Too damn bad.
I caught the wince he tried to hide when he took the weapons from me and replaced them over his torso. For probably the first time ever, I wasn’t distracted by the strong structure and shapes of his body. All my attention was on the blooming discoloration and angry wounds.
His neck was the worst of it, yellow and purple splotches roping his throat where the Horrad’s hands had mauled him. Vying for second place was the space beneath his ribs, his muscled torso swollen and red, followed by that horrible, crusted wound along his scalp. Not far behind were the bruises spreading over his jaw.
Better than him being dead, I reminded myself.
Dragging the stool over, I ordered him to sit. He did—with another sigh—making sure to face the entrance.
“Don’t tell me you’re scared this will hurt,” I challenged as I wet and soaped a rag. The suds smelled faintly of herbs.
“It isn’t very kind to insult an injured man.”
An injureddramaticman.
“It’s a genuine question. If you’re scared, I can get Aric to come in here and tell you it’ll all be just fine.”
This earned me a rather grumpy side-eye.
Wringing out the fabric, I walked to his side to tend to his head wound. “What, am I hurting Princeps Harthon’s delicate feelings?” I meant for it to sound teasing, but the fun died from my question when I saw how deep the cut and severe the swelling was. It had reopened during the battle, now seeping fresh blood.
The image of him crumpled on the ground after being struck in the head when we were first captured shot to the front of my memory.
I felt his hand wrap around my wrist, which had paused mid-air. He took a break from watching the entrance to look at me and gently reassure, “I’ve walked away from fights far worse than this.”
He’s fine. Get it together.
I forced a small smile and started at the perimeter of the blood. Cleaning his matted hair as gently as I could, I said, “They haven’t removed their challenger’s body to bury it.”
“No,” he agreed curiously. “Perhaps because he lost.”
I felt no sympathy for the dead man, but I could still acknowledge how wrong that felt. “He didn’t make a sound, not even as you killed him.”
The Horrads didn’t speak, but for a man to not cry out when he was being mortally wounded…I didn’t know that was something a person could even control.
“Years ago, when I encountered them outside of First, it turned into a fight to the death. Even with limbs missing, they would not make a sound,” Harthon revealed as I took a clean section of cloth to the laceration.
“How do people even come to be that way?” I asked as I studied the wound. For all that blood, it didn’t appear to be as deep as I’d first thought, but it was still oozing. “Dammit,” I muttered.
“I’m assuming it needs to be sewn.”
“I’m no healer, but it’s still bleeding.” And the Horrads had provided us with a threaded needle for a reason. I’d never sewn a wound before.
Harthon brushed my hands away and dabbed at the sliced skin, his fingers much rougher than mine. “Should only take a few stitches,” he determined. “I’d do it myself, but we have no mirror.”
Even if we did, I wasn’t going to allow him to tend to himself after all he’d just done.
“Can’t be very different from sewing clothes, right?” I chirped, retrieving the needle. The thread appeared to be clean, at least.
Fortunately, he didn’t appear unnerved by my lack of experience. “Just requires a little more force,” he coached calmly. “Knot your starting point, pinch the skin, then three or four passes should be enough. Knot the end when you’re done.”
I held the thin, razor-sharp tip to the skin, fighting a surge of nausea and reminding myself not to be a coward. He’d just fought off a giant with his bare hands, for Domus’ sake.
Harthon kept me distracted with his voice as I made contact. “As you know, the Horrads only came into existence once the Domus appeared,” he said, like I wasn’t jabbing a needle into his skin. “Before that, they lived the same life that many did. They were farmers, hunters, traders. It’s said a few may have even been nobility.”
His voice remained steady and unbothered as I sealed the first quarter of his gash.
“What changed?”
