He shrugged. “They’ll grow back.”
She positioned his hand and lifted the nippers. “Stay still so I don’t accidentally nip off a finger.”
“Gods save me,” he muttered.
“Keep praying,” she said and clamped down on the first claw. A sliver came off with a loud crack and shot past her shoulder. This may not have been one of her better ideas. She might well lose an eye for her efforts.
Louvaen glanced up at Ballard who smirked. “You can’t stop now, mistress.”
He was right, and she set to work, dodging flying bits of claws and snapping at Ballard to hold still if he so much as twitched an eyelash. By the time she finished both hands, her back ached and her fingers were stiff. She dropped the nippers into the basket and surveyed her handiwork. The claws had been cut back to his fingertips. Still macabre and strange, his hands weren’t quite so bestial in appearance.
She lifted one of his hands. “They need a filing to smooth and even the edges, but at least they no longer resemble daggers.”
For the first time since she met him, he grinned. He had good teeth, straight and white. His canines, however, gave one pause. They were longer than the others, curved and pointed much as his claws were. He must have noticed her fixed stare because the grin fled as quickly as it appeared, and his features froze into drawn lines.
“I’m not nipping or filing teeth,” she said in an attempt to lighten the mood. She lifted the rasp out of the basket. “You might need them later. Magda’s a decent cook but I wasn’t sure if that last bit of meat she served was mutton or shoe.”
Ballard didn’t respond to her banter. He sat quietly as she smoothed his nails with short strokes of the rasp. Her rhythm remained unbroken when he asked “Why don’t you fear my appearance as others do?”
Louvaen halted, still holding his hand. “Why should I? You don’t spit sewing needles when you talk, don’t shoot flames out of your nose when you breathe, and you have a fine pair of eyes when I’m not blackening them for you. What’s there to fear?”
He looked nonplussed by her answer. “You can’t tell me this face of mine isn’t fearsome.”
She resumed her filing. “I’ve said no such thing, but that wasn’t your question. You asked why I didn’t fear it.” This was delicate territory and demanded a subtle answer. “My husband was an undertaker.” Ballard’s finger twitched, and she nearly scraped off his cuticle. She scowled at him. “Keep still!”
“My apologies.”
“As I was saying—” The rasp grated across the jagged nail. “Thomas was an undertaker. One of the duties was to prepare the dead for burial, wash and dress the body if the family wasn’t up to the task. As his wife I helped with his business, and such duty fell to me.”
Ballard shifted in his seat. “I may be disfigured, mistress, but I assure you I’m not dead.”
Louvaen pointed the rasp at him. “You will be if you don’t stop fidgeting. Where was I? Oh yes, nowhere yet.” She went back to filing. “The dead came to us in many states. Some as peaceful as if they simply slept, others curled in on themselves as if they denied death. A few, those who lived violent lives and met violent deaths, were delivered to us in pieces.” Nightmares about those burials still plagued her. “The ones who died of disease were the worst. Limbs or noses rotted away. Faces distorted from suffering and whatever poison literally ate them alive.”
She glanced up to measure his reaction. He watched her, his features expressionless. “Once, and I have no idea why they did so, a family waited days before summoning Thomas and me to the house. An uncle, sick for a long time with holy fire, had died. I was helping his niece bathe the body when it burst.”
“Good gods,” Ballard breathed.
She’d returned home in only her shift and a blanket to declare to Thomas she was done, and he was on his own with the corpses. She’d then marched out to the garden and promptly emptied her stomach into one of the flowerbeds. Later, she told the family in no uncertain terms that she didn’t want her ruined dress back. “So you see, I’ve gazed upon far worse and survived just fine.” She adopted a mock look of pity. “And I’m sorry, Lord de Sauveterre. Flux or no flux, you’ll never be as pretty Cinnia. No one will.”
He offered her a close-lipped smile, but she was satisfied. Amusement and something else—something hot which brought an equal heat to her cheeks—flared in his eyes. “Regarding the last, mistress, we must disagree.” He gestured with his chin to the hand she held in her grasp. “Are you done?”
Louvaen mentally shook herself out of the stupor taking hold. Annoyed at getting caught up in de Sauveterre’s gaze, she filed the last nail with more enthusiasm than necessary and proclaimed the job finished. Ballard raised his hands to admire the results. “What do you think?” she asked.
He peered at her over his newly exposed fingertips. “You realize once the flux returns they’ll be long again.”
She stood and brushed black dust from her skirts. Magda wouldn’t begrudge her a broom later. “Then we’ll cut and file them again.”
Ballard stood as well. Trapped between him and the stool, Louvaen could count the stitching on his leather tunic and catch the scents of evergreen and smoke on his clothes. The brief smile hovered at his lips. “I’m pleased. You have my thanks, but next time we’ll wait until after I’ve eaten. I’m fond of a hot meal.”
Louvaen lifted her chin and scooted around the stool to put some distance between them before she succumbed to the temptation to reach out and touch his jaw, feel the moving marks on his skin for herself. “No one ever died from eating cold chicken.”
“I’ll let you tell Magda that after she’s worked this past hour trying to keep mine warm.”
She winced. Magda would probably kill her for keeping the master of the house away for so long and her trapped in the kitchen waiting for him. “Come on then. I’ll need my own fork to fend off an angry cook.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
They found Magda at the hearth, stirring the contents of a pot so vigorously Louvaen wondered if whatever stewed inside was actually dead. The housekeeper glanced over her shoulder. “If it took you that long to tup her, then you can take your food with you next time. I’ve better things to do than guard your chicken while you’re flipping a skirt.”
