“Ale?” she called out.
“Goat’s milk,” he said, running to her. “Will it help?”
Elspeth looked at him. He appeared to have had a good cry while he was milking the goat. She wished she could have joined him, but there was no time for that.
She took the jug and held it to Logan’s lips. “Drink this, my love. ’Twill soothe ye.” She prayed it would at least absorb the poison.
“He looks better. Ye did it, lass,” Ealar said, granting her a smile that made her shake her head to chase off thoughts of how starkly handsome he was.
“Nae. He is still verra ill. I must make him retch again. Jamie, find me some mustard.”
Luckily, the mustard was in the cupboard of the small kitchen. She mixed it with saltwater and made him drink that next. He retched again. Elspeth held him while his body trembled and shook.
“Go find the others. I need the charcoal. Tell them to bring the black heart of burned wood, not the white ash!”
“How do ye know all these things?” Ealar asked when Jamie left to find the others.
“I had to know them in case one of my master’s bairns fell ill.”
“Yer master?”
“Ealar,” Logan managed weakly. “Dinna pester her.”
Elspeth smiled and wiped his face. “Save yer strength.”
’Twas very possible that she was hallucinating, but he smiled at her. Even now. He smiled at her. “Ye called me yer love earlier.
“I certainly did not.”
“I heard her, Logan,” Ealar butted in.
Jamie burst back into the house. “The lads are comin’.”
No sooner did he say it than Ewen and Steafan hurried into the house with a large pouch, which they handed to Elspeth.
She was already up, and after crushing some charcoal with a mortar, and mixing it with milk, she turned to Logan.
“Do ye trust me to drink this all down? ’Twill be bitter, but ’twill help ye live.”
With his cousins and his brother watching, he nodded. “Aye, Elspeth, I trust ye.”
Chapter Sixteen
Elspeth sat besidehis bed the rest of that night, feeding him small amounts of ale to revive his heart and the rest of him. She didn’t know if it was enough. Sometimes certain remedies did not work. If he died…
She swallowed back her tears. Since when did she have such strong feelings for him?
He slept. The candles around the room had died out. Only the one on the bed table still burned. It bathed him in golden light and shadows. Enough light to see him.
Sleepy, she leaned down in her chair and rested her head on the edge of the mattress. His arm was closest to her face. Her eyes followed the sinewy lines that sculpted his forearm…his upper arm.
Moving closer still, she rested her head on his chest and stared at his chin and chiseled jawline beneath his shadowy gruff.
She fell asleep on him, smelling him, feeling him, hearing his heartbeat going strong against her ear.
She woke the next morning with a jolt, remembering what had happened. She sat up and felt his arm falling away from where it was around her shoulder.
He was awake, staring at her, smiling when she sat up.
