Joining by Johanna Lindsey Page A

seemed non-threatening, so mayhap they were nothing alike after all.
    “What do you out in these woods?” she asked curiously.
    “Looking for those who are stupid enough to make war on a lady.”
    Jhone was the lady he spoke of, obviously, those assailants on the path the ones he sought. Had Sir Milo enlisted his aid? She could not fathom why he would, when Dunburh hadplenty of household knights and over fifty men-at-arms.
    “Should you not come down from there, ere that limb breaks?” he suggested.
    “I am not big enough to break it.”
    “Aye, you are small,” he agreed, then added cryptically, “but older than you appear, methinks.”
    “Why say you that?”
    “You are too discerning, for a villein, least for one as young as you seem.”
    She realized then that he did not know who she was any more than his brother had known—until he’d been told.
    But he was not finished, said also, “And too audacious for one. What are you then, lad? A freeholder?”
    “A freeholder wouldst be preferable to what I am, sirrah. Nay, I am Nigel Crispin’s daughter.”
    He winced and she heard him mumble, “Poor Wulf,” which she was likely not meant to hear, as insulting as it sounded. So he pitied his brother, did he, for being contracted to wed her? No pity for her, of course, for being forced to marry a callous brute. But then when was a woman’s lot ever taken into consideration by men?
    In two carefully placed steps along the tree trunk, she dropped onto the ground in front of his horse, making it shy back a ways. She spared a moment of concern for the animal, putting her hand out to it and saying a few comforting words in Old Saxon. He came forward to nuzzle against her.
    The knight blinked. She didn’t notice beforeshe glared up at him to say in parting, “Aye, your brother deserves to be pitied, for he’ll have no peace if I am forced to join with him.”
    She was turning to disappear again in the woods when she heard, “Do you wear that dirt for concealment, or are you a believer that bathing is unhealthy?”
    She whirled back around. As if it was any of his business what she wore …
    “What dirt?” she demanded.
    He smiled then, his eyes crinkling again with it. “The dirt on your face and hands, demoiselle, that covers what might be perceived as a woman’s skin. Very deceiving in keeping one from noticing to begin with that you are indeed a woman. You do it apurpose then? Or mayhap it has been a while since you have seen your own reflection?”
    Milisant gritted her teeth. “Gazing in mirrors is an utter waste of one’s time, and not that ’tis
any
concern of yours, but I bathe more often than most, nigh once a week!”
    He chuckled outright. “Then you must be due for a bath.”
    She refused to drag a sleeve across her face to see if it would come away dirty. She did not doubt that it would, though. Jhone was forever dabbing at dirt smudges on her face—when Milisant would stand still long enough. She just was not used to having someone mention it. But as if she cared, she snorted to herself. How silly and—and womanish, to be concerned with vanity.
    And even if she was due for her weekly bath, she’d avoid one now just on general principles—at least until Wulfric was gone from Dunburh, which could not be soon enough to suit her. If his brother had noticed she was dirty, then he likely did as well, and all the better to send him away pleased with a broken contract.
    So she smiled in parting and said, “Worry about your own bathing habits, sirrah, for you are not like to have time enough to find a hot tub here.”
    With that she slipped back into the woods and was quickly gone from his sight.

Eight
    Milisant was feeling
the effects of missing both supper and dinner that day, but she was too anxious to visit the kitchen before she sought out her father. He was a creature of habit, and ’twas his habit to retire at precisely the same time each evening, whether he had guests or not. And she