Both men’s eyes were on Maddie.
The sun was shining and they had stopped riding to take lunch. They were two days’ journey from the port city in Hawkvale where they’d board the ship to Lunwyn. The other men were inspecting the steeds in preparation to ride on. The men’s belongings being few (save weapons, which they carried on their persons), Maddie’s much more abundant belongings were separated amongst the saddlebags of their nine horses.
They should have taken a carriage but Apollo instructed they not. A carriage was much slower going. It would delay their return by some time.
In the end, however, their return had been delayed by a lot longer than a carriage would have done it. And Achilles had no doubt that Apollo’s wish for them to arrive at Karsvall without delay going unheeded would not make his cousin happy.
Achilles wasn’t thinking about this.
He was thinking about what Maddie had just told them, the sun and wine at lunch perhaps loosening her tongue.
However, it was more likely that she had just become comfortable enough with them to share. It was impossible on a long ride such as theirs not to bond with those around you, spending day in and day out with them. And they’d had quite a number of days together, and adventures.
But with Maddie, the way she was, the sadness constantly lurking in her eyes, the joy she allowed to show openly coating it, it was impossible not to bond.
There was something about her which made a man wish to watch over her. There was something else about her that made a man wish to get to know her, prod under a veneer Achilles was certain she thought was a shield, but didn’t understand it was flimsy. It made a man wish to dig dipper and discover what lay beneath.
And she’d just gifted them with some of what lay beneath. Her story of how she got there, running from her husband and why, being found, beaten and Apollo and the witch with the green magic from the other world saving her.
That was the end of her story.
But what she’d shared was enough.
Achilles tore his gaze away from Maddie, feeling his mouth tight, and looked at Derrik. With one glance, he knew Derrik was feeling what he was feeling.
Maybe more.
He turned back to Maddie. “You’re here now, little bug, safe from that.”
She lifted her lovely brown eyes to him, eyes he’d looked in a million times before he’d even met her. Yet not.
And looking in them now, he knew definitely not.
It had been jarring at first, Maddie looking like Ilsa, but they got used to it. And then the Ilsa they saw in Maddie had faded away and it was just her.
Now, after that story, it was only her.
“I know,” she whispered.
She said I know.
She meant, Thank you.
He grinned at her, pushed away from the tree and bent close to kiss the side of her head.
When he pulled away, she tipped her head and grinned back.
“Thank you for trusting that to us,” he said gently.
“Thank you for being trustworthy enough to get it,” she replied.
He winked.
Her eyes twinkled.
“If you lazy cusses are done being lazy, we need to be away,” Remi called from his horse thirty feet away.
Achilles pushed up to gain his feet and when he did, Derrik was there, offering Maddie his hand.