Page 23 of Raven's Rise
“As I warned you when we first met,” he said.
Seeing a large fallen log near the edge of the pond, she stopped. “I’d like to sit here a while.”
“We have time.”
“You could sit with me…unless you need to keep watch, lest a deer or a rabbit comes to attack me?”
“I’ll risk it,” he said, sitting down just close enough that if she reached out she could touch him. “The local rabbits are probably not a threat.”
She laughed. “You don’t act like any other knight I’ve met. Not that I’ve met many. I enjoy talking to you.”
Rafe gave her wink. “Don’t get used to it, my lady. At your nunnery, you’ll endure days of silence. Or endless prayer.”
She wrinkled her nose in distaste.
“Why is it to be a nunnery?” he asked, more intently. “Why not marry again? You were widowed so young. How have you not gained more suitors?”
“I have nothing to offer. Who would wish to marry the broken widow of a minor nobleman’s son? Even aside from my affliction, I bring no great lands, nor distinguished name. And…” she broke off.
“And what?”
“Nothing.”
“Were I a lord, I’d offer for you.”
“Were you a lord, you would need to make alliances, or gain land, or get an heir, like any other man. You’d choose a young bride with a great dowry to bring to the marriage bed.”
“Just as well I’m not a lord then. None of those things do I want. Not lands, or alliances, or an heir.”
She was skeptical. “What man doesn’t want a legacy? What would your father say if you told him such?”
“I don’t know, because I don’t know who my father is,” Rafe said. His tone was careless, but she saw a flash of pain in those deep blue eyes. “Maybe he’s one of the great lords of England. Or maybe he was a common soldier, dead a day after siring me. I have no idea, and no loyalty to a man I have no name or face for. Let that be my legacy—that I won’t do the same to a child that my father did to me.”
“Oh,” Angelet said, reaching out to cover his hand with hers. “Don’t say that. You don’t know where you come from, but I am sure you were loved. Your mother, what of her? Did she tell you nothing of your birth?”
“My mother’s identity is a mystery to me too. I don’t remember her at all. I think she must have got rid of me the first moment she could after I was born.”
“You can’t say that about your mother!” Angelet said, thinking of what she’d do to see her own son again.
“I can and I will,” Rafe said bitterly. “The cold fact of the matter is that I was born a bastard and then instantly abandoned. So don’t speak to me of family name or legacy. They’re empty dreams, stories nobles tell each other to convince themselves they’re better than the peasants plowing their fields. I’ll make my own way.”
“Is that why you’re a soldier?”
“It’s a profession where skill is all that matters. Doesn’t matter how noble a man’s blood is…he can still lose it all on the battlefield.”
Angelet winced at the thought of him dead.
“Forgive me,” he said. “None of these things are subjects to discuss with a lady. I shouldn’t have said anything. In fact, why am I telling you any of this?”
“Do you not normally confide in a woman?” she asked.
His expression became more closed off than before. “I don’t confide in anyone.”
“You must have someone,” she said. “I refuse to believe you’re alone, without friends or companions or someone you love.”
“Why does it matter to you?” he asked. He turned toward her, his expression dark. “I don’t want pity—”
Without knowing that she was going to do it, Angelet leaned over and kissed him.
