Nim turned restlessly against him, frowning in her sleep, and he forced himself to relax until she settled again.
The healer was right. Fuck it. He needed to protect her, and that included protecting her from himself.
Nim was much better off far away from a bitter, disgraced captain and his motley squad of almost mercenaries. There was no future for them. She would be on the run, and then hopefully settle down somewhere safe and pretty. Somewhere she could grow her herbs and make her ointments. While he was bound to service. Sent to the worst places in the country, even when they weren’t in active combat. Living in tents. Eating what they killed.
She was everything good and innocent. A soldier’s woman’s life was not for her. And there was no way he could have her for just one day. His beast, worryingly, already considered her his.
Not forgetting that once she’d learned the unpalatable truth about her brother, there was very little chance she’d want anything to do with him anyway.
Hell. It would have been so much easier if they’d never found her. If she’d simply disappeared.
The most he could offer her was protection for a couple of days and then he’d help her to do just that. Disappear. So she could have that perfect life.
And he would go far away, where this disconcerting blend of lust and protectiveness would fade, and he could get on with his life. Gods knew, the last thing he needed was to get tangled up with a woman. Especially Val’s sister.
Chapter Nine
Nim woke up disoriented,her head foggy.
They had stopped traveling, and someone was carrying her. Tris. She could smell the slightly spicy masculine scent she knew was his. Feel the leather of his armor against her cheek, the warm strength of his arms around her.
It was almost like a dream, after being so afraid for so long, to find herself safely held. By Tristan. The boy she had fallen in love with so many years ago. Who she had never managed to let go of, despite everything. Who had caught her when she fell and held her safely while she slept.
Maybe she had overreacted earlier. Tristan had said that he would protect her, and everything he’d done had proven he was true to his word.
It wasn’t surprising that he still had doubts, but he’d agreed to help her to see Val in spite of them, and she was certain that he would be convinced of the truth when they finally had a chance to speak to her brother. Val was a good man, she knew it in every cell of her body. And not just because he was her brother; it was in everything he did. And he had always spoken of Tristan and the Hawks as if they were heroes, even in those dark days leading up to Ravenstone.
Tristan tightened his arms as he walked, and she wished that she could stay like that forever, but she could feel him slowing. Soon he would realize that she had woken.
She knew, in her heart, that the Hawks were certain they were going to prove she was wrong about Val. They needed to prove it to themselves as much as to her. But she would take their help. It gave her the chance she needed to show them the truth. And if it came with time in Tristan’s arms, a dream she had never imagined could come true, she would take that too.
She opened her eyes and took in where they were. They had stopped in a damp meadow, fragrant with dill and swept with long afternoon shadows. A small, abandoned shepherds’ hut squatted next to a tiny pond, and all around it, the men were rubbing down their mounts and setting up camp.
She wiggled, and Tristan looked down, saw that she was awake, then lowered her gently to the ground.
“Thank you,” she said, mostly to him, but loud enough to include the whole squad.
She took a few steps forward and looked inside the rough hut. It was empty except for a rickety stool, a swath of autumn leaves littering the hard floor, and a pile of blankets in a corner that she was sure would be so full of lice that they could move by themselves.
She snorted and turned to Tristan with a grin. “Remind you of anything?”
He scowled at her, face blank, and she couldn’t resist needling him. “Come on, you must remember! The old hut in the hills that you and Val made into a fort and protected against all the vicious sheep. Don’t you remember stealing pies for feasts and holding battles? You spent hours playing up there!”
He took a small step backward, not saying anything, but his scowl deepened, and she found herself stepping forward, placing her hand on his arm, desperate to remind him. “At the very least, you must remember that time I ran away from home and you and Val hunted all over the hills before finally realizing I’d been staying there all the time. It felt like forever, but it wasn’t even one day.”
She remembered it so clearly. They had been teasing her, calling her a baby. The two boys were seventeen and already soldiers, home for a few days’ leave. They had been so confident and sure of themselves. Almost men.
She, on the other hand, had been just a few weeks past her thirteenth birthday. Mama had been lost only the summer before, and she’d been so sad and angry.
And so very desperate for Tristan to see her. To see that she was growing up.
It had seemed like a good way to shut them all up. Show them just how comfortable they’d be when the “baby” didn’t turn up to bake their bread and run their home. So, she’d left.
She spent the afternoon collecting herbs and then she’d set up a camp in the old hut. She ate her sandwich and amused herself by imagining their faces when they realized that they had to cook their own dinner.
Of course, by the time the sun went down, it had occurred to her that the herbs were useless without her stillroom. That she was thirsty and couldn’t go back to the river in the dark. That it was terribly lonely and cold all by herself in a strange hut surrounded by the evening calls of the local wildlife. And that it was too late to leave.
She had been so relieved when Val and Tris had turned up with lanterns, like heroes from the stories. She hadn’t even minded the long lecture she’d had from her brother all the way home. Or the even longer lecture from Papa when they got there.
