“The humans may surprise you. They aren’t all bad, Solveig,” he admonished.
“I know.” Solveig brought her uninjured arm up to drag a hand over her face. “Fucking Latham. What the Hel was he thinking?”
“He was thinking that he had to fight for what he wanted, and since you won’t let him fight for you, this was a good outlet.”
She focused on his concentrated face. What an odd thing to say. Did he actually think Latham was right? Did he think she should give him another chance? She wouldn’t.
“And one hundred and two soldiers paid the price for it.”
“Some prices are worth paying,” he said quietly.
Solveig was about to respond when the flap of the medical tent opened. Sten poked his head in and gave her a small smile, but his eyes widened as he spotted Laeknir half a second later.
“Oh ... s-sorry, I didn’t know you weren’t ... I’ll just ... I’ll wait outside,” he said, stumbling over his words. Before he could back away, Solveig stopped him.
“Come in, Sten. It’s fine. We’re almost done.”
He hesitated at the opening but let the tent flap drop and stood awkwardly to the side, trying to avoid looking directly at her wound. Or at Laeknir—Solveig didn’t quite know. She waited for him to speak, but he didn’t.
“What do you want, lad?” Laeknir barked. Solveig shot the healer a look and he shrugged his shoulders.
“I just, uh, I need to speak to General Tordottir,” he said quietly. His eyes shifted back and forth between Solveig and Laeknir.
“Then speak,” Laeknir growled.
“I ... I uh, I need to speak with her ... a-alone,” he managed to get out.
Solveig furrowed her brow. Sten was acting strange—well, stranger than usual. She hadn’t told anyone about Sten’s access to his magic, but she supposed it might be good for Laeknir to know.
“It’s okay, Sten, we can trust him.”
Still, Sten seemed uncomfortable. “I don’t ... I just think maybe ...”
“Oh, for the love of the gods, boy, spit it out!” Laeknir said, glaring at the lad, clearly annoyed.
Sten opened his mouth, either to tell her what he needed to say or to try to avoid the question again, but he was cut off by the prince barging into the tent and almost knocking him over.
“Aren’t you finished yet, you old witch?” the prince snapped at Laeknir. Solveig gave him a questioning look, but his focus was on the healer.
“How am I supposed to work with constant interruptions!”
“Okay, two interruptions does not qualify as constant,” Solveig said, wincing as he dug deeper. The prince finally brought his attention to her, concern replacing anger.
“You okay?”
“Oh yeah. Just peachy.”
He smiled, and she ignored the way her heart leapt in response. Her focus returned to her shoulder as Laeknir’s fingers found what they were looking for and yanked out what was hopefully the last shard of arrow.
“Fuck,” she hissed, rolling her shoulder once Laeknir’s fingers were out of the way. The prince grabbed her hand and she squeezed it tight as the pain slowly subsided.
“You were right,” she told Laeknir through gritted teeth. “I think that was the last one.”
The sharp, throbbing pain that had been present since she was skewered eased, her body finally able to start mending itself. Laeknir covered the wound with a salve to numb the ache and treat the poison.
“Don’t know why you sound so surprised,” Laeknir mumbled, cleaning up the arrow pieces and blood. “Now get out. I need the bed.”
Solveig gave Laeknir the vulgar mortal hand gesture as she hopped off the table. The prince was there to steady her if needed, but thankfully she was already starting to feel better.
