Read Online The Ballad of Aramei by J. A. Redmerski - Free Book Online Page B

foreigner? She thinks quietly as she stands to her feet, drying her hands on her apron. Her smile is soft and pretty and inviting, but not so much that she is giving in to his interests. Just enough to be polite and cordial. But it does make her uneasy that he followed her out here by the stream while she is alone. It gives her comfort that she can see the back of the large barn behind her house from this distance.
    “Milord,” she greets him and half-curtsies with the coyness of a young girl.
    The man, dressed in fine garb that reminds Aramei of something royal yet casual, like the noblemen from the north, bows his head gently and reaches out his hand to her. A thick silver ring with an engraving across the band adorns one finger. She notices that his hands are dirty, unbecoming of the rest of his appearance. Hesitantly, Aramei offers her hand to him and he takes it between his thumb and fingers, leans over and touches the top of it to his forehead.
    “I am Viktor Vargasavic,” he says after raising his head again, but he keeps her hand gently clutched in his fingers. “Have I offended you with my curiosity?”
    Gently, she lets her hand slip from his.
    Even more bashful now because of his intimate introduction, Aramei turns and bends over to retrieve the basket from the ground, tucking it back against her side. She bows her head slightly. “No, Milord, but it is inappropriate to be here alone with you.”
    Viktor smiles and bends one arm behind him across his lower back. He bows once more and holds it longer than the first time; a gesture of submission. “Forgive me,” he says and rises upright, “I mean no disrespect.”
    Aramei blushes and lowers her eyes.
    “Sissa! Sissa!” her older sister, Filipa, shouts as she runs toward them from the back of the barn. She’s waving one hand in the air above her, the other holding her dress at the legs to keep the ends from dragging the ground.
    Aramei smiles at Viktor. “I must go,” she says. “Good day to you.”
    Aramei meets Filipa halfway.
    “Who is that man?” she says, eyeing Viktor from across the yard. She takes the basket from Aramei and carries it for her and fits her arm around Aramei’s back, clutching her shoulder.
    “His name is Viktor,” Aramei whispers, “but that is all I know.”
    Filipa looks at Aramei warily in a sideward glance, helping her farther across the yard and out of Viktor’s sights. “Did anyone see you?” Filipa asks sternly. “Sissa, he is not from here.” She stops near the east side of the barn, drops the basket and moves around in front of Aramei, grasping her shoulders in both hands, shaking her. “He feels dark. You must stay away from him. Do you understand?”
    “Yes, I understand.”
    Aramei has no intention of defying her sister’s orders. Viktor is handsome, but like Filipa said, he is an outsider and their father would never approve of their marriage. And Filipa, taking the place of their mother nine years ago after she caught the fever and died, Aramei would never consider disobeying her. Aramei is only nineteen, Filipa twenty-five, but Filipa has been as much of a caretaker as their mother was and Aramei often forgets that Filipa is her sister.
    “You trouble me sometimes,” Filipa says, taking Aramei’s hand. “I cannot decide if you are fearless or just plain heedless.”
    Aramei lowers her head shamefully. Filipa is right after all; Aramei has always gotten herself into trouble and in tight situations while growing up. Instead of running from a snake, she stopped to study one when she was five and it nearly bit her. Filipa pulled her away just as the snake went to strike. And when Aramei turned twelve, she went out alone to look for one of their sheep lost in the valley though it was known that wolves had likely claimed it. They could have claimed her, too, but Filipa found her and brought her back before the sun slipped behind the treacherous mountains. Aramei had always been very smart, having