Her face shifts—eyes going sharp, jaw setting, a breath out through her nose. "Are you hurt? Beyond the obvious?"
"My cheek. My head hit the tree. I've had worse."
"You haven't had worse. You're a healer whose worst injury was getting scratched by your own chicken."
"That was one time. And she was molting."
"You've been crying."
Well, no answer for that. My face is exactly what it is—tear-streaked, swollen, wrecked.
Her eyes move over me again. The tear tracks. The disheveled clothes.
"Where's Keer now?"
"I don't know."
"Mel—"
"I don't know, Kestria. He left. He just—left."
She goes quiet. Reading everything I'm not saying. All ofit written in the shirt and the tracks on my cheeks and how I'm standing and how I must smell.
"Come on." She takes my arm properly, firm. "Let's get you cleaned up."
I let her lead me because I don't have the energy to resist. My dwelling. She sits me on the stump outside, goes in, comes back with water and clean cloth.
She starts on my cheek without asking.
"This needs proper treatment."
"I'm aware. I'm the healer."
"Then stop being a bad patient." She tips my chin up and the world tilts, a slow roll, before settling. She checks the swelling. "These scratches on your arms—"
"Bark. I was pinned against a tree."
"During the attack?"
"Uh, yes."
Also after. Different circumstances.
The silence holds. She wrings out the cloth.
"What happened?"
"I told you. Humans, knife, Keer, dead humans. That's the whole story."
She pulls back. Looks at me. Her eyes go to the shirt one more time. Back up to my face.
"Is it?"
"Kestria."
"I'm not asking as his sister." She picks up my hands. Turns them over. Washes them carefully, between my fingers, under my nails. Doesn't comment. "Did he hurt you?"
Just answer the question. Simple. Answer it.
