Lady Thief - By Rizzo Rosko Page 0,95

from her hair and face, but his efforts were constantly stalled as he could only picture her as she was now. Still, even dressed as a filthy serf, she was beautiful.

She looked at him, one dark eyebrow raised, a sardonic smile touching her full lips. "My apologies, milord, but as you are wearing nothing at all beneath my blanket I foolishly assumed that 'twould not be necessary."

Blaise grumbled at her biting reply, eager to get into a pair of leggings, boots, and tunic instead of walking around with the cold breeze tickling his shrivelling manhood.

He needed to take his mind away from the chill that assaulted him. "Where did you come about a fine gown such as that? Considering your situation and all, my lady, I find it unlikely you had the money to have it made."

She glared at him. "'Twas a gift from my father to my mother, before she stole herself away like she did."

"Your mother kept the gown all this time? I thought she despised the man enough to run away?" Even had that not been the case, Blaise would have had trouble believing her simply because of the condition in which she lived.

"She did despise him, and was always seeking to make me despise him with her stories as well.”

She stopped and cleared her throat, as though only now aware of what she had said. “I believe she kept it for something to sell should we ever be in dire need. When I grew old enough, fearing she would soon sell it, I begged her to give it to me instead."

"Hmm," It seemed like a plausible explanation, but her story combined with her current situation and miraculous rescue of him, made him question her true motives, as he'd learned to question everyone's since Robert, a mere groom, used him to try and lift up his social status.

"There, 'tis where I found you."

Blaise pulled himself from his thoughts and stared at the spot where her delicate finger pointed. In the center of the road was a small pond of rainwater. A toad swam frantically inside while a pair of robins harassed it.

Curious as to how deep the puddle ran, Blaise bent down, picked up a fist sized rock, and tossed it in the water. The splash frightened away the birds and saved the toad, but the water was deep enough that when the rock went in he could no longer see it.

Blaise turned to stare at Elizabeth, who met his gaze with no smirk on her face or victory in her eyes. When she claimed to have saved him from drowning in, of all things, a puddle, he assumed she had been making the situation seem worse than it was to claim her reward for his rescue.

However, if this small lake in the middle of the road had been where he lay with his face pointed towards the earth, he no longer had any doubts that he, a grown man and knight, could be killed by it.

'Twas mortifying and surprising, and he thanked the Lord that being killed in such a weak manner had not been his Fate. To be remembered as a man who drowned in a puddle! 'Twas worse than death itself!

"'Twas not so deep when I found ye, but the rain did fall heavily. Had I left you there the water would have filled—”

"And I would have met my end. I see that now." Blaise turned his eyes away from the offending water to continue his walk.

Elizabeth followed at his heels, as he expected she would. "I shall introduce you to my family and explain how I came to know you." He stopped abruptly to glare at her. "I will tell my father the manner in which you saved my life, but no one else is to hear of it, understood?"

As if sensing the threat, she bobbed a minor curtsy. "Aye, milord."

***

Elizabeth could barely contain her excitement as Graystone came into view. A stone fortress of immense length and height that stood proudly on top of a small hill, with powerful cylindrical towers that bolstered its thick walls.

The image before her made Elizabeth feel small, her plan for a better life inside those battlemented barriers foolish. It also made her legs wish to run in the other direction now that she made it so far.

She forced herself to keep moving with Lord Blaise. The young lord she travelled with seemed to become more and more sour every step they took. She knew by his