Lord of Vengeance Read Online Free PDF Page A

hips and her pert chin tilted to a supreme height, amused him greatly. Intrigued him.
    “Good morrow, Lady Raina.” He leaned heavily on her title, trying to cover his reaction to seeing her in this new light.
    Yesterday, despite the mud and grime, she was attractive. Now, looking up at him, her face scrubbed clean and her cheeks pink from the sun and surprise, she was breathtaking. Her friends disappeared nearly without his notice.
    “I see my lamb has traded her fleece for fine silk.”
    That proud chin climbed up a notch. “And you, my lord, may have hidden your black hide beneath steel links this morn, but I still see a wolf.”
    “Indeed?” He dismounted and came to stand before her. “I suppose then, 'tis too much to hope that you might cheer me on to victory today as your personal champion.”
    She made a small noise in the back of her throat, surely intended as a denial, but he didn't miss the faint curve of her lips, nor the blush that rose to her cheeks the instant before she tipped her face down to feign interest in the toe of her embroidered shoe. “I shall not be cheering anyone on,” she said with a trace of disdain. “If I had a choice in the matter, I should rather not even watch the melee. Contrary to my father's fondness for the sport, I find tourneys but an excuse for violence and debauchery.”
    “Aye,” Gunnar agreed with private reflection. “They do bring out the worst in men. Everyone seeking fortune or glory.”
    “And which have you come to seek, my lord?”
    He nearly chuckled at her frankness. “In truth, I have use for neither. I've come in the name of honor.”
    “A lady's honor?”
    “Aye,” he acknowledged, taking far too much interest in the way her eyes dimmed at the mention of another lady. “I've come to right a wrong.”
    “My lord, you surprise me,” she said with a light, teasing smile. “I hadn't taken you for the chivalrous sort. Tell me, is your lady here to see you defend her honor?”
    Instantly, he thought of his mother and her efforts to teach courtesy and manners to a boy more interested in mock battles and raucous adventure. Chivalry and honor were two things she prized; two things he had never possessed and likely never would.
    “She is dead,” he fairly snapped, his curt response enough to wipe any trace of joviality from Raina's features, but he scarcely noticed her response. Caught up in his own contemplation, he muttered his thoughts aloud. “If all goes well, the villain responsible will pay in kind by day's end.”
    The peal of a trumpet punctuated his ominous statement and drew the attention of nearly everyone gathered. A shout went up from a group of knights in the ale tent, followed by a collective clanging of armor and stumbling of men toward their waiting mounts.
    “Well,” Raina said, looking over her shoulder toward the lists, “'tis time for the tourney to commence.”
    “Aye,” Gunnar acknowledged, scanning the crowd of competitors, impatience building in him with every heartbeat. “But I don't yet see the baron.”
    “He's there, in the stands.”
    Gunnar dragged his attention from the lists and followed her breezy gesture to the top of the loges, where a grizzled, paunchy old man sat beneath a striped canopy. Swathed in yards of bright silks that did naught to conceal his girth, the baron reclined like a slovenly king, sipping from a tankard and fanning himself with his hand. As if he suddenly sensed their regard, his attention turned toward them and he leaned forward in his seat, squinting under the glare of the sun and righting his little crown when it slipped forward over his brow.
    Gunnar's stomach clenched with a dawning realization. “He isn't dressed to compete....”
    “Compete?” Raina replied on a soft laugh. “Nay, of course not! 'Tis been years since he's competed himself.”
    Her voice was all but lost in the tumult whipping to a frenzy inside Gunnar. Rage, disappointment, helplessness, frustration--a swift