Never Kiss A Stranger (4 page)

The fabled Foxe Ring was no magic place, after all. Yet another thing Sybilla had been right about. Alys had been in the very center of the frigid circle for ages it seemed, the moon lighting her like a beacon, and the only visitor she’d received was some sort of nocturnal animal scurrying out of sight in the ruined keep’s interior.

It seemed everyone in the land had either tried the Foxe Ring, or knew someone who’d used it, as a last desperate act to find love, and all the stories had told of its wise success. Men and women, brought together alone within the circle of standing stones upon a full moon were fated for a lifetime of love together. So respected was the belief that many couples who met in the Foxe Ring never even bothered with an official ceremony. They entered the ring alone, but they departed a couple, for the rest of their lives and even into eternity, if the tales were to be believed fully. The ring had brought her own mother and father together, and so Alys did believe, God help her foolish, girlish heart.

But for Alys, it was a failure. Or perhaps ‘twas she who had failed. Perhaps the stones felt her unworthy of a magical, forever union. Or perhaps Clement Cobb and old Lord John Hart were simply the only two remaining eligible men in the whole of England. Any matter, Alys couldn’t so much as slink back to Fallstowe to crawl into her own bed at this hour—she’d be forced to beat at the gates for someone to admit her, and her pride could not tolerate another stiff blow this night. Better to sneak back
in with the sun, and simply avoid meeting with her future husband for as long as Sybilla would allow.

“Alys Cobb, Lady of Blodshire,” she said aloud, and then pretended a retching sound. “Horrid.”

Alys reached for her sack with one hand and plumped the contents. Then she lay down on her side once more, snuggling Layla into her midsection and cushioning the monkey with her arms. She pulled her cloak around them both, flicked up her hood with one finger, and then rubbed her face against Layla’s soft hair. Her nose was numb. She closed her eyes lest they begin to leak once more.

There was a girl sleeping inside the ruin.

A golden haired girl, lit up with moonlight until it seemed to Piers that she glowed. Asleep on a cold slab of rock as if it was her royal fairy bed, her hood shielding all but a sliver of her creamy face and a single, thick lock of yellow hair trapped beneath her cheekbone.

He closed his eyes tightly, took a deep breath, and then looked again.

He blew out his breath in a weak huff. She was still there.

Piers’s eyes narrowed and he quickly looked around the standing stones and over both shoulders, even spinning around to take on any would-be attackers. He had gained enough experience in brawling for coin that his instincts for ambush were sharper than most men’s. Piers knew there was almost no level too low for an opponent to sink to when a heavy purse was the wager.

But no, he was alone, standing just outside the ring, looking at the enchanting golden girl asleep on the stone slab.

Perhaps the final blow from Bevan had rattled Piers’s brains irreversibly—by all that was holy, his head still hurt like the very devil, the healing wounds itching on his butchered scalp. There could be little other explanation for the girl’s presence save madness. Certainly she wasn’t a fairy—there couldn’t be fucking fairies on Fallstowe lands. That was absurd. And he couldn’t see any wings, any matter.

Piers recognized that he was debating the existence of a mythical woman-creature in an unlikely area of England, as if there were other regions more hospitable for the fey. This disturbed him enough so that he squared his shoulders and stepped into the ring fully, determined to either discover the woman’s origin, or jump entirely over the farthest edge of insanity.

The atmosphere within the standing stones seemed oddly thick, and Piers didn’t think it was his imagination. Warmer here, too, although the fallen and standing stones—most two yards wide and twice that tall—were no shelter from the now burst open, sparkling sky. Piers hadn’t noticed the clouds disappearing, but now the moonlight seemed to rival the very sun in its brightness. He reached up to the cowled neck of his borrowed monk’s robe and pulled it away from his skin. He was starting to sweat.

“Ho there,” he called out, dismayed at the timid whisper that barely stirred the air in front of his face.

Her arms, crossed in front of her bosom and covered by her cloak, shifted.

Piers moved slowly to the stone slab, until he stood over the woman. She seemed very small to Piers. Curled on her side, the toes of her dainty slippers peeked out from beneath the hem of her fur-lined cloak, and he fancied he could scoop her up from the slab with one swipe
of his arm. The tips of her profile—browbone, nose, lips, chin—seemed like polished ivory in the moonlight, and her dark lashes rested on her cheeks like the smallest black under feathers of a tiny bird. He shrugged out of his pack and let it slide soundlessly to the ground.

“Hello?” he called again, and this time, he reached out one hand. He intended to pull back her hood and experience her full beauty—imagined or nay—at once.

A blur of movement stopped his heart, and before he could jerk his arm away, the first two fingers of Piers’s left hand were laid open by very small, very sharp teeth.

As he roared and began to fight off the thing that was attacking him, Piers no longer thought he was insane.

But he did think it somewhat ironic that he was wearing monk’s clothing while in a battle with the devil.

Alys came fully awake at the shout that seemed like thunder in the heretofore stillness of the Foxe Ring. Layla had clawed from her embrace and Alys could no longer feel her small warmth, although she could most certainly hear the monkey’s wild shrieks. She sprung upright on the slab.

Someone was trying to abduct the monkey she had rightfully stolen!

“Layla!” she cried, and then immediately scrambled down from the stone to launch herself at the dark, hooded mass of a creature that was presently trying to flog Layla with a forearm. “Let her go, you beast!”

“Get it off me!” the hooded figure boomed. “It’s biting my fucking fingers off!”

“Stop hitting her!
Let go!
”

“I’m not holding it!
”

“Layla!
Ow!
That was
me,
you bastard!”

At last Alys managed to work an arm between the monkey and the hooded man, and wrench Layla away from the cloaked villain. She marveled at the amount of effort it took to remove such a relatively small animal.

“My goodness, Layla,” Alys gasped, bending over at the waist to brace her hands on her knees now that Layla had taken up watch from her shoulder once more to chatter angrily at the man. “You’re a strong girl, aren’t you?”

“Son of a
bitch!”
the man hissed, grasping his left wrist tightly in his right hand. His cloaked head came up, and although Alys could not see his face clearly in the shadows of his hood, she could imagine his ugly, furious countenance. “I’ll have that beast’s hide!”

Alys straightened and knew a moment of unease. He was a large man, and obviously quite angry at the injuries Layla had visited upon him. There was no one around the old ruin as far as the eye could see. Who knew what he was capable of? Although he was dressed in the garb of a pious man, his vulgar language quickly gave truth to the fact that he was almost certainly common. Cecily would faint into a puddle at the very thought of the phrases issuing from such holy vestments.

“She was only protecting me,” Alys said, lifting her chin and striving for an air of superiority. “What business have you sneaking up upon a woman whilst she sleeps and molesting her?”

“Moles—” the man broke off. “Just what is a young girl doing about a desolate ruin in the dead of night with only a monkey for protection?”

His summation of her as a young girl stung Alys’s already battered pride so that her courage experienced a rebirth. “That is absolutely none of your affair. Besides, this is Fallstowe land, and as I am none other than Lady
Alys Foxe, I go where I please. ‘Tis
you
who are the trespasser. Layla has gifted you with but a sampling of the punishment you shall receive once my sisters hear of your assault.”

The hooded figure snickered. “Oh, so I am to fear your
sisters
now, am I?” His mirth grew into a round laugh. He looked down at his injured fingers and flung blood away. “I cow to no
lady
.” He said the word as if it were a foul thing.

Alys frowned at being laughed at. “You very obviously have never met Sybilla, then. She is completely vicious, I assure you.”

“I have heard of Sybilla Foxe,” the man acquiesced. “And I am most familiar with vicious women. But I can assure
you
that I have already met the worst of the lot, so forgive me if I do not quake and tremble.” He paused. “What are you doing out here alone? ‘Tis unsafe for a girl, even if on your own lands. After all, I came upon you, and there would be no help for you should I have wicked intentions. A monkey is only so much against a blade and a quick hand.”

“Well, she’s already taken care of one of your quick hands. And I am not a girl. I’m ten and eight.”

“Oh, well then, my apologies, matron.” His hood turned slightly as if he looked at the stone slab. “I see you have your bags packed. Running away from vicious Sybilla, were you?”

Alys felt her face heat in the cool moonlight. Observed by an outsider, her actions did seem that of a young girl rather than a grown woman. But he simply didn’t know how desperate she had been to leave Fallstowe for the Foxe Ring. And now Sybilla was going to see her married to
Clement Cobb
because the old legend had turned out to be nothing more than—

“Oh, my God,” Alys breathed, realizing that her impossible wish had come true and she hadn’t even noticed it, so busy had she been arguing with the man. “Take down your hood.”

The cloaked figure drew back slightly. “Why?”

“Because”—Alys licked her cold, numb lips—“because I want to see your face.” Her heart pounded and she forced a nervous laugh. “You’ve seen mine after all. And I’ve only just realized what is happening.”

“I don’t see what that has to do with anything, but I’d rather not. I’m not very pretty of late.”

“Please,” Alys breathed. “We are in the Foxe Ring, at the full moon. We will both remember this moment for the rest of our lives.”

He stood silent for a moment, as if unsure. The silly man—he was shy! How perfect!

He tried to back away at the last moment, but Alys took him by surprise when her arm shot out and shoved back his hood. He cried out indignantly.

The moonlight hit his face and Alys gasped. He looked like he had been very recently run over with a cart. His skin was pale around fading bruises ringing bloodshot eyes, a cut over one eyebrow healing, but still scabbed and red. His lips had been split by a heavy blow, their scars visible even within the tangle of uneven beard. His hair was of a darker shade, although in the night it was hard to tell the exact hue, but the cut of it was in no recognizable fashion: long in spots, hanging down to his shoulders, and missing in other patches, as if hacked off in great chunks.

He looked quite mad, Alys had to admit, and more than a little unkempt. Perhaps he was even a bandit, wearing monk’s clothing as his disguise. But she quickly dismissed these trivialities. After all, a mad, disheveled
outlaw was better than Clement Cobb. And now Sybilla would be forced to keep her word.

“What happened to you?” Alys asked, trying to pull her mouth out of the grimace she knew had to be apparent.

“Whatever do you mean?” the man replied with a snide lift of his mouth.

To her own surprise, Alys giggled. And the man’s sneer faded into something akin to a grin. Still perched on Alys’s shoulder, Layla clapped her hands. The Foxe Ring at last felt like the magical place it was rumored to be.

“You didn’t tell me your name,” Alys pointed out.

“Didn’t I?” the man taunted. Then he paused, looking at her contemplatively for a moment. “Piers, and that’s all you need know. I was going to shelter here for the night, but as it is obviously already occupied …” He shrugged, bent to pick up the pack at his feet and then nodded his head toward her courteously. “I would not risk us being found together. ‘Twould ruin you and possibly put me in great danger.”

Alys was intrigued. “Danger? Are you fleeing from someone?”

“More like fleeing
to
someone.” He shrugged into the pack. “Good luck with your sister, Lady Alys.” He only glared at Layla and then turned as if to leave.

“Wait!” Alys called, reaching out her hand and taking a step toward him. “Uh … Piers! Where are you going?”

“Not your concern,” he said over his shoulder.

“It is my concern. You can’t go without me.”

Now he turned toward her once more. “I can’t go without you?”

“Of course not,” Alys scoffed. “It’s fate!”

“Fate,” he repeated flatly.

Alys rolled her eyes and sighed. “We’re in the Foxe Ring. At a full moon …?”

“And …?”

She growled in frustration. ‘Twas as if he didn’t know the legend of the ruin! Or he was being deliberately obtuse. Perhaps he thought she was the one who was unlearned of the old tales.
“And,
you can’t just leave me here now!”

“Why the bloody hell not?”

Alys beamed at him, happy to speak the miracle aloud. “Because, silly—we’re
married.”

Piers shook his head as if perhaps the motion might clear it, for surely the girl had not just said that they were married.

Had she?

He squinted and leaned toward her slightly, pointing to his ear. “My apologies, but could you say again? I’ve just recently taken a sharp blow to the head. Several blows, actually.”

The little golden-haired thing leaned in, giggling, her monkey sitting surely on her shoulder.
“We’re married.
You know”—she spread her arms and looked around the circle of stones briefly—“here in the Foxe Ring.”

Piers stood upright once more, completely perplexed. “As I understood the situation, you were cross with me for trespassing on your family’s lands and nearly getting my fingers bitten off by your ridiculous animal.”