Knight's Prize (22 page)

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castle all day, Miriel didn't know. He
refused to tell her what ailed him. 'Twas strange that he should be afflicted
at all. Indeed, 'twas her
xiansheng
who had taught her the herbs
and meditations and pressure points to stave off pain. Miriel used the
knowledge extensively whenever she suffered sparring injuries, thus her
tolerance for pain was high. Otherwise, she'd be limping about the keep
herself.

But
there was no point in asking Sung Li about his discomfort. He disliked being
reminded of his own frailty.

'Twas
admittedly easy to put Sung Li's troubles out of her mind anyway, since her
head spun wildly with thoughts of Sir Rand of Morbroch.

Who
the Devil was he?

Certainly
not the mild-mannered, kindhearted, sentimental suitor he pretended to be.

The
fool had gone after The Shadow again this morn, only this time he'd returned
with more than a few scrapes and bruises. Which was why she was now perusing
the storeroom shelves for her jars of healing herbs.

Surely
the varlet hadn't been hurt
that
badly. He'd broken no bones, only lost a
little blood and bruised a bit more than his pride. But he was insisting on
playing the wounded soldier, which meant she was obliged to play the healing
maid.

She
sighed, tapping her finger on a vial of carmine thistle extract, then
thoughtfully bit her lip. Perchance 'twould not be so bad a thing to tend to
Rand's injuries after all. 'Twas said that men sometimes made bedside
confessions to a nurse they'd never utter to a priest. Mayhap when he was under
her tender care, she'd find out who the real Rand of Morbroch was.

Satisfied
with her harvest of medicines, she tucked in an extra bottle of colchicum for
Sung Li. The stubborn old man might not want to admit his joints troubled him,
but surely he'd avail himself of a cure left in his reach.

She
found Rand in the armory, talking with Colin and Pagan.

"Forsooth,
I didn't expect to run into the outlaw at all," Rand was telling them as
she stood outside, listening. "I only followed the Herdclays to make sure
they did no mischief."

"They
were
a pair of overblown ballocks, weren't they?" Colin said.

"The
worst sort," Pagan agreed.

"I'm
almost glad they got robbed," Colin added.

"But
you shouldn't have tangled with The Shadow alone," Pagan told Rand.
"You might have come back with worse injuries than these."

"And
for what?" Colin scoffed. "A bit of silver that didn't belong to the
louts in the first place."

"I
guess I wasn't raised to run away from a fight," Rand murmured.

"Even
when you're...overpowered?" Pagan asked as diplomatically as possible.

Rand
replied with a humorless bark of laughter. "In my household, I was always
overpowered."

Miriel
frowned. What did he mean by that? In his household? Wasn't he raised in the
household of Morbroch? And overpowered? The knights of Morbroch were fine
fighters, but Rivenloch had defeated them soundly at the tournament. Rand
couldn't have been overpowered by them.

A
hundred questions suddenly clamored in her head.

She
swept through the doorway, unprepared for the fact that Rand was standing
there, bare from the waist up. With a tiny gasp that almost made her drop her
vials, she quickly averted her eyes, but not before the image of his broad,
bronze chest burned itself indelibly into her brain.

"Lady
Miriel," Pagan said with a nod.

Colin
smirked, tossing Rand his shirt. "Hello, Miri."

"Ah,
my angel of mercy, come at last." Rand sighed, bunching the shirt before
him in a manner that only half-covered that glorious expanse of golden skin.

She
tightened her jaw. She mustn't give in to the foolish flutterings of her heart.
She'd seen men's chests before. Rand's was no different.

Mayhap
a little more muscled. A little wider. A little more sculpted, indeed rather
like the flawlessly formed body of Adonis. But...

Tossing
her head impatiently, she forced her feet forward. She was here to treat his
injuries and collect information, no more. With single-minded purpose, she
pushed down on his rock-hard shoulder, pressing him onto a bench so she could
take a look at his wounds.

"Where
does it hurt?"

One
side of Rand's mouth curved upward in a slow grin. Behind her, Colin stifled a
laugh.

Pagan
cleared his throat. "Perchance we should return to the lists, Colin."
He added sternly, "Behave, Rand, or I'll never hear the end of it from my
wife."

Rand
gave him a salute, and Miriel resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Sweet Mary,
even when they weren't present, her sisters posted guard over her.

When
Pagan and Colin had gone, Rand brushed a finger across his lower lip.
"Here, my love," he whispered.

Despite
her best intentions, Miriel's heart skipped a beat. Lord, the varlet was
wasting no time. Her gaze drifted down to his tempting mouth, parted in
invitation, and she bit the corner of her lip.

"I
think it's split," he said.

For
a moment she only stared at him. Then she gave a quick shake of her head.
"Of course." She rummaged through her containers, finding the
fenugreek balm. She dabbed a bit on her fingertip and smoothed it across his
lip.

"Got
a good whack on the chin," Rand admitted, "though naught seems cracked."

She
pressed gently over the area. He winced as she found a tender spot. "Just
a bruise."

"You
know, I was thinking on the way back to the keep," he said as she applied
rosemary ointment along his jaw, "you're lucky you didn't run into The
Shadow yourself that day you met me in the woods."

Her
finger slipped in the salve, and she jabbed him in the cheek. "Oh.
Sorry." Bloody hell, she had to be more careful. She dabbed away the
excess ointment. "Why do you say that?"

"You
both seem to have a curious penchant for hiding in the trees."

************************************

Rand
studied Miriel closely from the corner of his eye. Aside from a subtle twitch
of her lip, she exhibited no noticeable reaction to his comment.

Not
that he expected one. But it
had
occurred to him as he'd come limping back
from his encounter with the agile outlaw that The Shadow wasn't the only person
he'd met among the branches of the Rivenloch wood.

'Twas
an absurd idea, he knew. There was no way Miriel could be The Shadow. Miriel
was sweet, delicate, helpless. She disliked combat. 'Twas impossible to imagine
that the tenderhearted maid treating his injuries with such gentle hands could
have inflicted them upon him. Nay, she was not The Shadow.

Still,
he would have liked to take a peek at her knee.

"I
wasn't hiding in the trees," Miriel told him, swabbing some oily
substance on a scrape atop his shoulder. "I was rescuing a kitten stuck on
a branch."

He
smiled. She was good. She hadn't even stumbled over the lie. But he knew better.
A kitten stuck on a branch would have been meowing as relentlessly as a Mochrie
maid. "Rescuing a kitten?"

"Aye."
She shrugged. "You're a knight. I'm sure you've come to the rescue of
helpless creatures before."

An
unpleasant recollection suddenly popped into his head, making a crease betwixt
his brows. "I saved a cat once when I was a lad. The poor thing had been
kicked half to death by my father."

She
stiffened, and suddenly he wondered if he'd said too much. But she soon resumed
her ministrations, circling behind him to examine his bruised backbone.
"Your father must have been a cruel man."

He
shrugged. "No worse than most, I suppose." He hoped he lied as
smoothly as she did. Forsooth his father had been a drunken brute, an evil,
conniving, selfish boor who had terrorized his childhood.

"And
your mother?"

Rand's
memories of his mother were bittersweet. She'd never mistreated Rand. Indeed,
she'd seen that he was raised in his father's noble household. But she'd been
blind to her lover's abuses and, in the end, too weakhearted to be faithful.
"My mother died when I was fourteen."

"Ah.
Do you have brothers? Sisters?"

He
frowned over his shoulder. "What an inquisitive maid you are today."

She
shrugged. "You know everything about my family. I know naught of
yours."

"Ah.
Well, I have four brothers."

"Is
that all?"

"Isn't
that enough?"

"I
mean, tell me about them. What are they like? Are they overbearing like my
sisters, or do they worship the ground you walk upon?" He winced as she
slathered some stinging paste on the back of his shoulder. "Would I like
them?"

"Nay!"
he said more forcefully than he intended. "Nay." The thought of one
of his depraved half brothers meeting innocent Miriel was unspeakable.

"Indeed?"
She ran a finger lightly down his arm. "Are they more handsome than
you?"

He
caught her wrist before he realized she was only teasing him. At her gasp, he
lightened his grip and raised her hand, pressing a kiss to the back of it. He
clucked his tongue. "Handsome? Is that all you care about? I thought you
loved me for my wit."

************************************

Miriel
did
love
his wit. But she wasn't about to admit it. She was learning some very revealing
things about Sir Rand, who might or might not be of Morbroch, and she didn't
want him to wander too far from their current conversation.

She
affected an air of innocence. "Your wit? Oh, nay. 'Twas always about your
appearance. Your languid eyes and your noble nose. Your toothsome smile
and..."

"Go
on. Say it."

"What?"

"My
dimples."

"Your
what?"

"My
dimples. The ladies love my dimples."

She
knitted her brows. "Do you have dimples?"

He
grinned and shook his head, displaying those very notorious assets. Lord, they
were
adorable.

"Tell
me more," she pleaded, spotting a scratch on his ear and dabbing a tiny
bit of dill salve on it. "What were you like as a lad?"

He
sighed. Rand apparently didn't like to speak much about his youth, which meant
it must have been unpleasant. In fact, she'd begun to doubt very much that
he'd come from the Morbroch household at all. The Morbrochs were a jovial,
well-meaning lot. Any man who'd kick a cat half to death would have been strung
up by his thumbs.

"I
suppose I was like any lad. Picked up a sword when I was two. Got my first
horse at three. Stuck my nose where it didn't belong a few times and earned a
few scars. Kissed a lass when I was ten. Bedded my first wench—"

She
whacked him on the back of the head.

"Ow!"
He chuckled.

She
popped a cork back into the vial. "You're finished."

"Finished?"

She arched
a brow. "Unless you've got a hangnail that needs surgery."

He
grinned.

She
gathered her jars, casting a sidelong glance at him as he donned his linen
shirt, watching the splendid flex of his muscles. She might appreciate his wit,
but the sight of his naked torso did something to her insides.

At
long last she thought she'd untangled the mystery of Sir Rand of Morbroch.
Indeed, he wasn't who he claimed to be. But she knew now why he'd lied about
his identity. And the moving truth of that lie left her with a soft, warm glow
that threatened to melt her very soul.