“Then ye might have to leave Scotland, me friend,” another had replied, and they had laughed. Even the younger Torcall had also laughed, for he did not see so many women on horses. The few he saw tended to be more graceful than swift.
“Oh, they are in our Scotland, lads. I have seen one so with me own eyes.” The man’s eyes had grown bigger as he had stared into the fire. “A lass who could tame a horse,” he had said before turning back to his audience of drunken men. “She was beautiful.”
Thinking back to that memory, Torcall would have thought the man had spoken of Ceana, but she was young then as he was. She was brave and a woman who could break a horse, he knew. He sank in his bed, wondering what it would have been like to see her ride. He wanted to ride alongside her, across the fields and the hills and the woods.
Her red hair would have floated in the wind, bouncing off her shoulders as would have her plump pale breasts. Torcall sat up in his bed when the thoughts of her breasts appeared in his head. Of course, he had seen bits of them in her dresses, but he had been a gentleman and had never stared too long, but it changed nothing of the fact that he saw them. They were drawn on rocks in his mind so he could not forget them. They plagued him in his dreams so much so that he craved the feel of them. And in these dreams, he heard her moan his name.
Shite! Get hold of yerself!Torcall scolded himself. He took up his sword and headed to the arena. New wood was brought to the arena every day to swing at for the recruits who were to train their wrists' strength for swordfights. Torcall hacked and hacked away until he had sweated his lust from his body. By the time his uncle came to the arena, Torcall was spent.
“Ye have been workin’ hard these days. Is there a war comin’ that I ken nothin’ of?” Dirk asked his nephew.
“Nay, uncle. I just needed to get somethin’ off me mind,” Torcall replied in pants of breath. He hoped his uncle would not ask him what it was.
“And did ye find success?”
“Aye,” Torcall answered.
He excused himself from his uncle’s presence and went back into the house. The play was in the evening, but he wanted to meet up with Ceana sooner before they were crowded out by the other play lovers in the town. He washed and went to his uncle’s wife for some perfume. It was an odd request, but one he dared to ask for he had no other choice.
“Ye wish to see a lass?” She asked him as she let into her room to choose from her collection. Torcall’s smile had been the only hint needed. He had a tough time choosing from her oils, so she chose for him.
“Use this one. Yer uncle got it for me when he was still love-struck by me. It is what young men do,” she told him. Torcall smelled it again. He found it pleasant but admitted to himself that what mattered more was what Ceana thought of it. He hoped that she liked it.
Torcall got dressed and smelled good before he mounted his horse. Ceana’s home wasn’t a long ride from his uncle’s house, but it would be longer that day because he wished to pick a rose for her. His aunt would not have allowed him to take a step into her flower garden for any reason in the world, so he went flower hunting.
Not many horses would have been able to climb the rough paths to get the flowers, but his horse was well trained. Torcall plucked a rose and then headed back onto the path to her home. He waited in the spot that she had told him to wait the day before, and soon, he heard a horse neigh as a rider approached from behind him. He turned to look, and there she was —
She was more beautiful than he had remembered her to be. She had an elegantly sewn cloak over her shoulders and a white dress beneath it. Her face was richly bathed with the sunlight, and her skin flourished beneath it. Her slender neck invited him and her breasts. He could barely see, but only bits as her gown was tied together to prevent it.
“Were ye lookin’ at me breasts?” She asked him as she came to his side.
“Nay!” He yelled louder than he had intended. Her question had both caught him off guard and had made him uncomfortable. He had looked at her breasts—it was unavoidable. Everything about her fascinated him, and to say that was to admit that he indeed had feelings for her. Nay, not feelings, he corrected himself. Lust. It was pure lust. He couldn’t have feelings for her.
“Are ye sure?” she leaned into him, and Torcall sweated a little, trying not to glance at them again.
“Aye,” he said.
“Really sure?” she leaned even closer, and Torcall knew that only one look would reveal the shape of her breasts.
Torcall was losing the battle. “Aye.”
Luckily, she seemed to tire of tormenting him and pulled away.
“Ye’re late,” she said to him sharply. He looked up at her and was relieved by the change of subject.
“I ran an errand first.”
Ceana folded her arms as she looked at him. “What errand was so important that ye would keep a lady waitin’ on ye?”
Torcall produced the flower he had tucked behind his back, and she covered her mouth to suppress her glee. It gladdened him that she found it an acceptable gesture.
“Thank ye. It was so thoughtful. Nay man has ever given me a flower before,” she told him.
“Do ye have a knife?” She asked him. He gave her his little knife. She took the knife and rose from him and cut its stem with it. Making it shorter, she put the rose in her hair, and it was perfect. She handed him back his knife.
“This was me plan all along,” he told her.
“Nay, ye lie. Men ken nae these things,” she teased him. “Shall we?”
