Angelica tipped the corners of her lips upward with grace in her shimmering hazel eyes. “Maybe. But I know I’ve never felt a hint of what I see in your eyes now.” She stood from the table and dropped the breadcrumbs into the pig slop bucket beside the sink basin. I knew she was waiting for me to reply, but when I didn’t, she went on, “Horses and animals are all well and good, but they won’t keep you company at night. They won’t see you through the long winter. They won’t fill your house with joy. Why not find yourself a wife? I could find you a willing woman in no time,” she said with a wink, as if to say she might be willing herself.
Just hours ago, I’d have agreed with her that a wife was what I needed. But not anymore. I wanted only her. I knew I was too much of a brute to be with her, but that didn’t stop me from rubbing salt in my wound. “I want to ask you about someone I saw today in the village.”
Angelica narrowed her eyes at me. “Someone?”
“A girl.”
She nodded slowly and shrewdly. “Go on.”
How would I even begin to describe her? How the fuck was it even possible to reduce these impulses, these urges into ordinary words? “Raven-haired. Eyes like emeralds. Skin like cream. Cherry wine stained lips so full they…” I trailed off realizing I was about to slip into a description of things Angelica would understand, but need not be said.
“Sara,” Angelica said, laughing lightly. “She’s pretty. And good. I approve.”
It was a beautiful name and it suited her well. “Sara,” I repeated.
Angelica nodded. “Lives out by the old forge with her family. She’s like an angel among them, if you ask me. She’s far too good for their sort. They treat her like a charwoman, a servant. Never heard them say a good word about her. They don’t treat her right.”
I clenched my beer mug in my hand, so hard I damn near crushed it. The idea of her hurting was fucking unacceptable. “Do they hurt her?”
“It would seem their way. But more than anything, they don’t value her. And that’s its own terrible pain. Take it from me.”
My desire to protect Sara was an animal urge, a simple instinct—a stallion guarding his mare when she went into heat. “I saw her for the first time today,” I said, letting my eyes wander over to the window, looking out into the garden. “I was like a man possessed. An army couldn’t have stopped me from putting my hands on her, nor God himself. The only reason I didn’t touch her is...”
Angelica got the measure of me from across the table, eyeing me up and down. “Talk like that is enough to make a woman jealous. Oh, don’t look so torn, you know I’m only teasing. You and I are better as friends than lovers. So, you didn’t touch her because?”
“A girl like that and a man like me? Fucking impossible.”
“You might have a knack for animals, Bors. But I have a knack for people. You might be just what that girl needs. A man who’ll treat her the way a woman ought to be treated. Take her away from a joyless existence.”
The idea of having Sara made me fucking wild. I felt my heart and cock ache at the same damned time. Still though, it was insanity. “I’ve seen too much of the bad in this world. I’d break her. I’d ruin her,” I said, not entirely sure my body agreed that was a bad thing.
But Angelica poured me another mug of ale, without breaking my gaze, and said, “Storms come on sunny days. Night follows day. The light needs the dark.” She smiled enigmatically. “That’s the way of the world.”
“Maybe.” I considered her words deep down knowing poetry and reality had little in common.
I drew my ale from the mug, swallowed hard thinking maybe drinking would be my new charge. Staying sober without her would be too painful.
Just as I considered my new fate, there was a noise from outside. A sharp sound then a yelp and Angelica turned to me as I rose to my feet, my fighting instinct impossible to quell as I stomped out the door more in the mood for a fight than I’d been in as long as I could remember.
Sara
I peeked through the window of the whitewashed cottage and my worst fears were confirmed.
He was in Angelica’s house—the prostitute’s house. She was serving him food and beer, touching his arm. Oh no, no, no. I felt the clutch of my heart in my chest with a burning in my eyes that made no sense.
I knew little about the ways of men and women together, but I had seen animals breed on the farm often enough to have the basic idea. There could only be one reason he was in the whore’s house: to relieve his animal instincts. I felt a mixture of disgust and jealousy, all tangled up together.
I knew I shouldn’t be spying on him, but I couldn’t help myself. I carefully placed my market basket at my feet, gently setting it down so as not to upset the unsold eggs I carried.
Not for one second did I take my eyes off of Bors. Once, when I was a child, there had been a lunar eclipse and I found I couldn’t look away. For hours I stayed awake, until my eyes stung, watching and waiting, studying every curve of the moon, memorizing the stars. I did the same now as I looked at Bors.
He sat in the chair with his long legs spread wide, like he was too big and burly for ordinary furnishings. His scarred arms were immense, rippling and straining against the fabric of his shirt; the once white cloth pushed up to his elbows. His boots were enormous, the leather battered and worn. The veins in his forearms seemed to throb as I watched them. My eyes fell on his neck and throat, his Adam’s apple and the dark stubble along his jaw.
His dark hair long enough to tuck behind his ears yet not cover the collar of his shirt. Its waves called for my fingers and I dreamed of running my hands through the shiny silk telling him my secrets as he kissed my neck making me shiver.
Looking at him ignited something in me—something between my legs—as did my dream this very morning. As my breathing quickened and my cheeks grew warm, I felt another rush of wetness trickle from my sex and I resisted the intense desire to touch myself as I stared at him.
Suddenly I felt a hard, stinging smack on my bottom and I yelped even as my hands flew to my lips and I whirled around. Before I could make sense of what was happening, I was in the wiry arms of a vaguely familiar man.
He had the unfocused, moist eyes of a drunkard and he smelled like spoiled beer and unclean hair. I pulled my face away and planted my arms on his chest to push him off me. But he was too strong and too drunk to notice.
“If you’re thinking of working in Angelica’s profession, lass, you’ll need a reference,” he growled. “I’d like to take the first plunge in your pool.”
A wave of nausea came up from my stomach into my mouth, as much from the smell of his breath as the idea of him thinking even for one moment about my virginity. Still with one arm wrapped around me, he started digging in his pockets. I heard coins jingle and he chortled. “Won’t be able to raise my member for a while yet. But I’ll give you five farthings in advance and pay the rest once the deal is done.”
What a vile man. I found I wasn’t afraid of him as much as revolted by his presence and his assumptions. He was much bigger than me, but I knew from my experience of my father that drink made men slow and sloppy.