"Come to earth!" And scooping up a
handful of the fragrant bloom, she pelted the dreamer with rosy balls.
Shaking them from robe and clustering hair, Randalin turned back, smiling. But
her lips sobered almost to wistfulness as she sank down upon the seat beside
her friend. "It seems that I must do that against my will," she said.
"Dearwyn, do you get afraid when you are happy? Sometimes, when I stand here
watching for him and think how different all has happened from what I
supposed, I am so happy,"--she paused, and it was as though the sun had caught
the iris flowers in her eyes, until a cloud came between and the blue petals
purpled darkly--"so happy that it causes fear to me, lest it be no more than a
dream or in some way not true."
Her cheek, as she ended, was softly pale, but Dearwyn brushed it pink with
sweeps of the long-stemmed blossom in her hand.
"Sweet, it is the waxing of the moon. I pray you be blithe in your spirits.
Small wonder your lover bears himself as gravely as a stone man on a tomb if
you talk such--"
"Dearwyn, the same thought has overtaken us both!" Randalin broke in
anxiously, and now she was all awake and staying the other's busy fingers to
ensure her attention. "Not a few times it has seemed to me that he looks weary
of heart, as though some struggle were sapping his strength. He swears it is
not so, yet I think the rebellion of his pride against king-serving--"
"If you want to know my belief, it is that he carries trouble in his breast
about you," Dearwyn interrupted.
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