Page 206 of The Daughters of Avalon
And he was lost.
Seren Pendragon wasn’t merely lovely. She was kind and sweet, and humble besides. Even her sister was far haughtier than she was, and if Seren’s temper was ever riled, it was always over the welfare of others.
During their time together, Wilhelm had heard infinite praises for her sisters, and if Seren were to be believed, she was never the expert, always the student, learning diligently from her sisters—Elspeth who was eldest, Rhiannon who was wisest, Rosalynde, who was bravest, and Arwyn… well, understandably, she’d yet to speak much of Arwyn. Her eyes filled with tears when her thoughts returned to Dover. But, from all that Wilhelm could see, the woman traveling beside him had a giving heart, and having watched her with Jack—the gentle way she’d treated him, the sweet words she’d spoken to him—he found himself wishing she could be the mother of his babes.
And that was the entire crux of his mood—not Giles, nor Warkworth, nor even York, or Matilda. It was Seren, and the indisputable way he was beginning to feel about her—phfht, beginning?Truth be told, he had fallen in love with the lady at first sight, and he’d envied his brother desperately. He’d gone into that hall at Westminster fully prepared to despise the woman, and he’d left with a pang in his heart that exacerbated his grief. That night, months ago, he and his brother had gone to some sad little tavern to commiserate over ale, and the entire time he’d sat there listening to Giles carry on about why he mustwed Lady Seren—for the good of Warkworth, and no less the good of the realm—all he could think about was punching Giles in the throat.
It was not a feeling he was proud of, and he couldn’t explain it to Giles. It was no wonder he’d leapt to the task the very instant Rosalynde asked him to find Seren, because, even then—months before he’d encountered her in Dover—he could think of little else. And now that he realized how worthy she was of respect he knew himself to be unworthy.
When most women of her station would have had naught but complaints over the bed he’d provided her each night—which was to say, none at all—Seren slept where she could and woke with a smile and ‘good morn’ fresh upon her lips, even despite her travails. Like Rosalynde, she was a soldier and he was proud of her for enduring the journey with so little complaint. If she was hungry, she ate what was provided. If she was thirsty, she drank what he drank, be it water from a brook, dew from a leaf, or stalevin. If she was cold, she made do with the blanket she was given. If she was hot, she spoke not a word in complaint.
As relieved as he was that their journey so far had been uneventful, and that her winsome smile managed to ease any worry over danger, it was still there in the back of his head…
Morwen was still out there, somewhere; he felt her.
The air itself held a certain tension, as though every moment and every mile brought them closer to peril.
Distracting him from his brooding thoughts, Seren giggled. A butterfly had landed on her nose. But, instead of shooing the creature away, she endured it, wiggling her nose to alleviate an itch.
“How long will you suffer that bug?”
Seren smiled. “So long as it wishes to stay.”
Wilhelm smirked, lifting his brow. “You’d better shoo it away. It will lay eggs on your snout, and then what?”
“Snout?” she asked, acting incensed by his description of her nose, and her laughter saved her from having to shoo the butterfly. It flew away, into the bellflowers.
“See what you did?”
“I do. I saved you from being the mother of pests,” he said, and found himself eager to show her his favorite spot with a view of the sea. If she could smile so brightly over a glade full of bellflowers and a silly little butterfly, what else might she say or do over the sight of a thousand damselflies at dawn.
At low tide, Warkworth’s beach was long, with sprawling white sand that stretched for miles. “Have you e’er seen the ocean?” he asked, and then suffered himself a fool. Because—God’s teeth—of course she’d seen the ocean. He’d found her hiding aboard a ship en route to Calais. His cheeks burned like hot coals, and Seren must have realized his faux pas, because she giggled, then averted her gaze.
All told, Wilhelm was ill-equipped to have any form of courtly conversation. It was a struggle, to be sure—and more and more now that he was so painfully aware of himself in the lady’s presence. Quite likely, Seren thought him an imbecile, because he certainly felt like one.
“But, of course, I knew you had,” he dissembled. “’Tis only that the closer we come to Warkworth, the more eager I am to show you my home.”
“I am eager as well,” she confessed, and Wilhelm’s heart tripped painfully. He wished to God he were brave enough to tell her how fond he was of her. “How long before we arrive?”
“Not long,” he said. “If my guess is good, you’ll be seeing your sister afore the sun sets on the morrow.” And rather than twist his lips into a grimace, he forced a smile.
They hada veritable feast that night—blackberries, strawberries, pignuts and wild carrots, along with a good-sized trout Wilhelm caught by hand.
It was thrilling to watch—the swiftness with which he’d moved, the grace he’d displayed in the hunt.
And yet, now that the fish was prepared to be cooked, he was equally inept at building his fire, working stubbornly with his fire-steel, as he was inclined to do every time.
Alas, the flame refused to kindle, and Seren would have laughed if he weren’t so disconcerted.
For some odd reason, it seemed to her that the ability to start a fire was strongly imbued into the makings of a man. It seemed to be a thing theymustmaster in order to be considered a man, and in truth, she wondered idly if fathers ingrained this fear in their sons. It was something to think about… as she sat munching on a carrot. She wished she could do something to help. And because she wished it so desperately, even knowing her own limitations, she envisioned the tinder igniting, and suddenly, inexplicably, the wood exploded into flames, startling her as much as it did Wilhelm. Blinking, she held the carrot aloft, mouth agape as she stared at the blue flames.
He laughed. “My brows for a good flame,” he said, and then turned to look at Seren with a question in his eyes. “I thought you couldn’t do that?”
Seren’s brows lifted in bewilderment, not only because the conflagration surprised her. It was a blue—as blue as the fire that took the Whitshed.
Witchfire.
“I-I didn’t know I could,” she said, a bit stunned.
