Chapter 17 #2
There was immediate relief once he was inside the thick walls. The wind snarled and smashed the door open and shut behind him, but he had already made it past the mudroom and up the stairs to enter the house proper.
Meri squirmed out of his grasp and together they laid Sinan down on the floor of the trophy room, which featured a huge fireplace on a wall bristling with antlers and horns from both common forest prey and rare Archaic beasts.
Somewhere in that display of trophies might be the remains of the stag Gallmau had shot for his father, another gift the man had been given and never appreciated.
Sinan groaned, his eyes fluttering open for a brief second.
He had stopped shivering, even as Meri’s and Gallmau’s teeth chattered, and his black hair glistened with icicles and frost. On his cloak, most of the sigils were no longer visible, having faded away into the white of the shroud.
The violet symbol remained, now dim and flickering as if its energy had been drained away.
Sinan would die of the cold soon, even if they were out of the wind.
“Get those wet clothes off him.” Gallmau hoisted his shield in one hand and his short sword in the other. “I need to make sure there aren’t any nasty surprises in the house and find some blankets.”
Meri gave an exhausted nod and sank down next to the necromancer.
Gallmau didn’t have time to search through the whole chateau, but a quick survey of the rooms on the first and second floors revealed no evidence of either threats or recent visitors.
He ended up using his shield as a tray to carry down whatever bedding he could find, along with clothes left in the servants’ quarters. His walk downstairs became a run when he heard an unfamiliar scream. Bounding into the room, he brought himself up short as he saw Meri wrestling with Sinan.
She grabbed at the necromancer’s arm, yanking off one of his gloves as the man thrashed, then gave Gallmau an exasperated look. “He’s not making sense, and I can’t touch him without him yelling.”
Gallmau seized some of the blankets and brought them over, but Meri shook her head. “Come over here and hold him down.”
“Why?” Gallmau asked, afraid of the answer. Meri had unsheathed one of her water blades and was holding it over the necromancer.
No, Gallmau could not let Meri do this. “He risked dying to get us out of the lake. You can’t murder him.”
“I’m trying to save his life.” Meri fixed him with a glare fierce enough to melt the blizzard that still roared outside into warm spring puddles, and Gallmau gave in and pinned Sinan down.
His fingers gripped Sinan’s bare, cold arms, and the necromancer screamed again. Undressing him in any dignified way proved impossible, and Meri resorted to using her blade to slice Sinan’s sodden clothing into ribbons so they could peel the fabric off him.
It was truly awful. Sinan cried out like they were torturing him, eyes wild and unfocused. He cursed them, mumbled words in a foreign tongue that sounded like a prayer, and at one point begged them to stop.
They finally managed to strip him naked, and Gallmau couldn’t look away from Sinan’s pale, beautiful body, as Meri scrambled to get the blankets and bedding.
Other than on his head and face, Sinan had none of the body hair of a grown man, but everything about him, from his defined chest, narrow hips, and proportioned limbs, was flawless and perfect, like a toppled marble statue of a young god.
“There.” She wrapped several wool blankets around Sinan, as Gallmau lifted his hand from Sinan’s arms and chest, horrified at the red imprints of his fingers on the necromancer’s skin.
Meri had Sinan cocooned in the dry bedding in short order, then leaned on his chest and cupped her hands around the thick cloth she had put over his wet hair.
“We’re not trying to hurt you. We only want to get you warm. ”
Sinan’s eyes flickered open, and for a moment he sounded lucid. “The two of you don’t even understand what you’re doing.”
He gave a half-laugh, half-sob, and his eyes rolled back, head lolling to one side.
Meri pressed her fingers to his neck, then to his wrist.
“He passed out, thank the Prophets, but his pulse is weak.” Meri yanked at her wool tunic and motioned for Gallmau to help her.
“Come on, you can take a woman’s clothes off, too, even if you’re not that excited about what’s underneath.
I’m going to strip and crawl under the blankets with him.
Then you’re going to do the same thing.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea.” Gallmau was quite sure about that, even if Meri’s suggestion did make practical sense. He pulled off her tunic and shirt and helped her out of the men’s trousers she had put on for their quest. He let her slip out of her smallclothes herself.
“You need to change anyway, and you’ll give off more heat than I will.” Meri was shivering and nude now as well, and she slipped quickly under the mass of bedding next to Sinan. She gave him a tired smile. “I’ll get to brag I bedded two princes in one night.”
Gallmau started to laugh then stopped, his conscience getting the better of him. “He thought we were trying to—I don’t know, rape or torture him. Waking up next to me isn’t going to make him happy.”
“He should be happy to wake up at all, after what happened.” Meri brushed a lock of Sinan’s black hair away from his face and regarded him with interest. “All Bone Lords have a curse. Why isn’t there anything wrong with him? He’s—too perfect.”
“Maybe he’s broken on the inside.” Gallmau took Meri’s advice when it came to taking off his wet clothes, but he stayed upright and found a large enough thick coat to wrap around himself.
He carefully dried off Meri’s blades and scabbards and laid them down next to her.
She didn’t go to sleep with them more than an arm’s length away.
“I’ll join the two of you after I get the fire going and get us some water, but I’m not getting naked. ”
It was far from the heroic start to his sister’s rescue he had hoped for.
He and Meri had come close to being eaten by a cursed fish, and the Bone Lord they had partnered with was half-frozen and unconscious.
If the unnatural storm outside had spread throughout Terra Amata, was Rixende protected against the weather, or was she cold and shivering in some crude cell?
Worrying about his younger sister wasn’t going to help him save her.
Making sure his companions recovered enough to help him free her would.
He set to work. By the time Gallmau lit the heating stove inside the fireplace, pumped some well water, and spread all of their clothes and gear out to dry, exhaustion won out over his guilt.
He took off the coat and crawled into bed with Sinan and Meri.
Sinan lay oddly still, moaning when Gallmau tried and failed to get under the bedding without touching the necromancer who had made it abundantly clear he didn’t like physical contact. Sinan’s skin wasn’t clammy, at least, and his breathing was deep and steady.
Meri, usually the lightest of sleepers, only fluttered her eyelashes open for a second at Gallmau then rolled over to rest her head on Sinan’s chest.
It wasn’t easy to lie there and not think about how handsome and naked Sinan was, all while trying not to press up against the man. What Gallmau should do was banish filthy thoughts from his mind and get the rest his body needed.
Several inappropriate dreams later, he jerked awake at the rasp of a sword being pulled out of its scabbard.