“What field?”
He jabbed a thumb toward the south. “There is an open field on the other side of the road that leads to the gatehouse,” he said. “We’ve held tournaments there in the past, so I’m assuming that is where these games will be held.”
“Then I will bathe and dress quickly.”
He bent over and kissed her. “Take your time, angel,” he said. “We shall wait for you.”
She put her hand behind his neck and pulled him down for another kiss. “I do not want to miss anything,” she insisted. “I will be ready within the hour, I promise.”
He smiled at her and touched her cheek affectionately before heading toward the door. Diara watched him, tall and strong and proud, her heart swelling with delirious joy at the sight of him. Her husband.HerRoi. No offense to Beckett, but she knew she’d married the right de Lohr.
Lifting the latch on the door, he paused and looked at her. “One more thing,” he said.
“What is it?”
He appeared thoughtful. “I do not believe that I have told you that I love you.”
Her lips broke out in the most amazing grin. “I do not believe I have told you that I love you, either.”
“I do, you know.”
“So do I.”
Flashing her a toothy smile, he winked at her and quit the chamber, leaving Diara floating about five feet off the bed in euphoric delight.
*
The first gamewas called, simply, “ball.”
The object was to take an inflated pig’s bladder from one end of the tournament field to the other and place it in a basket. There was a basket at either end and there were two teams, essentially just two groups of men, and each group was to protect their end and their basket from the other team, who would try to put their pig’s bladder in it.
It was chaos from the start.
Diara stood at the edge of the field with the other de Lohr ladies and Iris, watching Roi, his cousin Daniel, Curtis, knights Kyne and Adrius, Gallus and Maximus, and a few soldiers as they took their ball and tried to plow through the other group of men, which was comprised of Westley, Douglas, Mathis andPryce, Tiberius, a few guests, and a couple of soldiers. Roi wasn’t the tallest de Lohr brother, but he was more than likely the most powerful, because his team gave him the ball every time and he essentially plowed through the opposing group like a runaway bull, with men hanging off him trying to bring him down.
It was hilarious and thrilling to watch.
Adalia and Dorian were also watching the games, with Dorian holding Diara’s hand and Adalia essentially clinging to her grandmother. Mathis and Pryce were part of the opposition against Roi, and Adalia was particularly interested in watching that team but too shy to admit it.
Peter, Christopher, and his brother, David, were the field marshals for the game, calling for pause whenever Roi or someone else would go down. If a man dropped the ball and the other team picked it up, then that team would try to run it back the other direction. At one point, Roi was hit hard from the side by Westley, who lay on the field in agony next to Roi, who had only gone down to his knees. Westley’s head was killing him from a night of overindulgence, and when he hit Roi and caused him to falter, Roi dropped the ball and went after Westley, throwing him in a chokehold and rubbing his knuckles across the top of Westley’s aching head.
The crowd roared with laughter.
But the gesture caused Westley to jump on Roi’s back every time he ran with the bladder in an attempt to bring him down. Given that Westley was a large man, he was successful more than once, which only made Roi grab him in frustration. Several times, they started to brawl, but Christopher and David broke it up, sending them to opposite sides of the field until the bladder was in play again and Westley would try to jump on Roi.
And the situation would repeat itself.
Unfortunately for Westley, Curtis was onto him. Curtis and Roi, the eldest brothers, stuck to each other like glue, andCurtis took Westley down when he tried to jump on Roi again. That brought Douglas, who would back Westley, and the de Lohr brothers were throwing punches, tripping one another, launching themselves at each other, and more besides. Peter got into the act, naturally siding with Curtis and Roi because they were the older brothers, and the game deteriorated into a battle between the de Lohr brothers, so Christopher finally put a stop to it and declared Roi’s team the winners.
Westley didn’t take kindly to it.
Sweaty, dirty, and sporting a cut above his right eye, Roi joined Diara on the edge of the field. She gave him a hero’s welcome, hugging him and clapping, and the ladies around her joined in. Roi took a gallant bow, accepting a hug from Dorian, but Douglas and Westley crowded in and started to complain to Dustin, insisting that Roi had cheated. Diara and Roi stood together, shaking their heads at the annoying younger brothers.
“Are they always like this?” Diara asked.
Roi nodded firmly. “Always,” he said. “I was nine years of age when Douglas was born and nearly twelve when Westley was born, so they have always been the little brothers. Any little thing and they would go running to my mother to cry and complain, like they are doing now. Some things never change.”
Diara chuckled at the pair, who were trying very hard to convince Dustin that they were angels and that Roi was the devil himself. But watching them with their mother reminded Diara that her own parents were missing from the festivities, and she looked around, hoping she might have missed their arrival.
