It was almost a shock when Lysander turned a bend in the river and found an active village square before him. It seemed a hardworking but not terribly prosperous village for such a large population. Then Lysander realized that despite his best efforts, he'd walked right into some sort of local festival.

Several giggling children ran past him as they played a game of snatching streaming ribbons from each other's grip. Icarus startled violently at the shrill shrieking and the wildly fluttering ribbons, so Lysander thought it best to get back into the saddle. He could better keep control of Icarus and afford himself some relief from walking among the crowd. And it was a useful vantage, for Lysander spotted the smithy immediately. He and Icarus headed for a stone building with an open shed to one side where Lysander could clearly see an anvil. The cheerful crowd parted respectfully before them.

Nearly twitching with discomfort, Lysander looked anywhere, everywhere except down at the faces upturned to eye him curiously. Something caught his eye, a graceful movement on the edge of his perception. He found his attention snared by a slim form on the far edge of the crowd.

There was a sort of pavilion set up on the common. It was an unlovely structure that served the very practical purpose of protecting the festivalgoers from sun or weather. Lysander had a vague impression of a giant parasol cobbled together from old carts, the posts looking like wagon tongues, taken from between the horses and plunked upright. The thing was little more than a rickety freestanding roof with no walls. The patchy, hand-hewn shingles had lain in place long enough to acquire a green mossy growth on the northern slope.

He'd caught the woman in the act of brushing away a strand of dark hair from her face. It caught on her lower lip, the brunette lock pointing a perceptible arrow at the soft plump curve of her mouth. She stood on tiptoe, bracing one hand against the pavilion post to gaze out over a number of temporary livestock pens. Lysander wasn't sure what made him think that she was sad, for her lovely ivory features held a small smile and her gray eyes snapped with lively intelligence. Yet he had the instant conviction that she was all alone in the crowd, separate somehow, watching but not belonging.

What should he do?

Lysander's twin brothers, Castor and Pollux, would have sent her a flirtatious smile or swept a courtly bow. Yes, it could be done from the saddle. Archie had insisted that they all practice it until Iris approved the romantic gesture.

It would have been a strange education, if one was not a Worthington.