Hunt- Red Riding Hood Retold Page 7

  Unless she'd lied about her age, but he doubted that. She liked discomfiting him with the truth far too much.

  Nothing he said or did seemed to discomfit her…except when she'd seen the cup. Maja's cup, that Abraham had turned to gold at a touch.

  If her eyes had taken on a greedy glitter at the sight of so much gold, he would not have been surprised, but she'd looked…saddened. Disappointed, perhaps? So, out of respect for his hostess, he'd asked her to hide it again.

  Her good spirits had returned as she bustled about, stoking the fire and seeing to breakfast. She hummed a little as she worked, but it was no song Chase recognised.

  If he closed his eyes, he might be back in the kitchens of the castle where he and Abraham had fostered together, hoping for a treat from the cook before being sent back up to the Great Hall to serve at table, as a good page should.

  But those days were gone, and Mistress Rosa's humble cottage would not yield the same fare as a castle kitchen. Likely he wouldn't see meat again until he was well enough to return to the Baron's house.

  He would find a way to repay her, he promised himself. Once he'd killed the wolf and received his reward from the Baron.

  "Can you sit up?" she asked, setting a plate on the table.

  She didn't wait for an answer, slipping an arm behind his back to lift him with unexpected strength.

  Chase gritted his teeth against the pain he expected, but it never came. He stared at her in surprise.

  "That medicinal mead's powerful stuff, is it not? I told you it would heal you by dinnertime." She winked. "Ah, but there's no such thing as magic, is there?" Her mischievous eyes dared him to admit he'd lied about believing in magic. She'd seen the cup. She knew.

  "All the magic I've seen up 'til now has caused nothing but grief, so you'll forgive me if I am not so ready to believe it can be a force for good," he said, turning his gaze to his plate so that he might avoid those knowing blue eyes. Yet even the plate wasn't what he'd expected – for even the Baron's table had been set with trenchers of stale bread. And what lay upon it…fried eggs, slices of some sort of spiced sausage, several slices of fresh bread, though there was no butter. He automatically looked across the table, even as he told himself he'd be lucky to get butter here.

  Her sharp eyes missed nothing. She grinned as she bit into a piece of bread, thickly spread with something white. She chewed and swallowed before she said, "I wasn't sure if you'd want cheese or butter with your bread, so I set out both." She pushed two bowls toward him. "I think I put too much honey in the ricotta, so it's sweeter than it should be, but I find a little extra sweetness in the morning is not such a bad thing."

  He stared at his plate. His belly growled at him to eat all that lay upon it, but he could not. "I cannot accept all this, for I cannot pay you for it. Mistress Rosa, I cannot in conscience let you empty your cellar for me. Please, take some for yourself."

  She burst out laughing. "Sir Chase, if you ate ten times that much, you could not empty my cellar, not if you stayed here a year. Now. You lost plenty of blood before I got you home, and you will need your strength. Mine will be ready soon, and then I'll join you." She headed over to the fire, tipping the contents of a pan onto her own plate. Not quite as much as she'd served him, but the sausage and eggs were plain enough to tell him he'd been mistaken about her.

  He waited no longer, taking up his eating knife to devour the food before him like he hadn't eaten in a week.

  Then again, he wasn't sure how long he'd been asleep.

  "Healing yourself does work up an appetite, for magic can only do so much. The rest is up to you. There's more bread and I can fetch more sausage, but you'll have to wait until tomorrow for more eggs. Eat your fill, Sir Chase." She handled her eating knife with all the delicacy of a court lady.

  She didn't belong in a hovel on the outskirts of some tiny backwoods village.

  "Who are you?" he asked. "And what are you doing here?"

  She set down her knife, her eyes widening with surprise. "Why, Sir Chase, you must have injured your head worse than I thought. I am Mistress Rosa, the witch of these woods, and when you fell from a tree, I rescued you and brought you here to my home to heal you. I thought to share a pleasant meal with you before I commence my work for the day, while you rest. But perhaps I should check your head first." She reached for him.

  Chase caught her wrist before she could touch him. "Not before you answer me. What have you done to me? How did I get here?"

  He became aware of something sharp pressed against his throat. He glanced down, and found himself staring at the hilt of his own knife, floating in the air.

  "What are you?" he whispered.

  Her eyes seemed to glow. "I'm a witch who doesn't take kindly to threats. I may have saved your life once, but that doesn't mean I'll hesitate to take it back. Especially from such a poor guest, threatening your host when I have spent the last two days healing you. You're lucky I have a greater grudge against the wolves than the momentary irritation of the insult you've offered me."

  It was like facing Queen Margareta in the court of Aros all over again. Except this time he had nothing left to lose. Chase sagged. "Then I must beg your forgiveness, though I do not deserve it. Magic has meant ill luck for me at every turn, so that I cannot recognise anything else. I have nothing left to offer but myself, and I am poor compensation for anything. Yet…I pledge my sword and my honour in your service, until my debt to you is paid."

  Custom required him to kneel and lay his blade at her feet, but he had no idea what had become of his blade, and if he tried to get out of bed, all he would do is fall at her feet. So he bowed his head and hoped it would be enough. At least if she refused, his death would be swift, for he could still feel the blade at his throat.

  "Now I know you have drunk too much of the medicinal mead. A highborn knight, pledging himself to a witch? You must have mistaken me for your princess, or someone else. I have no need of swords or service or men at all."

  But he could not feel the blade any more.

  "Rest and regain your strength, Sir Chase. Maybe you'll regain your wits along the way. You may stay for the week, but then I must send you on your way, back to the Baron." Her smile held sympathy – something else he did not deserve. Then she touched his forehead and sleep engulfed him.

  Almost like some sort of spell.

  Twenty-Three

  For a moment, Rosa almost regretted putting the knight into an enchanted sleep, but she banished the thought as quickly as it had come. She needed to take out his stitches and check how his bones were healing, instead of wasting time arguing with him.

  Pledging himself in service to her, indeed! That had been the mead talking, more than the man. The only thing she could possibly use help with was killing the wolf, and what use was a man with a sword against an entire wolf pack?

  But he hadn't been wearing a sword when she found him. Just the empty sheath. Oh, and he'd had a bow and quiver strapped to his back. Speaking about size, she'd never seen a bow so big. Taller than he was. She couldn't imagine how much strength it would take to draw such a thing, and he would need to heal some more before she could ask him to show her.

  She changed the bandages around his ribs, noting with satisfaction that the bruising was already fading to yellow. With another dose of medicinal, they might have healed properly by the morrow.

  She would have liked to leave the stitches in for another day, but she wasn't sure she'd get another chance if he woke up even grumpier than before, so she decided to take them out today, and mend the wound with a healing spell instead.

  He might be a fool, blaming magic for his own ill luck, but she would not compromise her care on account of his foolishness.

  When Rosa was satisfied that she'd done all she could for the snoring knight, she climbed up to the loft to check on the mead. As she'd surmised, the fermentation had finished and it was ready to be moved to the cellar to mature. That meant moving it from these casks to new ones, a task that
would easily take the rest of the day, and perhaps the next, too.

  By mid afternoon, she was lifting the barrels through magic alone, for her arms ached more than she cared to admit. Yet she'd dealt with more than half of the mead, so there would be less to move on the morrow.

  Rosa floated the newly filled barrels to the cellar, then rolled them into place at the back of the cellar, where they would not be disturbed until they were ready.

  If she had time on the morrow, she'd try her hand at turning the remaining barrels in the loft into extra strong, medicinal mead. She had to do something close to home, what with Sir Chase here in her cottage.

  But such things could definitely wait until the morrow.

  Sir Chase slept through the dinner hour and past dusk, so Rosa finished off the remains of the bread and sausage without cooking anything, and climbed into bed.

  Her last thought before she fell asleep was that at least there was one benefit to having Sir Chase stay – it was warmer at night.

  Twenty-Four

  Chase could not remember the last time he'd slept in a bed so warm. Maybe when he'd been a boy, and shared a bed with his brothers on the cold winter nights. The sound of their even breathing had lulled him back to sleep then, but the sound of someone else breathing beside him set his every nerve on alert now.

  What was the witch doing to him?

  He reached out, and his hand closed over something soft and warm.

  Her breast, he realised in horror, yanking his hand back, but it was too late.

  "Yes, that's a breast, Sir Chase the Chaste. Your mother had them, and if you ever find the courage to propose to a woman, your wife will, too."

  He'd touched fabric, not flesh, but the thin shift had left nothing to the imagination. "Why are you in my bed in nothing but your underthings?" he demanded, feeling his desire rising even as he tried to think of something, anything, else but the near-naked woman lying in bed beside him. Close enough to touch…

  "Because it's my bed, you fool. Even with you taking over most of it, there's still space for me."

  Shame washed over him. Of course it was her bed. A place he had no business being, even if she'd put him here.

  "I'll sleep on the floor," he mumbled, sliding a leg out from under the blankets. Cold air chilled his flesh, but honour gave him no choice.

  "You will not. You'll freeze your man parts off, and other bits, besides. I haven't tended you for days to let you freeze to death on my floor."

  Impossibly, her arms wrapped around him, pulling his body against hers.

  Soft, warm flesh, with only a thin shift between them, her breasts pressing against his back, tempting him, taunting him…

  "But…your honour…" he began, trying to pull away.

  For a woman, she was uncommonly strong. More magic?

  "My honour? What about yours? Isn't that the mark of a knight, his high honour? Surely you can find it in yourself to be honourable enough to share a bed with a woman without molesting her in the night. At least, I thought you would be. Was I mistaken, Sir Chase the not-so-chaste?"

  The taunt stung, especially as his thoughts were anything but honourable.

  "You were not mistaken," he said stiffly. "If I but had my sword, I could lay it between us, for honour's sake. Forgive me for touching you…where I did. If I had but known you were there, I would not have reached out. It will not happen again."

  She laughed softly. "If I have to choose between sharing a bed with a sword or risk being woken by the occasional caress, I'll choose you and your wandering hands, Sir Chase."

  He felt the blood rising in his cheeks, and other places besides. Thank all that was holy he had his back to her.

  Her breathing soon returned to the even pattern of sleep, but Chase lay awake for a long time.

  When he woke groggily the next morning, he found the bed empty. A sense of loss skimmed through his mind, too fleeting to catch.

  Chase shook his head. She was right. He had suffered a blow to the head, and it had turned him into a fool for sure.

  Twenty-Five

  For the third night, Rosa dreamed of Midwinter night, and the rite she was required to undertake if she wished to take her grandmother's place a priestess. Only a few days hence, and the gods had given her a man who would be living under her roof that very night. Almost as though they wished she would choose him.

  A far better choice than Alard, for the knight would soon leave. The highborn knight probably thought peasant women shared their beds with noblemen like him as a matter of course, and he'd probably never think of her again afterward. A good thing, she told herself as she forced herself out of bed.

  Rosa crept outside in the predawn light, holding her cloak tightly closed against the cold. She longed to return to bed, and see if she could wake the knight with a well-placed squeeze or caress. She'd done more than that in her dreams, and so had he. She laughed softly. No man could be as good as her dream lover had been with his hands, even if last night he'd worn the face of Sir Chase.

  With Midwinter approaching, she shouldn't be so surprised the gods of the forest were sending her such dreams. Better that she spend the day working outside, for the more time she spent with the knight, the more likely she was to say something about his prowess in her dreams. Or how much she'd liked the feel of his hand on her breast last night. His touch had been surprisingly gentle, even as it set her heart alight.

  She blamed her mother's tales of knights and princesses, chivalry and other such nonsense. Tales for normal girls, like Lule and Piroska, for whom marrying some nobleman was the highest ambition they might have, but not suitable for a witch.

  Her grandmother's tales had taught her far more, about the woods, and the history of this place, and magic. So much about magic.

  But the tale uppermost in her mind now was about mead, and how one winter it had been so cold, the mead froze in the castle cellars. When the brewer had skimmed off the icicles and poured the remaining liquid into a new barrel, she'd found the mead more potent than anything she'd brewed before. The goddess of winter had blessed her brew, she decided, and offered up barrels of mead to her at Midwinter every year. When the longest night of the year ended, the Midwinter's Night mead was the best and strongest of all.

  So Rosa had left some barrels outside last night, hoping they might freeze, and they told the truth of her grandmother's stories – frost rimed the sides of the barrels, and a thin layer of ice floated on top of the mead. She skimmed off the ice, poured the first barrel into a fresh one and dipped a cup into the liquid to taste it. Sure enough, it was stronger than the stuff she'd cellared yesterday.

  By the time she was done with all the barrels, the sun was up, and the ice in the empty barrels had melted, so she left the casks in the sun to keep them from refreezing as she headed to the barn to milk the goats and fetch the day's eggs.

  When she left the barn, he stood in the cottage doorway, squinting at the sun. Not naked any more – he'd found his clothes, and managed to put them on. He must be feeling better.

  But that didn't mean he should be walking on that leg yet.

  She opened her mouth to order him back to bed.

  "Good morning, Mistress Rosa," he said, bowing, before he walked toward her.

  He did not wince like a man in pain, nor did he limp. He was healed, Rosa decided, breathing a sigh of relief. Perhaps she could heal a man after all. Though that medicinal mead had definitely helped. She must make some more.

  "Well met, Sir Chase. I was just fetching something for breakfast." She lifted the egg basket.

  He frowned. "I should carry that for you. Leave it here. I will be but a moment…" He scanned the clearing, as if looking for something he'd lost.

  Rosa smothered a smile. "The outhouse is that way." She pointed.

  The knight flushed, muttering his thanks, as he loped off toward the outhouse.

  Twenty-Six

  Rosa's eyes sparkled with unusual brilliance this morning, like the sun glittering off blu
e ice. Her cheeks were pink more from cold than any blushing at his fumbling in the dark last night. Perhaps she'd forgotten it.

  He wished he could. Even washing in the icy well water hadn't helped.

  She finished her breakfast quickly, then headed back outside. She returned with a paddle loaded with two loaves of bread. She dropped these on the table. "Careful, they're hot," she called over her shoulder on her way out. Two more loaves soon joined the first two, whereupon Rosa enveloped one in a cloth and began to cut thick slices from it.

  "Now this is what butter was made for," she said, spreading it thickly onto the heel of the loaf. She bit into it before the butter could melt. "Mmm."

  Chase gripped the table with both hands. Watching a woman eat had never done this to him before. Maybe if he jumped into the well and stayed there until everything was numb, he'd manage to cool his ardour.

  "Help yourself," she said. "After watching you break your fast yesterday, I hope I've made enough."

  She lingered long enough to grab a second piece before she departed again.

  Chase deliberately took his time finishing breakfast, thinking about all things cold and as unlike the young witch as possible.

  It didn't help. The moment he was done, she entered the cottage again, this time headed for the ladder to the loft.

  "Sir Chase, would you go and stand by the fire for a moment? I'd hate for you to get in the way. If I broke your ribs after all that effort healing them, I'd be a poor host indeed."

  He headed for the fire, happy to warm himself while she did…whatever it was. It sounded like it involved moving something heavy. It was on the tip of his tongue to offer to help, but a gust of wind rushed through the open door. He headed to close that first.

  "Oh, by all that's holy…stand aside or be it on your head!"

  Chase whirled at the sound of her voice and froze, transfixed. A row of barrels floated toward him, supported by nothing but air. Headed for the door behind him.