Sir Rowan and the Camerian Conquest by Chuck Black Page B

today as long as you put everything back and ride away.”
    The two men looked at each other and started to laugh. “We’re the ones wit’ the swords, an’ besides, if’n you did ’ave one, a farmer’s no fighter. Now back off!”
    The larger of the two thugs jabbed his sword at Rowan to get him away from their horses.
    “You don’t seem to understand,” Rowan said calmly as Mariah moved up quietly behind the men.
    The thugs hesitated. Just then a sword flew over their heads from behind them, and Rowan snatched it out of midair. “I do have a sword,” he said, “and I am not a farmer.”
    Rowan engaged both men simultaneously. It took him a few strokes to find his rhythm and the feel of the sword, but soon he had both men in steady retreat. They began to panic as his mastery was revealed. At one point Rowan parried, feigned a thrust, and sliced across the sword arm of the larger thug. He screamed, backed away, and cradled his bleeding wound.
    “That’s for striking the lady,” Rowan said to the man.
    The other man hesitated with eyes wide.
    “This next one’s for stealing,” Rowan taunted.
    The man threw his sword down and backed away with his hands up.
    “You, there,” Rowan said to the larger bandit. “Drop your sword.”
    The man dropped it. Rowan maneuvered the men back to their horses. “Put it all back exactly where you found it. Mariah, fetch a cloth.”
    Mariah looked at Rowan as if he’d lost his mind. He winked. “We don’t want him bleeding all over the floor, now do we?”
    Rowan and Mariah waited while one thief tied a bandage aroundthe other’s arm and both thieves became busy returning all of the stolen goods back to the house. The men looked quite humiliated during the task, but Rowan was not done with them. On their last trip, Rowan took their horses and tied them up on the far side of the home.
    “Hey, where’s our horses?” the larger brute said with a scowl on his face when they exited the home.
    “You will have your horses back when you’re finished paying for your crime,” Rowan answered. “Down in that grove of trees you will find cut wood, an old mare, and a cart. Load up the cart with the wood; then bring it back and stack the wood neatly alongside the house on the south side.”
    The men sneered and hesitated. Rowan stepped toward them with his sword ready. “Hurry along now, before I feel like using this again.”
    The men ducked their heads and started toward the trees. Rowan could hear them grumbling at each other as they went.
    “Having fun?” Mariah came to stand beside Rowan.
    Rowan just smiled as he watched the men disappear into the trees.
    “I didn’t know if you remembered how to use a sword after all these months,” she said. “I guess you must have been pretty good after all,” she teased.
    Rowan lifted up the sword and saw the mark of the Prince in the pommel. “It’s a beautiful sword,” he said. “Where did you get it?”
    “My father has three more in a trunk in my bedchamber. He believes in being prepared.”
    “I’m glad for it,” Rowan said, “and for your quick thinking. I don’t know what—” Rowan looked down at Mariah and saw the cut and bruise on her forehead from the brute’s attack. He reached up and gently pushed her hair away from the injury to inspect it more closely. “You’re bleeding.”
    Mariah shrugged. “It’s nothing.”
    “Come.” Rowan took her hand and led her to the well. He drew a bucket of cold water, then dampened a clean cloth and gently cleaned the blood away. He held the cool cloth on the bruise.
    Mariah looked up at him. “Thank you.”
    “I have a long way to go to catch up to you,” he said. “But I’m willing to stick around and try if you’ll let me.”
    Mariah smiled briefly, then turned away and looked toward the trees where the would-be robbers were working.
    “Should we feed them?” she asked.
    Rowan was stunned by her question—and by this glimpse into the beauty of her