The Warrior's Damsel In Distress. Meriel Fuller

simple lace at the neck of Eva’s nightgown tickled her chin and she pushed the fabric away, turning her head towards the window. Her braided hair rustled against the straw-filled pillow. Her mind scuttled fruitlessly down one path after another, chased by a pair of silvery eyes, a hard, determined mouth. Through the rippled glass, light from the rising moon tipped over the window ledge and stretched down into the chamber, pooling on the floorboards like milky liquid. How on earth could she and Katherine extricate themselves from this mess?

      Beneath the window, a bundled lump on one of the low pallets shifted around, then sat up, furs falling off young shoulders. Alice. Golden hair fell down in a tumbled mass over a white nightgown; Eva’s heart panged with guilt. While she was downstairs, Martha had put the children to bed, obviously forgetting, or simply not bothering, to braid the girls’ hair. The child made a small mewling sound, reaching out towards Eva.

      She threw back her blankets, welcoming the distraction of the child from her own troubled thoughts. Tentatively, she placed her weight upon her injured leg, please to find it was less painful now. She moved with a hitching, but bearable gait across to Alice, kneeling down beside the pallet bed.

      ‘What’s the matter, darling?’ she whispered, placing her hand on Alice’s head. The child’s golden hair, exactly like her mother’s, was silky beneath her palm.

      ‘I feel sick.’

      Eva peered into Alice’s face. The child’s skin was pinched, drawn, but at the same time, flushed with a leaden colour. She placed her palm against Alice’s forehead. Her skin was hot. Very hot.

      ‘You lie down, Alice; I will fetch some water.’ Straightening up, Eva removed the furs from around the child, leaving a single sheet. Alice had a fever, not unusual in someone of her age, but she needed to be cooler, before her temperature raged out of control. She would go down to the kitchens, fetch some water from the well. ‘Don’t wake your mother,’ she whispered. ‘I’ll be back very soon.’

      Seizing a blanket from her own bed, Eva flung it around her shoulders. She took the candle from the bedside table, touching the wick to the flame within the charcoal brazier, watching it flare. The chapel bell had tolled midnight as she had lain awake with her troubled thoughts; everyone would be tucked up in bed now, especially on such a chill, snowy night. Katherine would have given the guest chambers to the visiting knights, chambers on the other side of the bailey, a lengthy distance away. And thank goodness for that, she thought with relief, as she pulled the door open.

      As she stepped forward, her toes collided with a large bulk lying across the threshold.