The Captive Maiden (3 page)

Valten stepped forward and caught Ruexner’s forearm and wrenched it behind his back. The horse’s hooves pawed the air mere inches from Ruexner’s face, causing his eyes to go wide and his friends to jump back. Valten let go of his arm, and Ruexner and his lackeys edged away. When they were twenty feet down the street, Ruexner called, “This will be your last tournament, Valten. For every blow you’ve ever given me, you’ll get double. I swear it.”

Valten made sure Ruexner and his friends kept walking, and waited to move until they were out of earshot.

When he turned around, the girl was staring at him.

No wonder Ruexner had noticed her. Her eyes were a clear blue, without a hint of gray or green. Her features were bold and generous — long, thick eyelashes, a straight, proud nose, a full brow, a gently squared chin, and high, prominent cheekbones. Her skin fairly glowed, and he had to remind himself to breathe.

She seemed to be studying his face too. “Thank you.” She abruptly turned away and continued on her way as if nothing had happened.

He stood stunned. Should he call after her? He only knew he couldn’t let her walk away, so he followed her.

As she turned down the narrow street to the blacksmith’s,
she looked over her shoulder. “Do you want something, my lord?” She added the last phrase with a bit of slyness in her voice, it seemed. She must realize who he was.

Never good at making conversation with maidens, he ransacked his brain for something appropriate to say. Another way Gabe had been better than him — talking with women. His brother always knew what to say, and it was always something charming or clever. Valten’s experience was much different. He’d had little time for women due to his travels and training, and most of the ones he’d met he’d only spoken to briefly. Their fathers had paraded them before him at balls given for the tournament knights, but he’d never known them long enough to feel comfortable. He had not been ready to marry, and therefore he had no interest in showing them how lacking he was in the art of conversation.

He hoped he didn’t sound like Ruexner as he said, “A fine destrier you have. He looks very much like my horse, Sieger.”

She turned and gave him her full attention. He marveled at her self-reliant expression, a unique trait in a woman, especially one who was less than twenty years old and obviously poor. Or maybe she was only eccentric, wearing ragged clothes to disguise herself, as he was doing.

“Thank you. He is a great horse.” Then she turned and continued walking.

He still wasn’t ready to let her go.

Chapter
2

He should look like your horse, Gisela almost
said.
The two are brothers.
But it was best she didn’t tell him. He wouldn’t remember her, wouldn’t recall that it was her father who had sold him the horse ten years ago — and had been dead almost that many years.

Valten — Lord Hamlin — followed her. But Gisela pretended not to notice, hoping to disguise how seeing him thrilled her and made her heart pound.

It was evident she was a stranger to him, though she would have recognized him even if that disgusting foreign knight hadn’t called him “Valten Gerstenberg.” His hair was shorter than she remembered and was more of a dark blond. He bore numerous small scars on his face, and his nose was crooked, no doubt from being broken in one of his many jousting tournaments. But his ruggedness, his height and breadth and confident swagger—even his scars — only added to his appeal. And the way he had come to her aid, the kindness and respect that shone from his eyes when he looked at her, made him the most handsome man she had ever seen.

And he’d not been the least afraid of that bully he called Ruexner.

She, on the other hand, had been terrified when the man blocked her way, though she knew better than to show fear.
Spitting fire and giving a man the evil eye usually intimidated him enough that he kept his distance. But this man had two large friends to embolden him.

When Valten appeared by her side, she was so relieved — and thrilled just seeing him—that her knees went weak. But she was also unnerved by her reaction. The response made her feel vulnerable, and she hated feeling vulnerable. So she kept walking, never turning back, when all she really wanted to do was look at him and ask him what his life had been like the past nine years — what he had been doing while she’d been dreaming about him in her desolate room, staring out her cold window and wondering where he was.

She could hear and sense him behind her as she approached the blacksmith’s. Did he want to talk to her? What could he possibly want to say? Even if he remembered her as that little girl from so long ago, he certainly hadn’t thought about her the way she’d thought about him. Besides that, she was a nobody now, disowned by her stepmother and stepsisters and without family of any kind.

The blacksmith, a burly man covered in soot, turned from his forge as she walked up.

Gisela forced any sign of emotion from her face and focused on her task. “My horse has thrown a shoe. How long to get him fitted with another?”

“One hour. This one’s ahead of you.” He pointed to a palfrey standing patiently on the tether.

After haggling a price with him, she lifted her arm to take the money from her moneybag, which she kept close to her side. She placed the sum in the blacksmith’s sooty palm. Gisela removed Kaeleb’s old, ragged saddlebag and stuffed it into the new one hanging over her shoulder, then whispered soft words in the horse’s ear while she attached a tether to his bridle.

She turned to leave and found herself face-to-face with
Valten, who was still standing behind her. He was so close she could see the flecks of brown in his green eyes.

“I will escort you … until your horse is ready.”

Gisela stared at him a moment before saying, “I thank you.”

She was unsure what to do next. Did he want her to take his arm? She walked toward him, trying not to look nervous, and together they started down the street.

Gisela suppressed the smile that tugged at her lips. She was walking beside Valten, future Duke of Hagenheim. She was considered slightly tall for a female, but even so had to look up to see Valten’s face.

He looked down and met her eye. “Where would you like to go?”

“I have no more business, except to wait for my horse.”

They meandered along a main street in the general direction of the Marktplatz, encountering people leaving the market with their purchases.

Where could they go? She and Valten needed a destination, something to do. Abruptly, Gisela said, “I would like to see your horse.”

She couldn’t tell if he was surprised, but he looked at her askance from his gray-green eyes. “You like horses?”

“More than people sometimes.” She sensed, by the way he was looking at her, that he felt the same way.

Their arms brushed as they passed through a tight crowd.

“We can go to the stable. Sieger expects me to visit him at least once a day.”

“I’d like to see him.”

Did Valten often meet women in the street and then offer to take them anywhere they wanted to go? She was determined to be on her guard. Could it be that he simply wanted to watch over her until she could return to the blacksmith’s shop for her horse? There was something in his eyes, such a look of chivalry.
Though the rest of him had transformed and matured since that day when he was fourteen, his eyes had not changed. Even then, he’d had trustworthy eyes.

“How long have you been away from Hagenheim?” She already knew, but she wanted to hear him speak.

“Two years.”

“Your family must have missed you.”

“So they told me.” Valten rubbed his chin, wincing. “I got scolded quite a bit. All three of my sisters are good at scolding.”

She tried to imagine what it must be like to have sisters who cared so much. His younger brother Gabehart, the one who had married Valten’s betrothed, had also been away for two years, living in Hohendorf. Did Valten miss him? She thought it best not to ask.

They continued on their way, forced to pass through the Marktplatz to reach the castle stable.

“Are you wearing those clothes to disguise yourself? No one seems to recognize you.”

“And yet you knew who I was.”

“I heard that coarse fellow say your name.”

“Ah.” He nodded. “But I am inconspicuous in these clothes, don’t you think?”

Gisela allowed herself a brief laugh. “You could hardly be inconspicuous no matter what you wore.” Her heart nearly stopped as she realized he could construe her words two different ways. Either she meant he looked so good that it didn’t matter what he wore—which was certainly true — or her real meaning, which was that he was so tall and broad and intimidating that he could hardly be missed.

They entered the most crowded part of the town square and were no longer able to converse. She couldn’t help but feel pleased at how he kept glancing behind to make sure she was there. When a particularly dirty, burly man stood in their way,
Valten waited for him to pass before leading her forward. A few minutes later, she got distracted by some leather feed bags at one booth and bumped into Valten’s back. She felt herself blush, but he pretended not to notice.

They emerged from the packed marketplace, and Hagenheim Castle stood before them as they approached the gatehouse. Valten nodded at the guard, who waved them through while glancing curiously at Gisela.

Once they were inside the castle wall and walking across the quiet yard toward the stable, she asked, “How many horses do you have?”

“Our family owns about thirty, but my father’s knights’ horses board here too.”

Excitement welled inside her as she anticipated seeing so many horses. At one time her father had owned twice that many, but her stepmother had sold them off one by one over the years — often for less than they were worth, since she was ignorant of their value — to satisfy her desire for extravagant clothing and carriages for herself and her daughters. Now her father’s stable housed fewer than ten.

As they made their way across the yard toward the stable, Gisela grew impatient with Valten’s slow stride, wanting to walk ahead of him as they drew near the dark building, where a horse was whinnying and two men were talking.

The men bowed respectfully when Valten entered, then went back to cleaning stalls.

Valten walked straight to the third stall on the right. A horse that looked almost identical to Kaeleb came and bobbed his head up and down over his stall door. He snuffled as Valten rubbed his cheek.

“This is Sieger.”

Gisela held her breath, wondering if the horse would remember
her. She let him smell her hand. He held still as she rubbed his forehead. “
Guten morgen
, Sieger.”

The big animal stretched his neck and sniffed her hair, then nickered. When he rubbed his head against her shoulder as if he had seen her only yesterday, her heart swelled inside her chest. She rubbed him behind his ear and he nickered again, wiggling his nose and searching her hand, no doubt looking for a carrot. He was remembering how she always fed him his favorite treat.

Valten gazed at her out of the corner of his eye before patting his horse. Sieger ignored him and nudged Gisela’s shoulder again.

“I’ve never seen him act this way with a stranger.”

Gisela remembered the last day she’d seen this beautiful creature — a day when life was still happy, when she felt safe and loved, and she still had a father to protect her. Seeing Sieger made her remember all the other horses she’d said good-bye to over the years.

“Perhaps he does know me.” She rubbed the destrier’s nose affectionately, breathing into his nostrils.

She could feel Valten’s eyes on her. With a final pat, she reluctantly moved away from Sieger and turned to Valten. “Can you show me your other horses?”

Valten stared a moment, then said, “Have you seen Sieger before?”

Gisela smiled innocently. “How could I?”

He frowned at her, then led her to the next stall, introducing her first to his courser, then to several other mounts, including the ponies and palfreys preferred by his three sisters. She got an idea about each sister’s personality as she got to know that girl’s horse, and as she listened to the small but pertinent information Valten gave about each one.

“Margaretha’s favorite horse is this palfrey.” Valten led her
to a horse with friendly eyes and a white blaze on her forehead. “Her horse loves to run, but she’s gentle and obedient.”

They moved to the next stall. “Kirstyn’s horse is calm and easy to manage, but she doesn’t like crowds.”

Gisela stopped to let the mare get a good look at her and sniff her hand before she rubbed the horse’s head.

“And this is Adela’s pony. We call her Dizzy because she dances around a lot.”

The pony was gray with white spots, a shaggy mane, and shy eyes. Gisela rubbed the pony and talked to him softly.

As much as she enjoyed meeting his sisters’ favorite horses, she found herself wishing she could meet his sisters and also see Valten with them. She imagined the youngest one asking him to play. He would pretend to be impatient with her — at first. When she begged, she imagined him eventually giving in, patiently playing a game with them. He would give her a piggyback ride and let them bring out a playful side he didn’t show anyone else. Yes, she would very much enjoy seeing him with his family.