Chapter 25 #2
Amaris dropped the candle, extinguishing it. Theodoric latched onto her wrist, his skin cold and clammy. His eyes met hers, again filled with swirling darkness.
She leaned closer without thinking. “Theodoric,” she whispered.
His erratic breathing began to slow, but his knuckles didn’t let up from their grip around her arm.
Her fingers twitched at her side, but she held her other hand back from reaching for him. Instead, she closed her eyes and took a breath before saying, “You’re safe.”
His fingers loosened their hold, and she opened her eyes. The storms settled, and bits of golden specks filled his irises. “Amaris,” he breathed. He winced and clenched down instinctively as his back muscles spasmed. He let go of her and dropped his hand to the floor. “I’m sorry.”
“You have nothing to be sorry for,” Amaris said.
“That was the worst lashing I’ve ever seen my father give,” Alan whispered, his face blank.
Gerard was Alan’s dad. That explains so much.
“What in the realm did you do?” Alan asked.
“He tried to stop Bennet,” Amaris uttered.
She hustled toward her worktable. She’d never seen a flogging injury before, but she knew his wounds needed cleaning, probably stitching, but that was off the table. She threw open the mystique journal but gripped the edge of the worktable. She paused. Her heart shouldn’t race like this.
Inhale. Exhale.
She hated the feeling settling over her. The panic. Theodoric was just another patient. She couldn’t allow herself to get worked up, but for fuck’s sake, it was all because of her. He was lying there with some of the worst trauma she’d ever seen, and it was all her fault.
Her hands shook as she read through the pages and found flogging scribbled at the top. A groan from Theodoric had her skimming faster, settling on pain management on the next page. It said to take dried leaves of cudweed and brew them into a tea and steep for desired effect.
“Alan, make yourself useful and boil some water.” He didn’t protest.
Amaris went to her shelves, reading each label.
Fade chicory, uppaway, izaseed…cudweed! She thought she’d arranged them alphabetically.
It appeared someone had been messing with her herbs.
The jar of cudweed held small basil-like leaves.
She set them in a cup, ladling the now boiled water to allow the tea to steep.
The old mystique often strayed from page to page with his thoughts.
Amaris thumbed through the next few pages to find something she could use to treat the wounds.
Theodoric let out another moan, sending Amaris pinching the corner of the page and sucking in a breath.
She closed her eyes, holding the air in her lungs. He’s just another patient.
Dragging her finger down the page. She found what she needed. She searched the shelves and found a large begregane leaf wrapped in a cloth. Produces cooling, numbing, and inflammation fighting effect for wounds, burns, and sores.
Amaris pulled the knife from her boot, thankful she hadn’t tossed it across the cell. She cut away the edges to reveal a light pink paste. Theodoric hurled into the bucket. Her hands trembled against the hilt, but she squeezed it tighter and plowed through.
“Where did you get a knife?” Alan asked, his eyes flashing to the dark blade in her hand.
“It was my parents’.” Her response was short, and she didn’t bother sparing him a glance or elaborating further.
She strained the leaves and sat on the floor beside Theodoric.
Her fingers gripped his chin, raising his head.
His eyes were bloodshot, and snot dripped from his nose.
He tried to pull away, but her grip tightened.
“Drink this.” She pressed the cup to his lips.
He smelled the wafting odor, his nose cringing as he raised a brow. “Cudweed?” he gasped.
“It’ll help with the pain.” Amaris tilted the cup to his parted lips. “Small sips to avoid further upsetting your stomach.”
“You won’t have to worry about him throwing it up. The brew you made is strong. He won’t have time,” Esaias chimed in.
Theodoric’s shaky hands held hers as they grasped the cup.
A muscle contracted in his back, and he winced.
His cry made Amaris’s attempts at steady breaths falter.
He grasped the edge of the cot, his knuckles leaching of color.
Instantly, Amaris reached for his shoulder.
A wrinkly burn scar slithered from his shoulder down to his heart.
She pulled back as his eyes tracked her movement.
She cleared her throat and lifted the cup once more to his lips. He took a sip, and with each swallow he grimaced in pain. It tore at Amaris, each audible gasp. When he’d finished the tea, his head slumped back to the cot.
“Thank you.” The next thing she knew, his body went limp.
Amaris stared in awe at the empty cup and Theodoric. She couldn’t allow herself to stop and think about him or the effects of the cudweed. All she needed to do was bandage his back.
Alan and Esaias refused to leave his side while she worked. Esaias perched on the table, lost to his own thoughts. She had Alan fetch a basin of water, and when he returned, he leaned against the window, watching her every move.
She began cleaning out his cuts, blood instantly soaking the rag and her hands.
It turned the water a dark shade of crimson.
Alan and Esaias started a cycle of fresh water every few lacerations.
Amaris kept to a rhythm, silently humming a song her mother had sung to her a dozen times over.
It aided her quick pulse and soothed her trembling hands. The room was otherwise silent.
She dragged the back of her hand against her forehead to wipe the sweat dripping into her eyes.
She didn’t know whether to be thankful for the silence or spiteful.
Basic first aid was all she had to go on.
She cleaned the mud from his cuts, but she didn’t know the lasting effects of flogging injuries.
He’d have more scars to add to the collection across his back.
She kept going, continuing to move her hands and clear her mind. It was all she could do.
After she’d cleaned out each wound, she applied the pink paste, moving gently in case he woke abruptly.
Cudweed had been one of the herbs she’d skimmed over but tabbed to read about later.
She was kicking herself for not further digesting the material.
She’d briefly read a line about injecting the herb.
It was good to know needles and syringes had been invented.
She moved to the fleshy parts of his skin.
The cuts weren’t as deep as she’d thought and were already beginning to clot.
She forced her body to relax, deeply breathing.
It was startling to feel like this, protective.
Maybe it was the guilt. She was the reason for it.
Her fingers moved over the ridges of his back, covering every injured part with the paste.
Her hands continued to shake as she secured clean cloth over the open gashes, but she positioned herself to keep Esaias and Alan from noticing.
She trudged to the last clean pitcher of water and poured it into the bowl to wash his blood from her hands.
It seeped like ink off her fingers and the tendrils swirled in the water.
Her hands wouldn’t cease their trembling.
It infuriated her, but she knew it was only the effects of the adrenaline leaving her body.
She dried her hands and used the remainder of the paste on her own welt.
The spiral of red stung as she rubbed the begregane paste over her skin.
“That was a brave thing you did,” Esaias said, breaking the everlasting silence between the three of them. He and Alan lounged in the chairs on the other side of the fireplace.
“I did what anyone else would’ve done.”
Amaris didn’t bother to look at him. She was too exhausted from the lack of sleep and the commotion of the morning.
She bound her forearm in cloth, tucking in the edge to tighten it.
Kneeling at Theodoric’s side, she monitored his vitals.
His breaths were regular, his back slowly rising about every five seconds.
She held his wrist, her fingers searching for the beating pulse of his heart.
“What was that?” Amaris breathed, coming back to her disbelief about everything that happened.
“Your punishment,” Esaias whispered grimly as he dropped his face and a shadow painted his features.
“My what?” She turned to meet his eyes.
“The duke knows about whatever happened between the two of you last night and sentenced you both to twenty-five lashes. He took all of them, at least before the duke stepped in.”
“Why did he step in?” Alan blurted out.
“I don’t know and don’t fucking care. The duke can burn in After,” Esaias growled. He leaned forward, resting his chin in his hand. “Has he told you anything about the war?”
Amaris swallowed the lump forming in her throat and whispered, “Barely.”
“Bennet called Theo’s actions treasonous. Gerard made a move to grab him, and Theo reacted.”
“He wasn’t committing treason. He protected me when Bennet tried to blame me for another case of scrying fever.”
“Luckily, Sephardi stepped in to confirm the truth, but he should’ve known. Bennet has his eyes set on you, and Theo is stepping in the way.”
Everything was turning into one big dumpster fire. She’d never asked to be thrown here, to be sucked from her life.
“Theo was imprisoned for over two seasons. He was captured during a mission at the end of Crimsonreign. With the bitter cold and snowstorms, we couldn’t get him out until Stormreign.
I fought for a rescue mission, but our superior officers said it was too dangerous.
Gris and I gathered a few from our squad willing to make the trek to Rongstad to break him out.
” Esaias paused then sighed. “I don’t know the details, but I do know he was tortured.
Today, the soldiers in the duke’s study went to grab him, and he flashed back to what I’m presuming happened during his imprisonment. ”
“How do you know that?” she asked.
“He has nightmares and fits of panic. He was the sole survivor.”
“He dreams about it?”
Esaias nodded, reclining back in his chair, crossing a foot over his knee. “He doesn’t talk about it.”
Her eyes drifted behind her. Theodoric’s dark strands were soaked with rain and sweat as they clung to his forehead. He tried to warn her, but she didn’t listen. He only wanted to protect her from Bennet and his father.
“Why did you take the whip?” Alan asked, pulling Amaris from her thoughts.
“I don’t know.” She sighed and leaned back against the wooden frame of the cot. Theodoric’s even breaths brushed her neck, calming her growing nerves. It was a reminder of his stable state.
Alan took a swig from a flask he withdrew from his jacket. He offered it to her. “You look like you fell into the cracks of the realm.”
“Thanks,” she muttered, snatching his flask and taking a drink. Rum coated her dry throat, burning and leaving a spice to tingle her tongue.
“Is that—”
“Cinnamon,” Alan answered flatly. “Imported from the Vukubua Islands.”
She took a long swig, her hands continuing their shaking. She drew her legs tighter.
“Why do you think he stepped in?” Amaris asked.
“Do you mean for your lashing?” Alan asked.
Amaris nodded. “And in the tower. He’d protected me when Bennet came for me.”
Esaias reclined back. “He’s selfless.”
“I was cruel.” She took another sip. Esaias extended his hand, and she tossed him the flask. “I didn’t listen to him and look what happened.”
“You can’t control what Theo does,” Esaias said.
“But I can control what I do. I was trying to get away the other night, but Theodoric stopped me. He warned me what would happen.”
Alan’s hand gripped his outer thigh, his fingers inches from his dagger. “That was you in the stables?”
“Yes,” she breathed. “He stopped me, and we argued. This is all my fault.”
She never wanted this, any of it. She’d only wanted to get away from Derek, to escape that room, that fight.
As Alan and Esaias’s grumbles drowned out, she lifted her shaky hands before her eyes.
She didn’t know what terrified her more—what Derek had done or that she’d lost her composure on a call for the first time.