An even louder explosion of thunder nearly knocked her to the ground, making up Norah’s mind for her. Surely, the dungeon would be safer than this. As soon as she was steady on her feet, she hurried past him onto the castle grounds.
Chapter 5
Truth
Norah couldn’t see the man’s face beneath the shadow of his hat, but as he was wearing the colors of the royal guard, she decided to let him simply lead her where he would. The storm was now too loud for any spoken words to be heard without shouting, so trying to tell him who she was wouldn’t do her any good, anyway.
Tiny drops of frozen water began to pelt them along with the rain. Norah put her hands over her head, but without breaking his stride, the man pulled his cloak off and flung it over her shoulders. It was expertly done, and so smooth that Norah might have suspected it was practiced, had she not been so desperate to get out of the storm. So she simply put the hood on and held it in place tightly, grateful for the gesture.
They ran through what appeared to be a large garden that had already been battered by the storm, and she had to do her best not to cry out each time she stepped on a rock with her bare feet. The guard, however, seemed to sense Norah’s struggle, despite her biting her tongue, and he put an arm around her and pulled her even faster toward the palace that loomed before them.
A moment later, they broke out of the garden and into amassive courtyard. In the brief flashes of lightning, she could make out certain features, such as white fountains, pools of water, benches, and pergolas. She didn’t have time to see more, though, because one of the palace’s many large glass doors facing the courtyard swung open. The guard shoved her inside before leaping through himself, the door slamming shut behind them just as a blinding flash of lightning struck a tree nearby, its crack echoing along with the sound of breaking branches crashing to the ground.
Finally allowed to pause, Norah looked around. They were in a large hall full of white rugs and furniture, all contained within tall, white walls. The floor, which she was now dripping muddy puddles on, was a shiny white stone. If she was aware of her shabby, disheveled state before, she was most definitely so now.
Guiltily, she began to pull the cloak off to return it to the man, but before she finished, she realized with a sudden panic that her headband, which Nanny had forbidden her toeverremove in public, was now askew on her head. So she just pulled the cloak closer, hoping the man would simply believe her to be cold.
“If you’re looking for Lady Freya, she and Sir Oliver are in her parlor,” a voice said.
Norah turned to find a servant bowing his head to her companion as though answering a question she hadn’t heard asked.
The only light in the room was coming from an open door at the opposite end of the room, which meant Norah still couldn’t see her companion well. But her rescuer simply nodded and held his arm out to her as though she were a fine lady and not a muddy, sopping mess.
If Norah was going to be technical, the gesturewasfitting of her rank. But he had no way of knowing that, unless he’d miraculously heard her near-crazed shouts at the gate. So, she simply accepted his arm gratefully with her left arm while keeping the now-soaked cloak pulled tightly over her head with herright.
He led her out of the large hall and into a smaller hallway, one with the same shiny stone floor and white walls. The doors they passed were also white, and there were large glass windows everywhere, so many that it seemed the architect must have put a window everywhere that the building would support it. Norah had never seen any building so pristine, which only served to make her sorry state even more mortifying.
“I’m sorry for the mess,” she finally said when she could no longer bear the awkward silence.
Her companion glanced down at her bare, muddy feet and dripping gown, but only gave her a friendly smile before nodding once in the direction they were already going.
Now that she could actually see, thanks to the lit sconces on the white walls, Norah realized that her rescuer was probably about her age, or maybe just a little older. He was clean-shaven with straight golden shoulder-length hair pulled back at the nape of his neck, and his eyes were a deep brown.
Brown eyes that were unabashedly studying hers.
She looked away, embarrassed to have been caught staring–even if he had been staring, too.I would be staring at me, too,she thought. Who wouldn’t stare at a woman running around in the indecency of her nightdress, barefoot, soaked from head to toe, and claiming she was a princess?
Oh yes, Norah would have stared all right, and she would have wondered what woman in her right mind would be seen flaunting such indecency in public.
But he didn’t chastise her or even wrinkle his brow. He only smiled that same polite smile as he opened a door at the end of the hall and gestured for her to walk through it.
As soon as she did, Norah found herself standing in a warm parlour. Thick rugs carpeted the floor, and a hearty fire burned in the hearth. The wall at the end of the room had a large window in it, but all the other walls were covered in book-lined shelves. Near the fire sat a sofa and two cushioned seats. On theplump furniture lounged a well-dressed man and an equally graceful lady, each engrossed in their own books.
At the sound of their entry, however, the man and woman put their books down, and for a long moment, they could only seem to stare.
“Phil!” the woman finally exclaimed, shaking her head as she bolted to her feet. “Were you… Were you out in the storm?” As if to punctuate her question, another clap of thunder shook the building. Norah jumped, but the man–Phil, apparently–only took Norah’s dripping borrowed cloak from her and hung it on a peg on the wall–leaving Norah in nothing but her thoroughly soaked nightdress for everyone in the room to see.
To her relief, however, he didn’t leave her that way. Without answering the woman, he calmly proceeded to lift a thick blanket off the back of the empty chair and then draped it over Norah’s shoulders.
“I think,” the second man said with the strangest hint of a smile, “that we can safely assume he has been out in the storm.”
But the woman was far from satisfied with this answer. She went over to Phil, standing close enough that Norah could see a striking resemblance between the two, although it was clear that she was several years his senior.
“What if you had been struck by lightning?” the lady protested as he pulled off his coat and hung it beside the cloak on the peg. “What if you had slipped and hit your head, and–”
“Frey,” the man said softly. “He’s a grown man. Clearly, he didnothit his head or get struck by lightning.” He stood and gave Norah a gentleman’s bow, not low enough to acknowledge her as someone of his rank, but polite enough to acknowledge that he was standing in the presence of a lady.
A very wet, very bedraggled lady.
