Chapter 15

I was very thankful to have my job as an excuse tonight; I did not want to have to be lectured anymore by Tristan, Galahad, or anyone else for that matter. I only had two weeks of work left, and then my debt to Haman would be repaid. When I entered the tavern, I found Helena and Lena, were already there serving the customers.

The tavern was very crowded, all the towns people were anxious to find word, about what had happened on the knights' mission. I assumed, they were all in some sense frightened about the woads, but I found it hard to believe the woads would ever try to attack a fort so heavily guarded by Roman's and Sarmatian Knights.

I saw Bors, standing in the center of the room surrounded by many men giving an account of the trip. From listening to his story, it sounded as if he had killed every woad out there, and the other knights had just sat on their horses and watched. I looked at Dagonet sitting at a table close to him, lost in his drink. He must have felt my eyes upon him, for he looked up and met my gaze. I looked over to Bors and back at him, and just rolled my eyes. He gave me grin in return, knowing exactly what I was thinking.

There was a group of Romans in one corner. No longer being afraid of them, I pushed my way between them and began clearing the table of the clutter. They paid little attention to me until I felt something grab my hand. I looked down it was Phillip. I smiled at him, but continued clearing the table.

I headed toward the bar to refill some glasses when I heard my name called softly from behind. I turned around to see it was Phillip again.

"I was just wondering if I could expect you for our morning ride tomorrow." He asked.

"Phillip, you know I would love to, but I am afraid it will cause trouble for both of us." I said remembering Galahad's warning.

"You are probably right Taryn." He said rubbing his nose I know he was remembering Gawain's fist.

"Phillip, I do want to thank you for helping me get through the last two weeks."

"Yes Taryn, I owe you a thanks then to, it was not the best time in my life." He said.

"You never did tell me what the bad news was you got from Rome."

"Oh it was nothing really, just that my time in Britain, was to be extended for one more year, and that my fiancé, decided she would not wait for me, and had already married another." He said sadly.

"Oh Phillip, I am so sorry, I had no idea." I exclaimed.

"Well Taryn, I had better leave, your knight friends are here, and I would hate for you to have to be seen with me." He whispered in my ear, as he stood and exited the room.

I looked up to see Gawain and Lancelot entering the room. I watched Phillip leave and could not help the feeling of guilt welling up in my chest.

I started to make my way over to where Gawain and Lancelot had set, but soon saw Lena was already there. I was going to go any way when a man grabbed my arm begging for another drink. I shrugged him off, and continued to make my way toward the knights when I heard Haman. "Taryn get that man a drink." He bellowed. I ran to the bar to grab a mug of ale to take to the annoying little man. His friends at the table were also asking for drinks, it took me at least twenty minutes to get them all served.

Finally I was free to go and talk to Lancelot and Gawain, I wanted to hear some more about there trip. By the looks of their table they had already drank several glasses of ale.

"You are not needed here Taryn, I have this table covered." Lena said from where she was standing.

"Taryn" Lancelot said ignoring Lena and grabbing my wrist and pulling me down next to him. "What are you doing here; I thought you would never set foot in this place again?" He asked.

"Long story." I said looking at a grinning Gawain. "Tell me about your trip? From what I hear Bors did all the work and you just all sat around and watched."

"I thought you would know by now not to believe a thing Bors says." Gawain said looking over to where Bors was sitting.

"Forgive us Taryn if we would rather not talk about it, we would rather talk about more interesting things like yourself, and what you have been doing." Lancelot said.

Why they are all concerned with my business I will never know. I don't know what people had to talk about hear before I came. I saw Gawain's empty cup, and grabbed it.

"Let me go get you another one." I said hurrying back to the bar; I did not want to go into the events of my week with everyone. Still though it was so good to have them back, I did not realize how much I had grown to care for all of them.

If only I had learned how to control my temper, the events that were about to happen never would have taken place, and would have saved me a lot of embarrassment. As I was walking back to the table to give Gawain his cup, I saw that Lena had placed herself on his lap, and was kissing him full on the mouth.

I am not sure why it made me angry, maybe because Lena had been so mean to me and I considered Gawain a friend, but the sight of her kissing him infuriated me. Then I did a very stupid, childish thing.

"Here is your drink Gawain." I said and instead of sitting the drink on the table, I threw it at both of them. Spraying them both with the smelly liquid.

Lena jumped up out of his lap, and glared at me. "You little Brat" she hissed.

I could not form any words, I don't know why I did that, so I turned, like a little child and ran to my room.

"What was that all about?" Lancelot laughed.

"I don't know." Gawain said standing up. "But I am about to find out."

"Don't go." Lena begged grabbing his arm. "She is only jealous."

Gawain did not listen to her, and continued to follow me, leaving Lancelot's laughter, and Lena's begging behind.

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I made my way to my room, and threw myself on my bed and began to cry. I had just made a fool of myself again. I was not left long to ponder my thoughts, for my door was soon thrown open.

"What was that all about?" Gawain demanded an angry look on his face, his shirt covered in the drink.

Him bursting in my room confronting me, only made my anger return. I brushed the tears from my eyes and sat up to face him.

"Your best friend is seriously wounded, and all you can do is hang all over a woman." I yelled. "Not to mention, the meanest, ugliest, most hateful woman in all of Britain!"

"Maybe Lena was right' He said with a slow smile. "Little Taryn is jealous."

"I am not jealous Gawain; you can go sleep with the pigs for all I care."

"Taryn, I am sorry, but you must understand we live a hard life here, and sometimes, we need something to take our minds off of it." He tried to explain.

"A hard life" I sputtered. "You live like royalty here. The people worship you, you have the best to eat and drink, and apparently all the woman you want at your disposal. You want to talk about a hard life, go back to Sarmatia. Try working the fields all day in the hot sun. Try living in a hut with three people just a half of the size of the rooms you knights live in know, and then tell me about a hard life." I said taking all my frustrations out on him.

He was angry now I could see it in his eyes, I had only seen Gawain angry one other time, and that was when he hit Phillip, and it was a scary sight.

"Taryn, you know nothing of our life here. Do you think it is all fun and games? That we spend all our time playing in waterfalls. Do you know what I have done for the last two weeks? I have killed men, and boys. Men that have done nothing to wrong me or my country, but since Rome wants them dead I must kill them. I go where Rome says to go; I kill who they want killed. My brother and I were taken from our family when I was just 9 summers old and him 10. I watched him die Taryn when he was only 15 years old. Do you call that royal Taryn, hmm do you?" He said his voice surprisingly quiet for all the anger in it.

I was trembling now; the tears were running down my cheeks.

"You may have had to work hard Taryn, but at least you did it on your own free will. But I am sure you have never had to watch you family, and friends be killed to early in life." He stopped to look me in the eyes. "If you live here long enough though you will." He said sadly.

"Gawain I am sorry." I said through my tears. "I did not know about your brother. What was his name?"

I could see the anger leaving his face now, he came and put his arm around my shoulders. "Its okay it was a long time ago, his name was Garrett."

"Gawain, I don't know why I became so angry in the tavern. I just don't see how you can be with Lena; she is not a nice person."

"Taryn, I don't care about her, and she came on to me, not the other way around." He said.

"Well you sure seemed to be enjoying kissing her." I said with a little disgust in my voice.

"That is only because kissing in itself is nice." He said with a chuckle. I just shook my head at him.

"Surely you have kissed plenty of boys, little Taryn." He said softly.

I just looked at the ground, my cheeks beginning to color, I had never kissed anyone, I had always been to busy at home with other things to think of boys.

I felt his hand cup my chin, and raise my head up to look him in the eyes. "Is that a no?"

I nodded my head, trying to again look toward the ground, embarrassed over the whole situation. He did not let me lower my head again though. As if in slow motion, he gently lowered his head until his lips met mine. It was a sweet gentle kiss, unlike anything, I had ever experienced before, and I felt my head spinning. I raised my arms to wrap them around his neck to steady myself. The kiss began to deepen, when suddenly he pulled his head back.

He looked at my dazed face. "That is enough kissing for you for one day." He said with a laugh. "I am going to go check on my friend, and you my sweet need to get back to you job." He said turning and leaving me alone.

I sank to my bed, and reached my hand up to my lips. My first kiss, I thought to myself. Who would have thought it would be from Gawain? I sat there for a few minutes trying to regain my composure until I realized he was right, I still had several hours left to work tonight.

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I thought things would be awkward the next day, but they weren't. Gawain treated me the same as always, as if it had not happened, I am sure the kiss had meant nothing to him. We were together often, but never alone, always in the presence of Galahad, who was recovering nicely.

I spent much of my time training over the next few weeks, most of it spent with my father, using the long sword. Although I did not erase Phillip out of my life totally, we would spend time together when the knights were busy, or away. He was a good friend, and I did miss him.

I could handle my tridents fairly well, but I had not yet shown them to Tristan. One day when Phillip and I were sparring, we were interrupted by the knights returning early from one of there missions. I was going to go and great them, but my father stopped me.

"No Taryn please continue" He said taking a seat on a bench.

I looked at Phillip and then down at my tridents he nodded. We continued the session. I was trying my best wanting to prove myself to the knights. Phillip caught one of my blades in his. I used this opportunity to tie his weapon up; I spun around t whipping my other sword toward his arm.

"Taryn" He yelled grabbing his left shoulder. I saw where my trident had made a nice slice in his arm.

"Phillip" I ran to his side, "I am so sorry, I did not mean to cut, you, I guess, I got carried away."

The knights were all circled around us, not believing I had just wounded my sparring partner.

"Taryn, I see I have had you practicing with the wrong weapon." Tristan said with a twinkle in his eye.

"It is not funny." I said.

"Phillip" I said ignoring the knights, for I only felt concern for my friend. "Let me look at it." I ripped his shirt back to see a long, slice; thankfully it was not too deep.

"Let's go up to my room, and I will sew it up." I said grabbing his arm.

"Its okay Taryn really, I know you did not mean to." He reassured me as we walked arm and arm up to my room.

"When did thy get to be such good friends." I heard Gawain gripe from behind us.

"I believe while we were gone defending Britain." Galahad said with a sigh.

Authors note.

Hope that chapter was a little more interesting. Thanks for all the reviews; I hope I am still keeping you guessing. I plan on advancing the story faster, in the next few chapters I hope. It feels like I am dragging a little. Two chapters in one night! Can you believe it?

Katemarry77: Sorry don't know any of those actresses, have to look them up on internet Glad you liked the chapter, hope the next two are okay.

Tracy 137: Hope I wasn't two misleading, and the story did not go where I kind of lead.

Lucilla: Kind of maybe, not really, not going to tell. Lol

Lancelottristanbaby: Nope not mad, the Knights are all okay, except Galahad, who is now fine. Thanks for reading.

Camreyn: Still waiting for the money to come through. Glad you like my characters.

Zelinia: Okay Orlando Bloom he is. I will have to look for the other girl on TV so when Hollywood comes a knocking I can tell them who to cast. Lol. Thanks for your great review, I hope the next chapters are okay.

Irishfire: So happy for the Stowaway update, it is one of my favorites. Thanks for reviewing, you have such good ideas hopefully mine wasn't too disappointing.

KnightMaiden: You should like this chapter, based on your review, let me know.

JediPirateElfydude: Thanks for reading and reviewing. I will do my best to make all happy with the pairings. Keep reviewing.