“I still do not believe it,”. I declared Burrich? And the woman had liked it?
“Has he really a small scar, here, shaped like a crescent moon?” She put her hand high on my hip and looked at me from under her lashes.
I opened my mouth, shut it again. “I cannot believe that women chatter of such things,” I said at last.
“In the washing courts, they talk of little else,” Molly divulged calmly.
I bit my tongue until curiosity overwhelmed me. “What do they say of Hands?” When we had worked in the stables together, his tales of women had always astonished me. .
“That he has pretty eyes and lashes, but that all the rest of him needs to be washed. Several times.”
I laughed joyously, and saved the words for when next he bragged to me. “And Regal?” I encouraged her.
“Regal. Umm.” She smiled dreamily at me, then laughed at the scowl on my face. “We do not speak of the Princes, my dear. Some propriety is kept.”
I pulled her back down beside me and kissed her. She fit her body to mine and we lay still under the arching blue sky. Peace that had eluded me for so long now filled me. I knew that nothing could ever part us, not the plans of kings nor the vagaries of fate. It seemed, finally, to be the right time to tell her of my problems with Shrewd and Celerity. She rested warm against me and listened silently as I spilled out to her the foolishness of the King’s plan and my bitterness at the awkward position it brought me. It did not occur to me that I was an idiot until I felt a warm tear spill and then slide down the side of my neck.