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new understanding between your people and mine. So far, all we understand from one another is a lack of trust and complete brutality. Do you suppose that is what your father and my liege wished for when they set about this plan?”
    She wiped her nose. “Nay.”
     “What did your father tell you that he wished for?”
    She was reluctant to look at him, reluctant to carry on a conversation with him.  But the man had just saved her from a horrible situation; perhaps she owed him a measure of courtesy.
    “No more battles,” she said quietly, her gaze moving between his face and her fidgeting hands. “He has lost many a man to wars with the English, including his three brothers. He has no family left but me. “
    “Then he has sacrificed much.”
    “Aye.”
    “Then why would you try to escape and run back to him?”
    Her head snapped up, the emerald eyes narrowing.  “Because… because I dunna want to be here. ‘Tis not fair to pledge me to hostage. There are a number of others that could do just as well.”
    “Like who?”
    She was returning to her normal, belligerent demeanor. “I have six girl cousins,” she insisted. “He could have sent any one of them.”
    “But it would not have had as much impact. You are a laird’s daughter. The peace contract holds far more weight with you as collateral.”
    Carington’s emerald eyes flamed out and she looked to her hands again.  Her expression rippled, changing from one emotion to another.  “Maybe so,” she said after a moment. “But he has thrown me into a den of lions.”
    “It may seem that way,” he said quietly. “But I assure you that d’Eneas is not representative of us all. There are those of us who wish peace also and would seek to protect you as the emissary of that peace. We have all lost friends and family against the Scots.”
    She did not reply.  She kept her head lowered, fumbling with her hands, and Creed rose from his crouching position and went back over to where his tray of food now lay scattered.  As he lowered his big body to the ground, he heard a soft voice.
    “Have ye?”
    He paused to look at her, almost seated, and lowered himself the rest of the way. “Aye.”
    “Who?”
    “My younger brother.”
    As she looked at him, her gaze appeared less hostile.  The brittle, hard emerald eyes softened into something liquid.  “When did he die?”
    “Almost five years ago at Kielderhead Moor.”
    She nodded in recollection. “I remember that battle,” she said softly, almost reflectively. “It went on for three days. I lost an uncle in the end.”
    He righted the tipped cup and pitcher, realizing there was nothing left of the wine.  “Then it seems we both have a need for peace. I only have one brother left and I do not wish to see him perish in a foolish border skirmish.”
    She nodded, somehow feeling not quite so hostile against the knight.  But her guard was still up.  Her tartan lay a few feet away and she rose on weary legs, claiming it once again.  She wrapped it tightly around her, making her way back to the bedroll.  She had no idea that Creed was watching every move she made.
    “If I ask a question, will you answer me honestly?” he asked.
    She paused, her deep green eyes focused on him. “Aye.”
    “What did Jory do to you?”
    She blinked as if she had to think on an answer. But she had promised him an honest one.  “Nothing that canna be forgotten,” she said faintly. But she knew that was not what he wanted to hear. “He tried to kiss me and he squeezed something that he had no right to squeeze.  But other than that, I canna say he did anything that I willna recover from.”
    Creed simply nodded, his gaze lingering on her as she finally settled down and pulled the tartan tightly around her.  After a moment, he rose and went to the vizier, tipped in the battle between the lady and Jory, and righted it.  The embers in the ground were burned out but there were still a few inside the bowl that were