Forever Her Champion by Suzan Tisdale Read Free Book Online

not spook her into running away. The animal was grazing on summer grass when Rianna quietly took up the reins. The mare looked up, snorted as if to say she’d prefer not to be disturbed, before turning her attention back to her meal. With the reins in one hand, Rianna led the horse to a small bush and tied her to it.
    Searching through the packs felt like a tremendous invasion of Aiden’s privacy. Justifying her invasion with the need to eat, she also hoped to find something that would explain his current state. Mayhap a lock of hair tied in a bow? A letter or two expressing undying love and devotion?
    The search for intimate knowledge was fruitless. No journals or letters. No locks of hair. Not even an old dried flower. Nothing at all to indicate a great love or a broken heart.
    All she found were two clean tunics, a pair of brown leather trews, a shaving knife, one jar of clean smelling soap, a hook and string with which to fish, a bundle of dried beef, and a handful of walnuts. She also found two flagons of ale, one of which was almost empty. Not much in the way of earthly possessions, but at least he had food.
    Not far from where her former champion slept, just down a small embankment, she found a wide stream. Fishing could wait until after she tended to the bloody, wounded man. After dipping the cloth into the cold water, she headed back to Aiden.
    Kneeling beside him, she wiped away as much of the mud and blood as she could. Wishing for all the world for a bowl or a bucket, she had to make three trips to the stream to rinse out the filthy cloth. ‘Twasn’t until the fourth go of it that she began to see his face more clearly.
    Even through the swollen lip and black eye, she could see he had grown into a fine looking man. A firm jaw and muscles that, even while he slept like the dead, looked as though they’d been chiseled from granite. The crescent shaped scar was white against his sun kissed skin. As if it had happened only that morn, she could remember clearly how he’d come by it. They’d been running along the docks, as children do. He had tripped on his own feet and landed face down in a bundle of fishing lines. One of the hooks had ripped through his tender flesh. Even as he lay there bleeding and in pain, he ended up consoling her. With all the blood running down his neck and into his ears, she thought for certain he would die. “Wheest, lass! Ye’re cryin’ loud enough to wake the dead!”
    With his father far too into his cups to be of any assistance, a wife of one of the fisherman had heard Rianna’s screams and come to help. In her warm little home, she cleansed the cut and sewed his skin back together. Rianna had watched in fascination as the kind woman stitched his skin. What surprised her most was the fact that Aiden did not shed one tear. Nor did he complain of the pain. In that little moment, she looked at him with awe and fascination. ’Twas also then she decided that someday she would marry him. Only a man with such strength as to not cry when he was wounded would be good enough for her.
    Afterwards, the fisherman’s wife gave them warm cider and sweet cakes before sending them off with a motherly warning to not run along the docks. He allowed her to help him back to his own hut. And ’twas there, on his doorstep, that she stole a kiss from him. Standing on her toes, she kissed his cheek before running away. Aye, ’twas just a peck on the cheek, but in the eyes of a six-year-old girl, ’twas a kiss all the same.
    Now here they were, some twelve years later, in the middle of God-only-knew where. What had become of him? What had led him here?
    Several trips to the stream later, and she had managed to get all the mud and muck cleaned from his arms and hands. When she lifted the collar of his tunic to clean his chest, she noticed several small scars scattered there. Old scars, but not as old as the scar under his chin. Unable to remove his tunic for closer inspection — and without a lick