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At least she’d grown proficient with using soap and water. She still missed the dewy-clean feeling that water elementals gave, but soap worked, too. At first using their water stores sparingly, she quickly discovered that Gabriel’s flask magically replenished itself, ever full. One advantage of keeping company with a water wizard, she supposed. It was skirting the lines of being a magical artifact, but at least this one fell within House Phel’s traditional license, regardless of what Gabriel had negotiated for his house. If hehadnegotiated their license. She had a sinking feeling he hadn’t known to do that either—and the Convocation was obviously not bothering overmuch to assist him in reestablishing House Phel.
Not surprising, as the existing Convocation houses had no doubt helped themselves to House Phel’s provenance after its fall. They wouldn’t be eager to give up any of it. As she’d guessed—possibly with a glimmer of Hanneil foresight—Lord Phel had no idea what he was up against.
She refused to feel sympathy for him. Bad enough that she wanted to linger over the texture of his skin, his silvery-cool magic lulling her even with him unconscious. She pressed the bracelet’s copper fangs into her wrist, the sting a potent reminder. As if wearing a collar wasn’t enough of one.
She rummaged through her satchel—clearly Gabriel been so confident of catching her that he’d gotten it from the coach driver—for the mending kit Missus Ryma had given her. Along with all the basic supplies for taking care of herself, Missus Ryma had also gifted Nic with a mage lantern, mostly because it was an easy way to house and transport a fire elemental, and the maternal woman didn’t want Nic out in the world without at least that one convenience.
If it came to that, Nic could coax it into making a campfire for them.
With the wounds on Gabriel’s back and side as clean as she could get them, she set herself to putting in some basic stitches. Sewing was obviously not one of her best skills. Magical fastenings weresomuch easier to use, and Nic had been privileged enough to have her clothes made and mended for her. Still, she’d learned the arts of embroidery and crochet. They were excellent for building dexterity, concentration, and attention to detail—all useful for a familiar—and kept her hands busy on long winter evenings while she chatted with her friends or they listened to music or to someone reading aloud. Usually the books they chose were of torrid love affairs between wizards and familiars—not something she wanted to think about just then.
Suffice to say, she could produce neat stitches and knots that held, though it turned out that piercing a man’s skin with a needle wasn’t at all the same as sliding it through fine Ophiel linen. After a few failed attempts, where the thread simply tore through the ragged edges of skin, she realized she’d have to stitch together the deeper tissues first, then draw the skin over the top with longer lengths of thread.
By the time she’d finished, the sun had declined considerably, and Gabriel showed no signs of waking. Just as well, as she needed to deal with the throat wound still. But she also didn’t want to leave her makeshift stitches exposed, so she fetched the rest of his saddlebags and went through them for anything she could strip to make bandages.
She certainly wasn’t tearing up her own clothes. Maybe she was being self-defeating and stupidly sentimental by not escaping while she could, but she wasn’t sacrificing her few remaining possessions for him either. No doubt in her future, she’d want to give him everything, but at least she retained enough control of her own mind that she wasn’t feeling it yet. He might’ve captured her, and he’d be able to take what he wanted from her, but she wouldn’t give him anything willingly. She’d fight for every morsel of her autonomy.
Of course, you’re also staying here and helping him instead of helping yourself.
Ignoring the voice in her head and pulling things out of the bags, she made a pile for ones that might be useful for sleeping in the meadow, and another for things to put away again. She found a blanket but set that aside as definitely more useful as it was than destroyed for bandages. Next, the plush softness of velvet met her questing fingers. She drew out the carefully folded set of clothes, noting the careful weave and exquisite silver embroidery. A stylized full moon hung over still water, so beautifully worked that the moon’s reflection showed distinctly. The crest of House Phel—same as on the brooch he wore on his cloak. These must be Gabriel’s wedding clothes, packed carefully and with anticipation of celebration.
It hurt her heart to see them, which made no sense. Gabriel Phel didn’t need or deserve her sympathy. If she wanted to be as ruthless as she should be, she’d tear the velvet into strips for bandages. Instead, she packed them away again, telling herself it was out of respect for whoever had labored over that exquisite needlework, and determinedly not thinking of the beautiful wedding dress she’d abandoned. Venting her frustration on the shirt, she tore it into wide strips, sweating by the time she wrapped his wounds tightly, feeling her exhaustion from rolling his muscled bulk from side to side.
“Why couldn’t you be wiry?” she muttered at him. “Or elegantly slim. No, you have to be the draft horse version of a wizard.” With a last effort, she rolled him onto his back and examined the throat wound. Fortunately, that injury wasn’t nearly as bad, and she was able to clean it fairly quickly, deciding against more stitches and bandaging it lightly instead.
Standing and stretching her aching back, she became aware of her own bruises from the hunters’ ungentle treatment. The metal collar chafed the skin of her neck, weighing heavily against her collarbones, and her throat felt tight from the bruising. Resting a hand on her flat belly, she searched for any sign that the quiet life inside her had been disturbed. As usual, she detected nothing—neither good nor bad. But she felt fine, so she’d have to trust that all was well.
Resigning herself to a night in the meadow, she retrieved Vale and checked him over while she still had light. His wounds were surprisingly clean—Gabriel must’ve washed them, but flies had collected on the soft scabs, and he twitched, lashing his black tail and stomping in misery. She cleaned them out with more soap and water, just in case, decided the horse wouldn’t stand still for stitches, and instead got out an unguent she’d spotted in Gabriel’s bags. It smelled fine and didn’t sting on her own scratches. Vale sighed and relaxed as she spread the unguent over his wounds, so she congratulated herself on that choice.
“Clearly I should be a familiar to House Refoel, or Ariel,” she informed Vale, who bobbed his head in agreement.
She left Vale to keep an eye on Gabriel and scouted under the trees for fallen wood and tinder. Fortunately the grasses, though tall as later in the season, were spring green and full of moisture. Much as she’d have preferred to dig a fire ring, she had no shovel, and she had to acknowledge she was at the end of her stamina. Instead, she gathered stones to make a ring next to the still-unconscious Gabriel, then piled tinder in the middle and coaxed the fire elemental out of its lantern home.
Luck was with her, in that she managed to entice its curiosity. It danced brightly over the tinder and happily set it ablaze. She kept the water flasks beside her—including her own flask, picked out of the disgusting piles of goo that had been the hunters—in case the elemental got ideas about setting the whole meadow on fire. They could get ambitious and ornery that way, but this one seemed content to obey her. It had been trained by an Elal wizard after all, which made it much tamer and more inclined to cooperate with her than a wild elemental.
The sun set, and the night grew colder indeed. Nic checked on Gabriel, who seemed to have passed from unconsciousness to sleep, so far as she could tell. She covered him with their one blanket and availed herself of some of Gabriel’s food, as hers had gotten far too slimed to even contemplate. His supply was one of Missus Ryma’s generous packets of food for travelers. He’d obviously tracked Nic to the inn. No surprise there, though exactly how he’d managed it was a puzzle.
She watched Gabriel sleep while she ate, feeling oddly lonelier than if she’d been alone. Finally she lay down against him—on the side closest to the fire, because she wasn’t that much of a self-sacrificing fool—sliding under a fold of the blanket.
Exhausted, aching, and fighting the gray sink of depression, she watched the fire elemental dance over the wood, finally giving in to the drag of sleep. Maybe Gabriel would be dead in the morning. Then she could take Vale and keep going inland with a clear conscience.
She tried to convince herself that was a cheerful thought.
Gabriel groggily openedhis eyes to an expanse of bluing sky—and Vale’s dark-gray muzzle taking up most of the middle of it. Vale snorted, blowing grass-flecked spittle all over his face, waking him up quite thoroughly. “Good morning to you, too,” he muttered, and pushed himself up on one elbow, groaning as his entire body protested—and bright pain blazed down his back and side. Deciding against sitting up, he lay back gingerly.
“Good idea. If you pull out your stitches, I’m not putting them back.”
Rolling his head, he stared in considerable surprise at Lady Veronica Elal, holding the mug from his bags, sipping something that steamed in the chilly morning air. Her hair was pulled into a single thick braid down her back—though glossy dark strands escaped it to curl wildly around her strong face—and she gazed at him with that sharp green gaze, full lips in a flat line. The metal collar sat heavily on her neck, a chain looped around it like macabre jewelry.
In a sudden rush, the events of—the day before?—flooded his mind. “The hunters?”
She waved a hand at the grasses. “All piles of goo, thanks to your enchanted knife. You don’t remember?”
“Just making sure.” Braced for it this time, he rolled onto his uninjured side, the blanket that had been covering him falling away. The ground beside him was warm, the grass packed down like someone had lain there until just recently. He pushed into a sitting position, painful pulls against his skin confirming she wasn’t kidding about the stitches. “You sewed up my wounds?”
“They’re not pretty, but you didn’t bleed to death. Alas.”
He tried again. “Needlework is one of your many skills?”
