Summer held one hand to her cheek, still clutching the blanket with the other where she’d fallen. Edward froze under Mordred’s grip, expression shocked.
“I think you’ve both made your stances more than clear,” a new voice interposed from the doorway. It belonged to an older man with iron-grey hair, still tall and straight and bearing a resemblance to Edward. “I would take it as a kindness if you could release my son, Sir Knight,” he added, nodding to Mordred. “Daughter, please collect yourself; you do your knight no good from there.”
Mordred took a step back, returning Edward to his feet as requested before he turned to face the man in the doorway. “Forgive me my lord,” he tells him, “to raise his hand to a woman — ” such a thing would have seen Edward hung, drawn and quartered in Camelot.
Summer paused only to hug Mordred from behind and bury her face briefly between his shoulderblades before she flattened herself to the wall beside the door, one hand groping for her father’s. “Peace, daughter,” he told her, squeezing her fingers. “Trust.”
Edward audibly ground his teeth, but held his tongue under his father’s level gaze. “You know the knight is correct,” Summer’s father said to Edward, who sneered slightly. “More so for that she is of your house, regardless of your opinion of her behaviour.” His grey eyes returned to Mordred.
“Might I have your name, sir knight?”