He only laughed softly and drained his tea glass. “Come walk with me then, if it worries you. I’ve been wanting to try the labyrinth in the western garden. Ryll tells me there’s a pretty fountain at its center.”
She took his arm and allowed him to escort her through the terraced gardens towards the large four-acre spruce maze that ran along the shores of the fjord west of the palace. The maze was a delight, designed several centuries ago by one of Wintercraig’s queens. In addition to the many twisting paths, it included half a dozen covered bridges built of stone and painted timber that rose up above the tops of the tall spruce hedges, crossing over paths below, to give maze walkers an elevated glimpse of the maze from various angles.
As they walked the maze and chatted, they somehow ended up on the subject of Dilys’s childhood betrothal. Gabriella wasn’t entirely sure how the subject came about, but once it did she found herself growing tense and slightly irritable. Dilys, of course, noticed instantly.
“What’s wrong?”
She plucked a fragrant, soft-needled branch from the spruce hedge, and glanced down as she twirled in in her hands. “Nothing. I don’t know... I just can’t imagine you betrothed.” She tossed the branch away.
He bent down to retrieve it. “Perhaps,moa leia,it isn’t that you can’t imagine me betrothed to another, it’s that you don’t like to imagine it.”
She looked up at him sharply. “I’m sure that’s not it.”
He gave a wry smile. “You are still so quick to deny me at every opportunity. Why is that?”
“I told you from the beginning I would not marry you.”
“You did,” he agreed, “but you’ve never told me why. What makes the prospect of being my wife so unappealing? I am not a cruel man, nor an ill-favored one. We enjoy each other’s company and are never at a loss for things to talk about. And, of course, sexually, we couldn’t be any more compatible.”
She blushed and gave him a warning glare. He merely grinned and continued listing all the reasons why he was such an excellent husband material.
“I am Calbernan, so you know I would never hurt you or be unfaithful. Nor would I ever try to control you.”
“No, you’d only seduce me into doing whatever you wanted.”
His eyes gleamed with warm golden lights. “A man has to have some way to keep the woman he loves from walking all over him. How could she ever love him back if he didn’t?” He brushed the soft needles of the spruce wand against her lips, a gentle caress that made her gasp a little and back away.
“You don’t l-love me.” She stammered over the L word. “You can’t.”
“Can I not?” He lifted the branch to brush its soft needles against his own lips. She watched with rapt attention. It was almost like a kiss. From her lips to his, with the small, fragrant spruce wand as the messenger. “I think I can.”
“You don’t know anything about me!”
“I know a great deal more about you than your father knew about your mother when they wed, I imagine. Besides familiarizing myself with the information prepared by the Queen’s Council, I have spent the last month learning everything I can about you. Your likes and dislikes. How to make you smile, even when you don’t want to. How to tell when you’re lying—which you do with abominable regularity, by the way. At least when it comes to subjects you don’t want to talk about. I know that you like children, and womanly things. I know that you would follow Hekane herself into Hel if she but baited a trail with Zephyr Hallowill’s chocolates. I know that you like me—more than like me—even though for reasons you will not share with me, you are determined to deny it. And I know, Gabriella Coruscate”—he brushed the small, fragrant wand against his lips again and leaned closer to caress her mouth in the same manner—“that you are all that I could ever desire, all that I have ever needed, all that I can imagine when I think of my life bound to another’s.”
“What a pity you shall be so sorely disappointed, then.” She meant for the quip to come out lightly, a saucy rejoinder to show that his declaration meant nothing to her. Alas, her throat was too dry and too tight, and her voice sounded more like a shaken whisper than a teasing riposte.
“What a pity if we shouldbothbe so sorely disappointed,” he corrected. He tucked the little spruce branch into the band on his right arm, as if it were a memento he meant to cherish. “I can give you everything you ever dreamed of, Gabriella, if only you will let me.”
“I already have everything I need.” She turned away and started down the garden path. It was dangerous to stand for long in the company of a tall, dark, unrepentantly masculine Calbernan intent on seduction.
He followed close on her heels. “Untruth,” he murmured, his lips so close to her ear, she nearly jumped out of her skin. “You want a husband. You want children. You want love. I can give you these things.” His voice whispered down her skin, making her flesh pebble and her breasts grow full and tight.
Helos help her. She did. She wanted all of that. She wantedhim.She wanted to fall into his arms, promise to give him everything he asked for, take everything he offered. She wanted to bind him to her for all times and so securely that he wore her possession like one of those iridescent tattoos on his skin, openly, permanently, for all to see. So that no other woman would ever again know the teasing, seductive glint in his eye or the sound of her name whispered in his dark velvet voice.
“The price is too high,” she bit out.
“The price of what?”
She’d taken a wrong turn in the labyrinth and come to a dead end. Trapped, she whirled around and spat the truth, hoping that might grant her a reprieve. “Love!”
He put his hands on either side of her head, boxing her in loosely between himself and the hedge at her back.
“Tell me about the love that hurt you so, Gabriella. There is a wound in your soul, a sorrow you do not speak of. I know this, for I have known loss and sorrow too. It helps if you talk about it.”
There it was again, that tug deep inside. That yearning to open herself up and bare her soul to him. She shook her head. “No, it doesn’t.”
“Try. Talk to me, Gabriella. Lay down the burden you insist on carrying. Give it to me. I am strong enough to bear both our troubles. Let me help you.”
