A Bargain Made Ch. 01

"That actually makes me feel better, if anything in this can." She suddenly became uncomfortable with his gaze. "What?"

"You are even more beautiful when you smile."

The smile broadened and she turned away for a few moments with the embarrassment of it. She saved herself by grasping on to the other, more somber topic she needed to broach. "If this works out, you know I will keep my word."

He looked at her, the wondering on his face made her sure he wasn't rooting around in her head. "Of course."

"I will marry you and do my best to be a," she searched for the right word, "satisfactory wife, not that I have much idea what that is."

Deres wanted to make whatever it was easier for her, "Such a high bar to set for yourself, are you sure you can manage?"

She ignored it. "I need your word on something as well. If this doesn't work and something happens and I end up dead or...what might be worse than dead with all this milling around in my head that has been done of late, give me your word you will do whatever you can to stop people from being hurt. Promise me you will try to save the queen, and many of the people who would take the brunt of this in the villages are people not unlike you used to be. Do what you can to help them."

He reached for her hand as he looked into her eyes, "You're going to be fine."

"I've planned a great many things well on the battlefield. Rarely did they go as I'd planned."

His voice was tinged with smugness as though he'd caught her, "But sometimes they did. This will, too."

He squeezed her hand, lacing his fingers through hers. "You've got my word. I'll help and, if I have to, die helping them, though I'd be happy skipping that last one."

She believed him and, looking down, realized that the feeling of his hand in hers wasn't so foreign or terrible a thing after all.

To be continued...