Ayla remained in the great hall, standing tall and proud until the very last of her people had left. Only then did she rush out and collapse against a wall in a quiet back room.

"By the apostles!" she murmured to herself. "Get yourself together! Sentencing that madman shouldn't have been difficult! He deserved everything he got!"

Yes, he did. But still...

Ayla loved many things about her life in Luntberg. She loved caring for her people, protecting them, and, failing that, stitching their wounds. She even loved them for their silly squabbles and arguments which she had to resolve on a regular basis to keep people in the castle from constantly being at each other's throats.

But what she did not love was having to cause pain and suffering. Be it to the soldiers of Falkenstein outside, who had only been dragged into this feud because of their loyalty to their lord, or to those of her own people like Gernot who could not live with her decisions—she hated it!

For a while she just stood there, leaning against the wall, gathering her strength and waiting for her dizziness to abate. When it finally did, Ayla stood straight and gathered her dress up in her hands.

"No sense just standing around here," she muttered.

People would come to find her eventually. They always did. Whether it was to ask her to look after a sprained ankle or to make sure food was fairly distributed, people wanting to occupy her time were never in short supply. Normally, she didn't mind, but right now, she felt different. Right now, she needed time to think. Preferably in company that didn't bother her with unecessary chatter.

Well, there was only one choice, then, really.

Five minutes later she arrived at her destination—a building which used to be a simple barn, but ever since the stables had burned down, served a different purpose. The smell of horses permiated the air and she heard nickering from insided. A feeling of warmth spreading through her, she stepped inside and made her way towards where a certain mare was tethered.

"Eleanor, my girl. How are you?"

The horse whinnied and turned towards Ayla, giving her a friendly nibble on the sleeve, her traditional greeting.

"None of that, you sweet little glutton!" In spite of her admonishing tone, a smile spread over Ayla's face, and her body relaxed for the first time since she had seen flames rising out of the storage building earlier that day. This was where she wanted to be—with her friend, in companionable silence. No one would find her here. "There's something much better on the menu then my dress. Look, I've come bearing gifts."

And she held out a carrot to the horse.

"Although looking at you," she said, raising a sceptic eyebrow, "I'm not at all sure you need it. Your belly has grown quite a bit larger, hasn't it?"

Ignoring this insult to her horsely charms completely, Eleanor snatched up the carrot and devoured it.

"You greedy hog!" Laughing, Ayla patted the mare's paunch. "How can you be so hungry, considering how fat you've already grown? You should have enough fat on you to last you a month!"

Eleanor nickered indignantly and looked around for more carrots. When she found none, she leaned her head towards Ayla's belt pouch and tentatively bit into the leather, testing if it might be edible.

"Hey! That's going a bit too far, you know? My things are in there!"

The mare looked up at her with large, fathomless black horse eyes. Ayla wondered how such a devious creature could look so innocent.

"No more food for you today! You really need exercise, you know? It's this infernal siege—such a nuisance!" Leaning forward against the mare's neck, and hugging her to herself, Ayla tickled the horse behind her left ear. "I'll have to speak to Reuben," she mused, smiling, indulging in dreams of freedom for a moment. "He says we'll still be stuck here for a few weeks, but maybe he can kill all my enemies before that, and I can finally go riding with you again."

"Your wishes are duly noted, Milady."

Jerking up and away from Eleanor, Ayla nearly hit her head on one of the barn's low crossbeams. Rubbing her head, she whirled around to face the voice that had spoken behind her.

"Reuben!"

He was standing in the entrance of the temporary stable, leaning against the creaking doorframe, his arms crossed in front of his chest. He was still wearing full armor, and hadn't had time yet, it seemed, to wash off the black stains all over his red surcoat and face.

Half-covered in soot like that, and standing in such a position of relaxed menace that showed off all his muscles even under the armor, he looked like a devil freshly ascended from hell. An incredibly tempting devil.

"Y-you surprised me," she muttered, feeling shy for some unfathomable reason. "I didn't think anyone would find me here."

He cocked his head.

"I saw the look on your face after you sentenced that piece of scum. You needed to get away. It wasn't really hard to guess where to. I know you."

"Do you, now?"

"Yes."

"Did it ever occur to you to wonder whether I might not want to be disturbed?"

"I'm sure you don't want to be, Milady—by anyone but me."

She raised an eyebrow. "You have a very high opinion of yourself, Sir Knight."

He sent her his devilish smile. Spitting his blackened face in two, it hit her with unexpected brilliance, and knocked the breath out of her. "Yes. Can you blame me?"

She swallowed, letting her eyes roam over him greedily. "No. Not really."

At the corner of her eyes, Ayla felt a twinge. Reaching up, she detected wetness on her cheeks. She was crying! So far she had managed to live through everything, head held high, and now she was crying?

"Ayla, what..."

"It's... it's nothing." Hurriedly, she moved to wipe the tears away. "Just the smoke. A delayed reaction to the smoke, that's all. Please, don't—"

Paying no heed, he moved towards her. He had crossed the distance between them with three quick steps, and then she was in his arms, suddenly sobbing against his shoulders.

"I-I'm sorry," she whimpered. "I'm being silly, it's just..."

"Shh. Don't worry. Shh. Everything is going to be fine, just fine."

"Fine? I just condemned a man to life in prison!"

"The bastard deserved it."

"You're not helping, Reuben!"

"Then let me start with that right away." Leaning forward, he brushed his lips against her hair, holding her more tightly against his chest. "There. Does that help?"

"Y-yes. It does, actually."

"You see? I always know exactly what to do."

Ayla nodded, sniffling into his tunic.

"Does it really weigh so heavily on you?" Reuben asked, with curiosity, and no small amount of puzzlement in his voice. "Sentencing that bast—man?"

"Well... yes, it does. But it's more than that. I can't understand how I could have been so stupid!"

"Stupid, Milady?"

"Yes, Reuben stupid!" She looked up at him then, and could feel the desperation burning in her eyes. "I mean, how could I have missed something like that?"

He still looked puzzled.

"Should I ask what you mean or just say "there, there" and kiss your head again?" he asked.

"You're not very practiced at comforting women, are you?"

"Not really, no."

"Then let me give you a piece of advice," Ayla sniffled. "It's always good to ask what's wrong."

"I see." Gently, he cupped her face. Tipping back her head so she had to look directly into his eyes, he gazed at her, his gray eyes burning with the fire of sincerity. "What's wrong, Ayla? Is there anything I can do to help?"

Then he let go of her face and grinned. "How was that?"

Ayla couldn't help it—a little, teary chuckle escaped her. "Much better."

"So? What is the matter? What shouldn't you have missed?"

All humor drained out of her.

"Gernot's fanaticism, of course! Ever since the siege began and the peasants moved into the castle I've been living under one roof with the man! I am the liege lady here. I am supposed to know my people, know what troubles them, what they strive for and how I can lead them into a safe future. And then something like this happens! This catastrophe! I should have recognized what was happening earlier and put a stop to it! I should have talked to him. I should have had Father Jone look into the matter. I should have—"

At that point, Ayla's words were abruptly cut off. Reuben had placed his hand over her mouth.

"There," he said. "That's better."

"Mmpf! Mppff!"

He grinned.

"If that was a threat to bite my fingers, don't bother. You know I won't notice."

Ayla glared up at him, fuming inside. If he hadn't had his hand so tightly clamped over her mouth, she would have hurled all kinds of insults at him that weren't suitable for a lady to use.

How dare he? Here she was, confessing her secret guilt over her failure, and all he did in response was clamp a hand over her mouth? She really was tempted to bite him—but he was right, curse him! He wouldn't feel a hint of pain.

Struggling to get free, she pushed against his chest. But one of his arms, clamped tightly around her waist, was more than enough to counter the force of both of hers.

"I realize," Reuben said, nodding to his hand over her mouth, "that this is probably not standard procedure in the comforting of females. But you know me—I'm always up for interesting alternatives."

He gave her his devilish grin again, and Ayla's traitorous body relaxed into his hold.

"The point of this," he said, nodding to his hand again, "is just to stop your self-flagellation long enough to tell you what I know to be the truth. Ayla—what happened is not your fault."

Bending down, he removed his hand from her mouth, but before she could get out an argument, his lips sealed hers.

His taste was different now. Mixed with the raw, masculine taste that was Reuben came the heavy aroma of smoke. It tasted as if he had just been roasted over an open fire, which, she supposed, in a way he had been.

She opened herself up to him, letting the desperation and ferocity of the fire saturate her mouth, and then letting him batter against it with the storm of his passion, until it was gone and all there was was him and her, clutched tightly in each others arms. She knew that she was crying, but just then she didn't care. It felt too good to be in Reuben's arms, connected to him in this beautiful way.

When he finally drew back, they were both breathless.

"It was not your fault," he repeated, iron determination in his voice.

"H-how can you say that Reuben?"

"Because, Milady, I've asked around a bit among the soldiers and villagers."

Ayla frowned. This wasn't what she had expected to here. "Asked around?"

"About that fellow, Gernot. You think all it would have taken is for someone to hold his hand and give him a good talking to about his religious views?" Reuben shook his head. "Think again, Milady. Apparently, the man was perfectly normal until a few months ago. Then his wife died from an arrow wound in the Battle of the Killing Fields."

"His... wife?"

The word, so present in Ayla's thoughts recently, lingered in the air between them. Reuben regarded her with shrewd gray eyes.

"Yes."

"I didn't know a women died in that battle."

"She was the only one. Got a stray arrow through the throat while trying to help a wounded soldier."

He shrugged, as if women getting arrows through the throat were a perfectly normal occurrence where he came from—which it probably was.

"It drove Gernot right over the edge. The few villagers I've talked to say he became obsessively religious, forever egging the priest on to have masses said for her soul, and pray for her, and Satan only knows what else. He began to believe that we were all doomed to die anyway, so the best thing we could do was die in the most Christian way possible to ensure a quick trip to heaven. Maybe he even wanted to die, thinking he'd see his wife again."

Suddenly, the nonchalance disappeared from Reuben's face. He looked down at Ayla. When he spoke next, his voice was rough.

"I suppose I can't really blame him, as much as I'd like to. I can't imagine what I'd do if I lost someone I loved that much."

Gathering her up in her arms, he leaned down towards her, and kissed her, long and hard.

"I don't know what exactly you'd do, either," Ayla mumbled against his lips. "But I do know you'd leave a lot less survivors than Gernot."

She could feel his deep laughter reverberate throughout her entire body.

"Oh, Milady! You know me so well!"

"So..." Ayla hesitated. "It was me you were talking about? You still love me?"

"Of course!" Again, he kissed her, on her mouth, her cheeks, her forehead. "How can you doubt it?"

"Well..." She bit her lip. "You haven't found the answer yet. You haven't found what I really want from you. What I need."

From his towering height, he looked down at her for a long moment. Long strands of black hair hung into his face like a dark curtain. Behind the curtain, his eyes smoldered with gray fire. She could see something going on in there, a struggle of epic proportions.

With himself? Or with the world?

"Can I try again?" he asked, in hardly more than a rough whisper.

Ayla's breath caught.

"O-of course." Her voice wasn't very loud either. She could hardly hear it herself.

Finally, he took a deep breath, and, tightening his grip, leaned down until their faces were only a few inches apart.

"Ayla," he whispered, his voice low and intense, "do you want to marry me?"

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Greetings, Milords and Ladies,

And? Are you excited for the answer? ;-)

What do you think it's going to be?

Farewell,

Sir Rob