Hey guys. Thank you all for understanding. Next week is the start of exams. Good because then I have a week off for writing, bad because I should be studying during that week off. We'll see how my time is spent. (I'm betting it'll be the former.)
A bit of disclaimer: There is amention ofS-E-Xin this chapter, although it is tastefully done (in my opinion). But,if you are a little sensitive, skip over that, er, paragraph. And remember, Aiden's a guy.
What, do I see the big 'L' word in this chapter? (gasp)
fell4adeadguy: Ah, Aiden's such a tease. Although, personally, I think Danni blushes too easily.
Glaze: Whoops, not two days. Sorry, but here you go. And... I'm not telling.
Tiger Lily21: That's cause Aiden is an awesome name. I like names that start with A for some reason. Lark sent Carpet through the wall. When Theo and Lynn pulled the ropes off his arm, he could control a little of his own magic, and since Lark is actually the one holding up the wall, he could send a couple things, like the note and Carpet, through the barrier.
UruvielTinuviel: Good luck! (crosses fingers for you) Wrist problems suck. Although, when I fractured my wrist, my school lent me a little keyboard computer thingy to type my notes because I couldn't hold a pencil. That was coolio. I'd give you some of my height, if I could.Maybe thenI'd come down from Amazon to warrior woman. I'll read your story as soon as you update it (no pressure ;c) )
TrudiRose: Thank you very much. I love sexual tension (in stories). Oh so fun.
moonlight and starlight: Thanks! I really like your name. That's an unusual spelling.
Ah, computer! You always call me away with your beautiful siren song! No more! I must study Chemistry now!
See you later!
-Lulai
Chapter Thirteen: Journey
Aiden laid the blanket on the ground as they sat for lunch. They had passed a vendor on the road and had bought a loaf of bread and some cheese for a silver coin before finding a small clearing with a large stone in it. Carpet stood beside the rock, grazing contentedly.
"How far is this monastery, exactly?" Danni asked, breaking the bread in her hands and handing one half to Aiden.
He took a bite as he thought it over. "By horse, it was only a half a day's ride," he replied, swallowing, "but by foot, it might be longer."
"Last night, you said that it was quite a ways away," Danni said with a frown.
"Last night, I was tired and wanted to go to sleep," Aiden returned, taking a bite of the suspiciously light cheese. It was surprisingly good. He took another bite. "It was a little white lie to make you go to bed."
Danni's scowl deepened. "You could have just asked me," she said.
"I did ask," he replied smoothly, wiping the crumbs from his shirt. "You were still bothering me."
"You never asked!" Danni exclaimed angrily.
"Of course I did," Aiden said, nonchalantly, flipping his hand in the air as he talked. "I told you to rest, and you assured me that you wouldn't rest comfortably unless I had a pillow."
"As I recall," Danni ground out from between clenched teeth, "I was the one who first suggested that we go to sleep, but you wouldn't listen."
"It's amazing how well you can talk without moving your jaw," Aiden remarked. He stood up. "That's because you kept insisting on me sleeping in your bed."
"What?" squeaked Danni, her cheeks beginning to blush.
Aiden realized what he said, and his ears began to become hot as well. He ignored them. "Er- I mean, you kept insisting that I take the bed, when only a man not in his right mind would let a woman sleep on the floor."
A wicked grin spread across his face as he levelled a teasing glance at Danni, her half eaten bread lying forgotten in her hand. "Mind you, I'm sure we could have shared the bed just as easily."
"Aiden!" Danni exclaimed, standing up, her face on fire. Aiden also ignored the swell in his chest when she exclaimed his name instead of his title.
"Are you going to eat that?" he asked instead, pointing at the half of loaf, looking quite crushed and forlorn in her fist.
Danni looked at the bread as if she had totally forgotten its existence. She shook her head mutely and handed over the bread. Her lips were pressed tightly together with irritation.
"Fabulous," he said, taking the proffered bread. He finished off the loaf while folding up the blanket and laying it across Carpet's saddle.
"Shall we be off then?" he asked, holding out his hand to her. She nodded, still not talking to him. They walked quietly down the path.
"Why are all the trees gone?" Danni asked, her curiosity finally overriding her annoyance. The forest had been cut back about a hundred yards from the road.
"Before the monastery was put in," Aiden explained, "travellers on this road were often set upon by robbers. They cut back the trees to let the travellers get a little bit of a warning."
"Robbers?" Danni asked, slightly alarmed. She realized that they hadn't come with a single weapon. They were totally unarmed.
"No need to be worried," Aiden reassured her. "There hasn't been a robbery here for about a hundred years." His eyes twinkled. "I guess committing a crime so close to a monastery was worse in God's eyes than committing a crime elsewhere."
Relief swept across her face. He smiled. He loved the way her face always reflected her vibrant emotions.
It was like a punch in the gut.
He loved her.
When had it happened? When had he fallen in love with her? He studied her discreetly from the corner of his eye. There was something genuine about her, even as Danni the boy and Daniela the Princess. She was witty and kind, and fun to tease, when she wasn't scared away by his title. Aiden sighed. If she was ever going to care for him as well, he'd have to overcome that obstacle.
Danni looked at him curiously, wondering what he was thinking about that was making him sigh.
"Tell me about your mother," Aiden stated suddenly.
"What?" Danni asked, confusion plainly showing in her features. "I've already told you about my mother."
"You've told me that she was dead. What was her name? What was she like?"
Danni looked at the sky above her, grief pulling at her features. "Her name was Ella. She was a lady's maid for a… baroness, I think. She lost her job right before I was born. We lived in a little cottage for a little while. Those were the happiest days of my life. She was beautiful and kind and had the loveliest singing voice I ever heard. We would play games, sing songs, even just lay on the grass and make up stories. She was my best friend, my sister, and my mother all rolled in one."
Her eyes misted a little. "Then she became ill and we were evicted all in one week. Bad things in our lives seemed to come in twos, I guess. Although Mama was adamant that me being born was the best thing that could happen to her. Anyway, I was about ten at the time. We had to move to Barrish and I worked in the stables as hard as I could to raise money for her. But it was too little."
Her voice dropped to a whisper. "She died a week later." Fat tears rolled down her cheeks. "It felt as though my life had collapsed in upon itself. My mother was dead, in the ground. We would never tell stories, never dance, she would never see me grow up…" she trailed off as her voice choked. Aiden stopped and pulled her to him.
She resisted slightly at first, but then collapse into his wonderfully firm chest. Fisting his white shirt in both hands, she bawled. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she realized that this was the second time in as many days that she had cried on royalty, but it felt so good to let all her grief out. She had forced it all down inside so many times that it felt like a ball of lead in her chest.
Now, standing here in the middle of a dirty road, in the arms of a prince, she felt the blackness around her heart start to crumble and fall away.
"I'm sorry," she said, finally, wiping her raw cheeks with the sleeves of her borrowed shirt. "I thought that I would have cried all these tears long ago."
"No apology is necessary, Danni," Aiden said tenderly, running his thumb down her jaw. "Your mother sounds like a wonderful woman. You are one of the luckiest people in the world to have known her."
She sent him a sunny smile through her puffy eyes. "Thank you." She took a deep breath… and a step back.
"We should continue on our way," she said. Her heart was still tender, and she was very much afraid that she might be falling in love with Aiden, a situation that could only lead to heartbreak.
"Of course," Aiden agreed.
"So?" Danni asked after he had gathered the reins and they were continuing on their way.
Aiden raised a raven eyebrow. "So, what?"
Danni blushed and looked at her toes for a minute. "I've told some personal things about me." She looked at him, the corner of her mouth tucked up. "Perhaps you can tell me something about you."
"What would you like to know?" Aiden asked amusedly.
She took a deep breath. The thought had been plaguing her for a while. "If you had such suspicions about Vardon, why didn't you tell anyone?"
Aiden's mouth straightened into a line.
"I'm sorry," Danni said, hurriedly. "I didn't mean to upset you."
"No," Aiden said, running his fingers through his hair, "it's alright." He paused a moment. "When my sister was ten, she received a bracelet from my parents. It was a pretty little thing, gold and silver, with two little horse charms on it. About two weeks later, it went missing. That afternoon, I saw one of the maid's sneak out of the library with something that glinted in the torchlight. She was so suspicious, that I was sure that she had stolen my sister's bracelet."
"What happened?" Danni whispered, her eyes wide.
Aiden's face was stony. "I reported her to my parents who promptly fired her. My sister then found the bracelet behind her bureau." His voice was laced with self disgust. "The object in the maid's hands was actually a necklace from her dead mother. But the stigma of the theft followed her around everywhere. She never found work again."
He turned to her, his eyes filled with anger. "I never say anything anymore without absolute proof."
Danni laid a comforting hand on his shoulder. "It was an honest mistake. You were what, eleven?"
"Twelve," Aiden said shortly.
"Twelve then," Danni said softly. "You had ample reason to believe that she had taken it. Anyone might have come to the same conclusion."
"But no one else did. I did. I ruined that woman's life." Aiden looked off into the trees. "It wasn't just that woman's reputation that was ruined. No one seemed to believe me anymore. Theo and Lynn would humour me, but I knew they didn't really believe me deep down." He gave her a sad smile. "Theo didn't believe me about you."
It almost broke Danni's heart to see such sadness in his eyes. She took his free hand in both of hers. "I would have believed you."
Aiden squeezed her hands. "I know." He wanted to kiss her. No, that was a lie. He wanted to take her, right there in the middle of the road. He wanted to sink himself into her, into her goodness and her vitality. He wanted her to be his and only his. He wanted…
Danni shivered, but she wasn't cold. Could one shiver from being too… hot? There was naked desire in Aiden's eyes, sending delicious sensations whipping through her body.
"There's- there's the monastery," Danni stammered, nervousness making her voice unnaturally loud. Aiden shuttered his gaze, and Danni had to fight down a intense feeling of disappointment.
"That wasn't too far away, now was it?" Aiden said, tucking her hand into the crook of his elbow.
"No, not at all," Danni managed to say. Her heart was still pounding, deafeningly loud to her own ears.
"Prince Aiden," a young monk called, descending the stone stairs at a relatively fast pace for being a man of the cloth.
"Crispin," Aiden said with a great deal of warmth in his voice. Then, to Danni's surprise, the two young men hugged, thumping each other's back.
"I haven't seen you in an age," Aiden said, grinning.
The monk, Crispin, grinned back. "You haven't changed much, Denny."
Aiden threw back his head and laughed. "I haven't heard that name since I was seven!" He grasped his friend's hand. "It's so good to see you again."
"And who is this lovely lady that you are travelling with?" Crispin asked.
Aiden held out his had to Danni who was still standing beside Carpet. "This is Lady Daniela."
Danni moved forward and extended her hand in greeting. "Call me Danni, please."
Crispin gripped her hand warmly, bringing it to his lips for a kiss. He looked from Aiden to Danni and back to Aiden.
"I hope you are not here to ask me to perform an elopement," he said, trying, unsuccessfully, to smother a grin.
Danni's face went bright scarlet, but Aiden answered smoothly, "No. Unfortunately, my reasons for being here are far less pleasant."
Crispin nodded, his face as serious as Aiden's. "Come, then. We can talk about it over dinner. Brother Harold will care for your horse."
The three marched up the stairs into the great stone building.