Lion's Bride Read Free Page A

talk about it.”
    “How cruel of me. Of course you don’t.”
    She quickly changed the subject. “And what of you? You said your father was a Frank. Have you lived here long?”
    “All my life. I grew up on the streets of Damascus. Have a little more water. Slowly.”
    She sipped from the water skin. “Yet you serve this Scot.”
    “I serve myself. We travel together.” He smiled. “He belongs to me. It’s rather like owning a tiger, but it has interesting moments.”
    She frowned in bewilderment. “Belongs to—”
    “Shh.” He suddenly tilted his head, listening. “Ah, do you hear? He’s coming.”
    She stiffened. She didn’t hear the hoofbeats, but she could feel them vibrating on the ground. “Who’s coming?”
    “Ware.” He chuckled. “I warn you, he’ll be very annoyed. He doesn’t like being thwarted.” His smile faded as he saw her expression. “You’re frightened.”
    “I’m not frightened.” She was lying. She could still see that looming giant before her. Cold. Fierce. Brutal.
    “He won’t hurt you,” Kadar said gently. “He’s only half beast. The other half is very human. Why else would he be coming back for us?”
    “I have no idea.” Shivering, she rose shakily to her feet. She did not want to confront this Ware, whom Kadar claimed was half human. She had seen too many beasts of late. “And I don’t want to stay here.” She slung the straps of her basket over her shoulders. “Will you give me water for my journey?”
    “It’s forty miles to the nearest village. You’re exhausted and weak. You would not survive.”
    The horses were coming nearer. The man on the first horse loomed large and menacing. “Give me the water skin and I’ll survive.”
    “I cannot do that.”
    “Then I’ll survive without it.” She had eaten and drunk deeply and still had a few swallows of water in her water skin. She had traveled far more than forty miles since the caravan had been attacked, and she could go another forty. She whirled and started to walk away.
    “No,” he said with great gentleness. He was suddenly beside her, grasping her arm. “I cannot let you go. I would worry about you.”
    She tried to shake off his grasp but couldn’t. Desperate, she began to pull at his fingers. “You have no right—”
    The riders were suddenly upon them, and she froze.
    Kadar stroked her arm as if she were a nervous puppy. “All is well. No one will harm you.”
    She barely heard him, her gaze fixed on the man who had reined in before them.
    “He is only half beast.”
    Mounted on the huge horse, looking like a centaur, dark and forbidding, he cast a giant shadow on the ground before him…and on her. She had the panicky feeling that if she did not move out of that shadow, she would be held captive forever.
    He did not look at her, but at Kadar. “Bring her.” His tone was crisp and stinging as the lash of a whip. “And if you don’t want me to turn your horse loose and make you walk, you’ll wipe that smile from your face.”
    “It’s a welcoming smile. I’m always glad to see you.” He released Thea and moved toward his horse. “Dundragon?”
    “Bring her, damn you.”
    He was angry. Kadar had said he was filled with anger; nothing could be clearer or more intimidating in this moment.
    Kadar did not seem to be affected as he mounted his horse. “My horse will not bear her weight. You will have to take her.”
    She could feel the displeasure Lord Ware emitted as if it were a tidal wave. “Kadar.”
    “Well, she’s a trifle unwilling. I’m not sure I could subdue her if she struggled.”
    Ware’s icy glance shifted back to Thea. “She does not appear unwilling. I’ve never seen a more spiritless or bedraggled maid.”
    She stared at him in disbelief. Spiritless. Bedraggled. What did he expect, with all the suffering and horror she had undergone. This condemnation was the spark that exploded her rage. “I’m sure you prefer women without spirit, as do all