Beauty is Deceiving 4 – What Harlon Said

Posted by Scourge on January 4, 2010

Harlon took some time peering about the yard. Frog pond. Flowers. A couple of leafy trees. When his gaze found its way back to Celiaria, he still had no clue what he was going to say. And, since he found himself like this pretty often (though not to such a degree usually), he did what he always did. He blathered.

“Nice day,” he said, glancing up at the sky.

She looked up for a monent and smiled. “Yes.” And then she looked back at him, her smile fading by degrees.

“So!” he said, and rubbed his hands together. He immediately wished he hadn’t. “So. I… just came by to welcome you to Barend, officially as it were.” He grinned, but her smile had vanished completely by now. “We don’t get many visitors.”

One perfectly-plucked eyebrow arched up her alabaster brow. “Officially? I was told you were… ahem… self-employed.”

If Big Dubby, the Bruiser of Barkwood, had seen Harlon at that moment, he would have surely busted his nose and shoved his face in the dirt like he had one million times during Harlon’s school days. Big Dubby thought blushing was the most disgraceful sign of masculine weakness, and Harlon was a blusher.

His cheeks blazed. Self-employed. He cleared his throat.

“Umm… yes. And I just wanted to welcome you to Barend.” He arched his own eyebrow. “We don’t get many visitors.”

“This is a working holiday,” she said, and crossed her arms under her considerable breasts.

The effect made Harlon forget anything else he could possibly say. “Ahh!” he said, and then simply turned around and left, walking fast with his coat pulled snugly around his front.

By the time he reached the cobbled road, which stretched between the castle in the west and the graveyard in the east, he was able to take his hands out of his pockets. He took a deep breath and walked on. Working holiday. Working holiday. The words tumbled over themselves in his mind.

What? he wondered, would a demi-duchess be doing for work? And why was she doing it here, in Barend of all places?

He vaguely wished someone, somewhere had invented a method of long-distance communication so he could get a hold of the Duke and tell him to come fetch his daughter home already. She gave him too much to think about.