Chapter Sixteen #2
Breathing in through my teeth, I hiss, “Guess we can consider it even, then.”
Ozias squeezes my hip. “If you like. I still feel like I let you down,” he says, his frown deepening.
Lowering my head, I find his eyes. “You kept me out of their reach.”
His mouth draws into a thin line. “You were only in danger because I’m asking something great of you.”
“Not exactly.” I shrug my shoulder until it kisses my ear. “I’m in danger because I want the world to change.”
A slow, sensual smile curls his lips. “I can relate to that.” Hand still braced on my hip, he stands with such fluidity and grace, I feel unsteady simply watching him.
“Let’s go take care of that wound.” His hand that was on my waist snakes around my back to support me, and I hook my arm around his shoulders to brace myself, then he’s moving us into the thicket of trees.
Rustling comes from ahead of us and a moment later Atlanta appears, followed by four others. Her eyes fly across our bodies, hovering on the arm Ozias has wrapped around my middle and the one that he’s now missing.
When she looks up, her voice is low and dangerous. “What happened?”
“It seems Dyēus has a nice addition to their team.” Ozias kicks his head back behind us. “Get on the wall and see what’s happening. We’re headed for the infirmary.”
At first, Atlanta doesn’t move, even when everyone who came with her does. “Ozias…”
“We need your eyes on this,” he tells her.
After another moment, Atlanta gives a stiff nod and brushes past us.
I can’t quite make out the significance of their exchanges.
They’re close, yet somehow distant. It reminds me of how Kalixta and I behaved with one another after she was chosen and I was not.
When mother wanted nothing to do with me, but would bend to the wind to give Kalixta the world.
Back then, I resented my sister. Now I understand that Kalixta resented me, too—for abandoning her.
For getting the choice to do as I pleased, when I pleased.
Ozias steers us towards a nearby hut, small but clean.
Inside, the walls are lined with jars, neatly folded gauzes and linens tucked into baskets.
Two long, narrow beds line the center of the room with clean, white linens draped across each.
Like his private office, the only windows are small ovals spread out across the upper walls near the ceiling.
It’s free of people and blissfully quiet.
Without a word, Ozias hikes me up against his side and swings me onto the first table.
He passes me a wad of gauze, which I take and apply with pressure to my wound.
Then he goes to work, walking over to a sink to pump fresh water into a basin.
Even with the one arm, he tackles the tasks with ease.
He quickly cleans his wound, unflinching when he applies ointments and dresses it.
Then he’s rinsing the basin, sanitizing it, and filling it once more.
When he turns to me, washbowl in hand, I nod to his missing arm. “Has this happened before?”
Ozias looks up from the basin, then notices I’m looking at his bandaged appendage. “Once, but on the other side.” He grimaces as he sets the bowl down on a table near the bed. “It’s more of an annoyance than a pain to grow back.”
I suck in my lips and bite them, thinking of how that might look, bones and sinew coming to mind before forming the skin. “I expect that’s something you might want to do in privacy.”
Towel in hand, Ozias dunks it into the water.
He waits for me to move the gauze and then squeezes the towel directly over my pants where the blood stain is.
“It’s not gruesome. It will steadily reform in segments, each section appearing as it’s finished regenerating.
Keeps it from getting damaged during the reformation process. ”
That sounds less horrific than I imagined. He douses my leg again, and the cool water sends a shiver through me. “To get the linen unstuck,” he explains.
“I know. I can do this myself.”
Ozias looks at me from under his brow. “I know.” A pause, then, “Pants off.”
My breath hitches, his words a heady reminder of what we did before the night began.
I steady myself and breathe. I don’t need to make this awkward, or anything other than what it is.
So I lie back on the bed, hook my thumbs into the waist of my pants, and arch up as I draw them down over my hips and backside to the top of my thighs.
Ozias watches every moment, pupils dilating at the sight of me curving my body against the bed.
I sit up and try to ignore the rising flush of my skin, the rush of desire between my legs.
My undergarment is damp from the water he doused me with.
I shimmy the waist of my pants down farther, carefully peeling it from my wound, a hiss leaving me, until I free my injured leg entirely.
Ozias’s eyes follow the curve of my hips to the wound at the top of my thigh, the length of it twisting around to the inside.
He takes his finger and hovers it over the wound, running along the length of it to the inner part of my thigh, then stills.
“There’s a superficial nick to an important artery.
If this cut had gone any further, you wouldn’t be here right now. ”
The heat of his hand radiates against my chilled leg, pebbles of flesh rising. “It’s a good thing you didn’t, then.”
“Mm,” he muses, then slips his fingers between my thighs and nudges them farther apart.
I exhale sharply and open for him. He stares at the space between my legs for a beat, before blinking and turning away, the rise of his chest telling me he’s taking a deep, deep breath.
He hands me a fresh pad of gauze. “Press this against the wound.” He gathers a few more supplies, gauze and ointments, and to my dismay, needle and thread.
My throat closes up. “No.”
His jaw works for a second. “I don’t want to, but it’s deep, Kaisa. I can’t leave it like that and we don’t have time for anything else. When you learn to shift willingly, something like this can heal on its own, but you’re still too mortal.”
My breath comes fast and tight. I shake my head again, teeth clenching. “It’s fine.”
Ozias looks at the wound again, then gives me a pointed look. “It’s not.”
I’m silent, trying to work out an argument that will win me this.
His head tilts. “Have you had stitches before?”
I give him a hard look. “Plenty of times.”
“You have piercings.”
“So you’ve noticed.”
His smile is placating. “So it’s not a fear of needles.”
“It’s a fear of having a needle put in my flesh over and over while a tiny slip of cotton slides in and out of that wound, across a wound that already fucking hurts.
” My eyes flash, hot and wild. “But I guess you’ve never had to go through this particular torture.
” And then I think I shouldn’t have had to, either.
He’s silent, not biting at my argument, or even rising to the bait.
“Can’t you heal this with magic?” I implore.
“Minor wounds we can. This, unfortunately, is no minor thing.”
A silent scowl remains perched on my mouth.
“I’ll dull the pain,” he promises.
I shake my head, looking away at the rows of jars along the wall, a sneer wrinkling my nose. “Just do it.”
Ozias waits a beat, then comes in close, settling himself between my knees. I snap my attention back to him. “What are you doing?”
Face close to mine, Ozias leans in, his smell all cedar and sun and mist. “Distraction.” He holds up a strip of leather to my lips. “Bite.”
I open my mouth and he slides it between my teeth, thumb brushing against my lips before he moves on to the other supplies he’s spread around me.
He uses a clean towel and basin of water to wash and wipe the wound, then spreads an astringent ointment on the cut that stings, the wound pulsing to life.
I’m beginning to think he put the leather between my teeth so I couldn’t curse him during this bit, even as I gratefully bite down on the strip.
Another ointment goes next, his hand hovering over the wound, heat radiating from his hand to my skin and within moments, the area is numb.
Then he picks up the needle and thread and my skin prickles with the beginnings of sweat.
“Breathe,” he reminds me, looking up at me from the wound. “Maybe you can try meditating through this.”
“Maybe you can try fucking off,” I say, the crass words coming out mumbled and warbled, but his deep, throaty laugh tells me he understood well enough.
“Ready?”
“No.” Again, the word is muffled.
“Me either.” Then he’s going to work, the needle slipping into my skin, the sting muted from the numbing ointment and his magic, but the pressure is still there and it still hurts.
I’m glad I have the leather to bite on, even if it’s only to ease my anxiety.
I try meditating as he suggested, even as my jaw locks down tight on the leather between my teeth.
Ozias makes quick work of the stitches, neat and tidy, even with one hand doing the job.
I help him tie the thread off at the end, though my hands are quaking.
When it’s done, I drop the leather out of my mouth, licking my lips to bring them back to life.
Ozias catches the motion, eyes darting across my mouth, before trailing down my torso to my thigh. “Done.”
I sigh, the sound shaky and rough edged. I reach for the bandages to wrap it, though my hands are still unsteady.
“I’ll do it,” Ozias says, and with my body feeling utterly depleted, I don’t have the sense to argue.
But I should have. I really should have, because next thing I know, Ozias is sinking to his knees between my legs and the sight of him there makes me weak and wanting.
He carefully scoops up my injured leg, hooking my knee over the shoulder of his injured arm and I have to lean back on my hands to maintain my balance.
His eyes don’t leave mine as he takes the bandage and begins winding it around my leg with his one hand.
It’s loose at first, but he manages to tighten it as he goes around and around my thigh, the backs of his knuckles brushing my skin, each pass like a flame to dry grass.
When it’s fully wrapped, he leans in, lips skimming the inside of my thigh, and takes one piece of the fabric between his teeth while his hand holds the other end of the bandage.
He looks up at me from beneath the fan of his dark lashes as he pulls the fabric tight with fingers and teeth.
His exhale is warm across my skin, skimming up my legs, all the way to my center.
His eyes go molten, and I have the same sensation I did when he flew me away from Dyēus.
Ozias leans back, but my leg is still hooked over his shoulder. “How do you feel?”
Aroused, my mind says, but I try to stop the thought and the echo of that word from pulsing through my body.
We’re injured, we’re tired, and he’s not made a move or mention.
What we did before had a clear purpose. If I asked for something now, it would be pure indulgence and completely selfish.
He may be draconem, but he can still feel pain, and I can’t imagine the agony he must be in right now.
I clear my throat, voice coming out an octave too low. “Fine.”
There’s a lengthy pause where I wonder if he’ll go further after all and take this where I desperately want it to go.
His mouth is achingly close to my skin. A twist of his face would have his lips coming in contact with the delicate, sensitive skin of my center.
Instead, he skates his hand up my knee, unhooking my leg from his shoulder and carefully puts it down as he rises.
I sigh, clasp my hands together, and get a hold of myself. “Thank you. I really could have done it myself, though.”
Ozias studies me again, quiet, assessing. “I know,” he repeats, “but that doesn’t mean you have to.” He holds out his hand for me and I take it.