Chapter 31 #4
“How chivalrous,” Nyneve said archly, drawing a laugh out of him.
It would be easier, she knew, if she did not like the sound of it so much.
She let him guide her to the pool, gripping his hand as she descended the stairs.
When the waters closed in around her, she sighed.
The feeling of relief was cut short when she noticed that her braid was caked in dried blood.
“Stay close to the sides,” Mordred said like a worried mother. “You still seem quite dizzy.” He folded the woolen blanket, placing it by the stairs, and then sat down on the edge, resting his arms on his knees.
Knowing it would make her curls unmanageable and deciding she did not care, Nyneve tipped her head back, wetting her braid.
She reached for the wooden bowl holding a chunk of lye soap and lathered up her hands, scrubbing the blood off her arms and chest. She bit down on her tongue, trying to halt her tears.
How desperately she wanted to retreat into the back of her mind and clean off the blood like it was any other patient’s.
But Nyneve could not. Besides, if she had seen a stranger’s body as brutalized as Elaine’s had been, she knew she would still be crying in the bath.
Trying to quiet her sobs, the Druid girl reached up to unbraid and wash her hair.
Frustration swept through her when she found her arms weak, her hands trembling from the working she’d attempted to save Elaine.
Darkness clouded her vision, swarming like flies.
She cursed, slamming the soap back down into the bowl.
“Are you all right?” Mordred asked in a soft voice. It was impressive how he managed to sound genuinely concerned.
“No,” she sobbed, wrapping her arms around herself. “I can’t even wash my fucking hair. There’s so much blood in it.”
“Can you rinse it for now and wash it tomorrow when you are feeling stronger?” Mordred asked, his voice floating over her shoulder.
The thought of awakening again, still unclean, made Nyneve’s entire body recoil in revulsion. She turned in the water to face him, looking up through the steam to meet his gaze. He studied her for a long moment.
“Do you need help?” the faerie knight asked.
Nyneve nodded mutely, gesturing for him to come closer.
He obeyed her with an ease that made curiosity uncurl in her tired mind.
Then the creature who had torn five monks into pieces and hung another from the bell tower lowered himself onto his knees and reached over to gently take the lengths of her hair into his grasp.
Without a word, he lathered his hands and began to work, starting at her scalp. Nyneve made the mistake of glancing over the first time he rinsed, her stomach roiling at the pinkish water that bloomed around her. She squeezed her eyes shut.
“Why did you say you were waiting for me?” Nyneve found herself asking in a near-whisper. “In the clearing where we met.”
Mordred’s powerful hands froze in her hair. Even though she desperately wanted to turn and look at him, she had the distinct feeling that if she did, the knight would deliver her another falsehood, just as he had the night she’d followed him into the woods.
“I do not know,” Mordred admitted, his voice ragged. “I . . . I have always . . . I cannot explain it. It feels as though I have been awaiting you for a very long time.”
He began to work the soap into her hair again.
Something fluttered beneath her breastbone, but Nyneve did not press him.
Mordred had said more than she’d dared to hope for when the question formed on her tongue.
Neither spoke as he continued washing her hair, meticulously scrubbing away every last drop of blood.
When he finished, she rinsed the suds from her hair and climbed back up the steps. Her movements were ungainly as she dried off and re-dressed with Mordred’s assistance.
She tried to walk back to his quarters, but halfway there, she nearly collapsed, so he carried her the rest of the way. He laid her down on his pallet, which a servant had refreshed with new linens while they were down in the baths.
“I will be next door with Gawain,” Mordred murmured.
“Sleep well, Nyneve.” It must have been the utter horrors of the day that made him lean over and press a kiss onto the crown of her head.
It must have been how much blood she’d needed to scrub from her body that made Nyneve wrap her fingers around his wrist.
“Stay,” she said, hating how pathetic she sounded. “I do not want to be alone.”
“Gawain and I are just in the next room,” Mordred said, though he did not pull away from her grasp.
She closed her eyes and saw Elaine’s body, riddled with wounds, her blood seeping onto the linens. “Please,” Nyneve replied, a sob crawling up her throat.
Without a word, the knight sat on the edge of the pallet and pulled off his boots.
Then he lay down beside her. She squeezed her eyes shut, more tears spilling out, and almost gasped in relief when Mordred pulled her against him.
Her lower lip trembled with the force of holding back her sobs.
Despite her deep exhaustion, she felt wide awake.
“If I could just go to sleep,” Nyneve whispered into the darkness, her voice unsteady, “then it will be tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow will not be better,” Mordred murmured. “Cry today, before the grief calcifies.”
So, Nyneve curled into him and wept.