Fallen in Love Read Online Free Page B

they arrived at Lucinda’s side. She didn’t know where the Southern belle accent had come from, other than hearing present-day Luce’s mom’s drawl at Thanksgiving back in Georgia. And she had no idea what people here in this medieval British world would make of her sounding like a Georgia deb, but it was too late now.
    A few feet behind her, Miles shook his head in horror.
It was an accident!
Shelby told him with her eyes.
    Lucinda hadn’t even noticed—that was how lost in sadness she was. Shelby had to step up right in front of her and wave a hand in her face.
    “Oh,” Lucinda said, blinking at Shelby with no hint of recognition. “Good day.”
    It shouldn’t have hurt Shelby’s feelings, but it did.
    “H-haven’t we met before?” Shelby stammered. “I think my cousin from, er, Windsor knows an uncle on your father’s side of the family … or maybe it was the other way around.”
    “I’m sorry, I don’t believe so, though perhaps—”
    “You’re Lucinda, right?”
    Lucinda started, and for a moment there was a familiar spark in her eyes. “Yes.”
    Shelby pressed a hand to her heart. “I’m Shelby. This is Miles.”
    “Such unique names. You must have traveled from the North?”
    “Sure.” Shelby shrugged. “Very, very far north. So, we’ve never been to … ye olde Valentine’s Faire here before. Are you dropping your name in the urn?”
    “Me?” Lucinda swallowed, touching the hollow of her throat. “The idea that a stroke of chance could decide my heart’s destiny does not appeal to me.”
    “Spoken like a girl who’s got herself a studly boyfriend!” Shelby nudged Lucinda, forgetting they were strangers, forgetting that her words might be coarse and her sarcasm foreign to Lucinda’s medieval sensibilities. “I mean … is there a knight you fancy, lady?”
    “I was in love,” Lucinda said somberly.
    “Was?” Shelby repeated. “You mean
are
in love.”
    “I was. But he’s gone.”
    “Daniel
left
you?” Miles was red in the face. “I mean—what was his name?”
    But Lucinda didn’t seem to have heard. “We met in the rose garden of his lord’s castle. I must admit that I was trespassing, but I had seen so many fine ladies come and go, and the gate was open, and the flowers so, so comely—”
    She clasped her hands to her heart and sighed with deep regret.
    “That first day, he mistook me for a girl of higherstature. Of class. I had my best kirtle on, my hair woven with hawthorn flowers, as some ladies do. It did look fine, but I fear it was dishonest.”
    “Oh, Lucinda,” Shelby said. “I’m sure you’re a lady in his eyes!”
    “Daniel is a knight. He must marry a fitting lady. My family, we are common. My father is a free man, but he grows grain, just as his father did.” She blinked and a tear slid down her cheek. “I never even told my love my name.”
    “If he loved you—and I’m sure he does—he’ll know your true name,” Miles said.
    Lucinda shuddered as she took a breath. “Then, last week, as part of his knightly duty to the lord, he—he came by my father’s door to gather eggs for the lord’s Valentine feast. It was the anniversary of my christening. We were celebrating. To see my love’s face when he saw me in our meager home … I tried to stop him going, but he took his leave without a word. I’ve looked for him in all our secret places—the hollowed oak tree in the forest, the northern fringe of the rose garden at dusk—but I have not seen him since.”
    Shelby and Miles shared a look. Obviously, Daniel didn’t care about what kind of family Lucinda came from. It was the anniversary—the fact that she was getting closer to the limits of her curse—that had spooked him. By now Shelby was familiar with the way Danielsometimes tried to pull away from Luce when he knew her death was near. He broke her heart to save her life. He was probably moping around somewhere, brokenhearted, too.
    It had to be that way. This girl