Silvana's Trial

Chapter 3 - Camping

The following morning, they set off again with the two guards and a packhorse, heading into the rocky hills covered by small trees and thick scrub. In the late afternoon, they set up camp in a clearing not too far from a bubbling brook.

All was well until Silvana gestured to the tent.

"No, Lady. I cannot accept. Where will you sleep if I should take the tent?"

She rolled her eyes. "I may be a princess, Your Excellency, but I happen to know a bit about camping out. I'll be fine. The tent is intended for you."

He shook his head. "I have no use of a tent and I must insist. I wished to turn this tour into a camping trip." Then he grinned, adding, "I may be an imperial prince, but I, too, happen to know quite a bit about camping out and I enjoy falling asleep under the stars."

He bit his lip at the stony face she made. He could play the game of verbal sparring just as well as she did. Although he regretted it a moment later.

She bowed her head. "As you wish, Your Excellency."

"Silvana," he made to stay her by grabbing her hand but she whipped it out of reach. "Please call me Ned," he entreated. "There is no need for titles here in the wilderness. The birds and the squirrels don't care about my birth and you don't need to either, especially not here."

She shook her head. It was a tiny motion but it spoke volumes. He sighed as she walked off. He knew it would take time. He was disappointed she couldn't relax her opinion of him, her insistence of holding onto the past, clinging to his position and title and refusing to get to know him as a person.

He tried several times to get her to use his nickname over the next few days. She refused every time, pointedly ignoring the request.

On the fifth morning, he woke early. The sky was still a deep violet. A bright line on the horizon indicated the sun was on its way. Surprised, he looked about trying to work out what had woken him. His gaze fell on the tent. The front piece of material hung open, a limp green triangle drifting back and forth in the breeze. The bedroll inside was bundled up and ready to tie to a saddle.

Looking around he noticed a shadow slipping along a path up into the hills. He rose, hurrying after her. She was hard to follow but he managed somehow. He was grateful the path didn't fork. He came around a bend in the trail. Before him, the rocks opened up into a glade. Silvana knelt, her brown trousers hugging her figure. She slipped a knife into its sheath at her waist and came to her feet. She was lithe, her movements fluid. Two dead rabbits dangled from her left hand. She stared at him, eyes wide. Uncertainty was written all over her face.

***

Silvana didn't know what to do. No man had ever seen her hunt—except for Flynn. Self-consciousness rooted her to the spot. She stood, seeing herself through his eyes. The two limp rabbits, hanging from her grip, a brown patch on her knee from where she knelt in the dirt. Blood, drip-dripping from her kill, oozing into the parched sand by her foot.

Her petrified stance gave way, some invisible puppeteer relinquished her strings, and she dropped her gaze while striding forward. "We were running out of meat," she stammered.

Heat flooded her neck and face when she continued to sense his eyes boring into her and she pushed past him. She needed to get away.

"Wait!"

Although she ignored his request, it didn't take him long to catch up with her. She spun around to face him. Hatred for this man burned deep within her chest. He witnessed something special she had with Flynn, ruining even that sacred memory.