A Kiss of Fire (A Kiss of Magic #2)(40)

She laughed. “Yes. You did. Perhaps we were selfish…and you were greedy?”

“Perhaps,” he allowed with a nod of his head. “Such a gift would have doubled the size of Kilt. But I was determined that my legacy for Kilt would be that we would never want for land ever again. That we would be able to support ourselves independent of trade if it should ever come to that.”

“You’ve done that.”

“It would have been better had we gotten the entire territory.”

“Oh! You are never satisfied!” she declared.

“No. I am not. I will never be satisfied when it comes to the betterment of my country.”

She stopped to look in the window of a tailor’s shop. There was a beautiful head wrap made of watered silk. The colors were extraordinary.

“Your people use so much color. Such bright, bold hues. We use pastels and whites…so different.”

“We should celebrate our differences, not war over them. If we were all the same it would be quite boring.”

“You are anything but boring,” she said. Then she seemed to realize what she had said and she colored prettily over her nose and cheeks.

“Does that mean you find me exciting?” he couldn’t help but tease her.

“I wouldn’t go that far,” she said primly. “But…you are different.”

“Would you like that?” he asked, nodding to the scarf.

“Oh! No. I couldn’t.”

“Why not?”

“I haven’t any money.”

He tsked. “I would get it for you.”

“No. Thank you just the same. The less I owe you the better.”

He frowned at that.

“You would not owe me,” he said. It bothered him to think she had some kind of tally going on in her head. “It would be a gift.”

“No. Thank you but…no.”

He wanted to press her on it, but decided it would perhaps be better if he didn’t.

“Are we going somewhere in specific?” she asked him. “Or are you simply showing me the makings of what will one day be a fine city?”

“I do have somewhere specific in mind, but I will show you the town as well.”

He did just that. He showed her the shops and the bedsit houses, he showed her how now one family could have an entire house to themselves. She noticed there were many stray cats running about in the roads and alleyways.

“They simply seemed to multiply,” he said. “They keep the vermin in check, so we do not worry much about them. Many of the shop owners will feed them or take them in as pets. They are surprisingly friendly. I would have thought they would be half wild, but they are not.”

One proved his point by coming up to her and winding around her ankles beneath the long fall of the cloak. She giggled then stooped to pick him up. He let her and purred as she scratched his ears and rubbed her face against his fur.

“I’ve never had a pet outside of horses,” she said.

“Horses make fine pets. But they cannot curl up in your lap.”

“Have you any cats in the temple?”

“I have a cat, yes. But I believe I will have more soon.”

“Why?”

“I believe she is pregnant.”

“Oh! Well then yes. You will have more soon.”

“I can feel them. Inside of her. While I’m petting her. They move about and I can feel them.”

He felt foolish for saying it the minute it was out of his mouth. Why would she care about his ability to feel the kittens?

“I should like to feel that,” she said eagerly, reaching out to catch his wrist in her hands. “Can I?”

“Of course,” he said a little dumbly. She had touched him. He had not asked it of her, and she had touched him. How ridiculously good that made him feel. He wanted to run back to the temple with her right that very minute and find the cat for her.

Ariana realized what she had done only moments after she had done it. She dropped his hand as quickly as she had picked it up and turned away from him. Confusion ratcheted through her.

This was no good! She was letting down her guard. If she did that then he would win this contest of wills and she would not have that. She would not have him thinking it was okay for him to have done what he had done.

Yet she couldn’t help but see him for the man he was becoming to her. She had begun to realize that they were not so different from one another as she had once thought. They were both passionate about their people. They both wanted what was best for them. He had not entered war any more lightly than she had done.

She wondered in what other ways they might have common ground. She feared learning anything more about him. Anything that might make her like him any more than she was already beginning to.

“Where are we going?” she asked as she realized they were leaving the town behind. She could hear the sound of children playing. Laughing and screaming.

“You’ll see,” he said.

As they came over the snowy rise they came upon a frozen lake. The screaming and laughing children were playing on the ice.

Ice sliding.

“Come. You said you hadn’t done this since you were a child. Why should the children be the only ones to enjoy it?”

He took her hand and brought her to the edge of the lake.