Tempest Heart - Paula Quinn Page 0,6
touch hers. “What d’ye mean what kind of word is dinna?” he asked, not too much farther away. “’Tis dinna.”
A faint smile curled her dry, cracked lips. “I have never heard it before.”
Now it was his turn to stare at her. “Ye never heard a Highlander speak?”
She shook her head and then turned away from him and coughed. “I’m cold.”
He pulled her closer to his body and then adjusted her hood over her head. A stray strand of her chestnut-looking hair fell over her eye. He left it there but it called his attention even after she slept, until finally, using the underside of his index finger, he brushed it away.
He kept his eyes on the road ahead and not on her as they traveled. Most of the time. He was glad she slept for much of the day. She weighed little. He wondered who she’d lost to the Black Death already. A husband? She didn’t look poor with her soft woolen mantle and wooden shoes. He thought about their quick conversation earlier. How had she never heard a Highlander speak? Highlanders traveled through the Lowlands all the time.
A strong gust of wind blew his plaid and her skirts up over her knees, over her hose. He saw her burned, wrinkled flesh creeping up her thigh. How much of her did it cover? Hell! She’d already been in a fire. He was happy he stopped her from going through it again, but he had to find a place for her. He couldn’t keep her with him. He had men to kill.
He stopped to eat and sleep four miles north of the next town. He didn’t enter the town to look for an inn. He wouldn’t infect everyone—that is, if they weren’t already infected. Having one dying person around him while he tried to enjoy his supper was going to be bad enough. An entire town would be too unpleasant.
He looked down at the lass again while he carried her off his horse and set her gently in the grass beneath a tree. She woke up while he was setting her down, still wrapped in his plaid. Was she dying? She didn’t appear any worse—or any better.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
He didn’t know what to say so he remained quiet beneath his mask. He’d never saved a life before. Had he saved her life? “How do you feel?”
“Not good, I’m afraid.”
He nodded. She would likely be gone by morning. He would bury her and then continue on his way.
“Still…’tis better than the fire.”
“How did ye get burned on yer legs?” he asked, sitting down next to her beneath the tree. He pulled down his mask and took some wrapped up dried, salted meat, bread, and an apple from his bag and began to eat.
“How do you know of my scars?” Her voice was a low, shallow whisper. From it, Tristan discerned that she was a Scot, bred well, and very weak.
“The wind blew yer skirts up.”
She scowled at him as if she didn’t believe him.
He took insult and scowled even harder. “I dinna grope dy—sickly lasses.”
“Forgive me,” she said and let her gaze drift to his apple. “Far be it from me to insult the man who saved me from the fire.”
He popped a piece of bread into his mouth then narrowed his eyes on her. Was he supposed to feed her? “Hungry?”
“No. But the apple would be refreshing on my tongue.”
He pulled out a knife from his belt and cut the apple in half. Juice flowed down the sides. She watched it. He held a half to her.
She turned a little green. “I would not waste it.”
He sliced a parchment-thin slice and held it to her on the tip of the knife.
“Ye dinna have to chew it. Just suck on it.”
She looked down at her arms tucked tightly in his plaid.
His gaze fell to her long lashes shadowing her cheeks. “Right. Sorry.” He scowled at himself when he realized she couldn’t feed herself. He pulled the thin slice off the knife and held it to her mouth.
“Are you not afraid of the sickness?” she asked him before she opened her mouth to him.
He shook his head and moved a little closer to her. “This sickness knows better than to come against me.”
When he didn’t smile, she did, though it was slight. “You say that as if you believe it.”
“I do.”
“Are you mad?”
He pushed the slice against her lips and waited while she opened them to receive the apple. “Are we not