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Her braids flew as she raised her head. “Bedamned to you, Hastings! Where is Gwent? I had prayed he would be here, but he is not. Where is he?”
Gwent? The Healer despised men. All knew it. Gwent?
Hastings noticed for the first time that the Healer did not look quite like the ragged woman that she normally did. No, her gown was a soft yellow, she was wearing leather slippers, her thick, long hair was braided loosely and tied with a yellow ribbon. She looked remarkably young.
“My son has gone to find him and another dozen of our men,” Lady Moraine said.
“He is a man but surely he would not lose himself apurpose.”
“No, he and all the other men were drugged,” Hastings said. “Richard de Luci swore that it would not kill them. But he captured us and we were forced to leave all of them unconscious on the ground. Severin is very worried. We will know by the end of the week.”
“That dim-cockled lout,” the Healer muttered to herself. “I warned him that this journey to Rosehaven would bring him low, but would he listen to me? Does any man ever listen? No, the cocky little bittle sticks just strut about and expect all to transpire as they wish it to. I told him not to go. Even Alfred jumped on him and tried to hold him down.”
Hastings could but stare at her. “But you did not tell me that the journey would bring me low, Healer. Yet you told Gwent. What is this?”
“I did not know about you, Hastings. You are here, after all, standing in front of me all smiling and well, and Gwent is likely in some dungeon somewhere rotting like a meat under maggots. By the Devil’s shins, I will make the overgrown pus-head regret this once he returns.”
“Saint Catherine’s eyebrows,” Lady Moraine gasped, staring at the Healer, “I see the truth now. You are besotted. You are acting just like Hastings does with my son. You and Gwent. But how can that be? He hates Alfred. I suspect he even fears him. He jumps whenever the cat leaps at him.”
The Healer’s chin went up. Hastings saw that her neck was firm. No, the Healer wasn’t old at all. Certainly no older than Lady Moraine or Hastings’s own mother. “Gwent now has great affection for Alfred. Alfred even once sat on Gwent’s legs whilst he ate some of my special broth. Alfred did not try to steal the broth. There is now a bond between them. That miserable crockhead.”
“Healer,” Alice said, “Alfred would steal the meat off your plate. Surely he would not show pity to Gwent?”
The Healer turned on Alice. “You will not talk about my tender Alfred like that. He is a sweeting. It is Gwent that is a hulking cretin, so sure of himself and his prowess that he must needs follow Lord Severin. Now he will die in a dungeon, rotting.”
“But I thought you hated men,” Lady Moraine said.
“Of course I do,” the Healer said, staring darkly at Lady Moraine. “They are all useless, windy bladders, concerned only with themselves. But you, lady, you blather nonsense. You will say no more about it. I will leave now. I will return tomorrow to see if there is any news. That lack-witted oxhead had better return to Oxborough well enough so that I can fix him.”
Without another word, the Healer marched out of the great hall, everyone staring after her, even one man who was too weak a moment before to raise his head.
“Well,” Hastings said, shaking her head, “this is a remarkable thing.”
“Aye,” said Alice, “more than remarkable. Gwent kept his distance from me when I told him I would consider bedding him and giving him a man’s pleasure. He did not seem interested. Well, he was interested, but something held him back. I could not understand him. By the Devil’s horns, does the wind blow that way?” She just shook her head and carried a mug of milk to one of the ill men, saying a silent prayer now for Beamis, who rode with Lord Severin.
Hastings was laughing even as she lightly rubbed her palm over her belly.
Within two days fifty men from Severin’s other keeps had arrived at Oxborough.
“We will starve if they long remain,” MacDear said as he stirred a giant caldron of stewed pheasant with cabbage, onions, and leeks.
Steam curled up about his massive head, wreathing him in gray mist.
“I will tell them they can only eat every other day,” Hastings said, poked his huge arm, and returned to the great hall. The sick men were nearly well, the one man who had died shortly after the Healer had come had been buried in the Oxborough graveyard.
Sir Alan was dealing well with the three castellans, drawing Sedgewick keep on a large square of parchment so they could see what they would face as soon as Lord Severin returned.
The Healer returned the morning of the third day.
“I am sorry, Healer, but there is no word. But Severin said I was not to worry. He will bring them back safely.”
“He is a man. His horse brings him back, not his small brain. Gwent’s brain is even more shriveled. I will grind borla root and stir it into his ale. It will make his toes numb and his manhood as flaccid as the onions in MacDear’s soup. I will tell my sweet Alfred to grant him the weight of all his affection.”
Hastings was holding her stomach she was laughing so hard. “But Healer, if he is flaccid, then what pleasure is there for you?”
“You speak like that silver-haired bitch, failing to give me proper honor and respect.”
“Oh nay, never that. Please remain, Healer. Please.”
