Page 89 of The Champion

Stryder hadn’t realized he’d spoken aloud until Nassir had asked his question.

“Nothing.” Stryder made his way to his cot.

As he lay down upon it, Rowena and Zenobia rejoined them.

Rowena rushed to his side and brushed his hand away from the cloth.

Stryder closed his eyes and took comfort in the sensation of her hands on his cool flesh. He took comfort in the care he saw in her green eyes.

She was beautiful in her concern for him.

Unconsciously, he reached out and ran his hand through her long blond hair, letting it wrap around his fingers. It instantly soothed the fears inside him. The horror that he might have left his own beloved brother in the hands of his enemies.

“I need a bowl of wine and thread,” she said to Nassir. “This wound needs be stitched.”

Then she looked at Stryder and something inside him shattered. No woman had ever held such a look on her face when she stared at him. He hardened instantly. His entire body burned for a taste of her lips even while it ached from his injuries.

“I think he’s been addled by that strike to his head,” Swan said from behind them. “Look at him there.”

“Aye,” Val agreed. “His mind is not as it should be. Mayhap we should beat some sense back into him.”

Stryder didn’t care what his men thought. His mind wasn’t addled. It was clear. Perfectly clear.

For the first time in his life, he understood some of what his father had felt for his mother. Understood the desire to just sit and watch a woman do the simplest of things while he ached for her.

But it changed nothing.

Damien. Ganymede. Kit. His men. They were what he lived for. They reminded him daily of the fact that he could never tie himself to his lands. So long as a child suffered, he had to do whatever he could to see that child home.

He could never rest. Never.

No matter how much his heart might wish otherwise.

He tore his gaze from Rowena to find Kit standing to the back of his men. A stern frown lined his brother’s brow.

In all the time they had been in prison, Ganymede had refused to speak of his family. He had said nothing personal. Not even how he’d come to be taken.

All the child had wanted was to go home.

Could that boy have really been Kit?

Kit had been homeless when he’d found him. Their half-brother Michael had said nothing other than Kit had returned and then Michael had thrown Kit out. At the time, Stryder had been too angry to ask where Kit had returned from.

Now, he wished he had.

There were no marks on his brother’s hands. Not like the ones that had been branded into the hands of the Brotherhood.

Nay. Kit couldn’t be Ganymede. His brother loved him. Of that he held no doubt. Damien had promised him that Ganymede hated him and the boy would have every right to.

But there was no hatred on his brother’s face as Kit watched him. Only concern showed in his blue eyes.

Damien had planted that seed there to hurt him. To weaken him. Even as a child, Damien had always known how to wound with his tongue.

Saying something didn’t make it true.

It just made it cruel.

“Stryder?”