Medieval 02 - Forbidden

to my bed.”
    “Mmmm,” was all Cassandra offered.
    Amber said no more.
    “You have few words,” Cassandra said.
    “I follow your teaching, Learned,” Amber replied formally.
    “Why are you so distant?”
    “Why are you quizzing me like a stranger caught within the keep’s walls?”
    Cassandra sighed and held out her hand.
    “Come,” she said. “Walk with me in the hour that is neither day nor yet night.”
    Amber’s eyes widened. Cassandra rarely offered to touch anyone, especially Amber, to whom touch was often painful and always uncomfortable.
    Except for the stranger. His touch had been purest pleasure.
    “Cassandra?” Amber whispered. “Why?”
    “You look hunted, daughter. Touch me and know that I am not one of your pursuers.”
    Hesitantly, Amber brushed her fingers along the other woman’s hand. As always, a sense of fierce intelligence and deep affection flowed from Cassandra.
    “I want only joy for you, Amber.”
    The truth of Cassandra’s words flowed through the touch like a bright scarlet ribbon.
    A bittersweet smile curved Amber’s lips as her hand dropped to her side. She doubted that Cassandra knew what a joy touching Duncan was to Amber.
    And if Cassandra had known, Amber doubted that she would wish more of it for her pupil.
    When the wise woman turned and walked slowly toward the moonlight pooled in the meadow just beyond the cottage, Amber followed, walking by Cassandra’s side.
    “Tell me about the man you have chosen to call Duncan,” Cassandra said.
    The words were as soft as twilight, but the command just beneath them was not soft at all.
    “Whatever he was before he came to the Stone Ring,” Amber said, “he knows none of it.”
    “And you?”
    “I saw the marks of battle on his body.”
    “Dark warrior…”
    “Yes,” Amber whispered. “Duncan.”
    “Is he a brute, then?”
    “No.”
    “How can you be so certain? A bound man can do little save try to free himself by strength or guile.”
    “I cut his bonds.”
    Cassandra’s breath came out in an audible rush as she crossed herself.
    “Why?” she asked in a strained voice.
    “I knew he meant me no harm.”
    “How?” Cassandra asked, fearing the answer even as she demanded it.
    “The usual way. I touched him.”
    Hands clasped, Cassandra stood, swaying like a willow in a slow wind.
    “When he came to you,” she asked in a strained voice, “was it night?”
    “Yes,” Amber said.
    In shades of darkness he will come to you .
    “Are you mad?” Cassandra asked in a horrified tone. “Have you forgotten? Be therefore as sunlight, hidden in amber, untouched by man, not touching man. Forbidden .”
    “Erik required that I touch the stranger.”
    “You should have refused.”
    “I did, at first. Then Erik pointed out that no man gets fully grown without a name. Therefore, the prophecy holds no—”
    “Don’t presume to teach a falcon how to fly,” Cassandra interrupted angrily. “Did the man know his own name when he awakened?”
    “No, but that could change at any moment.”
    “By Mother Mary’s sweet smile, I have raised a reckless fool!”
    Amber wanted to defend herself, but could think of nothing to say. When she was away from Duncan, the recklessness of her own actions in touching him appalled her.
    Yet when she was with him, no other action seemed possible.
    As one, both women turned around to go back to the cottage. As one, they stopped.
    Erik was standing a few feet ahead of them.
    “Are you proud of your work?” Cassandra asked him acidly.
    “And a good evening to you, too,” Erik said. “What have I done now to earn the sharp side of a Learned woman’s tongue?”
    “Amber has touched a man with no name who came to her in shades of darkness. Brought, I might add, by a young thane with no more brains than a drystone wall!”
    “What would you have had me do?” Erik asked. “Gut him as though he were a salmon to be salted?”
    “You could have waited until I—”
    “You do not rule Stone Ring Keep, madam,” Erik interrupted coolly. “I do.”
    “Just so,” Cassandra said with a thin smile.
    Erik let out an explosive breath. “I respect your wisdom, Cassandra, but I am no longer yours to order about like a squire.”
    “Aye. And that is as it should be.”
    “We are in agreement on that, at least.” But Erik smiled as he spoke. “Since it is impossible to undo that which has been done, what do you suggest we do?”
    “Try to bend events so that life rather than