Darkest before Dawn (The Kingdom of Mercia Book 2) by Jayne Castel Page B

and wounded pride.
    “I am waiting,” he said finally.
    “I… I am sorry,” Alchflaed choked out the words,
realizing as she did so that it was the first time she had ever apologized to
anyone other than her father. “I should have let him speak to me as he wished,
for I was his guest.”
    “You could have got yourself killed,” Maric replied, his
voice roughening before he added. “You could have got us all killed.”
    Alchflaed stared at him, surprised by his words.
    Does he actually care what happens to me?
    “You have a quick temper, Alchflaed,” Maric continued his
tone gentling for the first time. “Learn to control it, or you will have no end
of trouble in Tamworth.”
    He released her then, and stepped back. The night’s chill
replaced his heat and Alchflaed shivered. Without another word, he turned and
strode back in the direction of the clearing.

Chapter Twelve
The Snows
Come
     
     
    They rode south-west with the dawn. Maric chose to
abandon the road, and continue through the woodland. Shortly after noon, the
company reached a landscape of wild, windswept hills, intersected by thickets
and trickling brooks. Beyond the sheltering trees, the wind was biting, the sky
brooding and dark.
    After a brief meal of stale bread and cheese, they
pressed on. Maric set a hard pace across country. Snow was in the air; he recognized
the dank smell of it. They needed to put as much distance as possible between
them and Eoforwic, before it arrived.
    Maric’s eyes stung with fatigue as he rode, for he had
slept little the night before. Even now, the events of the previous evening unsettled
him. Things had gone awry from the moment they had arrived in Eoforwic. Maric
knew the ealdorman’s type; he had fought many such men in battle. Such a man
never forgot a grievance.
    Yet, what most disturbed him about the night before was
his own reaction. In daylight, with a bitter wind on his face, Maric regretted dragging
Alchflaed from the campsite to argue with her alone in the darkness. Being so
close to her physically made him say things he should not have. The ache to
pull the girl hard against him and kiss her had nearly overwhelmed him.
    The last two years had passed in numbness, broken only by
the rage of battle – but the willful Northumbrian princess had succeeded in
puncturing his detachment. Her temper, quick and hot as a Winterfyllth fire,
had forced his own out of hibernation.
    He could never let his anger get the better of him again
– for recklessness was its close cousin.
     
    It was mid-afternoon when the first snowflakes drifted
from the sky. Fat and white, like fresh spring blossom, the flakes settled on
Alchflaed’s fur cloak, and frosted Briosa’s bristling mane. Although she had
been expecting a change in the weather, Alchflaed’s already bleak mood worsened
at the sight of it. Snow was the last thing they needed. She was not in any hurry
to reach Tamworth, yet she did not want this journey lengthened either.
    Eoforwic was behind them, but the events of the night
before continued to torment her: the ealdorman’s rudeness; her fury; Maric’s
anger; and the things he said, which stung more than she would ever care to
admit.
    To make matters worse, flashes of the dizzying hunger she
had felt when he pinned her up against the tree trunk still haunted her. She
had kept her distance from him since dawn, riding as far back in the column as
she dared, but still her thoughts returned to the way her body responded to his
nearness. Even now, the memory of it made her short of breath.
    Stop it , she chided herself,
brushing snowflakes off her hands.
    She had enough to worry about without sighing over a Mercian
warrior who had grossly insulted her. Still, he had spoken true all the same;
last night was her fault and she had the sinking feeling she had yet to pay the
full price for her rash anger.
     
    ***
     
    Alchflaed was sitting next to the fire watching two spits
of waterfowl roasting over smoking embers, when