Lion's Bride - Iris Johansen [64]
But he was not moody, he was a man in pain. She knew now how he covered every emotion with a blanket of thorns. She was trying to ignore it because she did not want to deal with it. Her response had been too strong, too frightening, and she wanted only to hide away.
He was in the Great Hall, as she knew he would be, sitting staring into the fire.
She strode past the arched doorway and started up the staircase.
By all the saints, she couldn’t do it.
She sighed and started down the steps again.
“Your face is ugly when you scowl,” she said as she entered the room. “It displeases me exceedingly.”
“Then go somewhere you don’t have to look at it.”
She sat down on a stool beside the hearth. “Kadar wouldn’t like it.”
“Kadar.” He turned his head to look at her. “Is that why you’re here?”
“Why else would I be—” She met his gaze and shook her head. “It troubles me when you’re like this.”
“Does it?” He lifted his goblet to his lips. “Would you like to soothe me?”
“I’d like to help you.”
“No, you wouldn’t. Not in the way I want you to help.” He drained the goblet. “But if you don’t go away, I may ask it anyway.”
She smiled with effort. “That’s no great threat. I’ve refused you before.”
“No, you haven’t. I haven’t fallen that deep into the pit as yet.” He gazed at her for a long moment and then shifted his glance away. “Leave me.”
She sat unmoving.
His hand tightened with white-knuckled pressure on the goblet. “Leave me,” he said through his teeth. “Or, by God, I’ll call Abdul and have him carry you from this room.”
He meant it. She had never seen him like this. She slowly rose from the stool. “No one need force me. I take no pleasure in your company when you’re like this.” She started across the chamber. “Good night.”
“Wait!”
She glanced over her shoulder to see expression after expression flickering over Ware’s face. “What is it?”
“Nothing,” he muttered. “Nothing.” He lifted his goblet to her and smiled mockingly. “A moment of weakness. Shall we wager whether I succumb the next time?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, and I’m weary of trying to understand you.”
“No more than I am. I don’t understand myself at all of late.” He looked back into the fire. “But I wouldn’t wager on either my generosity or strength of will. It would be very unwise.”
Thea woke with a start in the darkness.
“Hush.” Ware was a massive shadow sitting on the bed beside her. “I’m not going to harm you.”
Her heart was beating so hard, she could scarcely speak. “You already have,” she said tartly. “Frightening me unto death is harm enough. Light the candle.”
“No, there’s moonlight. I can see you well enough.”
“Well, I can’t see you.” But she could sense him and the tension that seemed to reach out and enfold her. She was suddenly acutely conscious of scents and textures drifting to her in the darkness. The scent of leather, which always surrounded Ware, the fragrance of lemon, cedar, and mulberry drifting from the trees below on the green, the soft cotton coverlet against her naked body. She swallowed. “Light the candle.”
“I don’t want you to see me.” He reached out and touched her bare shoulder. “Silk,” he murmured. “Can you weave cloth this fine?”
Her skin seemed to burn beneath his fingers, yet she didn’t want to move. “Finer.”
“No,” he said thickly. “Not finer.”
“Have you had too much wine?”
“No, but I might have had enough.” He rubbed gently, sensuously at the hollow of her shoulder. “Why else am I here?”
“I don’t know. Go to your bed. You’ll feel better in the morning.”
“Not better, but not as mad, perhaps. They say dawn brings a sweet clarity of spirit.”
“What do you do here?”
“Madness. I thought I’d told you.”
She moistened