Rose stared at him, the high, flat cheekbones stark, pale skin stretched taut across them. “It’s not hopeless,” she said forcefully. “Stop acting as if it is, else he’ll begin to believe it and give up. Once the soul gives up . . . there’s nothing I can do.”
Nicholas looked away from her and, against his will, his gaze returned to Alan’s other daughter. She stared at her father, tears standing in her beautiful gray eyes. His stomach bottomed out, and he forced his gaze to the fur-covered bed, angry with himself for not being able to do more. All the money and power and lands he had could not save his friend. He pulled up his customary stool beside Alan’s bed and watched his friend sleep. The deerhound lay nearby, drowsing. Rose returned to her work, and after a moment, Gillian read softly again.
Nicholas closed his eyes, listening more to her voice than the story she read—the tale of the Green Knight.He’d spent no more time alone with her after their forest outing. He’d considered it several times, perhaps inviting her to join him for a meal, or a game of draughts, before realizing that such things would not do. It had been an understatement when he’d admitted to not hating her. In the scheme of things, one would suppose liking one’s betrothed to be a positive development. But Nicholas didn’t particularly want to like Gillian. He didn’t want to be amused by her curiosity, didn’t want to admire her courage, or feel the uncomfortable tugging in his chest when she was so hesitant and uncertain. He would not make the same mistakes with this wife. He would remain vigilant to deception. A husband was lord and master, not friend. He would protect her with his life, take pleasure in her body—but she would be nothing more to him than a vessel for his children.
Gillian stopped reading abruptly and closed her book. Nicholas opened his eyes to find Alan awake. It was clear he’d not woken from a peaceful sleep—his eyes were wild, his mouth open in a silent scream. Something jerked against Nicholas’s feet. The deerhound twitched madly, in the midst of its own nightmare.
Nicholas was on his feet beside the bed. “Alan—what is it?”
Hagan loomed behind him, reaching for the fur coverlet, but before he touched it, Rose gripped the edge and flung it back.
Alan gasped a few times before his breathing calmed. His eyes drifted shut, but he did not sleep.
Gillian made a strangled sound.
Nicholas glanced at her. She stared at her father’s uncovered body, eyes wide and white, fingers pressed hard against her lips. Nicholas had seen it before, and he forced himself to look again, to see what new horror had sprung up on his dearest friend’s helpless body.
Alan wore his shirt tied up to his throat, but his legs from the knees down were exposed. Nicholas remembered seeing him but a few short months ago in his plaid, his legs bare. They’d been thick, muscular legs, covered with auburn hair. They looked like wizened twigs now, the skin hanging off the bones and milky white except for the bruises.
The bruises were but one of the many mysteries of Alan’s illness, but they were the most disturbing one. His sleep was frequently troubled, and when he would wake, sometimes he would be covered with marks, as if he’d been in battle, though he remembered nothing of his dreams. Hagan was always present with Alan and could attest that no one had touched his master. And though Alan sometimes thrashed about, never so much to cause himself such damage.
But even if hehad,it would not explain these marks. The newest one, verily glowing on his calf, was in the shape of a half moon. Not so curved that it looked like a horse’s hoof had struck him, though he had a few of those, which were fading and a sickly yellowish color on his other calf. No, this was precise, with a fine point at either end of the bruise, as if he’d been branded with a crescent. Except it wasn’t a burn.
Rose pulled his shirt up further, and there were moreon his thighs—one in the shape of a star. Hagan untied Alan’s shirt. When he spread it, yet more marks colored his sunken chest.
Alan waved his arms irritably. “Enough! We all know what they look like. Let me be.”
“Da?” Gillian asked softly, almost timidly, from behind them. “Do they hurt?”
Nicholas allowed himself to glance back at her, but he turned away quickly at the stricken look on her face as she stared at her father’s ravaged body. She hadn’t seen them before. Rose should have been more thoughtful. He scowled at the redhead, but she was intent on Alan.
“Och, my love, no.” Alan sighed, pulling the fur close around himself. “Gilly, my sweet, do me a favor?”
Gillian came forward, sitting on the edge of the bed. “Yes, Da, anything.”
“Write to Isobel and Sir Philip. Tell them to come. And to bring Stephen, aye?”
Gillian’s face froze. She did not answer. Alan gave Nicholas aHelp melook and lifted his chin toward his daughter. Nicholas touched Gillian’s shoulder.
She didn’t look at him. She was stiff and pale—an image stricken in marble.
“Gillian,” Nicholas said in a low voice, slipping his hand under her elbow and lifting her forcibly off the bed. “Come. You can use my messenger.”
He led her to her chambers. She did not speak, only stared straight ahead, eyes blank. He took her to her writing desk, and she sank onto the stool but did nothing, staring vacantly ahead. Nicholas pulled a piece ofparchment out from under a large glassy rock and placed it in front of her.
She looked down at the parchment. A tear splashed onto it.
Nicholas did not know what to do. Instinct told him to hold her again, as he had in the forest, but the memory of her body pressed against his was too fresh, even two days past, and he found himself frequently preoccupied with carnal thoughts, as if he were a green lad again—even when he wasn’t near her.
He pushed the inkwell and quill toward her and said gruffly, “Write the letter, and I’ll have it sent.”
She wiped at her eyes and sniffed delicately. “You know why he’s sending for them, don’t you?”
“Aye.”
Gillian picked up the quill. “I don’t know what to write. ‘Father is dying and has asked for you. Time is short. Make haste’?”
“Aye, that would work.”
