Touch of Gold: (Rumpelstiltskin) (Tangled Tales Series Book 4) by Elizabeth Rose Page A

you’ve been,” she said, keeping her eyes forward as they rode. After all, someone had to keep an eye on the bumpy road, since he was more interested in whatever was behind them.
    “What did you say?” he asked as if he hadn’t heard her.
    “Is there something back there more interesting than up here?” She meant herself, since when they’d first left on their journey, she thought she felt something special between them. But now he seemed to have forgotten she was even there.
    “We’ll water the horses at the river and take a rest,” he called out to his squire.
    “My lord?” came the squire’s confused answer. “We’re not ten minutes from Castle Tark. Shouldn’t we keep going and rest and water the horses when we get there?”
    “Nay. We’ll do it now.” He was off the horse and helping her to the ground before she could object. She expected his hands to linger on her waist, or his eyes to meet with hers, but he just put her down and headed toward the creek, checking his weapons at his side as he walked. “Olivia, stay by your father and hold onto the horses for a minute. Quaid, join me at the river please,” he said over his shoulder.
    Olivia did as Kin instructed.
    “Olivia, how are you doing?” asked her father, coming to her side.
    “Shhh.” She put her finger to her lips and strained her ears to hear what Kin and Quaid were saying. “Something is going on, and I intend to find out what.”
    “I can’t hear a thing,” said her father, tilting his head and trying to listen.
    “Neither can I. I’m going to sneak down to the river to eavesdrop on their conversation. You stay here, and I’ll be right back.”
    “Olivia, no,” warned her father, but she ignored him and headed through the underbrush toward the river.
     
    “What is the matter?” asked Quaid as Kin led the way to the river.
    “I don’t know,” said Kin, checking his sword and dagger for the third time. “I just get an uneasy feeling. Like someone is following us.”
    “Following us?” Quaid pulled his sword from his sheath and held it in the air, turning slowly. “An enemy, my lord?”
    “Not that I can tell. And put the weapon down before you scare the girl and her father.”
    “If you’re sure.” Quaid lowered the sword but kept it at the ready. “Who do you think it is?”
    “I’m not even sure someone is following us,” said Kin, looking around. “It’s more like a feeling I’m getting.”
    “Oh, is that all.” Quaid put the sword back in the sheath at his side. “I thought we were really in danger for a minute.”
    All of the sudden they heard a scream and it was coming from the underbrush at the edge of the creek.
    “That sounded like Olivia,” said Kin, taking off at a run. “Get back to the horses and keep an eye on her father,” he ordered.
    “Aye, my lord. Just call if you need my help.”
    Olivia tore out the bushes, holding up her skirts, screaming. She ran toward Kin, and kept looking over her shoulder.
    “What is it?” he called out, coming to her aid. He raised his sword high in the air, ready to take down any attacker.
    “It’s an old hag,” she cried, clinging to Kin as her frightened eyes looked back toward the bushes.
    “What are you talking about?”
    “There was no one there, I swear. Only trees,” she stammered. “I stopped by this odd tree with branches out to the sides that almost looked like a person holding out their arms. That’s when I noticed the hand mirror on the ground and picked it up.”
    “Hand mirror?” Kin stayed alert to everything around him. There was only one person he knew who would have a hand mirror out in the woods, and he didn’t like the sound of this at all.
    “I looked into the mirror and saw the tree behind me turn into an old, ugly hag.”
    “Hecuba, I know you’re there so you might as well come out,” Kin called out.
    Out of the bushes walked the old witch, grasping onto her hand mirror. “I was having so much fun watching you