Free Wings of the Storm by Susan Sizemore Page A

thought, not for the first and proba-bly not for the last time. She tried to put the sad image of the lonely Sibelle out of her mind as she threw herself onto her own straw mattress.
    Melisande and the puppies gathered around her. "Right," she said, rubbing the deerhound's ears. "Us womenfolk have to stay together, don't we?"
    She fell asleep soon after winning the nightly argu-ment with the dogs over who got the most bed space.
    Sometime in the middle of the night, Melisande woke her briefly with a low growl. The bed creaked as the dog got up to investigate some minor noise. She came back soon enough. Jane went immediately back to sleep.
    She dreamed once again of Sir Daffyd. In her dream they lay down together in a sun-warmed field of lavender, crushing a bed of tiny purple flowers to cushion their ardent embrace.
    His mouth claimed hers, making her giddy with desire. Without a word she told him he reminded her of chocolate. He asked her what chocolate was. His mouth covered hers. Does it taste like this?
    She undid his sword belt and told him how no man of her own time was like him.
    The thought woke her. Sitting up, she scrubbed her palms over her face. The dogs were warm lumps around her feet, the fur blanket was soft and warm, yet she was cold. Cold with dread? She shook her still somewhat sleep-fogged head. Why did she dream about the man? she wondered. She'd met him twice, but her subconscious seemed to have latched on to him as an object of desire.

    All right, she conceded, he was gorgeous. Per-haps she had a weird subconscious. Or maybe it was her conscious mind that had always been weird. She'd always looked to the past, hadn't she? She'd made the past her hobby and her profession. Maybe she'd been secretly longing for a knight in shining armor. Knights didn't wear shining armor in 1209, she reminded herself, and chivalry had been invented by women while the menfolk were out pillaging and crusading. Knights wore rusting chain mail and chased down peasants who had to steal to survive.
    But Daffyd wore chain mail better than anyone she'd ever seen, she told herself. He'd been worried about her safety this afternoon. That was almost chivalrous. This afternoon . . . She settled back on the bed and closed her eyes. She could see him clear-ly, gold hair flaming in the shaft of sunlight, the hard, handsome-lines of his face. She remembered the feel of his hands on her waist, of her hands on his, the softness of his hair, the scent of lavender and leather.
    He was very real, she warned herself. He was not any idealized, sanitized, twenty-first-century version of a medieval man. He was himself, and being attracted to him would be very dangerous indeed. He was a landless knight, and she was masquerad-ing as a rich widow. He might be interested in a rich widow for her dowry. She didn't let herself encour-age his attention in any way. He might get ideas. She had to remember marriage was a business arrangement. It was an arrangement with only one side benefiting: the man. She was not from this time, she couldn't be an obedient chattel. She didn't dare let herself be attracted to any man from this time. A convent was safe, a marriage to a man from this time was not.
    "Not that he'd necessarily be interested in mar-riage," she mumbled as she rolled over and tried to get back to sleep. "That would be even worse. Can't ruin my reputation if I want a convent to accept me.
    Can't think about Daffyd ap Bleddyn anymore."
    She fell asleep, and immediately back into the dream.
    7
    "Not Not on the floor!"
    Jane cracked the squatting dog hard on the backside. "Outside!"
    Melisande yelped and skittered away. She whim-pered impatiently by the alcove curtain while Jane hur-riedly finished struggling into her shift and underdress. Jane slipped her feet into shoes and fastened a veil over her uncombed brown curls.
    The first light of dawn was creeping in through her narrow window, and Melisande had been trying once again to use the far corner