Lord Soth (20 page)

He couldn’t think of anything.

He’d merely been attracted by her appearance. And while she was stunningly attractive, her looks were no reason for him to lose his head and start acting like a lovesick young boy. But while there wasn’t anything wrong with lusting after beautiful young women, elf or otherwise, (he was married, not dead, after all) it was another matter entirely if he chose to act upon his emotions.

The kiss had been an aberration, he thought, vowing to have Isolde’s injuries taken care of, then send her off to Palanthas with an escort so that she could rejoin her fellow maidens.

“Almost there,” he said.

Isolde craned her neck to see the top of the keep over Soth’s shoulder. “Where are your chambers?” she asked.

“The second window from the top on the left side of the tower,” he said.

“And that’s where you sleep?”

Soth considered telling her that it was the room where both he and Lady Korinne slept, but for some reason he did not. Instead, he merely said, “Yes.”

“Lord Soth returns!”

“Milord approaches!”

The loud shouts echoed down from the tower’s two top observation posts almost at the same time.

Immediately upon hearing the words, Lady Korinne felt her heart drop like a stone into the pit of her stomach.

Something had to be wrong.

The Knights’ Meeting was to have lasted seven days and her husband was not to have returned for at least ten, or perhaps for even two weeks, yet here he was returning just two days after leaving. He hadn’t even reached Palanthas.

A lump of worry gathered in Korinne’s throat as she hurried to the window of her bedchamber. The room was high up in the keep with a view that stretched all the way to the Vingaard River. If the sky was clear, she’d likely be able to see her husband’s approach.

She scanned the horizon and picked out two horses far off in the distance making their way toward the keep. There appeared to be two riders, but she couldn’t be sure. One was obviously Lord Soth, his size, shape and the deep rose-red color of his leather armor unmistakable even at this distance. The other traveler was much harder to identify. Clearly the rider was not a knight, being too small and slender to belong to any of the orders.

At one point, the two horses turned slightly to one side. At once, Korinne saw that the trailing horse was riderless, while the second rider sat directly behind Lord Soth.

She shifted her gaze back onto her husband. From the way he was riding, it was obvious that he was unharmed.

She was relieved but the lump of worry was still knotted in her throat. In fact, it seemed to have grown larger.

If he hadn’t been injured, then why was he returning so early, and in the company of a woman? A woman who rode with her arms wrapped tightly around the waist of Korinne’s husband.

Chapter 11

By the time Soth reached Dargaard Keep, dozens of people had
gathered just inside the gate to receive him. There was a buzz traveling through the crowd and speculation ran rampant with theories ranging from an ambush and slaughter on the trail, to the discovery of a lost lone traveler brought back to the keep for her own safety.

When Soth and Isolde entered the keep, something of a stunned silence came over those gathered as they recognized the maiden’s beauty to be quite extraordinary.

Soth stopped his horse and dismounted. “Where is Istvan?” he shouted, his voice tinged with just a hint of urgency.

“Here I am, milord!” said the elderly healer. In his prime Istvan had been a short man of stocky build with a full head of thick brown hair. Now, after more than twenty years of service as healer, first for all of Knightlund and now within Dargaard Keep, his dark brown mane had turned white and flowed down over his shoulders like tattered white threads. He was also thinner and scraggier—
some might even say emaciated—than he’d been in his youth, yet despite his lack of bulk, he was still quite nimble, especially considering his age.

But nimblest of all was his mind, not only in areas of healing, in which he had no rival, but also in areas of keep politics. No one understood the internal machinations of the keep and the knighthood better than he. For that reason he had managed to offend no one in all his years of service and had maintained his position for decades despite changes in rule and shifts in allegiance.

Soth helped Isolde down from her pillion. When her feet touched the ground, much of her weight was placed on her injured ankle causing her to stumble. Soth made an overly dramatic gesture to help steady her and turned to Istvan with a look of grave concern.

“She was injured in an ogre raid on her traveling party. She’s in desperate need of your attention.”

Isolde grimaced at the pain in her ankle.

Istvan looked the elf-maid over, quickly inspecting her wounds and using what he saw to make a general assessment of the injuries he could not see.

From the look on his face it was obvious to Soth that the healer thought her injuries to be minor, nothing that a few days rest wouldn’t cure.

He glanced up at the lord of the keep with a look that asked, “Why are you wasting my time with such superficial cuts and bruises?”

Soth merely stared at him, knowing his steel-gray eyes could be as piercing as daggers when he needed them to be.

In a moment, without a word being spoken, Istvan understood.

“Quickly,” shouted Istvan to his assistants. “Take her to my chambers. Prepare the comfrey and yarrow.” He clapped his hands together twice and his assistants swung into action, carefully escorting the elf-maid away.

Then Istvan turned to face Soth. “She will recover, milord,” he said, his head bowed. “I give you my word.”

Soth nodded to the healer. “Well done.”

“Thank you, milord,” Istvan answered, turning in haste to follow the elf-maid as she was carried to his chambers.

Soth glanced around, noticing that all eyes were on Isolde.

Including those of Lady Korinne.

Lady Korinne watched the elf-maid being taken away to the healer’s chambers then turned to look at her husband. She was surprised to find his gaze lingering on the doorway the elf-maid had just been taken through, but dismissed it as his simply being concerned with the woman’s well-being.

She walked over to him. “Milord,” she said when there was still some distance between them. Then as she came closer, “Loren,” she whispered.

Soth turned, smiled upon seeing his wife then greeted her with an embrace and a kiss. The kiss was less passionate than Korinne would have liked, but he had been traveling for some time and was probably weary from the journey.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

“Yes,” he answered plainly.

“What happened?”

Soth took a deep breath and began explaining how the knights came upon the encampment, rescued the elf-maids and routed the offending ogres. As they walked through the keep, several other people including many knights followed, all keen on hearing the details of his foreshortened journey.

“And her?” Korinne asked when Soth was done with his story, nodding her head in the direction of the healer’s chambers.

“Who? Isolde?” said Soth.

Korinne inhaled a slight gasp at her husband’s mention of the elf-maid’s name. There was something too familiar, too personal about it. “Yes,” she said. “Isolde.”

“I found her face down on the ground. She’d been savaged by an ogre, or at least the attempt had been made. According to her account of what happened, she put up a respectable fight. And her wounds bear her out.”

Korinne suddenly felt foolish for doubting her husband’s intentions. Although the elf-maid was quite beautiful and she was instinctively jealous of her youthful appearance—what human woman wouldn’t be?—Korinne concluded that her husband had acted as any Knight of Solamnia would have in accordance to the rules of conduct set forth within the Oath and the Measure. It was in his power to help the elf, so he did so. There was nothing more to it than that. “The poor creature,” she said at last, her voice edged with pity.

“Indeed,” answered Soth.

For some reason, the word sent a chill down Korinne’s spine.