“Is that what she wanted your healing skills for?” Gybbon asked, wanting to be certain Mora had told him exactly what ailed her.
Jolene winced. “I got the feeling she did not want you to know and, perhaps, worry.”
“So, it was her wound? The one she always claimed was nay more than a scratch?”
“I told ye last night. Aye, it was as though her fall worsened it. It was far more than a scratch. It looked as if some fool tried to gut her.”
Gybbon growled and Freya rubbed her head against his arm. “Robert. She told me of that incident but said the point of his knife just scratched her a bit, although I could tell it pained her from time to time.”
“That does not surprise me. It should have been stitched up immediately, and when your ill-tempered horse tossed her to the ground the wound opened wider than it had been, but I can certainly understand her reluctance to stitch up herself. The bleeding had ne’er really stopped.”
“I wondered. When we stopped at the cottage I found a few small spots of blood on the blanket. I dinnae understand why she just suffered and didnae tell me.”
“Weel, the wound can only be reached and treated if she sheds her clothing,” Jolene said as she sat on the edge of the bench and shook her head.
“Ah, of course.” Gybbon grimaced. “Modesty.”
“Silly thinking, I know, but I am no good at suffering with pain. I would shed my clothing before a whole army if it meant someone could stop my pain.”
“And I would wear myself out killing all those men who looked at ye, so we best hope ye are ne’er pushed to that point,” drawled Sigimor. “Come to me if ye feel a pain.”
Gybbon shook his head and laughed softly. “And what would ye do?”
“I would do a lot of patting her on the back and saying ‘There, there, stiffen your wee backbone and grit your tiny teeth.’”
Grinning at the way Jolene rolled her eyes, Gybbon looked at Sigimor as Jolene said, “Aye, and that worked so very well when I had the girls.”
Something in Sigimor’s eyes told Gybbon that his friend had suffered every moment his wife was in pain during a birth but that he loved the results of it so deeply he would not stop fathering more.
“Weel, it stopped your screaming.”
“Because I was stunned! I could not believe you thought it would help.” Jolene looked at Gybbon, as she ignored the way Sigimor fed Freya a little meat even though her lips twitched with the need to laugh. “Now, Gybbon, she may have just been denying that she was hurt or it simply was not a serious hurt at first.”
“That sounds like foolishness,” Gybbon said. “She just didnae want me demanding to see the wound. That could have gone on for quite a while longer, but the moment she swooned from pain, fever, or the constant slow loss of blood, I would have tended the damned wound. She was just being stubborn or hiding behind needless modesty.” He glanced toward the door again. “I think I should check on her before Sigimor and I leave. She just wouldnae sleep so long. She had a touch of fever last night, ye ken. Do ye think it got worse?”
“It could have. I will go have a look at her.”
“Ye dinnae have to go up. I ken how to tell if she is feverish or nay.”
“I did the patching. My job now is to make sure it is working,” Jolene said as she walked toward the door.
Gybbon thought about that reasoning for a moment, caught Sigimor grinning at him, and hurried to follow her. When he reached Mora’s room, Jolene was already sending one of the maids for a pan of cool water and collecting up what she would need to change the bandage.
“The fever has worsened,” he said as he walked up to the bed and stroked Mora’s hair. Freya leapt up on the bed as the maid returned with the water.
“Aye. I feared it might.” Jolene set the bowl of water on the bedside table. “I want you to bathe her face to try and cool her down while I take a peek at her wound, mayhap even change the bandage. Ye are also to try very hard not to look at her.”
“Jolene, I have seen a few women without their clothes on. Iamnine and twenty.”
“She would be embarrassed and, if she asks, I want to be able to say no without guilt or the need to hide my expression.”
“That bad a liar, are ye?”
“Abysmal.”
He wrung out the rag in the pan of water as Jolene arranged the bedcovers to hide as much as possible while still giving her access to the wound. With as soft a touch as he could manage, he wiped Mora’s face and neck. Despite his best efforts to do as Jolene had asked, he glanced down at Mora. There was little to see and her wound grabbed his attention.
Her skin was pale and the wound with its stitches, and lingering redness, was glaringly obvious. It was ugly, marring what looked to be unmarked skin. It also looked like far more than a scratch, and probably had been even before Jester had tossed her to the ground. Jolene was right. Robert had attempted to gut her as she fled him.
