Chapter eight #3
When everything was ready, I sat beside her, and she immediately went rigid. “I’ll be careful,” I assured her, understanding that fear coursing through her was causing her to react as she was.
“I know,” she said, then seemed annoyed she had admitted it.
I first took the damp cloth and cleaned the dried blood from her skin. She flinched at the first touch, and the sound she made through clenched teeth nearly made me stop.
“Keep going,” she whispered.
I did, but only because I feared infection, and I’d seen many a man die of it.
It was a horrid way to go, and I could not stand the thought of Katreine meeting that end.
As I cleaned slowly and carefully, I considered it.
My concern for her was deeper than simply gaining the stronghold and title, but I wasn’t exactly sure why I was feeling this way, beyond my guilt over deceiving the lass.
Given that I needed to concentrate on caring for her, I turned my mind to the task and away from questions I had no answers for.
Every inch of damaged skin tightened the knot in my gut.
I had seen wounds that should have killed men.
I had stitched gashes in my own flesh and laughed afterward.
But this raw, private hurt, hidden beneath stubbornness and skirts, made me want to take my own body back through time and place it between her and every mile we had ridden.
“I should have stopped,” I said.
Her head turned slightly on the pillow. “I told ye I was fine.”
“I should have known ye were lying.”
“Aye, well, I’m verra good at it.”
The admission was quiet. Too quiet. I paused, my hand hovering. “That does nae comfort me.”
“It was nae meant to.”
I wanted to ask how many lies she had told me.
I wanted to ask which name, which fear, which story was true.
But her lashes fluttered, and the pain powder had begun to soften her hard edges, so I tended her instead.
When the wounds were clean, I applied the honey and herbs as she directed, then laid clean linen over the worst wounds.
Her hand gripped the coverlet so tightly that her knuckles whitened, but she did not cry out.
Not once. That, too, angered me. Not because she was strong.
Because she had clearly learned to be silent about her pain long before this.
When I finished, I covered her properly. She was trembling now, whether from pain, exhaustion, or the powder, I could not tell.
“There,” I said quietly. “It’s done.”
She exhaled shakily. “Thank ye.”
The words were barely a breath. As I rose, her fingers caught my sleeve, and I looked down.
Her eyes were half-closed, her face pale against the pillow, her damp hair curling wildly around her cheeks.
The sharp-tongued lass who had fought me at every turn looked younger in that moment. Not weak. But worn to the bone.
“James?”
“Aye?”
Her fingers tightened. “Will ye… hold me?”
The request struck me harder than any command could have.
For a moment, I did not answer. The wine and pain powder had loosened her tongue.
I knew that. She might wake furious that she had asked, or curse me for obeying, or she might not remember asking at all.
But her dark, vulnerable gaze would not allow me to say no.
I climbed onto the bed behind her with care and drew her gently against me.
She came with a soft, broken sigh, settling back into my chest as if her body had been waiting for permission to stop fighting.
I slipped one arm beneath her head and lightly curved the other around her waist, mindful of every injury, every place that might ache.
Her damp hair brushed my jaw. She smelled of herbs, honey, and warm skin.
“Is this hurting ye?” I asked.
“Nay,” she murmured.
“Tell me if it does.”
“Mmm.”
That was not an answer, but it was the last she gave.
Her breathing slowed by degrees. The room quieted around us until I could hear the faint hiss of the fire and the distant murmur of the inn below.
Outside, the wind dragged itself along the shutter, making it rattle.
I stared into the low light and held her.
Some emotion swelled in my heart. I didn’t try to name it.
I could ill afford to. It was not part of the plan. This moment was not part of the plan.
That thought circled me like a wolf. I had meant to find Katrine, deliver her to the king, claim what had been promised, and finally step into a life no one could sneer at. A castle. A name. Men who answered to me. Land that no legitimate brother or a lord’s passing whim could take.
I had wanted those things for so long that they had become part of my bones.
And yet, with Katreine asleep against me, her trust warm and fragile in my arms, I could not make the wanting feel clean.
She shifted and whimpered, and it gutted me.
I bent without thinking and pressed my lips to the top of her head.
“Shh, lass,” I whispered, brushing damp hair back from her brow. “I have ye. Rest now.”
She eased almost at once, her body softening against mine again.
I closed my eyes. I have ye. The words had come too easily.
Worse, I had meant them. A fierce, overwhelming need rose in me, so sharp it nearly stole my breath.
I wanted to keep her from harm, from the road, from a king who summoned her like a piece on a board, and from men who would use her like me.
My jaw clenched. She slept on, unaware of the war tearing through me, and I lay awake long after the fire had sunk to embers, holding a woman I had no right to want and even less right to keep.
I awoke with a start to daylight streaming in through the window, and the bed was empty of Katreine.
I scrambled out of bed, heart pounding, certain she had figured me out and fled.
Fear drove me out of the room and down the stairs, but it was more fear for what might happen to her alone on the road than anything else.
Aye, I still planned to take her to the king, but she would be safe with the king and with me.
Out alone on the road, she’d be anything but safe.
I found her in the main inn room, sitting at a table with Irma standing in front of her as they chatted.
I stood for a moment at the threshold, letting my heart stop pounding and the knots in my shoulders loosen, then crossed the distance between us.
When she saw me, she smiled, making two dimples appear, and her eyes lit up, and damned if the sight of her didn’t tighten my chest. My reaction now, and the one moments ago when I had found her gone, was unwelcome.
I had to regain the control I was losing.
This woman was a means to an end, and detouring from my plan meant losing my chance to get what I’d long been after.
With that in mind, I determined to do better at keeping the necessary walls between us.
As I sat down, Irma was speaking to Katreine.
“Ye look a bit better, lass,” she said.
“I’m well enough,” Katreine replied. Aye. That was as close to the truth as the lass seemed willing to come.
Irma set down a jug of watered ale. “Where are ye headed from here?”
I reached for my cup. “North.”
At the same moment, Katreine said, “To the Isle of Skye.”
Irma’s brows drew together. “Skye?”
I set my cup down slowly, realizing my error.
Katreine looked at her. “Aye.”
Irma’s gaze flicked to me, then back to Katreine. “Then ye’re headed the wrong way.”
Katreine turned to me, and every muscle in my body tightened.
“What does she mean?” she asked.
“We need to go,” I said, rising, while inwardly cursing myself.
Her eyes narrowed. “James.”
I tossed coins on the table. “My thanks for the room and food, Irma.”
Irma looked as though she wished to say more, but something in my expression kept her silent. Good. I could not afford for her tongue to wag any further.
Katreine did not move, so I leaned close enough that only she could hear me. “We leave now.”
Her gaze searched mine, and I watched suspicion sharpen in her eyes. She rose carefully, too proud to let either of us help, and that pride felt different now considering Irma’s revelation. I was headed for trouble with the lass.
Outside, the morning air carried the cold bite of damp earth and the scent of distant rain. The horses waited near the stable, stamping and breathing clouds into the gray light. I helped Katreine mount despite her stiff protest, and though she allowed it, her silence had teeth.
We rode out beneath a low sky, and for a time she said nothing. I should have been grateful, but instead, each quiet moment felt like a rope tightening around my neck.
At last, she spoke. “Are we headed to Skye?”
“Aye,” I forced myself to respond immediately, but the lie tasted bitter on my tongue.
She looked ahead, her hands tight on the reins. “Then why did Irma say we were going the wrong way?”
“Because there is more than one road through the Highlands.”
“Is there?”
“Aye.”
“And is this one faster?”
“In a manner.”
“In a manner,” she repeated.
I did not answer.
She turned her head slowly. “That is a verra slippery answer, James.”
“So was the tub last night, yet ye survived it with my help.”
Her eyes flashed. “Do nae try to charm me out of my question.”
“I was nae aware ye found me charming.”
“I do nae,” she snapped.
That should not have made me want to smile, but it did.
The lass made me feel and act in ways that could cost me my future.
I had to stop being a fool. We rode in silence, and I noticed she was watching the road now, the slope of the land, the bend of the path, the thin line of trees ahead, as if every stone might confess what I would not.
Katreine was clever. I had known from the beginning that the truth would catch up to this journey, but I had not expected to dread it.
Not like this. What was happening to me?
Why did the thought of losing her trust feel less like an inconvenience and more like a wound waiting to open?
“James,” she said again, softer this time.
I looked at her.
Her face was pale from pain, but her steady gaze bore into me. “Where are ye taking me?”
The wind moved between us, carrying the scent of wet heather and the promise of rain.
For one breath, I almost told her. I almost gave her the truth and let the world break as it would, but I had no doubt she would fight me the rest of the way and try to flee.
And if she managed to flee and ended up in the arms of Siward or Conn?
I was not ready to relinquish the chance I had chased my whole life.
To be worthy of pursuing a woman like Katreine, I had to have something to offer her.
The knowledge didn’t lessen the sting of guilt, but the next thought did.
If I gained the prize, I could court Katreine, that is, if she ever spoke to me again.
“James?” she said once more.
My hands tightened on the reins. “To the Dark Woods, exactly as I told ye. Where the devil else would I be taking ye?”
She nodded but looked away from me, back to the road and the countryside.
She suspected I was lying. I knew it by her stiff posture and her white-knuckled grip on her reins.
I vowed then and there to ensure she would be well rewarded for her service to the king, and I would personally escort her back to the Summer Walkers when the king’s daughter was better.
Or, mayhap, if she would allow me, I’d court her.
I wasn’t escorting her to a terrible future, I reasoned, grasping my new line of thinking.
I was giving her an opportunity to gain a better life by serving the king.