.

“Come on, I’ll show you where the Three-DK tents are.”

I tried to lock Moth into the tent, figuring he’d be ready for a postdinner snooze, but he started scratching at the material the second I zipped up the door, so I ended up putting his harness on.

“You’re putting a crimp in my style, cat,” I said as I scooped him up and ran across the field to catch up with my cousin. “Hey, Ceej, wait up, I’m lugging his majesty.”

She stopped and waited for me, rolling her eyes when I set Moth down. “Honestly, the way you coddle that cat . . . I thought you didn’t like him?”

“I don’t. He deliberately dribbled cat food on my foot and kicked the lid off his litter box so the litter sprayed all over my sleeping bag.”

“You sure keep him around you a lot for someone who doesn’t like him.”

I glared down at the big white cat walking alongside me. “He’s a great big hairy pain in the butt.”

“Methinks the lady doth protest too much,” CJ said in her best Shakespearean voice.

“Methinks the lady hath no other choice. Hey, what do you know about Veronica? Was she really . . . er . . . you know. With Walker?”

CJ shrugged and raised her hand when a couple of people sitting around a campfire called out a greeting. “They’re minstrels from Ottawa. Nice people, but never get into a singalong with them. They don’t know the meaning of the word
enough
.”

I smiled and waved at the minstrels, following as CJ weaved her way through the seemingly endless tent city. Smoke from various barbecues mingled with the exhaust from the food vendors, making my stomach growl. I dragged my mind from the need for food to the need for information. “You said you’ve heard of her. Veronica, I mean. What have you heard?”

CJ looked a bit evasive, which really made me curious. “Not much, just that a bunch of rich society babes had formed their own jousting troupe. Word is they do a lot of charity stuff, and donate all their winnings to a children’s organization. There they are! Lamby-pie!” CJ squealed and launched herself at the man who was sitting in a lawn chair.

Moth lunged forward, all but dragging me into the circle of people collected around a couple of barbecue grills and coolers.

“Moth, stop it! Heel! Excuse me, I hope I didn’t hurt your toe—Moth! Get down off him!”

Clearly unaware of how a proper cat maintains an air of dignity and uninterest in the people around him, Moth hauled me through the group of people and leaped up into a startled Walker’s arms. He dug his claws into Walker’s tunic, quickly scaling him and alighting on his shoulders, just like Walker was some sort of human scaffolding put there for feline entertainment.

“I’m so sorry; he seems to have a little crush on you,” I said, tugging on the leash to get Moth down. “Come along, you horrible beast.”

Walker grimaced as Moth fought the leash. “It’s all right; he’s not doing any harm there.”

“Oh.” I unsnapped the leash, then stood looking at Walker, more than a little awed by what I saw. On a horse he was impressive. In a practice ring, he was intimidating. Standing just a few feet away from me, the setting sun turning his hair a glossy ebony, he was magnificent. He was a few inches taller than me, and had shoulders big enough for a monster like Moth to settle onto comfortably, and a long, angular, English sort of face with extremely expressive eyes. He wasn’t handsome the same way Farrell was, but his face was interesting. I liked watching his eyes, and the way his lips moved when he talked. I also liked his softly blunted squared chin, the sharp angle of his jawline, the faint shadowing of whiskers darkening already tanned skin. I had the worst urge to just taste that lovely spot where his jaw connected behind his ear. . . .

“Why are you staring at me?” he asked, the low voice rubbing against me like the softest silk. It took me a minute to stop fantasizing about nibbling on his neck to realize what he had said.

“Oh . . . uh . . . am I?”

His brows pulled together in a frown. “Yes, you are. I’d like to know why.”

I gave him my best smile. “I like looking at you.”

His eyes got huge at that, and I would have said more, I would have told him about how I liked the shape of his jaw and chin, but CJ was trying to get my attention.

“Pepper, this is my lamb. Isn’t he the most gorgeous thing you’ve ever seen?” CJ, petite little five-foot-two CJ, hung off the arm of a huge man. He had to be at least six-foot-six, and if I was built like a brick oven, he was an entire bakery. His face was pitted from a severe case of acne in his youth, and somewhere along the line he’d had his nose broken and never set quite right. He held out a huge hand for me to shake. It wasn’t until I looked into his soft brown eyes that I saw the gentle man inside him that had attracted my cousin.

“Pleasure to meet you,” he said in a low bass rumble that was just as deep as Walker’s, but had none of the latter’s goose-bump factor. “Ceej has told me a lot about you. Glad you could join us this year.”

“Thanks, I’m looking forward to watching the competition. I’ve never seen jousting before, but it looks like a blast. Is it hard to learn?”

“Not hard, but it takes practice,” Butcher said with a smile that turned his face from gruesome to delightful. “A lot of practice, if you’d be noticing all the falls we took today.”

“I just assumed that was because you were riding horses you weren’t used to.”

“Yes, that’s it exactly; that’s what we keep telling Granddad here, but will he listen to us? No,” Vandal said as he emerged from a tent, giving the Moth-clad Walker a wide berth as he took my hand in his, indulging in a little palm tickling before he kissed my knuckles.

“That’s because it’s not true,” Walker said, one hand absently scratching Moth’s chest. The big cat’s eyes were closed in sheer delight, his purr throbbing in the soft air of the summer evening. “The horses are fine; it’s you lot who need the practice.”

“Granddad?” I asked Vandal.

“Vandal,” Walker said with an obvious warning in his voice.

Vandal nodded to Walker. “Our fearless leader. We call him that because he’s so—”

“Vandal!”

“—cautious,” he finished with an insolent grin. “But enough of that knavish one. How charming you look with the fire of the sun dancing in your . . . erm . . . fiery locks.”

“You’re really good,” I told him. “Do you have to practice at that roguish smile, or does it come naturally?”

Everyone around us laughed. Vandal waggled his eyebrows at me and made a pretty bow to everyone else.

“I think you’ve met just about everyone,” CJ said, looking around. “That’s Bosworth Bale over there by the stable, and the guy with the water bucket is his partner, Geoff. Fenice you know, and talking to her are Gary and Ben. They’re from Whadda Knight, a jousting and steel combat troupe out of Oregon.”

The two men sitting in close conversation with the pink-haired Fenice were in chain mail, each clutching a bottle of beer. They nodded a greeting, then went back to their quiet conversation.

“The others you’ll meet as they show up. We usually have a lot of fun at night. Kind of a potluck picnic thing, where everyone brings a few bottles and some steaks and hamburgers,” CJ said. She rustled around the barbecue grill, chatting brightly with the people who strolled by, most of whom stopped to say hello, a few who dropped into chairs and joined the conversation. Everyone was very friendly and included me in their conversations, but I couldn’t help feeling like an outsider. I didn’t know the in jokes, and I didn’t understand the terminology, who the people were they were discussing, or even what the past tournaments signified in discussion. From time to time I was aware of Walker’s silver-eyed gaze on me, his attention itching my skin like an irritating sunburn.

“Do you ride?” Butcher asked me suddenly.

I was standing on the outskirts of the circle, watching everyone laugh and talk and joke, while CJ and Vandal manned the grill, turning out copious quantities of hamburgers and hot dogs. Fenice and her two attendant Americans went out and returned with big tubs of potato salad, beans, and pasta salads, which they were now arranging on a couple of card tables that someone had produced. My stomach grumbled as I turned to face Butcher. “Do I ride? I used to. I was raised with horses—my mother was crazy about them. I haven’t ridden in a while, though. Mom had to sell her horses when she moved to Belize to take care of underprivileged animals.”

“Ah. So she’s one of those charity workers?”

I gave him a wry smile. “No, just a vet who likes to help the underdogs. Literally.”

“World needs more people like that,” he said with an answering smile, and I thought to myself how lucky CJ was to have found him. “We ought to put you up on a horse. You have the look of a jouster.”

Instantly my hackles went up. “Why, because I look
sturdy?
”

Evidently Butcher missed both my glare and the way I spit out the last word. “That, and you look like you could take a hit and not lose your seat. Walker! What do you say we get Pepper up on Cassiopeia after supper? She rides, and she’s interested in jousting.”

Who, me?
Ack!
“No, I—”

Walker turned to give me a thin-lipped look. “She’s afraid of horses.”

It was the scorn in his voice that had me nipping my protest in the bud. “Oh! I am not!”

“You are, too. You screamed earlier.”

“Well, of course I screamed! I was strung out between two horses, one of which was clearly planning to eat me for lunch.”

“Horses don’t eat people; they’re herbivores,” he said patiently, just like I was too stupid to know that.