Flowers From The Storm by Laura Kinsale

Author:Laura Kinsale [Kinsale, Laura]
Language: fra
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2011-03-21T00:14:19+00:00

Chapter Nineteen

Dressing himself in the morning incensed Christian. He’d had enough of wearing Durham’s clothes; after a hard day of travel, even his court dress looked better, especially since the linen had been freshly washed by Bruhilt. The stockings, neatly rolled, were easy enough, but by the time he’d got the velvet breeches buttoned, he was furious with himself and his fuddled brain and his hands that would not work together properly and made such a simple thing so confounding.

After unending frustration, he’d just got the last fastening closed, using one hand, when he heard the deep boom of an outside door. He looked out the window and saw Maddygirl, her cloak sweeping out behind her as she headed off over the sheep walk toward the top of the hill. Her direction was away from the village, her pace quick and determined—the deportment of someone leaving.

Christian swore. He abandoned the waistcoat in his hand. Coatless, his shirt open, he strode out of the room.

Maddy did not know quite where she was going. The storm had brought winter, ready-honed. A wind from the north stung her cheeks. The downpour of the night before had made a muddy, sodden embarrassment of the garden, but the turf in the field beyond sprang back beneath her feet, resilient, just beginning to freeze, so that every step had a little wet crunch in it. She held her skirt up, though it hardly made any difference now; her best gray was so mended and stained that “best” was no longer a fair description.

At the top of the hill she stopped and faced north, glad of the icy blow. All night she’d listened to the capricious storm; this morning she wanted only cold steady discipline in her heart.

It was a trial, that was evident. She was tried and tested, and found herself of more common metal than she’d ever imagined.

Even self-censure was quicksand. To tell herself that she ought to take no delight in creaturely caresses was to remember how his hand had touched hers. To disparage the carnal earthy self was to think of his face, underlit by fire radiance, a tempest distilled to silence—midnight blue and flame.

She heard a step behind her, the sound of a harsh exhalation; she turned and he was there. He stopped a few feet from her, all blown about by the wind, in his shirtsleeves, the kind of man that sensible right-walking elderwomen warned the girls not to recognize should he speak to them.

“What is it?” she asked, deliberately curt.

His mouth drew back a little, as if he tried to speak and then could not. He looked away from her, off and down. The wind blew his dark hair.

“Go back. Thou wilt catch thy death.”

He lifted his eyes. They were the color of the deepest heart of hurricane clouds, deeper blue than the sky behind him.

“Go back.” Maddy turned away and began walking.

He walked alongside her.

For a few yards, she pretended indifference. Then she stopped. “I wish to walk alone.” She said it with her face to the wind, not looking toward him.

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