“Care to explain what all that was about today?” Ayla asked.
She didn’t feel terrified of him, as she had out in the cold. The wild look wasn’t in his eyes now, and the sword wasn’t drawn; he seemed calm. Repentant. Not that she could forget what he’d almost done.
She’d seen him kill before, of course. But that felt different from an execution.
The knight cast his gaze down to his bowl, dug his spoon in, and began to silently eat.
“Well,” she said with a sigh, as she tried the broth. It was rich with wine, flour, and bone. Someone among the soldiers was a half-decent cook. “This is silly. You’re trying to keep your oath, aren’t you?”
His eyes caught on hers for a moment. He took another bite of his stew. A minute passed, both of them eating. Shecouldn’t stand the silence. It wasn’t bearable. Another minute. Their spoons clinked against the sides of the bowl as they dug in. Below them she could hear the sound of one of the soldiers laughing as another yelled, his words muffled. The fire popped.
“Shouldn’t I, as the person you made the oath to, get a say in your punishment?” she asked abruptly.
He frowned, chewing. She could see his expression shifting, like he wanted to say something, but wasn’t letting the words out.
“I can choose any punishment I want, can’t I? Up to the one you set? Isn’t that how a knight’s oath works?”
He didn’t nod, or shake his head no. He just kept staring.
“Then if I told you to… say… skip your dinner as punishment, you could talk to me again?”
Eyes still on her, he set down his spoon and pushed his bowl forward across the table. She let him sit that way for a minute as she tasted another bite of her stew, but he made no move to break or back down. He was still staring at her. It was hard not to feel guilty, depriving a man of his supper, even knowing that he’d almost killed someone earlier that day. She only made it through one more bite before she buckled.
“Go on, eat. And talk, too. Please. You aren’t breaking your oath.” He looked at her silently, as stubborn as ever. “Truly,” Ayla added. “You said you wouldn’t yell in anger: only if you had to be heard, or warn me of danger, or the like. Correct? Well,weren’tyou? Iwasout in the snow, without real clothes on.”
He sighed, and leaned back in his chair.
“Well. Fine. If you don’t want to talk, don’t, I suppose,” Ayla muttered. “But there’s no oath holding you to it, in my view. I release you.”
“What were youthinking?” Niel immediately growled.
“Me?” She'd expected an apology, not a reprimand.
“You could have caught your death.”
“Well, your prisoner was about to,” she said sarcastically.
“He’s my concern. Not yours.” He dragged his bowl back to him and dug a spoon in.
“As a general rule, I prefer wounded, disarmed men not be executed in my courtyard. What did hedoto you?”
Niel silently chewed, his eyes hard on her.
“He’s an Ashbrin,” he said flatly, when he’d swallowed.
“Well,thatexplains it,” Ayla said with quiet scorn. Did Niel really believe just being a member of a particular noble house was enough justification for execution? “What did you mean, it was the second time you’d tried?”
“Don’t ask questions you don’t want answered.”
She nodded silently, and bit the inside of her cheek to keep from showing too much expression on her face. She’d been about to trust this man, to think the best of him. Worse, a part of her still wanted to.
“Right,” Ayla whispered. “How foolish of me. I suppose I’d better look the other way from here on, hadn’t I? What did youmean, Niel?”
“There was a tournament last spring,” he muttered. “We fought on opposite sides of a melee. I used a murderstrike—that's where you flip your sword over and use the hilt like a mace, to bash someone's head in. I dented his helmet and broke his skull. Nearly killed him.”
She stared at him in horror.
“What, onpurpose?”
