AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Someone thrust her underdress into his hands. Without hesitation he ripped the gold silk, then used a strip to tenderly wipe the water and the remains of the paint from Elina’s face. His eyes followed every movement of his fingers, his expression caught somewhere between confusion and anguish.
Was he blaming himself? He ought not.
“I tha—” Another bout of coughing choked her gratitude into nothing before the constriction on her chest eased. She was finally able to gasp out, “I thank you.”
His big palm cupped her jaw. He’d finished wiping her face, yet still he stared at her.
She sighed. “Not as lovely as the gold, I fear.”
He frowned at the serjeant’s translation. His thumb stroked her cheek as he rumbled his reply.
“He said that you are even more lovely.”
She smiled against his hand. Then coughed into it, even as her body was wracked by a bone-deep shiver.
Chardryn hissed a worried breath. “Serjeant, we must insist that the barbarian allows us to tend to her in the queen’s tent. She must get dry.”
This time Warrick nodded when the serjeant translated. Yet instead of giving way to her attendants, he picked Elina up with her shivering form swaddled in brocade.
The nurse bristled. “Warrior, give her over to one of—”
She broke off with a huff as Warrick strode past her, carrying Elina against his chest. Then she hurried after him, calling orders to the attendants. Elina’s quarters had not been fully assembled before the uproar of the mudbeast’s attack had sent everyone rushing to the pool, yet the tent was raised and her bed was within, though not yet draped with curtains.
Warrick set Elina on her feet. Serjeant Iarthil had followed them in, but spun to face away from her when Warrick stripped Elina of the brocade, then the shift. Dara appeared with a thick towel that he snagged out of her hands. Movements brisk, he set to drying Elina’s naked form, holding her steady with one arm while he turned her this way and that, rubbing until her skin was tingling and pinkened by a combination of friction and embarrassment and pleasure.
When he crouched to dry her legs, Chardryn gave to her a warm honeyed draught to ease her cough and soothe her throat. Dara wrapped her wet hair to stop the water from dripping down her back. Warrick rose and turned Elina again—then paused, his towel hovering between her shoulder blades.
Elina had never seen the symbol that was etched there, though Chardryn had described it to her.
“It is the mark of a curse,” Elina said, her voice raw with emotion. “A wasting disease that will soon kill me.”
And telling him made her chest ache worse than nearly drowning had. Not until this moment, as his fingers traced the mark, had Elina realized how selfish she was. She’d only thought of her own happiness, the joy of knowing love, even if for only a short time. But if Warrick came to love her, only to watch her die…?
For so long, her barbarian warrior had only existed as a possibility, without a name or a face or any life outside of a role the prophecy said he would fulfill. Yet he stood before her now, a man of flesh and blood. A man who could be hurt.
Her breath hitched painfully in her throat. “I am so sorry, Warrick.”
He tilted her head so that she looked up at him. His dark eyes searched hers.
“It was not…kind to ask this of you.” She lifted her trembling hand to his face as Serjeant Iarthil translated. “It was selfishly done.”
Warrick caught her fingers, pressed them to his lips as he spoke his reply.
“He says you asked nothing of him that he is not willing to do.”
Elina could hardly speak after that. Was this how a spark of love began? With a bit of kindness and generosity that made her heart ache—and at the same time feel lighter than it had ever been?
She found her voice again when Dara approached carrying a nightdress. With a smile at Warrick, Elina said, “I see that Nurse Chardryn has given her orders. I will be commanded to nap, then confined to my bed for supper. Will you eat with me when I awaken?”
Warrick nodded after receiving the translation, then lowered her onto the bed, where Chardryn quickly tucked her beneath a blanket. Sleepily Elina thanked them. Nanny Char turned away to busy herself elsewhere, but Warrick remained standing at her bedside. Watching her. Perhaps waiting for her to sleep. She watched him in return through the drowsy fall of her eyelashes, and saw that his confusion and anguish had transformed into steely resolve.
What had he decided upon? Perhaps she would ask him. Later. When she wasn’t so very tired.
Elina closed her eyes and slept.
Warrick the Overturned
The Falls
When the queen’s eyes closed in sleep, Warrick strode out of the tent—then stopped in disbelief. The sun was still high. The waterfalls still churned up mist. The river still flowed and the air still smelled of flowers. Everything was the same as when he’d gone in.
