Chapter Twenty-Three #2
Athdara was as pale as the linens she lay upon, but her eyes still had life in them.
They were still glimmering. “Did Ming Tang tell you what happened?” she asked, hardly above a whisper.
“It was a bounty hunter. I had seen him before. He found me and told me he wanted to take my head back to my uncle.”
Still holding her hand, Tay reached out to stroke her head tenderly. “He is dead now,” he said quietly. “Creston and Cruz took care of him, so I can only imagine he is in a thousand pieces, all of them being fed to the dogs. You needn’t worry over him anymore. He is no longer a threat.”
She nodded, still looking at him, but it was clear that there was something on her mind. Then she burst into tears.
“I am not going to survive, am I?”
He kissed her hand again before leaning over to kiss her cheek to give her comfort. “Of course you are,” he whispered. “You are going to survive, and we shall get married and have a dozen children. You are not going to die for a very long time.”
But Athdara would not be soothed. “I am so sorry,” she said, sobbing. “I thought it would be the best thing to do.”
He wasn’t sure what she was talking about. “What would?”
“Leaving you behind.”
His confusion grew. “When were you to leave me behind?”
She held his hand in a death grip. “Please do not be angry with me.”
“I would never be angry with you, but what are you talking about?”
“I was going to leave you,” she said, tears running down her temples and onto the pillow. “I did not want you coming with me to Toxandria and then resenting me in the years to come for taking you away from Blackchurch, so I was going to leave without you.”
Now things were making more sense to him. “So you were in the stable to leave me?”
“Aye,” she murmured. “I am so sorry. I did not want to, but I felt it was best for you.”
“You were trying to make the decision for me.”
“Aye.”
He drew in a long, labored breath. He’d promised her to not become angry, so he wouldn’t, but it did explain why she’d been in the stable. A scolding would have to wait.
“And the bounty hunter was waiting in the stable for you?”
She shook her head weakly. “I do not know,” she said. “He simply… appeared.”
Tay couldn’t help but notice that her lip was split and she had the makings of an ugly black eye. It was his first hint that the confrontation in the stable must have been more than a simple stabbing. It had been a battle.
Reaching out, he touched her eye, her lip. “It looks like you gave him quite a fight,” he said. “I am proud of you, love. You fought well. Most importantly, you won.”
That seemed to bolster her, just a little. “I was so afraid,” she said. “Afraid I would never see you again.”
He bent over, kissing her on the lips this time, trying to give her what comfort he could.
She had taken a horrible thrashing, but he struggled not to linger on it.
He struggled not to beat himself up over the fact that he hadn’t been there, had been unable to help her.
He only wanted to think of her getting well at the moment.
He couldn’t stomach anything else.
“Here I am,” he said. “You are going to see me every day for the rest of your life. All you need to do is concentrate on healing. That is your only task right now.”
She labored to calm down, but Tay noticed that she seemed to be very sleepy. Her eyes kept rolling back even as she struggled to keep them open.
“Tell me you love me,” she said.
He smiled faintly. “I love you,” he said. “Until the mountains crumble and the seas run dry. And even longer still.”
“Swear it?”
“With all that I am, I do.”
“Tay?”
“What, love?”
“I want to see Niko before I die.”
His composure took a blow. “You are not going to die,” he said. “I told you so. Do you not believe me?”
“I believe you,” she said, finally closing her eyes and keeping them closed. “But I still want to see him. I have missed him so very much.”
Tay knew she wasn’t thinking clearly because of the wound and the stress, and possibly the medicaments she’d been given.
He’d been wounded himself in the past—in a skirmish in the Levant that he wasn’t sure he would ever heal from.
He’d taken a sword to the thigh, and the wound had festered, so he completely understood the state of mind of a wounded man or woman.
One tended to be more emotional and reflect on things more deeply.
Perhaps it was the body’s way of preparing for the worst.
Whatever the case, he understood her request, and he was sympathetic to it because everything she’d done had been for her little brother.
If there had been no Nikolai, her drive wouldn’t have been as great.
She could have started a new life for herself without the burden of regaining her father’s duchy.
But a little boy needed his big sister, and she had been fighting for him.
Tay already loved her, but realizing how selfless she was made him love her even more.
Even if she had tried to leave him behind.
“Sleep,” he said gently, kissing her on the forehead. “Sleep now. I will be here if you need me.”
Her eyes were still closed, but she grabbed for his hand. “You will not leave?”
“I swear, I will not leave.”
That seemed to give her a great amount of comfort, and she settled down, finally drifting off to sleep. Carefully, he disengaged his hand from hers, glancing up at Marina to make sure she knew not to leave her post. She was to remain next to that bed in case Athdara needed anything.
Tay turned away from the bed, not feeling much better than he had when he entered the chamber. He’d spoken to Athdara and understood what happened, but she was still gravely ill. That was all he was truly concerned with.
Ming Tang was standing at the door when Tay quit the chamber. The two of them paused in the corridor outside, looking into the chamber and watching Marina stand guard.
Tay sighed heavily. “What are you doing for her?” he asked quietly. “If her innards were exposed…”
They both knew what that meant. Men didn’t often survive such a wound.
Ming Tang lifted his shoulders. “It is difficult to say what will happen,” he said. “As you know, part of my Shaolin training has been in healing.”
Tay nodded. “I know,” he said. “I know you have healed many a man around Blackchurch over the years.”
“But this is different,” Ming Tang said.
“The lady’s body was assaulted. Invaded.
I have given her what I can—some call it the joy flower, some the sleeping flower.
Whatever it is called, the flower seeps a special sap.
The resulting powder, mixed with water, can bring out the most remarkable cure for pain.
I gave her some earlier when we had to put her innards back into her body and sew it up. ”
Tay closed his eyes briefly, warding off the horror of what Athdara had to endure. “But the poison comes afterwards,” he said. “Poison always comes from something like this. What will you do?”
Ming Tang’s gaze moved to the still figure on the bed.
“Whatever I can,” he said. “There are ancient Arabic recipes for such things. I will use them if I must. But I will tell you this, Tay—you must prepare yourself for what is to come. I will try to save her, but I may not be able to. Her wound is very bad.”
Tay flexed his jaw, resigning himself to what he knew was probably inevitable.
Hanging his head, he leaned back against the doorjamb.
“It was bound to happen,” he muttered. “I finally find happiness, a woman I love more than life itself, and she may have to leave me. One way or the other, God does not want me to be happy. But to lose her like this… I am not entirely sure I can stand it.”
Ming Tang put his hand on his friend’s arm. “You will survive,” he said. “For her, you must be strong. May I tell you something?”
“Aye.”
Ming Tang thought about what he wanted to say and how he wanted to say it.
“I was with St. Denis when Lady Athdara came to tell him that she did not want you to go with her to Toxandria,” he said.
“Mayhap I should not tell you this, but it is important you understand the sacrifice the lady was willing to make for you. She knew that you had worked hard for your position at Blackchurch. She knew that, if you went with her, you would essentially be leaving Blackchurch with dishonor.”
“There is no dishonor in resigning from Blackchurch.”
“When you resign to take sides in a feud that is not your fight, there is,” Ming Tang said rather firmly.
“That is one of the cornerstones of Blackchurch’s foundation, that we must always remain neutral.
The lady knew this, and she was willing to sacrifice her happiness so that you would not have to surrender your honor.
She wrote you a missive ensuring you would not follow her. ”
“No missive would keep me from following her.”
“This one would.”
His tone implied that the missive contained something ominous. Tay wasn’t entirely sure he wanted to know what it was.
“Did you see this missive?” he asked.
Ming Tang nodded. “I did.”
“Will you tell me what it said?”
A pause. “It does not matter now,” Ming Tang said. “It was all lies.”
“Where is it?”
“In St. Denis’ solar. He was to give it to you when she’d gone.”
“Tell him to burn it.”
Ming Tang thought that was the right course of action at this point. Whatever was in that missive was meaningless now. Athdara was facing a much greater fight, and she would need all of Tay’s support and strength.
“I will,” he said. “But remember that it was her right to tell you not to come with her. This is her battle, after all.”
Tay slumped back against the wall, rubbing his eyes.
“I know,” he said. “The fight to regain Toxandria is not my fight, but because I love her, it has become my fight. You are a man I trust and respect, Ming Tang, but I will disagree with you if you tell me I cannot fight for the woman I love. That her sorrow does not become my sorrow.”
Ming Tang smiled faintly. “I suppose I cannot fault you that,” he said. “Men have been fighting women’s causes for centuries. There is no dishonor in that. But according to Blackchurch…”
“There is if I leave to fight someone else’s battle.”
“Aye.”
Tay lifted his head to look at his colleague.
“Then you are going to like this even less,” he said.
“If she does not survive, I will take up her cause. I will return to Toxandria and fight to regain it for her brother. I am sorry if you feel that is wrong, but I cannot help what I feel. I would not be doing justice to her memory or the love we share if I did not fight her battle for her.”
Ming Tang’s smile grew. “I would expect nothing less from you,” he said. “Now, go. Train your recruits. I will watch over her as she sleeps.”
Tay looked at him. “Are you mad?” he said. “I cannot train while she lies here wounded. I told her I would not leave. I meant it.”
“There is nothing you can do,” Ming Tang said. “At least rest yourself if you will not train. You have been up most of the night. Find a bed, and I will send you word if anything changes.”
It was the best Tay could hope for at this point. After putting a big hand on Ming Tang’s shoulder to let him know that he appreciated everything, Tay headed down to the common room just as the cottage door opened. Creston and Cruz came through. They caught him at the base of the stairs.
“How is the lady?” Creston asked.
Tay nodded. “Alive,” he said. “The wound was quite serious, however. She sleeps now. What did you do with the man she killed?”
Creston cocked a blond eyebrow. “What you would have done had you been there,” he said. “He joins our other enemies at the bottom of Lake Cocytus, only in his case, he was not in one piece.”
Tay looked between the pair—the fair-haired knight who looked as if he didn’t have a rotten bone in his body and the dark, sultry Spaniard who looked as if he ate babies for breakfast. Creston and Cruz were the best of friends, often doing things in a pair, as they had tonight.
They were true to the bone, and some of the most trustworthy men Tay knew.
And that gave him an idea.
“I would like to ask something of you two,” he said. “I would have to get permission from Lord Exmoor, but I would like you to do something for me.”
“Anything,” Creston said. “What do you need?”
Tay told them. Five minutes later, they had St. Denis’ reluctant permission, simply because he didn’t like his trainers gallivanting around England, but Tay convinced him that they could spare Creston and Cruz for a couple of weeks. There were enough trainers and assistants to fill in.
As it turned out, Tay had an important mission for them, something they were more than happy to undertake, and they were gone before the day was out.
All Tay could do, at that point, was pray.