Chapter Eight: Angel Eyes
Two months later
Alennia rode slowly through the forest, perfectly content to let her mare amble along at her own pace. It had been a long, hard winter, and finally spring was drawing in. The snow was melting in the mountains, and in the valleys Alennia could see brave shoots beginning to push up through the warming earth.
Spring was always Alennia's favourite time of year. Or at least it had been for the last two years. For it heralded the beginning of the Saxon raids on the coast. There was a time, Alennia thought, when the thought of Saxons made her quake in fear, but since they had slaughtered her family one autumn on the beaches of her homeland, she had lived to kill them.
A fierce pleasure rose in her as she thought of the hordes of Saxons coming to her country where she waited to spill their blood. She lived a cruel and brutal existence nowadays: she led a band of men and women, some no more than children. All had suffered at the hands of the Saxons in some way, and all, like Alennia, lived for revenge. It was not perhaps as satisfactory a life as Alennia had anticipated, but she had nothing left to live for, save to make the Saxons suffer as they had once made her suffer.
And yet she did have something to live for, a part of her mind told her, and her fingers automatically crept to the cloak that she wore. The memory of a pair of kind eyes on a wild-looking face, a rough voice hiding a gentle soul.
She sighed exasperatedly. Look at her! Her usually composed mind falling to bits at a man she had known less than twenty-four hours! What was she coming to! Alennia laughed gaily at her own folly, unable to be unhappy, for it was spring, and the Saxons would soon be queuing up to taste her sword.
A bird swooped down on the path in front of her, catching a mouse in its claws, and carrying the struggling beast up onto a branch by the side of the track through the trees to eat it. Alennia watched the hawk with interest, and something in the back of her mind recognised it. She frowned slightly, and then a knowing, and yet delighted smile crept onto her face.
Suddenly an arrow shot out of the trees and buried itself in a tree trunk by her head. Alennia laughed out loud, not at all put out by her narrow escape.
"Is that any way to treat a stranger?" she asked the woods teasingly, quoting words spoken two years previously.
A man with tattooed cheeks and wild hair rode out of the trees, with an amused grin on his face.
"I see you've learnt to ride," he commented.
"And I see you're still as uncivil as ever," Alennia could not help but grinning with sheer delight at seeing him.
"I said we'd meet again," Tristan said, pulling the arrow absently out of the tree. "I must admit, I have heard a lot about you."
"Oh have you?" Alennia asked, raising her eyebrows provocatively. Tristan looked in amazement at the change in her from the suspicious, timid girl he had met on the bleak mountainside, to the confident flirtatious woman before him.
"You have gained something of a reputation," Tristan admitted, lifting his gaze to meet her captivating eyes. There was something about them. In the two years since they had met, when her image had long faded from his mind, the memory of those eyes remained. They were dark, but flashing with colour and light. When she tried to conceal her emotions in her facial expressions, her eyes betrayed her. They were so captivating, that Tristan was amazed at the sheer willpower he had to use to break the gaze.
"Then let us hope that the Saxons have heard of it," Alennia grinned at him.
"I'll drink to that," Tristan agreed.
Alennia laughed. "And what is noble Sir Tristan doing in the forests of the Woads?"
"What noble Sir Tristan always does," he answered, inspecting her horse.
Alennia laughed, and watched as he looked the horse over. "What do you think?" Alennia asked, indicating her mare.
Tristan shrugged. "She's no match for my Bretena," he said, stroking the neck of his dapple-grey fondly.
"I'll wager I can beat you in a race," Alennia replied immediately.
"On that nag?" Tristan asked incredulously.
"Scared you'll lose?" Alennia asked provocatively.
"Alright! Where to?"
"There's a clearing about half a mile from here. First one there wins," Alennia said, already pulling her mare together.
"See you there!" Tristan said with a wild grin, as the two horses, freed from all restrainsts, plunged forwards into the forest.
They started neck and neck at first, but as the path narrowed, Tristan was obliged to pull back or ride into a tree. Alennia pushed her old mare forwards, but was only too aware of the ease at which Tristan kept behind her, and as the path widened once more, he overtook her easily, the competitive spirit in Bretena coming out, and he charged into the clearing half a yard or so before her.
They pulled their horses up: him laughing, her in mock annoyance, and they dropped their horses' reins and let them walk freely to catch their breaths.
"It seems you have lost your wager," Tristan said, grinning at Alennia.
"We weren't betting!" Alennia protested.
"Oh weren't we?" Tristan asked, and Alennia laughed at him.
"Alright. Name your prize."
Tristan considered her for a moment, and then a wicked smile crept onto his mouth. "One kiss," he said, grinning widely.
Alennia put on a face of mock horror. "Why, Sir knight!"
Tristan just laughed, and Alennia matched his wicked expression with one of her own. "You want a kiss? You can collect it when we next meet!" and with a delighted laugh, she pushed her horse straight into a canter, and had disappeared untraceably into the trees within seconds.
Tristan was left in the clearing, the fading laughter of Alennia echoing around the trees. If that wasn't an invitation to find her again, he thought cheerfully, then who knows what it was.
A/N - not sure if that sentance was meant to have a question mark at the end of it...anyway, thank you so much for all your wonderful reviews, I love you all very much, and I'll try to get round to reading all your work too! Thanks and watch this space...well, not literally