Free Dreamspinner by Lynn Kurland Page B

actually rather glad for his mount’s rather pointed snorting directly into his ear. He shook his head, looked at the beast in annoyance, then found himself helplessly looking into eyes that were neither green, nor blue, nor grey, nor any other color he could name. They were all those things, only possessing a sort of translucence that left him feeling as if he weren’t quite firmly settled inside his poor form.
    Very well, so he couldn’t say she was beautiful, though perhaps that had to do less with the fairness of her face than with the fact that she looked to be under extreme duress. But nay, she wasn’t beautiful. Then again, in all his years before he’d gone with his family to the well, he had seen more than his share of absolutely breathtaking women. He supposed in the arrogance of his youth he had been well aware of the fairness of his own visage, the lure of his magic, and the appeal of his parentage. Beautiful women, elvish or not, had put themselves in his way, hoping to catch his eye. He had even considered coming to an understanding with one of them, a princess of Cothromaiche. It was possible that he had enjoyed those attentions perhaps more than he should have.
    But at no time had he ever looked at a woman and—
    He shook his head sharply. He was weary, that was it. Weary and frustrated and needing to have found a barn and slept the night before instead of having spent it walking. The wench was naught but a silly gel who would have been better served to have found a simple, unremarkable man to wed and settled down to making his suppers and providing him with sons.
    “You can’t be in earnest,” he said with a heavy sigh. “Gobhann?”
    “Aye,” she said, pulling his cloak more closely around her and lifting her chin. “I have business there that cannot be delayed.”
    “The only business you should have, my
lad
, is taking up your place again behind your mother’s skirts. Now, why don’t you let me turn you around and set you on the right path?”
    He reached for her, but she backed away.
    “I don’t need aid.”
    “I didn’t say you needed aid, I said you needed sense,” he said, reaching for her arm and taking hold of it. “Let’s go—”
    “Look out behind you! There in the woods!”
    He released her and turned around, drawing his sword as he did so. He braced himself, ready for anything, but fearing he would see there the man he had seen earlier that morning.
    But he saw nothing.
    His horse chortled, a particularly equine sort of snorting laugh that grated on Rùnach’s nerves. He took a deep breath and looked at Iteach.
    “Are you trying to help?”
    The damned horse only lifted an eyebrow and snorted again. Rùnach rolled his eyes, reached for his temper, and strode off across the muddy spring ground toward a place he was quite sure wouldn’t improve matters any. Whatever other failings his erstwhile companion might have had, the inability to sprint was not one of them. Whether she would make it to the gates before he did, however, was yet to be determined.
    He dashed after her and contemplated what he’d seen in her face. If he hadn’t known better, he might have thought there was desperation in her look. Perhaps that had less to do with determination than it did with a desire to find somewhere warm to sit andhave something decent to drink. Obviously the task that lay next in front of him was to tell her that she would find neither inside Weger’s formidable gates.
    At least his legs worked as they always had, which aided him in getting himself quickly to the gates before his companion. He knocked politely, then put himself in front of her when she tried to elbow her way past him. He shot her a warning look.
    “Go home.”
    “I must speak to Weger,” she said firmly.
    He couldn’t imagine why. Obviously she had absolutely no idea what she was in for. Indeed, he couldn’t bring to mind a single reason why a woman would want to go inside those gates and subject herself