xxviii. In which Arthur faces several things he’d rather not, including a stab wound and feelings
xxviii. In which Arthur faces several things he’d rather not, including a stab wound and feelings
After a long, long while, the stag lay down beside the cat. She didn’t seem to bother him, but he eyed Arthur warily. Progress
nonetheless, until the stag started worrying the knife. Arthur gritted his teeth. His neck was throbbing, and Ira nudging
the knife in his own shoulder made it hurt worse.
Arthur’s thighs burned from squatting there for so long before the stag’s ears stopped twitching at him. A while later, Arthur’s
legs numbed. His back spasmed; he shot his hands out, narrowly avoiding toppling over.
The stag’s ears twitched again, but his head dropped to the ground. Taking a bath beside him, Freya was unconcerned. She seemed
to mind Ira considerably less in this form.
Arthur was not unconcerned. He crawled toward the stag and stroked his neck. The stag’s nostrils flared, but he didn’t kick
or bite or try to escape.
“That’s it. It’s me. Please, Ira. You’ve got to remember.”
Arthur lifted the stag’s massive head into his lap. He didn’t know what to do. It had taken so long just to get Ira to let
him approach.
“Please. Please remember.”
The stag snorted. Eyes brimming, Arthur laughed, kissed his nose, and pressed their foreheads together.
A moment later, his forehead was resting against Ira’s.
Arthur laughed once more and burst into tears. Ira kissed his brow and lay back in his lap. His hand went to his shoulder.
The knife. Bile rose in Arthur’s throat.
“How long’s it been?” Ira asked.
Arthur wiped his eyes. “Too long. I thought I’d lost you.”
Ira scrubbed a hand over his face. His ears had not changed back with the rest of him; they were a deer’s.
“I don’t . . .” Ira’s brow furrowed. “I don’t remember what happened. The hunt ran last night, the wild hunt. It was the dogs
we heard. The Huntsman collects human souls.”
Arthur shivered and held him tighter.
“I was afraid he’d find you. But I don’t . . .” Ira’s voice was uncertain. “I remember feeling scared and mixed-up. That’s
it. I don’t remember changing. It’s a haze until you kissed me. I don’t remember the rest.”
Arthur stroked his forehead.
“You’re all right now.” His voice trembled. “That’s all that matters. What do we do about . . .”
He touched the hilt of the knife gingerly. Ira let out a sharp breath, then, to Arthur’s horror, yanked the storm cloud blade
from his shoulder.
“What are you doing?” Arthur cried. He didn’t know much about stab wounds, but he was reasonably certain one ought not to
yank objects out of them like that.
The knife vanished in a wisp of light. Blood reddened Ira’s shirt. Arthur wanted to throw up.
“Had to come out eventually,” Ira said. “Where’s my pack?”
Arthur’s head spun. “You’re lucky I thought to bring it, you muppet! Why didn’t you ask before you pulled a knife out of your shoulder?”
Ira’s mouth twitched.
“It’s not funny! Where’s that water?”
“What water?”
Arthur pulled Ira’s pack toward him and dug through it. “The water. From Maud’s pool.”
“I told you, it won’t work.”
“It might.”
“It won’t.”
Arthur ignored him. The water had healed him; it would heal Ira. It had to heal Ira, because otherwise Arthur would have to
patch him up, and Arthur was the worst possible person to have to do so.
He found the vial and uncorked it with shaking fingers.
“Arthur. Don’t waste it.”
Arthur tilted the vial, letting half the water splash onto Ira’s shoulder before Ira touched his wrist.
“Don’t waste it.”
Too late, Arthur wondered if he ought to have wiped the blood away first—removed Ira’s shirt—done something in preparation. He corked the vial.
Freya settled on Ira’s stomach, purring. Ira let a clawed hand rest in her fur. Arthur’s chest tightened: The hand was hardly
a hand anymore. It was entirely covered in fur now, except for the palm, which had thickened and darkened into a metacarpal
pad.
Arthur tore his eyes away and waited, clenching the vial of water. Blood seeped through Ira’s shirt.
“Why isn’t it working?” Arthur fought with the cork. “Maybe if I use the rest—”
Ira closed his eyes. “Don’t. It won’t work.”
The cork popped. Arthur almost dropped the vial; water sloshed onto the ground. He swore and spilled the rest over Ira’s wound.
“Arthur—”
Arthur had used up the last of it. Nothing.
“No—”
“I told you.”
“But—” Arthur’s voice pitched upward “—what do I do?”
“Needs cleaning first.”
Ira sat up, grimacing, and clawed at the toggles of his shirt.
“Don’t do that,” Arthur said. “I’ll cut it away.”
The worst injury he’d ever dealt with had been a broken arm, when Sasha had fallen from a tree in the churchyard. There had
been no blood, though seeing Sasha’s arm at that angle had made his stomach turn, and of course Charlotte had taken care of
it. She’d simply had him hand her things, tell Sasha stories to keep her calm, and hold the girl’s arm in place so she could
splint it.
Arthur undid the toggles of Ira’s shirt, then sawed across its shoulder with a knife from Ira’s pack. The bloody fabric was
at once damp and tacky. His head spun, but he clenched his jaw. Peeling the shirt away, he had to stop. The injury was neat,
not torn or jagged, but that was little comfort with Ira’s blood welling beneath his fingers.
Arthur swallowed, closed his eyes, and breathed deeply until the wave of dizziness passed. Ira needed him. It would be like
caring for Charlotte on her worst days. Except for the blood.
As he thought of his sister, Arthur’s skin prickled. She might be having a bad day this very moment. What if she lay down,
weary and aching, and the forest swallowed her up?
He focused back on his breathing. He couldn’t do anything for Charlotte right now, but he could do something for Ira. And once Ira was taken care of, they could continue on toward the heart of the wood—they could replant the tree—they could make sure Charlotte was safe, wherever she was.
Arthur reached for Ira’s canteen, thought better of it, and found a small bottle of gin amidst the bandages and ointments
in the pack. The sight of them calmed him. They reminded him of Charlotte, the composed way she went about binding wounds
and treating illnesses and birthing babies, no matter how dire the situation. Surely Arthur could channel her now. Her surety
and calm, if not her knowledge. Not this knowledge—though afterward, if he didn’t muck it up, he could use the knowledge he’d gained in the last six months to alleviate
the pain.
Arthur splashed gin on the wound. Ira winced.
Wadding the ruined shirt up, Arthur pressed it to Ira’s shoulder. Ira’s nostrils flared, so reminding Arthur of how he’d been
as a stag that he was relieved all over by Ira’s transformation back.
“Isn’t there anything that can prevent you from becoming so . . . deerlike?”
“I can stay in the vale.”
Arthur bit his lip. “Perhaps you should go back.”
Ira covered Arthur’s hands with one of his own. “Perhaps we should.”
“Not we. You. If the tree isn’t replanted—not that I suppose I’ll get very far on my own, but—”
A small V formed between Ira’s brows. Arthur wanted to smooth it away, but he focused on keeping pressure on the wound.
“I’m supposed to protect you,” Ira said.
“Protecting me isn’t worth your life.”
Ira’s eyes flickered over his face. “Maybe it is.”
Something small and soft bloomed in Arthur’s chest. His own life wasn’t worth much at all; Ira’s was far more valuable.
Suddenly, he wondered if there was a reason he’d never found the right girl.
Ira’s shoulder had stopped bleeding. That was something. Letting out a breath, Arthur dabbed dried blood away, packed the
wound clumsily, and bandaged it. Freya cleaned Ira’s hair as if for moral support.
“I’m afraid it’s not done well,” Arthur said, but Ira nudged the cat away, sat up, and brushed a lock of hair back from Arthur’s
forehead. Arthur shut up, the tips of his ears pinkening.
“I’m practically as good as new.”
Ira got to his feet, grimacing. He leaned more heavily on his left leg than usual. Whatever exactly had happened last night,
it had been hard on him.
“We should move on. The wild hunt has gotten us off track.”
Arthur’s heart sank. “How do you know?”
“I feel it. The forest’s magic. Like a map in my bones. You could tell, too, though, with the acorn. Here.”
He held out a hand—almost a paw. Arthur pulled the acorn over his head. Ira curled Arthur’s fingers closed over it.
“The acorn knows where it came from. It’s attuned to the heart of the wood, what’s left of it, and with it you can feel the
stump. That doesn’t move, no matter how much the other trees do.”
His fingers tightened on Arthur’s.
“Can you feel it?”
For a long moment, there was only the warmth of Ira’s hand on his. Then, concentrating on the silver acorn, Arthur felt it,
like a bright ball of light to the north. A snarl of magic like the tangle of greenery in a wood at the height of summer.
The acorn was alive with it in a way Arthur hadn’t noticed until now.
“Oh.”
The corner of Ira’s mouth turned up. “As long as you have the acorn, you can find your way through the forest.”
He doubled over. Freya twined around his legs, mewling.
“Ira?”
Ira breathed hard through his nose, straightening slowly. “M’all right. The tarnish.”
His jaw tightened with pain. Moss spread across his face.
“It’s growing back.” As Arthur watched, white flowers burst into bloom in Ira’s hair. Moss crept down his throat and toward
his collarbone. “It’s growing faster.”
Ira shrugged, but a muscle tightened in his neck, from the pain or the growth Arthur didn’t know. “It’ll get worse the farther
we go.”
Arthur lurched closer, scraping moss away with his fingers. Freya scrambled out from underfoot.
“How can you be so calm about it?”
Ira flinched and placed a clawed hand over Arthur’s, stilling his frantic scraping.
“We’re two days from the heart of the wood, and with the detour, we’re almost as far from the vale, too. I’m sunk no matter
what we do. It doesn’t matter.”
“It matters to me. Surely there’s some way to . . .”
Arthur’s fist clenched tight around the acorn. Something so small, yet it could save the whole forest if only they brought
it to the place it had come from.
“I wonder . . .” He unfastened the chain. “May I?”
“It’s the only thing protecting you.”
Arthur gave a small smile. “I thought you were doing that.”
Ira bit his lip but nodded. Arthur fastened the chain around Ira’s neck, fingertips brushing against his skin.
The moss stopped growing. Ira’s jaw relaxed. He ran a hand over his face with a sigh.
Letting out a breath, Arthur smiled. “It worked.”
Ira’s brow creased. Arthur didn’t understand why; surely he ought to have been happy, or relieved.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing, I just . . .”
Ira’s gaze roved over Arthur’s face, up to his eyes, down to his mouth, in a way that made Arthur’s stomach swoop. He touched
the hollow of Arthur’s throat, fingers curled to keep his claws away. Arthur shivered pleasantly.
He wondered whether Ira felt the things he did. The things he thought he did. It was so much like the things the heroines
in his books felt for the strange, exciting men who rescued them from danger, but he wasn’t sure he was meant to feel this way about another man. He’d never known it to be like this, either
in books or real life, could remember nothing like it in any story his father had ever told or any romance he’d ever read.
He touched Ira’s cheek with a finger, thinking again of the old fisherman and his friend. In three decades, he’d never wondered
what had become of them.
Now he wondered a great deal. About himself. About things about which he’d never thought to wonder, because he’d thought his
parents and his novels had taught him everything he needed to know about the way love was supposed to be.
Arthur traced a finger along Ira’s scar, down his cheek, to his jaw. Eyes fluttering closed, Ira slipped a hand through Arthur’s
hair to the back of his neck, drawing him closer until their foreheads rested against each other. Until they shared the same
air.
“Arthur,” he breathed.
His breath was warm in Arthur’s face, sweet with the scent of flowers. Arthur was seized with a wild urge to kiss him.
Mrs. Young’s muttered words sounded in his head. He pictured the expressions on the faces of the other men as he and Cormac
drove through Seacliff together. Cormac stiffening beside him, creating space so their thighs no longer touched.
Flushing, Arthur pulled away.
“Arthur?”
Arthur shouldered his knapsack with such force he almost knocked himself over. “We should go. You said we’re off track.”
“Yes. Of course.”
Ira shouldered his own pack. He gazed at Arthur, impassive. Then he said, “This way,” and headed into the trees. Arthur let
out a breath and followed, hoping he could leave all the confusing things he was feeling there beside the stream.