Untamed Read Online Free

least is longest on the wing.’ ”
    “Fair sailor, how well read you are!”
    Trystan hurried after her, teased by the tinkle of her laughter and the barest glimpse of auburn hair. She led him such a chase through the orchard that he did not realize she had taken him in a circle back to the overgrown lawn until he raced out of the trees and came up short before a grinning statue.
    “Pan, you rascal,” Trystan puffed, lowering himself down onto the god’s pedestal. “I am bedevilled by a slip of a woman.”
    He laid his head back against Pan’s goat legs and closed his eyes, feeling weariness seep through his bones, making him regret his mad dash through the blossomed trees. He dozed for a moment, then jerked awake when a voice spoke from behind.
    “Sleep not at the feet of Pan,” the voice warned gently. Trystan did not attempt to turn his head and catch the woman. “He is responsible for the mischief of nightmares. Rather, choose to sleep at Apollo’s feet for his grace will heal your ills.”
    “Why do you not show yourself?” Trystan demanded softly, sighing deeply. He heard a rustle in the long grass and the voice came from even further away.
    “ `I fear thee, ancient Mariner! I fear thy skinny hand! And thou art long, and lank, and brown, As is the ribbed sea-sand.’ ”
    Trystan shook his head slowly, still too tired to attempt rising. He thought she had finished speaking but she spoke again and this time with her own words.
    “But, in truth, my brave sailor, your hands are not skinny, and so perhaps I should fear you even more for who would be afraid of skinny hands?”
    “I would never hurt you,” Trystan swore, turning his head slightly but he caught only the sight of her retreating back as she skipped passed an armless statue of Apollo and up the steps of the red brick house. She disappeared through the wide-open front doors.
    Trystan used Pan’s legs to support him as he dragged himself back to his feet. He paused to wait for his spinning head to settle and then managed a respectable lurch into the soothing diffused light of the front hall. The door to his left led to a small parlor, the door to his right led to a dining room. Neither of them contained his elusive hostess. Athena came darting down the hallway from the back of the house.
    “Hello there, girl.” Trystan leaned carefully down and let her sniff his hand before he scratched the fox terrier’s chin. “Where’s your mistress?”
    Athena tilted her head back and sighed in ecstasy, choosing to ignore his query.
    “Are you trying to seduce her?”
    He straightened and faced his hostess. She stood just down the hallway and she looked like a wild gypsy woman. Her long auburn locks curled undressed and windblown. Her lovely face, graced with a pert nose, full lips, golden skin, and wide-set warm brown eyes, held an expression of innocent mischief and shy knowing. She appeared to be only a half a head shorter than his six feet. There was a certain untamed vitality in her lithe form that excited him and drew him to her. When he took a hesitant step forward he thought she would turn and run again. Indeed, her blue skirts swayed as if she’d been about to flee but found the courage to make a stand.
    “I am Trystan Larabette, Captain of the Lady May , at your service, ma’am,” Trystan said as grandly as he could manage barefooted and in a borrowed nightshirt.
    “Ah, a captain.”
    He watched her look down at her naked left foot exposed by a skirt too short for her. There were grass stains on her heels and bits of wet mud between her toes but she didn’t seem to mind. A curious kind of casual abandonment shone in her manner as if she had never known reproof or criticism and so lived without expectation of it.
    “What is your name and where am I?” Trystan asked, easing forward another foot.
    “I am Desarae,” she answered, grinning happily. She curtsied gracefully. “Kind, sir, you are on Angel Island, located between the colonies