Something dropped briefly onto her forehead. Had he just kissed her?

While she felt like screaming on his behalf, he sounded perfectly composed. “Instead of being sorry, what you should be is wary.”

The full import of that was beginning to settle in. It clashed with all her sensory impressions.

The heavy weight of his arm circling her shoulders was a shocking comfort. After being chilled for most of her time in this cell, he radiated heat that suffused her with a sense of well-being. She reveled in the simple, animal pleasure of feeling his muscled body against hers, the hard pillow of his shoulder underneath her cheek.

She didn’t know his name, or what he looked like. She hardly knew anything about him that wasn’t self-report, except that Robin thought he was terribly dangerous.

He had gone out of his way to warn her, himself, but he had also healed her. He brought food and water, and kept his word as much as he was able, and even more importantly than all that, he offered her hope and encouragement at a point when she had been so devastated she couldn’t even bring herself to get up off the floor.

No matter what he had done—or had been forced to do—those were not the actions of an evil man. And while she might not be able to trust him, her life had been shattered so thoroughly she was learning to grab on to any piece of something that felt good, no matter how small or fleeting.

This moment of feeling warm with her belly full, whispering confidences to someone who didn’t judge her, leaning against a strong body that seemed to welcome her presence—this moment was so good it bordered on the miraculous. She concentrated fiercely on soaking in every impression to shore up the time when she was alone and cold again.

But if she was going to have any future at all, it was also time to start laying plans.

She whispered, “Tell me more about Isabeau.”

He stirred, his restless body signaling clearly the distaste he had for the subject, but he also answered. “Modern psychologists would probably call her a narcissist. Every thought she thinks, every move she makes, is all about herself. She will lie, manipulate, steal, kill, do whatever it takes to get what she wants. If you are on her good side, she’s all sweetness and smiles. If you get on her bad side… Well, you know something of what can happen if you get on her bad side.”

“Yeah.” She rubbed her eyes. “It must be terrible to deal with her.”

“I’m often away, carrying out her orders, which provides some relief. Long ago, she embarked on a crusade to destroy another demesne with crossover passageways near Avalon’s—that of Oberon and his Dark Court.”

“What kind of Elder Race are they?”

“Officially they’re labeled Dark Fae, which is why Oberon’s court is the Dark Court as opposed to Isabeau’s Light Court. But the reality is, Lyonesse is a society made of mixed races. They offend Isabeau’s racist and xenophobic tendencies.”

“I’m half Vietnamese,” she muttered, repelled by the very concept. “So I must really get up her nose.”

He tightened his arm around her shoulders. “She has no idea what a Vietnamese is. You offend her because you’re a dark-haired human, and she believes the Light Fae are the superior race. And while she must hate to admit it since you’re clearly of an inferior race and your looks are so different from those of the Light Fae, you’re also breathtakingly beautiful, and she’s always jealous of other beauties.”

Well.

Well now, wasn’t that something.

He thought she was breathtakingly beautiful, did he?

Sid felt her cheeks warm with pleasure and was glad for the darkness that hid her blush.

Before she could figure out how to respond, he continued, “She—we—drove Oberon’s people out of Great Britain and imprisoned them in their own lands, or so we thought. There were only a few knights of the Dark Court left in England, until they found some way to reopen one of the passageways to reach their demesne and bring back reinforcements. All summer they’ve been strengthening and reinforcing their presence along the Welsh Marches in England. It’s been a huge setback for Isabeau, and her moods have become more dangerous and volatile than ever.”

As he talked, he wound a strand of her hair around his finger. The sensation from the small gesture rippled gently through her body. Surreptitiously she rubbed her cheek against the softness of his shirt, enjoying the feel of the thick, broad muscle underneath.

She was… she was…

She must be really messed up, because she was attracted to him.

She didn’t even know what his voice sounded like, not really. The only clue she could gather was that the low, rich timbre in his whisper indicated it would be deep.

And his scent was… odd. Slightly chemical, but that might be from medicine used to treat whatever injury the bandages were needed for. Come to think of it, the only thing she could really smell was a touch of fresh air on his shirt, as if it had been hung out to dry in the sunshine, along with the lingering aroma from the meat pies they had just eaten.

What if she asked to run her fingers over his face, so she could get an idea of what he looked like? She almost asked, until she realized that knowing some details might give her clues to his identity, and she knew instinctively he would reject that possibility.

Besides, none of that was going to get her out of this cell.

Yanking her unruly thoughts back into line, she asked, “How does Modred fit into all this?”

His chest moved in a silent snort. “Modred is just like Isabeau, a complete opportunist focused on his own gain. They are in a relationship, of sorts. If you can call it relating. They’re not faithful, but they pretend to be, and they often partner in mischief together.”

“Modred is the one who found me shackled in the stable,” she whispered, clenching her hand in his shirt at the memory. “I’d been chained with the rest of the trolls’ tribute, and then they forgot about me until the next day. When he took me to the castle, I thought at first he was going to help me—feed me something, let me wash up, or take me to someone who would listen to my story so I could make a case for going home.”

“It was a perfectly reasonable expectation.” His voice was clipped, angry. “It’s also what any decent man would have done.”

She broke into a light sweat as she thought about it, and a tremor ran through her muscles. “Instead, he took me straight to Isabeau. I didn’t know who she was at first, although the richness of her dress and her surroundings should have given me a clue. Looking back, there were all kinds of warning signs, but I didn’t pay attention to any of them. She’d even said she’d had a bad morning, and she had a headache… but then so had I. I was dizzy with hunger, scared, and exhausted, and I’d been in a state of perpetual outrage for days. She called me ugly and bad mannered, and she fingered my hair like I was a dog or a horse. After having been kidnapped, spending several days on the road, and being treated like chattel, I lost my temper. And you know the rest.”