His gaze deepened on her. She looked away from the power of it. The power to render her breathless, helpless, and reckless. She had things to discover about him, and if he needed killing to prevent an all-out war, she might even be the one who had to do it. She wouldn’t let the chance to find out the truth escape her because the knight was handsome. She kept her fingers at her hilt just the same.
“Do you always stop to smell flowers?”
“Sadly, not always,” he replied. He moved closer until his nearness made her blood feel warm as it rushed through her veins. He was close enough to run him through—or to kiss her if he bent down.
She could end everything now. Her father wouldn’t have to decide. Her extended family would not be called to gather, and there would be no war with the warden.
He reached out his hand and, for a moment, Braya thought he was reaching for her. Her heart banged in her ears.
“I see you have met Avalon,” he said, scratching between the horse’s ears.
“Avalon,” she repeated, liking the sound of it. “That—” she paused to let her heart slow down. “That is a lovely name. What does it mean?” What in damnation was she doing growing breathless over him, asking meaningless questions about his horse when she had so many other things to find out?
“’Tis a place where a legendary king was taken to recover from his wounds after fighting his enemy. ’Tis sometimes called the island of apples.”
“The island of apples?” she said with a soft laugh. She couldn’t help it, for it felt as if a thousand dragonflies just flew across her belly. Still, she kept her fingers at her hilt. “How wonderful.” Which legendary king was taken there? She wanted to hear more. She shouldn’t. She should ask what she wanted to ask, and then return home and tell her father what happened.
But golden light spilled around him, making him appear almost otherworldly.
“Have you ever been to Avalon?” She couldn’t help but want to know. Perhaps he would tell her the way. She would ask him the more important question when the moment was right. It was still early enough not to be missed at home. She often went off alone. Besides, she liked the tale, and she liked the sound of Sir Torin’s voice telling it.
He shook his head and his hair fell into his eyes. He plunged his fingers through it and cleared it away. He looked more like something from her dreams than a skillful killer. “’Tis said to be a magical place that produces all things of itself. Fields have no need of the plough. Nature provides everything and people live there a hundred years or more.”
Her eyes opened wider, causing his gaze on her to go warm. “Do you believe ’tis a real place?”
“No,” he said, his slight smile fading as he dropped his arm to his side. “But I like the idea of it.”
Aye. So did Braya. No fighting. No hunger. But he was correct. It wasn’t real. “Tell me what happened with my kin at the tavern. I must know the truth.”
He knit his brow and slipped his shadowed gaze from his horse to her. “I already told your father what happened.”
“Tell it to me, please, Sir.”
What more did she need? He’d admitted to killing her kin; whether he had been trying to save Carlisle’s soldiers or not, he had killed them. He was her family’s enemy. She should kill him and run. How would she prove anything to her father if she had their enemy in her hands and did nothing but swoon over him?
“Sit and eat with me here,” he invited her, “and I will repeat to you what you heard me say in the great hall.”
She shook her head and realized that her fingers were nowhere near her hilt. “My brother—”
“Is nowhere near. You are alone,” he told her, looking at her calmly in the face. “You have nothing to fear from me.”
She doubted it. Though he was comforting, there was something innately dangerous about him.
“If I did,” she answered, fighting not to be affected by his rakishly tousled hair falling around his face like a nimbus, “you would not find me so easily overcome.”
His jaw tightened as if he were keeping his words from leaving his mouth. She thought she might have caught something dark pass across his features. A challenge, perhaps? He said nothing.
“All right,” she allowed and moved aside when he reached out again, this time for a large bag tied to Avalon’s saddle.
She knew it was a bad decision to stay when he untied his mantle and spread it out in the grass and offered her a seat. But when he sat close and opened the bag of food and six ripe, red apples fell across her lap, she thought of Millie and reconsidered.
