“Have you lost your mind?” he strode towards her, jamming his sword back into its sheath.
“Haveyou?” she answered.
She could see the prisoner clearly now, kneeling in the deep snow with some difficulty. Bradhan wasn’t blindfolded anymore. He was a plain-faced man in his thirties. The bruise on the side of his face stopped Ayla in her tracks. She froze in the snow, staring openly at the man Niel had taken prisoner.
Then the traitor knight was upon her. Niel grabbed her by her shoulders, and her gaze snapped back to him, her breathing short and tight. He loomed over her, and for the first time in days she felt afraid of him and of what he could do.
She could barely stand. She might have collapsed, if he hadn’t been squeezing her arms tight with his gloved hands.
“You’ll catch your death,” Niel snapped, fire in his eyes. His breath came out as a puff of white air. “You aren’t dressed.”
“Please don’t do this,” Ayla begged.
“You’re going back to your room.”
He let go of her shoulders and grabbed her around the waist, lifting her easily off the ground.
He hadn’t been a threat, sick in bed. Nor had he been dangerous when he cared for her. But he was savage now. She could see it in his eyes, the same rage that had been there when he yelled at her, after killing all those men; after taking the leg off the Ashbrin knight kneeling before them now.
“Put me down,” Ayla shrieked.
“Lady Blackfell,” the Ashbrin knight called, his voice worried.
Ditmar hadn’t been violent at first, either. She was in Niel’s grasp, his arm against the bare skin behind her knees, another under her back as he strode back to the castle.
Thrashing, she pushed against him and kicked her legs. Niel’s arms stiffened around her. He dropped her legs first, so she landed on her feet. Her robe loosened from all the movement. For a second the wind snapped it wide. His hands were on her instantly, yanking the robe shut over her nakedness and grabbing for the ties to fasten it as he cursed.
“You can’t be out here,” Niel said, his voice no gentler than it had been. “You’re not well.”
She pushed him off her and fastened the fabric herself, but Niel didn’t step back.
“You cannot do this.” Her voice shook. Her whole body stung with cold; she could barely feel her feet.
“Ayla. If you do not return to your room—”
“This isn’t you. Executing a man in the yard.”
She finished tying the robe and met his dark eyes. Niel’s jaw was tight. The wind snapped at his dark hair.
“You do not know me.”
“What’s his crime?” she lifted her chin, willing her voice not to shake, forcing her eyes to stay on his.
Perhaps he’d hit her. Perhaps he wouldn’t. She couldn’t watch him execute a prisoner just because she was scared for her own safety.
“Can you just—” Niel muttered. He lifted his hands to his forehead, sighed sharply.
“Isthere a crime?”
“He’s a knight of Ashbrin,” Niel said tersely.
She stared at him in disbelief. Her feet felt frozen to the spot. Niel didn’t move, either.
“Youhaveto go inside,” Niel informed her. “I don’t want to carry you against your will, Ayla, but if it’s that or watch you freeze to death—”
“Don’t,” she whispered, and took half a step closer to him, until she was almost grazing his armored chest. “Please, Niel, just… don’t do this.”
He broke away from her gaze abruptly, frowning and staring just to the side of her face, like he couldn’t bear the intensity building between them.
