“How dare you?” Sir Kit seethed. Wrenching Summer behind him and throwing her to the ground, he growled, “Stay put, wench. I’ll be back for you as soon as I’ve run off this interfering mongrel false knight.” Sobbing with fear, she pressed herself back against the wall, many small hands reaching over to pat at her shoulders.
Sir Kit stalked over to his horse and drew his own sword with a steely rasp. “You’re not a Hale man,” he sneered. “Hale men know better than to come into the lands of the Argents and throw their weight around. Argents don’t recognise Hale authority! You’re just an interfering bastard with some pretty toys who’s going to get his face broken in a minute, before I get back to dealing with my property.”
He advanced on Sir Isaac, jabbing at Buttons’ belly and hind legs. “You gonna fight, or are you all talk, pretty boy?”
“False Knight?” he spluttered indignantly and actually reeled back a little, before tugging off his helmet and clipping it to the side of Buttons’ saddle. Perhaps it wasn’t wise of him to be adding to the skin on show, but he needed to be able to see what was going on, and he wanted this monster to see his face when he was defeated.
“I may not be Hale in name but I’m a Hale in spirit – they practically raised me as one of their own, after all. I fight like one if you really want to test me…which I’m assuming you do if your actions are anything to go by?” he stated with an indifferent shrug. But then when Buttons was prodded, Isaac thrust the tip of his sword under the male’s chin with a blurring motion, eyes flashing with rage.
“I would thank you never to do that again, or you will find your fingertips separated from the rest of your body.”
Sir Kit slapped Sir Isaac’s sword aside contemptuously. “You get off that fucking horse or I’ll cut you off it. Are you actually going to fight me or just ponce about up there, flourishing that piece of tin? I’m not wasting time breaking lances with the bottom boy of the Hales.”
Summer, meanwhile, stared at the young knight, heart pounding for an entirely different reason. The moment he removed his helm, she found her gaze fixed; she could not look away. He was the most gorgeous specimen of young manhood she had ever seen, and her heart melted within her.