An Uncertain Choice(44)

And it was indeed beautiful.

I glanced sideways, as subtly as possible, at Derrick. The outline of his strong features alone was enough to warm my stomach in a sweet but aching way. I couldn’t let his reticence or my own shyness stop me from exploring the feelings further, could I?

With a resolute breath, I turned in my chair and faced him. “Have you been friends with Sir Collin and Sir Bennet for a long time?”

He swallowed his bite of food. “We’ve known each other forever — ?or at least since the day we all arrived at Rivenshire to begin our training.”

“Ah, then you were pages together?” I smiled at the picture I conjured of the three as little boys running around, wrestling together, and swinging their blunt swords in practice. I could imagine they were handsome even as wild urchins.

He grinned as if he too were remembering them together as boys. “We were quite the handful.”

“The duke was daring to take you all under his care at one time.”

Derrick’s smile faded. “I don’t know what would have become of me, if not for him.”

I couldn’t keep from thinking back to the rumors I’d heard about him that afternoon. My own mood sobered. “Is it true then that your family was murdered?”

My question was a gentle whisper, but his gaze jumped to mine as though I’d slapped him.

“I’m sorry.” Without thinking, I lightly touched his arm. His muscles rippled beneath my fingers. “The question is much too personal. I shouldn’t have asked it. Please forgive me.”


On the opposite side of Derrick, the abbot paused his eating at the sight of my contact with the knight. I quickly withdrew. I expected the abbot’s rebuke and was relieved when he glanced away without a word.

For a long moment, Derrick stared darkly at the pork on the tip of his knife. Had I ruined my opportunity to talk to him? Would he despise me now for probing into his past?

“There’s nothing to forgive, my lady,” he finally said. The depths of his eyes were haunted. But he leaned in and dropped his voice. “Yes. My family was murdered. But it was completely unnecessary.”

I had to bend closer to hear him.

“When my father’s enemy surrounded the castle, instead of attempting to withstand the siege or go out onto the field to fight against his enemy with courage, my father decided to surrender.” The lines in Derrick’s face were drawn tightly, and his jaw flexed. “If my father had been braver,” he whispered hoarsely, “he could have saved his family and his lands.”

A siege against a castle was never easy to resist. Even with the best-laid stores of food and deep wells inside the inner bailey, most sieges ended in disaster for the castle under attack. Surely Derrick knew that. “Perhaps your father only sought a peaceful end.”

“He should have known his enemy wouldn’t be satisfied unless blood was shed.”

“The rules of engagement allow for surrender under a white flag —?”

“It didn’t matter. Even with the white flag flying, my father was forced to watch the enemy chop off the heads of my mother and two little sisters . . .”

“No . . .”

His eyes were dark pits of pain. “He displayed them on spikes on the drawbridge, where he then proceeded to torture my father to death.”

I swallowed the bile that rose in my throat. “And how did you escape?”

“My nursemaid disguised me as her child. After several weeks of harrowing travel and evasion, she delivered me to the Duke of Rivenshire.”

“Oh, sir, I feel your pain,” I whispered, uncaring that my head was almost touching his.

Shadows flickered across his face as if he fought the demons of his past. His breathing was labored. Was he reliving the nightmare? I reached out and squeezed his hand atop the table. I tried to ignore that my guests were witnessing the intimate gesture. The urge to offer Derrick a measure of comfort was too strong to resist.

He stared at my fingers upon his hand. A war waged across his features, and I was afraid he would pull away, that he would retreat into himself and resist my comfort.

But after a long moment, he flipped his hand over and surprised me by capturing my fingers. He laced his fingers through mine, enveloping me with his strength. His weathered skin contrasted against my paleness, and the warmth made my chest hitch.

“Thank you for your kindness, my lady,” he whispered.

“I shouldn’t have made you relive such things.”

“And I shouldn’t have shared such gruesome details at dinner.”

I had seen much worse the day I’d encountered the rat cages, but I didn’t want to bring up my inner demons now as well.

He stared at our fingers laced together. “At least now you can understand why I’m a knight without family honor.”

“It doesn’t matter —?”

“It does to me.”

He was shutting me out of his life again. And I couldn’t let that happen. “But your father only did what he thought was safest for your family —?”

“He gave way to fear,” Derrick said sadly. “And in the end, his lack of courage cost him everything.”

“Courage can be displayed in many forms, my lord,” I said gently. “Sometimes it’s evident in the knight charging forward with the lance on his steed. But perhaps it can also take the form of a head bowed before the enemy.”