Chapter 18
Edwina stood by Drusilla’s side, watching her set and splint a broken leg with rapt attention.
When he had been brought to the healer’s chamber, Edwina had examined the wound carefully and gently removed the tiny shards of bone which might later have caused significant trouble, moving around on their own and continuing to slice away at his flesh from the inside.
Drusilla first wrenched the bone back into its proper place, relying on Edwina to help hold the poor man down as he screamed and flailed. Doing so reminded Edwina of James…
But then, so many things had reminded her of him since she’d left McDougal Keep weeks ago.
The injured fellow was a farmer whose leg had been trampled by his horse while he was plowing his field.
It was a minor miracle that the leg hadn’t been entirely ruined, the bones splintered in more places than could possibly be fixed—in most cases such as these, the man would have lost the leg entirely.
Edwina assisted in tying the splint into place. The farmer groaned, but he did his best to remain still.
“There,” Drusilla said briskly. “You shall remain here for the duration of the day and night, and tomorrow we will see to it that you’re carefully transported back to your farm. I shall come and call upon you in two days to make sure you are healing properly. You have sons?”
He nodded. “Two of them, aye.”
“Well, I hope at least one of them is old enough to operate a plow and do the other chores around your farm as well…for you will have to remain off this leg for a fortnight, perhaps longer.”
The man managed a weak smile. “I suppose they might manage it between the two of ’em. Thank you for all you’ve done for me.” He turned to Edwina. “And you as well, my lady.”
“There’s no need for that,” Edwina informed him. “When I am down here in these chambers, I am merely a healer, nothing more.”
“Even so, you have my everlasting gratitude,” he said.
“Try to get some sleep,” Drusilla advised. “You’ve been through quite an ordeal, and you require rest.”
He nodded, his head settling back onto the pillow.
Drusilla went into the corridor, and Edwina followed. “You did fine work in there, Edwina. Then again, given what you were able to accomplish at McDougal Keep, I suppose this is the very least of your talents. It made me proud indeed, hearing that.”
“That means the world to me,” Edwina replied sincerely, for Drusilla was the only person in the world who Edwina did not take a sardonic tone with (well, most of the time, at any rate).
“Without your tutelage, my efforts would have been useless, and James would doubtless still be dependent on laudanum.”
“I have no doubt that my lessons taught you what you needed to know in order to remove the metal from his wound,” Drusilla said, “though to hear you tell it, I likely couldn’t have done a better job of it myself.
Your approach regarding the angle of the wound was inspired, truly.
However, when it comes to having broken him of his need for opium, I daresay you could have done that on your own by sheer force of will…
and due to the emotional connection that was so obviously forged between the two of you. ”
“It was the concoction you taught me to make that began to wean him off the stuff,” Edwina protested. “And there was no ‘emotional connection,’ don’t be silly!”
“With regard to the mixture of herbs,” Drusilla informed her wryly, “I would not dare to claim that they are not potent or effective in lessening the symptoms of withdrawal. I will, however, say that much of their power also comes from how they are presented to the one who is ailing and how willing that poor soul is to believe in their effectiveness. So much of healing resides in the mind, my dear. And the heart. You claim you did not grow close to James while he was in your care, but in the time since your return, I have seen otherwise.”
“What, can you see into my mind and heart, then?” Edwina balked. “Take care with such claims, for it is a mere half-step from being called ‘healer’ to being denounced as ‘witch!’”
“You have a singular wit, Edwina. None would dispute that. But it has not spared you from the keenness of my observations one bit. Since your return, you have spent nearly all of your time down here with me.”
“I should think you would be glad to have me on hand to assist you!”
Drusilla put a hand up to placate her. “Yes, and I am. Your help is invaluable. You have thrown yourself into these pursuits entirely, and your skills are to be commended. It won’t be long before they equal my own, or perhaps even surpass them.
It does not change the fact that you have been doing this in an attempt to escape from your own feelings toward James. ”
“And what feelings are those, then? Since you claim to know me better than myself!” Now Edwina’s familiar strident tone was coming out, and she realized that it was because she was becoming defensive and using it as a suit of armor.
One designed to protect her from the painful truth that Drusilla was currently brandishing like a spear.
Drusilla arched an eyebrow but chose not to comment on Edwina’s disrespectful tone. “You feel that you were mistaken in turning away his affections so abruptly. You do care for him as he does for you, but because you are ill-equipped to deal with such things, you chose to shut them out completely.
“These past weeks have given you ample time to ponder, though. To realize that you may have made a grave mistake and to lament the fact that it cannot be taken back. You may have had a chance at last to find a man who appreciates you for who you truly are, despite the fact that your nature sets you apart from other women so thoroughly. You may stand there and deny all of these things if you wish to waste your breath, but we both know full well that what I have said is correct.”
No, Edwina could deny none of it, for it was more truth than she had been prepared to hear.
“Either way, it matters not,” she said, trying to keep her tone as neutral as possible.
“If such an opportunity existed in the first place, it has surely flown. He made his proposal, I rejected it, and there is the end of it.”
“Unless, of course, you were to swallow your pride and return to McDougal Keep,” Drusilla pointed out. “But we both know you would never do such a thing, for your pride matters more to you than your happiness does.”
“Do you mean to tell me that you yourself do not harbor pride?” Edwina countered. “That it is not the most important thing to you?”
The healer smiled sadly. “Girl, you have no knowledge of where I came from or who I was before I became the person you see before you now. These are stories I have never chosen to share with another living soul, and I never shall. Suffice it to say that I was not unlike you in my youth… Oh yes, our lives had many parallels, more than you might imagine. And it was my pride which ultimately became my downfall. I would not wish to see such a thing happen to you.”
“Why not?” Edwina gestured around them. “You seem to have done well enough for yourself! You are the most accomplished and revered healer in all the land!”
Drusilla shook her head. “Think over what I have said to you, child. Ask yourself what you are willing to do in the name of your own joy and what you are willing to deprive yourself of, just to save face.”
Edwina turned and stormed away, unable to listen to any more of this. Her life was her own, to do with as she saw fit; likewise, her priorities were nobody’s business but her own. She had done what she had done, and that was all there was to it. There was no sense in looking backward, only forward.
Except that, it seemed, was the problem. The more she tried to look ahead, the less she was able to make out any sort of future that appealed to her.
Drusilla had been entirely correct in saying that Edwina had been spending so much time in the healer’s chambers to avoid that fact.
She herself would never make healing her life, for such callings were not for noblewomen.
And even if she could have, she still knew deep within her that she would remain unfulfilled by that alone.
Not to mention the fact that after this argument with Drusilla, she doubted she would be particularly welcome down in the chamber any time soon.
A lifetime of idleness and reading, then? Going out for rides through the same fields over and over, entertaining courtships from a series of bland suitors? Being avoided by her own family members, thanks to the walls she had built around herself?
No. She wanted none of that.
Indeed, the only future she found herself picturing successfully (and pining for) was one that included James.
Returning to McDougal Keep to be with him, telling him that she was wrong to deny her feelings for him, embracing and kissing him, marrying him…
and in time, perhaps, helping him see that he could be a good father and not repeat the mistakes that were inflicted upon his own childhood.
That was a journey she could envision taking with him, and when she did, her heart felt cleft in two—adoring these ideas yet accepting that they would never become realities.
She knew, on some level, that Drusilla was right, that it was foolish of her to value her own pride over the prospect of a happy life, that she should simply travel to McDougal Keep and tell James she’d been wrong.
She knew all that.
But knowing it was not the same as being able to accept it and act upon it.
She felt trapped within the person she’d made of herself…
just as James had been, in some ways. Only instead of being addicted to laudanum, she was addicted to her own stubbornness, her own perverse need to be right and remain in total control of herself.
As Edwina was buffeted by these conflicting emotions, a servant came to her. “Lady Edwina, a man has come to visit you. He awaits the pleasure of your company in the great hall.”
Splendid, she thought dryly. Some dolt of a nobleman’s son heard that I returned from McDougal Keep and has decided to call upon me and attempt to woo me. How utterly tiresome. I wonder how I might best contrive to drive him away at once?
When she stepped into the great hall, though, she saw that James was waiting there for her.