She blushed a bonny shade of pink. “I have been told I am foolish.”
“I have been told I am reckless.”
She slanted her gaze at him and then laughed with him.
They walked to the house with Lily smiling all the way. They stopped to greet Eleanor and her husband, Walter, the butcher. Eleanor and Walter had been at the meeting and invited Elias to their home for supper one night before he left.
For saving Richard, Walter promised him a thick, juicy cut of his finest beef, and Eleanor vowed to make him her delicious fig tarts.
“They like you, Lion Heart,” Lily said on a quiet voice as she and Elias finally reached the shop. She didn’t want things to be awkward between them. He wasn’t leaving. The Black Death might be on its way here. If she were going to die, she would prefer her last days not to be miserable.
“They love Richard,” he answered, knowing it was true.
She smiled at him as they stepped inside. “Aye, they do love Richard. As do I.”
“I’m glad he is a good husband to ye, Lily. What he did fer ye was valiant.”
Her smile remained. When they entered the kitchen, she bid him to sit at the table while she heated up the leftover stew over the fire. “You seem to be familiar with knightly, more courtly ways,” she asked. “Did you learn about them in France?”
“Nae. I learned them from my Uncle Torin,” he told her with a little light flickering behind his eyes. “He knows the stories of Arthur Pendragon and Avalon, and all sorts of other romantic tales.”
“Do you know any of them?”
He nodded when she looked over her shoulder at him. “I know many of them.”
“My father used to tell me stories of knights. Perhaps you will tell them to me sometime.”
He nodded again and looked a bit muddleheaded. She felt the same way and looked away…still smiling.
“I could teach ye to defend yerself.”
“Oh?”
“Aye. Ye dinna even need to know how to swing a blade. There are places on a man’s body where cuttin’ the muscles renders yer opponent almost completely helpless.”
“Like where you threw the knife at Bertram?” she asked, her interest piqued. She knew of one place on a man’s body to cause him injury, but that was all she knew.
Elias asked her to stand up so he could show her the most vulnerable places on any body.
“Try to aim between the limb and the body. Cuttin’ these muscles and vessels and whatever connects it all together will stop yer enemy instantly. Sometimes, ‘twill even kill him. Cut here.” He walked around her and bent down to touch his finger to the back of her ankle. “Yer opponent will go down and likely never stand on his legs again.”
Elias continued his explanations. “Here is where my knife landed in Bertram. Instantly, the use of his arm was lost.” From behind her, he held up her arm and poked his finger in the socket between her shoulder and her chest.
She giggled and stepped forward.
“We can practice some strikes later,” he suggested, smiling at her.
“Aye,” she said softly, smiling and liking how his hands felt near her.
Someone knocked on the front door, startling them both. It was Brother Simon.
“Did Richard send ye?” Elias asked him as they sat upon stools at the table.
“No, he did not send me. He does not know I came here. I have reason to believe he would be angry with me if he knew, for he wants the two of you to be alone.”
Lily laughed, but she felt a little ill. “Why on earth would you say such a thing?”
“Because, lass, he told me so.”