She whirled to find Ballard standing not far behind her, already dressed in breeches. He pulled on a bliaud, not bothering with the laces. He hadn’t taken time to rinse away the blood on his skin, and pink stains blossomed across the shirt, speckling his chest and arms. He looked as ragged as she felt, the scars livid against his gray pallor. “Where’s Ambrose?”
“Returned to Gavin’s room.” She’d guessed right about a curse and burned to know more but kept her tongue behind her teeth. In the weeks she’d spent at Ketach Tor, she’d never seen fear in Ballard’s eyes until now. That fear was for his son. In his place, she’d have no patience for satisfying someone’s curiosity at the moment. “I’ll meet you there once I’ve dressed. I know you’re as anxious as Cinnia.”
He nodded, pausing long enough to brush a kiss across her brow before following Ambrose. Louvaen watched him until he disappeared into the stairwell. Her own dressing took longer than his, accompanied by a great quantity of cursing and hisses as her frock sleeves scraped the tears in her skin, and her stockings pulled on the scabs dotting her leg. She joined the parade of visitors to Gavin’s chambers and found Cinnia standing outside the bedroom’s closed door, wiping away tears with the corner of her sleeve. When she saw Louvaen, she threw herself into her arms. The sobs started anew.
Louvaen swallowed a pained yelp and stroked her sister’s back. “How is he?”
Cinnia stepped back and sniffled. Even with a red nose, swollen eyes, and skin blotched with tears, she was breathtaking. “In pain. Unhappy to see me.” She smiled crookedly. “You were right about his eyes. De Sauveterre admitted that Ambrose ensorcelled Gavin the last time so I wouldn’t become frightened.”
“Are you frightened now?”
“Yes, but not for myself.” Cinnia used her sodden sleeve a second time to scrub her face. “Gavin reminds me of Thomas when he first got sick.”
Louvaen swayed, dizzy with horror.
Cinnia gripped her arm. “It isn’t plague, Lou; it isn’t just the flux either.”
“I know.” Her sister’s eyebrows rose in question. Louvaen gestured to Gavin’s closed door. “I made a good guess and caught Ambrose by surprise. What did Gavin tell you?”
Cinnia plucked at her skirts. “Nothing, but Magda hinted at it when I was in there. Something to do with his mother Isabeau and curses.”
Once again, the de Sauveterre household danced around a revelation, saying just enough to fire the curiosity but leaving out the most important details. “Magda’s picked up some of her lover’s bad habits. Sly hints and half truths seem to be the order of the morning.” Louvaen wished she could shake one of them until the details spilled out. She returned Cinnia’s sudden stare. “What?”
“What happened to your cheek?”
Louvaen ran a fingertip gingerly across the deep scratch that marred her cheekbone. “You know those disgusting roses?”
Cinnia’s eyes widened. “They did that? How?”
“An unwelcomed dawn visit through a broken shutter. They’re sensitive to the flux the same way Gavin and his father are.” Louvaen paled at the image of Cinnia venturing too close to that seething mass of thorns and being ripped apart. “Don’t go anywhere near the roses, my love. I don’t care how beautiful you think they are.”
Distracted by the sound of the latch on Gavin’s door, Cinnia only nodded. Magda emerged from the room, closing the door gently behind her. Her pinched expression softened when she saw Cinnia, and she patted the girl’s arm. “He’s sleeping for now. Thedominusinsists on staying, even though he’ll need those cuts tended.” Her gaze settled on Louvaen, pausing at the scratch on her cheek before moving on to the injuries hidden by her wrinkled frock. “You too, I’ll wager.” She waved them along with her as she reached the stairwell. “Come downstairs. I’ll heat water and pour cyser. We can all use a cup a two, methinks.”
A tepid sponge bath followed by a slathering of yarrow ointment and two cups of cyser improved Louvaen’s mood from grim to anxious. As much as she wanted to indulge in a bit of pacing and hand-wringing, she put forth her best impression of a calm demeanor for Cinnia’s sake. The girl was doing enough worrying for two people.
“Do you think Gavin is feeling better now?” she asked for the fifth time in the past quarter hour. She helped Louvaen strip the blood-stained linens off Ballard’s bed and pile them by the door.
“Maybe,” Louvaen replied patiently. “We’ll know soon enough.” Gathering laundry wasn’t the most interesting way of distracting her sister nor the most successful, but she needed something to keep her occupied and not pacing outside Gavin’s door.
Magda had sent them upstairs after Louvaen pulled her aside. “I’ll ruin Joan’s fine tare if I try to spin, and Cinnia will drive us all to madness before noon with her misery. There’s plenty to do here, but I want something harder than dipping candles to keep her mind off what’s going on in Gavin’s room.”
The cook gave her a knowing look. “Just her?”
Louvaen shrugged. “Me too, if you must know.”
“Hard toil does wonders for an idle mind,” Magda said with a faint smile. “You can wash those sheets and clothing you and Ballard bloodied this morning.”
They yanked the last of the sheets from the mattress and bundled everything in a blanket to drag downstairs. Louvaen kept a wary eye on the window as they made their way to the door, ready to snatch Cinnia and run if a thorny vine coiled through the shutter slats.
Magda had a barrel and bucket ready, along with a bucking cloth filled with ash. Cinnia threw herself into the drudgery of rinsing, scrubbing and beating with gusto, only halting when Louvaen threatened to take the washing bat to her head if she didn’t stop long enough to eat Magda’s dinner of stewed chicken. All the threats in the world couldn’t force her to do more than pick at her portion, and Louvaen didn’t push her. Her own food grew cold as she pushed it listlessly from one side of her plate to the other. She hadn’t expected Gavin to make an appearance, but she’d hope Ballard might. She’d even welcome Ambrose’s usual censure of her if it meant learning more about this latest flux. Unfortunately, only Magda kept them company, and she’d warned them no amount of charm, tears or demands would move her to divulge the household secrets.
Dusk crept over the horizon by the time they draped the last sheets across winter hedges set up in the laundry room. Louvaen stretched her back and raised her hands to show Cinnia. “Prune fingers,” she said.
Cinnia smiled weakly. “This reminded me how much I hated the spring great washes. I didn’t think I’d ever dry out afterwards.” She glanced toward the kitchen and the stairwell beyond the screens. Her smile vanished as quickly as it appeared. “I can’t stand it, Lou. I need to check on him.”
Louvaen didn’t blame her. Hours had passed with only Magda and the maids for company. Magda had left for Gavin’s room a few minutes earlier carrying a cup and bottle filled with dark liquid. Cinnia watched her go with a longing gaze. Louvaen took pity on her. “Go on then. I’ll finish here.” The words barely left her lips before Cinnia flew out of the laundry room.
She desperately wanted to follow Cinnia, not so much to see Gavin but to find Ballard. He’d looked knackered and fearful when he left her in the morning, his wide shoulders drooping when Ambrose told him his son had already taken to his bed, ill from the flux. She put away the washing bats instead and headed for the kitchen. She entered in time to hear the door to the buttery open and close—Joan or Clarimond to fetch ale or wine. Something within her said otherwise, and she followed the sound, propelled by the certainty that the man she sought had just passed her and was descending to the well room.
