Page 72 of Tears of the Wolf
“Are you going to make me say it again?” Cenric half-laughed, though he seemed genuinely pained. “You handled that well. Better than I would have.”
Brynn had barely expected him to go along with her plan, much less acknowledge she was right. “Thank you.” The words came out stiff, uncomfortable. “I suppose we’ll see how things go at the feast in three weeks.”
Cenric chuckled, but it was awkward. Forced. Like he wanted to say something else but didn’t know how.
He was a proud man, this new husband of hers. It had probably cost him a great deal to admit he was wrong about his own neighbors. That she, a foreigner barely in his lands for a fortnight, had made better progress than he had in his two years as alderman.
“When your girl told us, I thought we’d been attacked.” Cenric reached for her wrist. He pinched the edge of her sleeve, not quite touching her, but tugging ever so slightly, like it was as far as he dared to go.
Brynn’s mouth went suddenly dry. “The house is fine,” she assured him. “All the cattle and crops and—”
“I wasn’t worried about the house.”
Brynn’s heart, the wretched thing, did a flip in her chest. It was folly to create expectations that had never been between them. It was foolishness to hope and yet…
“If anyone hurts you, I will kill them. I don’t care who they are.” Cenric released her sleeve, straightening.
Brynn smiled, trying not to feel disappointment at the loss of his touch. “Lucky for him, Olfirth didn’t hurt me.”
Cenric jerked his head in agreement. “Lucky for him.”
Brynn’s chest fluttered. She could have killed Olfirth herself and he’d known it, but Cenric’s vow still made her feel lighter somehow. She didn’t know where to go from here. “We should be done harvesting the leeks tonight.” She offered him the option to change the subject.
“The barley will be done tomorrow if not today,” Cenric answered.
Brynn tried to sound reassuring. “We will be secure through winter.”
“Yes.” Cenric scratched at his beard thoughtfully. He looked back to her. “Can I make this up to you?” He asked the question quietly, like he feared being overheard and perhaps he did.
“What?”
“Yesterday.”
Brynn still didn’t understand.
“How I spoke to you.”
Brynn tried to remember how he had spoken to her. They’d argued, but she’d won. He’d already admitted he was wrong. “You don’t need to make it up to me.”
“A gift, then.”
Did he think he could simply buy her forgiveness?
“If I wanted to give you one.”
“I don’t need anything,” Brynn answered. She had brought her chest of jewels and baubles that was the more mobile portion of her dowry. The entire longhouse was at her disposal. Ombra might not be as wealthy as the south, but she wasn’t lacking. “Guin was already a fine gift, thank you.”
“There is nothing you miss from your old life?”
“No.” She wished she could explain to him that her old life had been its own torment. Paega had treated her as an ignorantchild and all those closest to him had followed his lead. In Ombra, Brynn was barely a step below a queen.
Cenric was not used to impossible tasks, it seemed. “Nothing?”
“It’s not something you could give,” Brynn answered softly.
Whatever else he might be, Cenric was persistent. “Tell me and we’ll see.”
“Osbeorn is the only thing I miss,” Brynn answered, looking down. She inhaled a deep breath, determined not to cry first thing in the morning.
