Was he sick, to be healed?
Mayhap, but he doubted even she could heal him. As that voice soared and dipped, filling the quiet room, permeating it like rich, heady wine, Ivo wondered if he was alone in his abstraction, or whether every man and woman here felt the same. Her voice was drawing emotions from him that he had thought—hoped—forgotten. Love and happiness, sorrow and pain, inextricably mixed. Emotions, memories, he had long ago put aside. For how could a disgraced knight and a mercenary lay claim to such luxuries as feelings?
How could he dare?
Ivo gritted his teeth, forcing the rapid beating inside his chest to calm, forcing the heat in his blood to cool. Look again, he told himself. ‘Tis but a woman, singing. A small woman in a dark gown with her chestnut hair loose about her and her pale hands clasped in her lap. ‘Twas nothing amazing.
He realized, as he fought off the spell, that there was a harpist accompanying her. He stared at the instrument, as if that would help rebuild his barricades, and saw ‘twas one of the small harps used by the Welsh. The harp was being played by a girl with hair of a darker hue and a taller figure than the songstress, and her expression was utterly serious as she concentrated upon her notes. Despite their differences, the two looked similar enough to be sisters.
Aye, singing sisters, Ivo thought, with relief. No magic there! He had dreamed the sensation of that small hand inside his chest, squeezing his heart, of course he had. Perhaps something in her song had unconsciously reminded him of the past, enough to slice through his usually reliable protective walls.
It would not happen again.
But even as he made his vow, the woman’s voice soared one last time, and the poignancy of that single, pure note brought tears stinging to Ivo’s eyes. He blinked angrily, wondering why he, who should know better, could be so weak. A grown man toughened by battle and despair, a soldier who had not wept since he was a boy of eleven. How could this stranger so easily unlock his burdened heart with her key?
As if the songstress had read his thoughts, the woman’s gaze settled upon him once more. Her eyes were large and dark, and with very little effort he feared he could drown in them. And then she smiled—a small, secretive smile—and smoothed her plain gown over her hips with a slow, sensual movement.
Ivo’s hand closed hard on the tankard, so hard that he felt the metal ease beneath his strong fingers. There was no mistaking the woman’s look, or the smile that went with it—he had too many years and too much experience behind him to do that. She had just issued him an invitation.
Ivo was not in the habit of attracting his women this way, but just for a moment all he felt was another rush of relief. There had been no magic here after all, nothing bizarre or bewildering. Just a flesh and blood woman, who, for whatever reason, was desirous of his company. He let his gaze linger on the curves of her body beneath the drab gown, the way her hair caught fire in the sputtering candlelight. Ivo’s body stirred, hardened. It had been many a long month since he had last lain with a woman, and even longer since he had been fortunate enough to find one so comely as this songstress.
“She likes you,” Sweyn said with a laugh. “Tell me now that you would have preferred an evening in the castle garrison, with the stench of unwashed soldiers to accompany your meal.”
Ivo shrugged, and set his tankard down carefully. “Tonight she smiles at me. Tomorrow it might be you.” His voice was dry and noncommittal, but desire beat like a pulse within him.
“You underrate yourself,” Sweyn retorted. “If you get the chance to enjoy her, my friend, think not of the morning. The garrison will still be there.” He gave Ivo a none-too-gentle push, and went off to find himself a game of dice.
Ivo was crossing the room before he knew it. He hadn’t realized until he started walking how light-headed he was—it must be the ale. His boots seemed barely to touch the rush-strewn floor. The dais was before him and he vaguely noted that the girl with the harp had gone.
But the angel was there, waiting.
“You sing wondrously well, demoiselle.” He heard his own voice, deep and quiet, as if it were that of a stranger. “I am bewitched.”
She laughed, and cast him a flirtatious glance.
Her eyes were not brown as he had drought, but hazel. Watchful and secretive, and framed with thick dark lashes, they were set wide apart and slanted upward like a cat’s eyes. There was something familiar in those eyes, something distant and yet part remembered. I know her, but from where... Even as his mind was turning, his gaze moved on. Her mouth was small and lush, her chin a point for her heart-shaped face, and her skin was smooth and unmarked apart from a small scar on her right cheekbone. That long chestnut-colored hair fell about her, curling at the ends, rippling over her shoulders like a smooth waterfall.
There is something about her eyes, and the scar on her right cheekbone. Something about the scar...
Why had he drunk so much? His mind must be fogged with ale fumes.
“You like my songs, sir?” Her French was flawless—this was no English peasant.
Ivo blinked, brought his thoughts back to the here and now. “Aye, demoiselle, I like them very much.”
Her eyes smiled up at him, like the brown and green shadows in a forest, tempting him onward into places he had never been before. She reached out a slender hand and rested it upon his arm. Her hand looked pale and fragile against his dark sleeve, and he hesitated to cover it with his own.
“Mayhap you would like a private audience?”
Were the words truly spoken? Or had he dreamed them because they were so much what he wanted to hear?
Ivo knew he was sobering up fast.
He gazed down intently into her face, and saw her lick her lips nervously with the tip of her pink tongue. There was a flicker of doubt in her eyes, as though she feared he would say her nay. He wanted to laugh—nay was the last thing he would say her right now! She was beautiful, and her song still held him in its spell. And if he wasn’t either mad, or badly mistaken, she was offering herself to him.
All of herself.
Lust soared through him, tightening every muscle. To his surprise, his manhood began to thicken—he had thought he had better control than that. Ivo was no brutish soldier, willing to forgo all niceties for a hasty roll In the hay. He had been taught courtesy and respect, and although he may not always have abided by them, he knew the right from the wrong. To suddenly feel so totally out of control, like a lusty stallion in a paddock of mares, confused him.
