Luc sat without speaking, and after long moments Liaze said, “Whatever happens between us, let it be.”
Luc sighed and said, “Princess, you deserve someone much better than me, and that I truly believe. Even so, it will be difficult to keep a rein on my ardor.”
Liaze’s pulse quickened, still she said, “Keep a rein?”
Luc nodded. “My lady, some believe love at first sight is but a mad fancy, yet I tell you it is not, for at the first moment I saw you, you captured my heart.”
Liaze’s soul filled with joy, and her laugh came silvery, and she said, “Luc, you had been hit in the head and had fallen off your horse when you first saw me.”
Luc laughed along with her, but he quickly sobered and said, “Nevertheless, Princess…” His words died, and his eyes filled with an unfathomable expression. And then he said, “That was the very moment, though I didn’t know whether you were real or a dream.”
“To fall in love with a dream would indeed be a mad fancy, for dreams are not real,” said Liaze. “Yet heed me, Luc, I am no dream.”
“Non, my princess, you are not, and for that I give my most fervent thanks to almighty Mithras above.”
10
Over the next two weeks, in the evenings Luc and Liaze continued to play echecs, and on rainy nights they read before the fireplace in the manor’s library, oft quoting poems to one another, many of them concerning love- unrequited, consummated, lost, gained, and the like-as well as parts of sagas and bits of familiar tales. And during sunny days they flew arrows at targets, and in this Liaze proved the better. But in croquet, Luc had a keen eye and hand, and oft Liaze found her ball far from the next wicket, driven away by Luc. They dined together-breakfast, lunch, dinner-yet there were times Liaze had to attend to matters of the principality. During some of these, Luc sat high in the gallery that ran ’round three sides of the throne chamber, and he listened to judgments and arbitrations and settlements of quarrels. There were times of courtly functions, and these Luc did attend, such as when some of the Fey Folk came to pay respects: over three days Luc met five tattooed Lynx Riders, and a Gnome and three Kobolds who asked to have a mining dispute settled, and Brownies, Hobs, Pixies, Sprites, and one great shambling thing, and a Ghillie Dhu in his clothes made of leaves and moss.
During this time, Luc’s bruises cleared, and the bandage came off his forehead. A small circular scar remained, but Margaux told him it would soon fade.
And then Luc and Liaze began riding in the woods, exercising Nightshade and Liaze’s own horse-Pied Agile, Nimble Foot in the old tongue-a dark grey mare with a white face as well as white fetlocks on all four feet. And on these excursions Liaze carried her bow, and Luc went well armed, with his own bow and arrows, and a long-knife strapped to his thigh, and a new sword in his scabbard, the blade presented to him by Remy and Zacharie as a token of their respect. His spear had been found, as well as his helm, but these he generally left behind.
When Remy objected to these forest rides and said that Goblins and Trolls might yet be about, Liaze laughed and asked, “What better escort than Luc?”
“My warband,” replied Remy.
Liaze shook her head.
Remy sighed and said, “Then, Princess, fare not deep in the woods, and I will have men standing by in case of need.-And have that knight bear his silver horn.”
Now Liaze sighed and made a minor gesture of assent.
There came a cool morn, fog twisting among the trees, and as they rode Luc said, “Let us go on a hunt.”
“What after?” asked Liaze.
“A stag if we can jump one up.”
“Capital,” said Liaze. “Would you have others come with us?”
Luc grinned and glanced in the direction of the manor well beyond seeing and said, “And share the chase?”
Liaze laughed and shook her head. “I know where deer come to graze on low-hanging apples. If there is a stag among the doe-”
“Then we jump him,” said Luc, “and yield a bit of ground, for it would be most unfair to take him unawares at his breakfast.”
“Splendid,” said Liaze. “Follow me.” And she heeled her grey in the flanks, and in spite of her half-hearted promise to Remy, toward a distant woodland orchard they rode.
There was a stag at one of the trees, and away it flew, and laughing in the chase they pursued, Liaze’s nimble mare swift through the forest, Luc’s black stallion faster in the open.
They did not bring down a stag that day, yet they were well pleased when they called a halt to the chase.
Chatting and laughing, slowly they rode back toward the manor, the day growing quite warm with the mounting sun, the fog having been burned off long past.
As they came in sight of the mansion, “I know just what we need do,” said Liaze, and she led Luc toward the willows.
They rode in among the drooping yellow branches, brushing them aside with their hands. “I seem to recall such,” said Luc as he frowned at the dangles, “though the memory is hazy.”
They came at last to a small open glade there in the center of the grove. And across the sward, among great, flat white stones, lay the broad pool. Here they dismounted and turned loose their horses-stallion and mare-among the sweet grasses of the small, tree-sheltered meadow.
They walked to one of the stones at the edge of the pool, the spring-fed water lucid and welling, and a rill flowed out from one end to dance and sing over a stony bed on its journey to a faraway sea. And Luc looked about and smiled in recognition and said, “Somewhere in this place in the moonlight is where I first saw my Water Nymph.”
Liaze laughed and said, “Let me show you where,” and she sat down and pulled off her boots and stockings, then unlaced her leather jacket and flung it aside, along with her silken shirt.
Luc’s breath was taken away with the sight of her, yet he stood looking at her high breasts and slim waist, his gaze frank and admiring.
And she got to her feet and stripped out of her leather breeks and the waist-to-ankle silk garment beneath.
And Luc unfastened his long-knife and sword belt and scabbard, and he sat down to pull off his own boots.
Now completely unclothed, Liaze stepped to the edge of the pool, her form belling out from her trim waist over slender hips and then down into long, sleek legs. She stood there a moment, her back to him, and then, with a joyous cry, she dived into the crystal-clear water. She stroked down and across the pellucid mere, with its white bottom of flat stones and sand, the chill water bright with sunlight. To the other end she stroked and up the vertical face of the large rock at the verge. She surfaced and shook water from her eyes, then placed her hands on the low, flat top of the monolith and, with a kick, levered herself up onto the brink of the slab, and twisted about to sit. Laughing, she called out, “Luc!” but he was nowhere to be seen. She stood and peered about the glade. Where-?
In that moment, blowing, Luc surfaced in the water at her feet. And he looked up at her and again his breath was taken away. And then with a lift and a turn, he was on the stone as well.
Liaze reached down and took his hand, and he rose to his feet, and she led him to the mossy bank along the edge of the dancing rill. “And here is where I first found you,” she said, and she pulled him down beside her.
And embracing one another, face to face they lay, and she held him close and kissed him deeply. His manhood was hard and pressing against her, and she could feel the beat of his pulse.
“Luc,” she said, her voice husky, her eyes lidded with desire.
