The Spine of the World - By R. A. Salvatore Page 0,50

an exasperated Feringal replied, waving his hand dismissively, and turning back to Meralda.

Steward Temigast stared at her frightened, white face for a long while, a look of sympathy upon his own. "My lord," he ventured calmly. "If you are, indeed, serious about marrying this woman, then you must treat her like a lady. The hour grows long," he announced. "The Ganderlay family will be expecting the return of their child. I will summon the carriage."

"Not yet," Lord Feringal replied immediately, before Temigast could even turn around. "Please," he said more quietly and calmly to Temigast, but mostly to Meralda. "A short while longer?"

Temigast looked to Meralda, who reluctantly nodded her assent. "I will return for you soon," Temigast said, and he went back into the castle.

"I'll have no more of your foolery," Meralda warned her eager suitor, taking confidence in his sheepish plea.

"It is difficult for me, Meralda," he tried sincerely to explain. "More than you can understand. I think about you day and night. I grow impatient for the day when we shall be wed, the day when you shall give yourself to me fully."

Meralda had no reply, but she had to work hard to keep any expression of anger from appearing on her fair face. She thought of her mother then, remembered a conversation she had overheard between her father and a woman friend of the family, when the woman bemoaned that Biaste likely would not live out the winter if they could find no better shelter or no cleric or skilled healer to tend her.

"I'll not wait long, I assure you," Lord Feringal went on. "I will tell Priscilla to make the arrangements this very night."

"I haven't even said I would marry you," Meralda squealed a weak protest.

"But you will marry me, of course," Feringal said confidently. "All the village will be in attendance, a faire that will stay in hearts and memories for all the lives of all who witness it. On that day, Meralda, it will be you whom they rejoice in most of all," he said, coming over and taking her hand again, but gently and respectfully this time. "Years-no, decades-from now, the village women will still remark on the beauty of Lord Feringal's bride."

Meralda couldn't, deny she was touched by the man's sincerity and somewhat thrilled by the prospect of having as great a day as Feringal spoke of, a wedding that would be the talk of Auckney for years and years to come. What woman would not desire such a thing?

Yet, Meralda also could not deny that while the glorious wedding was appealing, her heart longed for another. She was beginning to notice another side of Lord Feringal now, a decent and caring nature, perhaps, buried beneath the trappings of his sheltered upbringing. Despite that, Meralda could not forget, even for one moment, that Lord Feringal, simply was not her Jaka.

Steward Temigast returned and announced that the coach was ready, and Meralda went straight to him, but she was still not quick enough to dodge the young man's last attempt to steal a kiss.

It hardly mattered. Meralda was beginning to see things clearly now, and she understood her responsibility to her family and would put that responsibility above all else. Still, it was a long and miserable ride across the bridge and down the road, the young woman's head swirling with so many conflicting thoughts and emotions.

Once again she bade the gnomish driver to let her out some distance from her home. Pulling off the uncomfortable shoes Temigast had sent along with the dress, Meralda walked barefoot down the lane under the moon. Too confused by the events-to think that she was to be married!-Meralda was barely conscious of her surroundings and wasn't even hoping, as she had after her first meeting, that Jaka would find her on the road. She was taken completely by surprise when the young man appeared before her.

"What did he do to you?" Jaka asked before Meralda could even say his name.

"Do?" she echoed.

"What did you do?" Jaka demanded. "You were there for a long time."

"We walked in the garden," the woman answered.

"Just walked?" Jaka's voice took on a frightful edge at that moment, one that set Meralda back on her heels.

"What're you thinking?" she dared ask.

Jaka gave a great sigh and spun away. "I am not thinking, and that is the problem," he wailed. "What enchantment have you cast upon me, Meralda? Oh, the bewitching! I know miserable Feringal must feel the same," he added, spinning