Blaine closed his eyes, tears burning against his lashes, and tightened his hold on Honovi’s hand, the only anchor he had in the drift of his damaged body and mind.
Six
HONOVI
Alrickson picked up Honovi’s empty whiskey glass and set it out of reach. “This won’t help you sleep.”
Honovi looked up from the folios scattered across his desk in their clan home, blinking gritty eyes at his father. The hour was late, the clock hands pointing well after midnight. “I don’t drink it to sleep.”
“It won’t help you forget either.”
Honovi grimaced and leaned back in his chair, dragging a hand over his face. “I know.”
“Don’t fall into a habit of finding false comfort in the bottom of a glass. It’s not worth it.”
He knew it wasn’t, but at a trying time like this, it was tempting. Honovi sighed, watching as his father deftly sorted out the folios into stacks for tomorrow—technically today—to deal with.
TheComhairle nan Cinnidheanhad eventually issued an embargo for the whole of Daijal. The ripple effects were hitting their own company, and someone had to deal with the logistics of getting the Eastern Winds Trading Company back on track. That task fell to him, while the task of shielding Honovi from political fallout fell to his father.
TheComhairle nan Cinnidheanwas going through a change ofcinn-chinnidh, with somejarlstaking over for their elders. The attack by Gregor, as arionetka, had nearly shattered the peak of their country’s government, and the new governing body was still finding their wings, so to speak, and learning to work together. What they all agreed on, however, was the threat Daijal and Queen Eimarille represented.
The threat wasn’t enough to get the country to go to war. Honovi’s actions in Foxborough aside, E’ridia was reluctant to commit any support to Ashion against Daijal at this time. Caris’ claim of the Rourke bloodline couldn’t be officially recorded, not until Blaine was there to stand witness for her, and right now, Blaine was not fit for travel.
It was his husband and the guilt he felt that drove Honovi to deplete his personal whiskey stores, but that sort of liquid bandage wasn’t sustainable. Some part of him wished it was. “They took his arm.”
Alrickson managed a wan smile. “They didn’t take his life.”
But his husband’s livelihood was out of reach right now as the stump of Blaine’s arm healed. He washealing, though, and Honovi kept that thought in the forefront of his mind. It’d been a week since Blaine had finally woken up, fever breaking, Banshari’s intervention meaning he’d suffered no permanent damage from the poison administered to him. That didn’t mean Blaine was healed. Far from it.
Honovi had brought Blaine to their clan home two days ago, his husband unable to stand being in the hospital any longer. Blaine was still recovering—would continue to recover for a long while—but he’d feel better at home. A nurse had been assigned to his care at home, and a doctor stopped by once a day to assess his body’s recovery. Blaine’s mental and emotional state was something else entirely.
“I don’t know how to help him,” Honovi confessed.
Alrickson stepped around the desk and rested his hand on Honovi’s shoulder. “Adjustment takes time. Just be there for him.”
Easier said than done at the moment. Glencoe’s hospitals were overflowing with wounded wardens. Clans had opened their homes to take in those not critically wounded but still in need of care. Delani was governing out of one of his clan’s homes, just down the street, the warden looking like she never slept every time he saw her.
Honovi knew the feeling.
A board creaked in the hallway, and Honovi’s gaze cut to the doorway. Seconds later, a familiar figure stepped into view, making him tense with worry, half-rising out of his seat. “Should you be up?”
“Shouldn’t you be in bed?” Blaine rasped, knuckling one eye. He was pale, the dark circles under his eyes prominent bruises, and he’d lost weight from his ordeal. He looked fragile in a way he never had, not even when he’d stepped off that airship as a child so long ago.
Alrickson gave Honovi a gentle shake. “Your husband has a point. It’s late. All this will keep.”
Honovi nodded and straightened up, leaving everything where it lay in favor of his husband. He couldn’t stop himself from staring at how the sleeve of Blaine’s nightshirt was tied up, showing off the empty space where his lower arm used to be. The sight of the missing limb was still jarring but becoming less so.
He still felt a deep, abiding sense of guilt for having not been able to rescue Blaine from the Warden’s Island before the soldiers captured him. Honovi knew it was irrational, that if he hadn’t been on the airship the battle might have gone differently, but he couldn’t quite shake the feeling that his actions had caused Blaine such grievous harm.
He settled a hand on Blaine’s hip, leaning in to press a soft kiss to his husband’s mouth. “Did the pain wake you? Do you need more medicine?”
Fingers curled around the edge of the plaid he wore, worrying at the fabric. “No.”
Honovi bit back a sigh. Blaine didn’t like how the pain medicine made him lose time and feel confused. The doctors said it would help with his healing, but Blaine kept refusing it. It made Honovi ache to see his husband in pain, but if this was how Blaine regained control of his body, then he wouldn’t argue.
He took Blaine’s hand in his and gently guided him back into the hallway. “Come on. Let’s get you back to bed.”
Blaine didn’t protest being led to their bedroom, a small gas lamp burning low on the nightstand. Since coming home, Blaine refused to sleep in the dark, and Honovi always made sure the gas lamp never went out. His own sleep had suffered a little, not used to constant illumination, but he was adjusting.
