Free Keeper of the Dream by Penelope Williamson Page B

regarding her in silence. He wasn’t surprised to feel his sex stir, lengthening, swelling. He had been a while without a woman and fighting always made him randy. He considered taking her after all, though he’d likely have to leave her bound, and stuff the gag back in her mouth.
    While he studied her, she hadn’t moved, nor did her expression give anything away. Finally, she took a deep breath. “Would you … the ropes are tied so tightly …” Her mouth pressed into a long, tight line.
    He waited, but that was the most he was going to get out of her. “I might consider untying you, if I weren’t convinced you’d come after my eyes again with your claws.”
    “I won’t. I give you my word.”
    Raine read the lie in her eyes. He knew well the Welsh. They would die before breaking their word if given to friend or kin, but they didn’t consider binding an oath given to an enemy. They reckoned that God, being on the side of Wales, would forgive such perfidy. In truth, in their perverted way, the Welsh considered it honorable to cheat and trick a foe.
    “ ’Twould be a waste of your breath,” he said. “We Normans have a saying as well … ‘A Welshman’s honor isn’t worth a leper’s piss.’”
    She reacted as if stung by a wasp. Her whole body jerked and her head snapped back. “How dare you, of all people, impugn my honor. I’ll have you know that I am—”
    “You are?” he prompted.
    “Nobody.”
    Suddenly weary of the game, Raine turned away.
    “Wait! Please …” He turned back. “I swear to you on the blood of Christ I will not harm you.” Raine snorted, and her voice grew desperate. “I’ll even take an oath on the relic in your sword if you like.”
    Every knight’s sword had a holy relic encased in the hilt. Raine’s happened to be the eyetooth of Saint Peter, or so he had been told. He thought it more likely, considering the size of the thing, that the tooth had belonged to a wolfhound with a penchant for gnawing on tough bones. But whether the relic was of saint or beast, he wasn’t letting her within a spitting distance of his sword.
    Still, he restoppered the costrel and tossed it back into the coffer, then strolled over to the bed. He sat down beside her again and she struggled awkwardly over onto her side so that he could get at the bindings. Her tunic was now rucked up practically around her waist, revealing just the barest hint of firm, rounded buttocks. He ran his finger beneath the curved edge of one soft cheek.
    She sucked in a sharp breath and her head whipped around. “You b—”
    He held up the gag. “Don’t say it.”
    She snapped her jaws together. But if looks could kill, he would have been dancing a carole with the devil in hell.
    Her flesh had been softer than the down of a newborn chick. He wanted to run his hands along the length of her calves, up the inside of her thighs, between them….
    He sliced quickly through the thongs and pushed to his feet, backing away from her. He did not at all like the way his body was reacting to her, not when his mind insisted on leaving her the bloody hell alone.
    The first thing she did was jerk her tunic down over her legs. She straightened, moving slowly, a grimace twisting her face. She chafed at the marks on her wrists. Though the blood rushing back into her cramped muscles must have been agony, she didn’t make a sound.
    Raine had backed up until he was propped against thetent’s center pole. He crossed his legs at the ankles and folded his arms across his chest. She lifted her head to meet his eyes and he saw her throat work as she swallowed hard. “What … what do you mean to do with me?”
    “Nothing. Let you go.”
    Her eyes grew wide. “But why? Aren’t you going to—” She cut herself off, and he was amused in spite of himself at the color that flooded her face. As if she didn’t know a dozen such words for what she was offering.
    He supplied a few. “Plow you? Swive you? Lay you? Tup you? Nay, wench, I