“I came in a little while ago,” he said, tossing something more into the dog’s bowl. “You were sleeping like the dead.”
Yawning again, Cadelyn climbed out of the bed and staggered over to the table where there was a good deal of food. The scent filled the stuffy chamber. She was so tired thatshe stumbled onto the stool that was next to the table before reaching over to inspect the dishes. As she began to poke around, Kress pointed to various dishes.
“They have quite a fare here,” he said. “There is pea soup with ham, and ham and eggs, and a pork pie. They have two kinds of bread. I think there is plenty to satisfy.”
Picking up a wooden spoon that had come with the food, Cadelyn dug in to the ham and eggs, which was essentially eggs mixed with pieces of ham and baked in a dish. It was delicious. The more she ate, the more awake she became, gulping the warm wine from a cup Kress had poured her.
“Are your men settled?” she asked.
Kress was eating the pork pie with his knife, tossing the dog big pieces of cooked pork from it. “Aye,” he said. “They are so cold and water-logged that I am concerned about travel tomorrow. The storm today was brutal and if it continues tomorrow, we may have to cut our day short again. That means a delay in reaching The Paladin.”
Cadelyn’s chewing slowed at the mention of their destination. “How close are we?”
“If we travel all day tomorrow and the next day, we should arrive by sunset.”
She stopped chewing and looked at him in surprise. “Are we that close?”
“We are.”
Upset, she returned to her food with much less enthusiasm than before. “I see,” she said glumly. “Then… then it is possible that in two days, I will never see you again.”
Kress continued to shovel pork pie into his mouth. “You will,” he said. “I will be escorting you to Mountain Dark, so you will see me until we reach our destination in Wales.”
Cadelyn mulled that over as she tore off a hunk of bread, hunting around for the butter until Kress found it and put it infront of her. She used the back of her spoon to slather it on the bread.
“And then where will you go?” she asked softly.
He chewed the bite in his mouth and swallowed. “Back to London, to The Marshal,” he said. “Beyond that, I do not know.”
She took a bite of her bread, chewing thoughtfully. “He will send you wherever he needs you?”
“Exactly.”
She didn’t say anything for a moment. “Kress, do you ever become weary of doing what you are told?” she asked, almost wistfully. “What I mean to say is don’t you wish you were answerable only to the king? That you were lord and master over your own domain and did not have to take orders from the Earl of Pembroke?”
He shrugged. “It is as I told you before,” he said. “We all must take orders at some time or another, and I find serving Pembroke to be both fulfilling and exciting. Well, for the most part.”
“You never want to do more?”
He set his knife aside and collected his cup of warmed wine, considering her question. “I have prestige and freedom now,” he said. “When I inherit Longdendale from my father, I will assume a great fiefdom. I will have a great army under my command. That has always been my destiny.”
“But if it wasn’t?” she asked. “What would you want to do?”
He shrugged as he thought on her question. “I have been fighting other men’s wars for many years,” he said. “There was a several year period after Richard’s Great Quest ended that I was paid a great sum of money to fight battles for the Saxon princes. They are always fighting over one thing or another. If I had not come home to serve The Marshal, then I would probably still be in Saxony. Or mayhap I’d be in Scotland, being paidobscene amounts of money by the Scottish king to help control his warlords.”
“Is it a mess up there, then?”
He smirked. “It is always a mess in Scotland. They are always looking for trained warriors to help fight their battles.” Then, he looked at her. “And you would be writing your poetry unhindered if you did not have a date with destiny in Chester.”
He’d turn the focus back on her. Cadelyn’s gaze lingered on him a moment before turning to the pea soup on the table, which was cooling and thickening. She put her spoon into it.
“Aye,” she said, taking an unenthusiastic spoonful into her mouth. “I would be writing my poetry, giggling with Lily-Elsie, and waiting for a handsome knight to marry me.”
“Did you have any interested parties before all of this?”
She grinned in spite of herself, her dimples carving into her cheeks. “I told you there was never anyone special except the de Lohr son.”
“That does not mean that you did not have any offers from other sources.”
