Robert Salvatore - The Spine of the World

"I haven't even said I would marry you," Meralda squealed a weak protest.

"But you will marry me, of course," Feringal said confidently. "All the village will be in attendance, a faire that will stay in hearts and memories for all the lives of all who witness it. On that day, Meralda, it will be you whom they rejoice in most of all," he said, coming over and taking her hand again, but gently and respectfully this time. "Years-no, decades-from now, the village women will still remark on the beauty of Lord Feringal's bride."

Meralda couldn't, deny she was touched by the man's sincerity and somewhat thrilled by the prospect of having as great a day as Feringal spoke of, a wedding that would be the talk of Auckney for years and years to come. What woman would not desire such a thing?

Yet, Meralda also could not deny that while the glorious wedding was appealing, her heart longed for another. She was beginning to notice another side of Lord Feringal now, a decent and caring nature, perhaps, buried beneath the trappings of his sheltered upbringing. Despite that, Meralda could not forget, even for one moment, that Lord Feringal, simply was not her Jaka.

Steward Temigast returned and announced that the coach was ready, and Meralda went straight to him, but she was still not quick enough to dodge the young man's last attempt to steal a kiss.

It hardly mattered. Meralda was beginning to see things clearly now, and she understood her responsibility to her family and would put that responsibility above all else. Still, it was a long and miserable ride across the bridge and down the road, the young woman's head swirling with so many conflicting thoughts and emotions.

Once again she bade the gnomish driver to let her out some distance from her home. Pulling off the uncomfortable shoes Temigast had sent along with the dress, Meralda walked barefoot down the lane under the moon. Too confused by the events-to think that she was to be married! — Meralda was barely conscious of her surroundings and wasn't even hoping, as she had after her first meeting, that Jaka would find her on the road. She was taken completely by surprise when the young man appeared before her.

"What did he do to you?" Jaka asked before Meralda could even say his name.

"Do?" she echoed.

"What did you do?" Jaka demanded. "You were there for a long time."

"We walked in the garden," the woman answered.

"Just walked?" Jaka's voice took on a frightful edge at that moment, one that set Meralda back on her heels.

"What're you thinking?" she dared ask.

Jaka gave a great sigh and spun away. "I am not thinking, and that is the problem," he wailed. "What enchantment have you cast upon me, Meralda? Oh, the bewitching! I know miserable Feringal must feel the same," he added, spinning back on her. "What man could not?"

A great smile erupted on the young woman's face, but it didn't hold, not at all. Why was Jaka acting so peculiar, so love-struck all of a sudden? she wondered. Why hadn't he behaved this way before?

"Did he have you?" Jaka asked, coming very close. "Did you let him?"

The questions hit Meralda like a wet towel across the face. "How can you be asking me such a thing?" she protested.

Jaka fell to his knees before her, taking both her hands and pressing them against his cheek. "Because I shall die to think of you with him," he explained.

Meralda felt weak in her knees and sick to her stomach. She was too young and too inexperienced, she realized, and could not fathom any of this, not the marriage, not Lord Feringal's polite and almost animalistic polarities, and not Jaka's sudden conversion to lovesick suitor.

"I. ." she started. "We did nothing. Oh, he stole a kiss, but I didn't kiss him back."

Jaka looked at her, and the smile upon his face was somehow unnerving to Meralda. He came closer then, moving his lips to brush against hers and lighting fires everywhere in her body, it seemed. She felt his hands roaming her body, and she did not fear them-at least not in the same manner in which she had feared her noble suitor. No, this time it was an exciting thing, but still she pushed the man back from her.

"Do you deny the love that we feel for each other?" a wounded Jaka asked.

"But it's not about how we're feeling," Meralda tried to explain.

"Of course it is," the young man said quietly, and he came forward again. "That is all that matters."

He kissed her gently again, and Meralda found that she believed him. The only thing in all the world that mattered at that moment was how she and Jaka felt for each other. She returned the kiss, falling deeper and deeper, tumbling away to an abyss of joy.

Then he was gone from her, too abruptly. Meralda popped open her eyes to see Jaka tumbling to the ground, a raging Dohni Ganderlay standing before her.

"Are you a fool then?" the man asked, and he lifted his arm as if to strike Meralda. A look of pain crossed his rugged face then, and he quickly put his arm down, but up it came again, grabbing Meralda roughly by the shoulder and spinning her toward the house. Dohni shoved her along, then turned on Jaka, who put his hands up defensively in front of his face and darted about, trying to escape.

"Don't hit him, Da!" the young woman cried, and that plea alone stopped Dohni.

"Stay far from my girl," Dohni warned Jaka.

"I love-" Jaka started to reply.

"They'll find yer body washing on the beach," Dohni said.

When Meralda cried out again, the imposing man turned on her viciously. "Home!" he commanded. Meralda ran off at full speed, not even bothering to retrieve the shoe she had dropped when Dohni had shoved her.

Dohni turned on Jaka, his eyes, red from anger and nights of restless sleep, as menacing as any sight the young man had ever witnessed. Jaka turned on his heel and ran away. He started to, anyway, for before he had gone three steps Dohni hit him with a flying tackle across the back of his knees, dropping him face down on the ground.

"Meralda begged you not to hit me!" the terrified young man pleaded.

Dohni climbed atop him, roughly pulling the young man over. "Meralda's not knowing what's best for Meralda," Dohni answered with a growl and a punch that jerked Jaka's head to the side.

The young man began to cry and to flail his arms wildly, trying to fend off Dohni. The blows got through, though, one after another, swelling Jaka's pretty eyes and fattening both his lips, knocking one tooth out of his perfect smile and bringing blue bruises to his normally rosy cheeks. Jaka finally had the sense to bring his arms down across his battered face, but Dohni, his rage not yet played out, only aimed his blows lower, pounding, pounding Jaka about the chest. Every time Jaka dropped one arm down lower to block there, Dohni cunningly slipped a punch in about his face again.

Finally, Dohni leaped off the man, grabbed him by the front of the shirt, and hoisted him to his feet with a sudden, vicious jerk. Jaka held his palms out in front of him in a sign of surrender. That cowardly act only made Dohni slug him one more time, a brutal hook across the jaw that sent the young man flying to the ground again. Dohni pulled him upright, and he cocked his arm once more. Jaka's whimper made Dohni think of Meralda, of the inevitable look upon her face when he walked in, his knuckles all bloody. He grabbed Jaka in both hands and whipped him around, sending him running on his way.

"Get yourself gone!" the man growled at Jaka. "And don't be sniffing about my girl again!"

Jaka gave a great wail and stumbled off into the darkness.

Robillard scratched his chin when he saw the pair, Wulfgar and Morik, moving down the alley toward the front door of the Cutlass. Deudermont was still inside, a fact that did not sit well with the divining wizard, given all the activity he had seen outside the tavern's door. Robillard had watched a seedy character come out and pay off a street urchin. The wizard understood the uses of such children. That same character, an unusual figure indeed, had exited the Cutlass again and moved off into the shadows.