The housekeeper and the sorcerer brewed teas and mixed elixirs. When they weren’t pouring them into Ballard’s mouth, they were splashing them over his swollen leg, dousing the putrid laceration. Ballard thrashed in delirium, hard enough once to pitch himself out of bed and halfway onto Magda who’d been standing over him. Gavin rescued them both. Fully recovered from the curse, he lifted his father off Magda and deposited him gently back on the bed. He spoke to Ballard in a steady voice, and the older man quieted even as the fever raged.
On the fifth day, when the red streaks radiating from the wound had retreated and the blood trickled clean, Magda announced Ballard would live. She grinned at Louvaen, who stared back at her owl-eyed. “You’ve another chance to take a crack at him, Louvaen, but wait a while. I’m too knackered to tend to him.”
Gavin, unencumbered by the sleep deprivation that numbed Louvaen, whooped his elation and yanked Magda into a rib-cracking embrace. She wheezed out a protest and finally cuffed him on the side of the head until he let her go. He did the same to Louvaen—who hung limply in his arms—before bolting out the door, crowing Cinnia’s name.
Louvaen stared after him before turning to her companions. “Are you sure?”
Ambrose shrugged. “How can anyone be sure of such a thing? But the fever’s gone and the wound is clean. He looks worse than a skinned rat, but he’s alive.” He drew a worn Magda into a much gentler embrace and kissed her mouth. “We are all in your debt, woman.”
Louvaen closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them, Magda had sagged into Ambrose’s side, asleep on her feet. She didn’t hear Louvaen’s fervent “May the gods bless all your days, Magda.”
Ambrose tucked her closer to him and half carried her to the door. “I’m taking her to her room. I don’t think she’s slept in a sennight.” He glanced at Ballard resting peacefully in the bed. “Can you stay with him? I’ll send one of the girls or even your father to take up sentry duty so you can sleep as well.”
She shook her head. “No need. I’m not sleepy, and I don’t want to be anywhere else.”
“As you wish.” He paused at the chamber’s threshold. A tiny smile played about his mouth, and a gleam of admiration brightened his eyes behind his spectacles. He nodded once. “Well done, harpy,” he said in tones usually reserved for Ballard.
Recognizing the respectful salute, she curtsied low and returned the sentiment. “Well done, spitfrog.”
After they left, she dropped down on the stool they’d each occupied at some point during Ballard’s ordeal and stared at the man who refused to die. Four days of fever and delirium had taken their toll, sculpting the skin tight to his facial bones. His beard, dark and salted with gray, covered the lower part of his face, hiding most of his gaunt cheeks. He wasn’t so pale as before though, and his lips were no longer chalky.
She took his hand, noting the pink nail plates with their white crescent moon tips. Perfectly normal nails. He needed a trim, but she’d no longer have to use hoof nippers. Louvaen raised his palm to curve against her cheek. “It’s just the two of us in here now, my lord. Magda broke her back to save you, and while I’ve never killed anyone, Ambrose is convinced I’m a murderess. Please do us all the courtesy of not dying on my watch.” She kissed each of his fingers before notching them with hers. Ballard didn’t waken, and Louvaen spent the next few minutes counting his breaths. For her, they were the most extraordinary music set to the finest rhythms. She could listen for hours.
They were soothing enough to put her to sleep. She woke to find herself hunched on the stool, her head propped on her folded arms where she rested them on the mattress. Something touched her scalp, exploring from crown to nape and back again. Louvaen straightened and discovered Ballard watching her from heavy-lidded eyes. His hand slid down her hair to her shoulder and over her forearm.
“Hello, my beauty.”
She blinked. “Ballard?” His lips twitched into a ghost of a smile. Louvaen leapt to her feet and pressed her hand to his forehead. His skin was cool and his gaze lucid. Her hands fluttered over him—his head and chest, shoulders and blanket-covered torso. The questions cascaded off her lips in a waterfall. “Are you in pain? Do you want me to get Magda? Are you thirsty? There’s willow bark tea.”
For a man who had just kissed death on the cheek before sending it on its way, he was fast. He caught her hand. “No tea,” he said firmly. He gentled his hold, and his pale features took on an arrested expression. “Gavin?”
That single-word question held a mountain of fear and an ocean of hope. Louvaen’s grin threatened to crack her face. “He’s fine, Ballard. The curse is broken. Gavin is and will remain himself.”
His eyes closed once more, long lashes like soot marks on his cheeks. His grip nearly broke her fingers, but she swallowed her gasp and squeezed his hand in return.
When he opened his eyes again, his gaze pinned her in place. “You shot me.”
Everything inside her stilled—her heartbeat, her breathing, her blood flow. She stared at Ballard and stayed silent.
“Remind me to teach you how to use an arbalest. You’ll have better luck next time.” He winked.
Her knees gave, and she plopped back down on the stool. “There will be no next time,” she declared. Her heart resumed beating albeit at a much greater pace. “You don’t have another four hundred years to forgive me.”
He tugged insistently on her hand until she sat on the bed, her hip pressed to his side. “There’s nothing to forgive.” He kissed her wrist, sending hot tingles up her arm. “Except maybe your bad aim.”
She frowned. “You’re not the first to make that point, though I’d challenge any of you to do better while half frozen and half blind.”
His eyes narrowed as he assessed her. Louvaen wanted to turn away but remained where she was as his gaze tracked the bruising that mottled her face in fading shades of lavender and yellow. His mouth flattened to a grim line. “I didn’t see when he struck you, but I saw the result in Cinnia’s mirror.” He growled low in his throat. “I should have been there. I’d use his guts for bowstring and turn his hide into a scabbard for one of my swords.”
Louvaen believed him. Cinnia had told her earlier of his rage when he learned what Jimenin had done to her, how he’d almost ridden across the drawbridge on Magnus before Gavin and Ambrose literally netted him off the horse. They had to use brute force and magic to subdue him. Hours of cursing, death threats and abuse on his cell door passed before he was calm enough to listen to reason.
“If it’s any comfort, my father exacted revenge when he planted the queen’s knife you gave me between his shoulders. Papa saved Cinnia’s life and mine.”
He quirked an eyebrow at her revelation and grunted his approval of Mercer’s actions. “And here I thought your battle spirit came from one of your mothers.”
Louvaen smiled at the memory of Abigail Hallis. Her stepmother would have stabbed Jimenin and shot Ballard without a second thought if it meant protecting her children.
Ballard patted the mattress on the side opposite his injured leg. “Come lie next to me.”
