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She gifted him with another hint of a smile. “Likewise, margrave.”
Considering her natural reserve and prickly nature, her response was akin to a declaration of love. His heartbeat sped up at the notion. While he was tempted to tease her, he thought better of it. He might not be completely bedridden, but neither was he a picture of nimble prowess. In this small chamber, he was at her mercy. Provoking a hornet promised a nasty sting.
She rearranged plates, putting a few back on the tray and filling the two tankards from the pitcher. “Ale,” she told him. “Unless you'd prefer water.”
“Ale every time,” he said as she brought the tray to the bed.
“Do you need help sitting up?”
He shook his head and lifted himself into a sitting position, once more bracing for a pain that never came. “The monks must have extraordinary healing powers. I shouldn't feel this good right now.” He offered her a short bow. “Then again, maybe it's the company.”
She sighed and set the tray carefully on his lap. “You're obviously feeling better judging by your incessant teasing.”
“I think you missed it.”
“And I think you should be quiet and eat.” She shoved a spoon and hand cloth at him. He was grateful she left the eating knife on the tray.
“Will you join me?” Sharing a meal while in bed with Anhuset was a fantasy whose current reality wasn't quite how he'd imagined it, but he'd take what he could get and be glad of it.
She sat across from him, legs folded under her to fit on the bed's narrow confines. There were no maggot potatoes or even the pan-fried ones she actually liked, but she shared the dishes with him, picking through heaps of roasted grains, eggs boiled in spiced tea, and fish baked in salt. He watched her from beneath his lashes, hiding his amusement at the various expressions that chased across her face: surprised delight, mild disapproval, but none of the outright revulsion he'd expected.
She glanced up once to catch him regarding her. As if she heard his thoughts, she shrugged and said “I'm growing used to how humans cook.”
He took a swallow of ale to smother his laughter at the faintly horrified note in her voice. Never before had he known so fearsome a martyr.
While he wanted to savor this time with her and speak only of pleasant things or tease her until she threatened to stab with his eating knife, he needed to know what happened on the island and how they'd ended up with an escort of Nazim monks to the monastery he feared they'd never reach alive. Most of all, he needed to know Megiddo's whereabouts.
She reassured him of that one first. “He's safe, the spell protecting his body intact. The monks have placed him in a special chamber reserved just for him. They say you can see for yourself when you feel up to it.”
All the tension locking his muscles with dread over Megiddo's fate bled away. There was nothing he could for now about the monk's tortured spirit, but he'd accomplished what he'd set out to do: return him to the arms of his order. Serovek's success had come with help and at a steep price, and while he couldn't resurrect Klanek and restore him to his widow, he'd make certain she wasn't left destitute.
“What about Chamtivos's men? The ones who stayed in the camp as well as those who hunted us?”
When she relayed the events on the island and told him of the monks' arrival and how they learned of their predicament, he exhaled a long sigh. “Be it luck, fate, or a god's intervention, the monks' timing couldn't have been more fortunate. Erostis wouldn't have survived and who knows how we might have fared if we even made it off the island alive.”
“The Nazim would say it was the mercy of Faltik the One that had them find Erostis at the right time.” She shredded a roasted chicken wing with her claws before spearing the slivers of meat and popping them into her mouth.
Serovek raised his tankard in a toast. “I'm happy to credit whoever was responsible and pay tribute, whether they be the One, the Two, or the Three.”
“Careful,” she said. “You're a wounded man convalescing in a monastery populated by warrior monks who might think you just committed blasphemy against their god.”
“I'm not afraid.” He tapped his drink against hers. “I have you to protect me. A woman who can take down a pack of raiders by herself… these monks are no match for sha-Anhuset.”
Her lids lowered and one of her eyebrows slide upward as she leveled a disbelieving look on him. “You might be handsome but your flirtation skills need work.”
Serovek froze with his drink halfway to his mouth. He inhaled to point out what she'd just said, afraid he'd misheard her. She realized her slip before he could speak, and her yellow eyes narrowed to slits. Lavender flags of color painted her cheekbones and the claws on one hand tapped a warning staccato beat on the tray's wooden bottom. “Is it really worth it to you to say it, margrave?”
They stared each other down for several moments before Serovek sighed and cheerfully said “Yes, Anhuset. Yes, it is. I always knew you thought me handsome. About time you admitted it.”
Those slender white eyebrows crashed downward, and the tray made a screeching noise where she dragged her claws across the surface. “Do you always court death?” she asked, a growl underlying her question
He dabbed the corners of his mouth with his napkin. “Rarely, though some might consider courting you one and the same.”
“You aren't courting me,” she snapped, the blush riding her cheekbones now spreading across her face. He'd flustered her.
“So sayeth you,” he replied. “And only you.”
“You assume a great deal just because I kissed you on that hillside.”
