Page 10 of The Protector’s Promise

A smart lass.

“I cannot give you details, but if you tell me why I was called to that place, I promise to tell you something.”

When she peeked up at him, light from the fire dancing across her face, Court’s sight fluttered and he had his first vision of his companion. No longer haughty, the earl’s daughter was replaced with a passionate woman, lips parted and eyes hooded.

“What is it?”

He closed his eyes and waited for it to pass.

“Court?”

“A vision,” he murmured, opening his eyes.

“You had a vision? Of what?”

If he dared to put to words what he’d just seen, his Scottish maiden would suffer quite a shock. Instead, he offered what he knew. Which was not much.

“I’ve had them my whole life,” he admitted. “Sometimes years pass between them. But since the stone’s pull began, I have them much more often.”

“What do you envision?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. The person in front of me. But different. They seem to give me some sort of insight.”

“What did you see when you looked at me?”

He didn’t wish to lie to her, but he was even less eager to answer her question.

“The guard. The one with the priestess,” he offered instead. “I saw him as a young boy, scared and alone.”

Thankfully, she didn’t continue to question him.

Placing a piece of meat daintily inside her mouth, she looked every bit the lady—her log a throne and the trees her lady’s maids. He smiled as he watched her finish eating.

“These visions,” she began, “are your special ability.”

“My—”

“Special ability,” she repeated. “Though I’m unsure exactly what it means. Mine is much simpler.”

He shook his head, not understanding.

“Did no one ever explain your gift to you?”

“Gift?” He laughed. “Curse, you mean?”

She sighed. “Aye, that too.”

“Nay,” he said, standing. As he made his way to the saddlebag, he continued, “My mother died in childbirth. My father followed her not many years later. No one knew of my gift. Until now. If they had gifts of their own, I never knew it.”

He pulled the leather waterskin from the bag and walked back to the fire.

“I fostered with Richard Caiser, Earl of—”

“Kenshire.”

He wasn’t surprised Marion knew of him. Though Richard had died more than two years earlier, passing the earldom to his daughter and her husband, all in the borderlands knew of the man. Some said he’d been more powerful, and certainly more beloved, than the King of England.

“Aye. He knighted me. Entrusted Camburg to me. And said nothing of my gift or ability or however you speak of it. Although I doubt he, or anyone I know, would believe such a thing.”