She didn’t know. According to women of the village, marriage wasn’t any better than slavery. It reminded her that she had to hurry and get to Eleanor’s home to give Walter his morning dose of herbs.
Joan, Walter and Bertram had all been given different herbs. She wished she’d given Joan Bertram’s blend first, for Richard had told her that Bertram seemed to be improving a little more each day.
A rooster crowed.
She sat up and stretched then quietly left the bed. She washed and dressed without making a sound. She wore a pale blue kirtle with long sleeves and full skirts over a white chemise. She slipped her feet into her boots and crept down the stairs. She didn’t know if Elias or Simon was still asleep but she tiptoed past their shadowy blankets so as not to make too much noise.
She prepared her mixture for Walter and left the house, thinking about how the silver shards in Elias’ eyes glistened like stars across the midnight sky. The way his dark hair fell over his forehead in thick, dark locks that he often dragged his fingers through.She didn’t want to think about those things, but she couldn’t stop. Besides, it helped keep her mind off the pestilence.
She found herself smiling on her way out the front door, thinking about sitting in her garden, listening to the birds’ delightful calls to one another before the night fell…and the men’s voices around her like a favored blanket on a cold night. For a little while, she had forgotten the cruel world she lived in and laughed instead, as if she hadn’t a care in the—
“Morning, my lady,” Elias said, about to cross her path with a pile of wood under each arm.
Lord, help her, she thought, unable to take her eyes off his handsome, chiseled face. “Sir, were you chopping wood?” Truly? Was that obvious fact truly what she just asked him? “I did not hear your axe.” There.
He gave her an indulgent half-smile that made his eyes appear bluer, his gaze, softer. “I went ootside the village. I didna want to wake everyone.”
“Aye,” she barely breathed out. “That was very considerate of you.”
He shrugged one shoulder and his bundle of wood scraped together.
“That must be heavy.” She did her best to sound and look unaffected by his presence. “You should be going.”
“’Tis not so heavy,” he quickly corrected, and lifted his knee to support the pile for a moment. “Are ye off to see Walter?”
She nodded, wishing everything was normal here. “Aye. I will see you after—when we attend to Joan.”
She stepped around him and closed her eyes, trying to keep her emotions inside. She had to be strong. This was likely going to get worse. She took a deep breath and found the strength to keep walking.
She refused to think of him as he hurried toward the house and she climbed the hill and reached the church. But she failed and thought about nothing but him for the next few minutes.
“I thought it best if I accompanied ye.”
She turned to Elias, his arms empty, and knew she was in trouble by the way her heart thrashed wildly in her chest. “Why is that? Will you protect me from the sickness, Elias?”
He nodded, his expression, serious. “If I can.”
The mad thing about it was that she believed he would, if there was any way he could. She smiled at him. “Walk with me then. ‘Twill give me a chance to thank you for last eve.”
“I need no thanks, my lady,” he said, keeping pace with her.
“It made me forget.”
“’Tis what I wished,” he said with a smile.
It was what he wished. Why? Why was he so concerned with her…and with Richard? “Where were you two years ago, sir?” she asked, pulling boldness from within.
“Hmm, let me think.” He was quiet for a few moments, giving her time to appreciate his size next to her. She barely reached his neck. He smelled like pine. She wanted to move closer, mayhap tilt her face to his neck and smell him.
“I was returnin’ home from Edinburgh.”
“Did you have a lover, a wife?” She swallowed, wishing there was a door on her mouth and she could bolt it.
“Nae,” he told her, making her want to smile again. “I have been fightin’ wars fer a long time. ‘Twould be selfish of me to drag someone else there with me.”
“You speak of your night terrors?”
“Aye, but they have subsided quite a bit.”