Chapter 13

Naomi sat hunched over in the covered wagon with Yula. It was one of the supply wagons. Bundles of cloth hemmed them in. There’d been no carriages at the castle or among the army. They’d been packed in like any other supply. Naomi was sorely missing modern suspension. She was sitting on two pillows, but she already had butt bruises, and they were still in their first hour of travel. It was going to be a long day. She closed her eyes and tried to nap.

Yula shook her awake a few hours later. The wagon had stopped. She pointed outside. Naomi rubbed her eyes and stuck her head out.

Tavik waited outside on his horse. He leaned down and offered his hand. She blinked owlishly at him. Her brain was computing the gesture. Though she may have nodded off in the wagon, she was more tired now than before. It was hard work sleeping in a jostling wagon.

“Ride with me so I can tell you what is expected of you when we reach my home.”

She leaned back into the wagon. “I don’t know how to ride.”

“You don’t have to.”

“Can’t we talk like this? I mean I can hear you fine from here, and I can talk louder if you need me too.”

Tavik did not respond verbally just continued to hold out his hand. She reluctantly hopped down from the wagon and went over to him. She grasped his arm in both hands, and he pulled her up. She had a moment of panic as she tried to figure out how she was supposed to sit: side saddle, astride, behind him, in front of him? Tavik did the deciding by setting her side saddle in front of him. Reflexively, Naomi wrapped one arm around his waist and grabbed the pummel with her other. Her legs wound up draping over his thigh. She tried to figure out how to move her legs off him, but before she could even get her bearings, he kicked the horse into a trot. Her hold tightened around his waist as she tried to keep her seat. One of his hands fell to her thigh, and the other wrapped around her waist as well to help hold her steady. Naomi’s eyes instantly shot to the first hand and wondered what he thought he was doing. It was warm and heavy. And unwanted.

She tried to get him to remove his hand by moving her thigh a little, but he only pressed his hand down harder. She decided the quicker she got this over with the sooner she could get him off of her or her off of him as the case may be.

“So what’s expected of me at your castle?” she asked.

“You will be the lady of the castle, but do not think that gives you control of my household. The servants and guards know that, even though I am gone, I will be back, and I will be displeased if things are not the way that I left them.”

“So what are you going to do? Throw a drop cloth over me when you go or something? What can I do while you’re gone?”

“You may visit the gardens. If you wish to rearrange them, that is fine. I will tell the gardeners. You can sew of course. Start a tapestry to surprise me with maybe. Oversee the maids. Go for walks outside the castle but only with guards.”

Naomi’s stomach turned as she listened to Tavik rattle off his list. She was not a feminazi but neither was she a fifties housewife. She could not do anything with thread except tangle it, plastic flowers wilted around her, the idea of ordering women around to do menial tasks repelled her, and going for walks would be tortuous because she had the feeling that if she started walking away from the castle, she would not want to turn back.

“Um, none that really appeals to me.”

“What would you like to do?”

Naomi said the first thing that came to her. “I want to learn how to ride.”

Tavik patted her leg, and Naomi’s thigh jumped under his touch. “I will tell the stable master to see to it personally. He will probably be the only one with enough patience to handle you.”

Her head snapped around him at the assessment. “And what makes you think I’ll be such a terrible student? I pick up things very quickly I’ll have you know.”

Tavik’s hand settled more firmly on her thigh, and Naomi stiffened in reaction to him. “Because horseback riding is not something you can just be told how to do and then do. Your mind can’t just order your body to do it. Your body has to accept it. Like right now you are totally wrong. If another man were holding you, he may very well have lost his grasp, and you would be on the ground a quarter of a mile back.”

“So how should I be sitting then?” She grumbled as she shifted self-consciously.

“First loosen your body. You have to let yourself move with the horse.” She tried to do as instructed. She loosened her grasp gradually from around his waist and flexed her back a little to loosen it up. She had been hunched tightly. She let her claw like grasp on the pummel lessen. Her hand had begun to cramp anyway. She was grateful when he removed his hand from her thigh and placed it on his own. Naomi tried to let her body flow with the horse but kept flinching when the horse took anything resembling a jarring step.

“I feel like I don’t have any control,” she said.

“Here then take the reins,” he offered. She looked up at him to make sure he knew what he was doing, but with that stupid mask on, she could not tell a thing. She took the reins and clenched them in her lap with both hands. She jolted in alarm when the steed stamped his feet in displeasure.

“I didn’t tug on them or anything,” she protested as the charger continued to step finically.

“Yes, but Victor can feel how rigidly you hold the reins, not giving him any leeway. He can’t even shake his head to throw off a fly.”

She loosened her arms and slackened the reins to give the charger a little more freedom while Tavik soothed the horse with gentle words. The steed settled down quickly.

“Sorry,” she mumbled.

He moved his hand and patted her thigh where it settled once again. “You are learning.”

Naomi noticed the action and scowled briefly. “I’ll be learning to ride on my own, right? Women are allowed to ride alone, aren’t they? This stable master won’t be sitting on the horse with me every lesson will he?”

Tavik threw his head back and laughed. “No, I don’t think his wife would approve of that.”

Naomi was comforted slightly by his answer but still scowled at his proprietary hand. “So what are the sleeping arrangements going to be? Am I going to be tied to a chair or could I just be locked in a room?”

“You will have your own room.”

Naomi perked up at this. Funny how certain things that would have been horrible a few days before now were reassuring. Her own cell. How marvelous.

They rode in silence for a while longer. Naomi began to wonder when Tavik would let her off to return to the wagon. He did not seem inclined to. She tried to put the time to good use and practice her balance like Tavik instructed, but she knew that her odd seat on the horse would not be something she would often have to use. She hoped the stable master would let her ride astride the horse and not side saddle. Tavik’s hand remained on her thigh.

Continue to Chapter 14.