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“Someone’s already gone to fetch a doctor,” Pinar said as Kadou froze in place, unsure whether to rush to Eozena, Tadek, or Evemer first. They were all of them bloodied, and Evemer and Eozena were sodden from the hips down and shivering. The water had washed away some of the bloodstains, but Eozena had half of an arrow sticking out of her leg, and Evemer’s clothes were bloody on one side from the shoulder to his waist.
“What happened?” Kadou demanded, when he’d found his voice.
“Went bad,” Eozena said. She was sweating profusely, and her skin was clammy when Kadou touched her, helping her onto one of the benches by the kitchen table. Evemer dragged a chair over to the hearth and dropped heavily into it.
Melek was already piling fuel into the fire. “Durdona!” çe called. “Quickly!”
Madam Hoskadem came clattering up the basement steps, took in the state of the group at a glance, and charged into her workroom, emerging a moment later with handfuls of clean rags to soak up the blood until the doctor could arrive and bandage them properly.
“Get out of your wet things, you two, before you catch your death,” Melek said, helping Eozena’s fumbling, cold-clumsy fingers with the fastenings of her kaftan. “We’re going to leave your trousers on until the doctor gets here, Commander,” çe added. “I don’t want to pull out that arrow until we have to.”
“I’ll get some blankets,” Pinar said, going for the stairs.
“Do you need help?” Kadou asked Evemer anxiously. “Are you hurt?”
“No,” Evemer said. Kadou wasn’t sure which of those questions Evemer was answering, or if it was both, but when Evemer peeled off his sodden, filthy kaftan and underlayer, the bleeding gashes in his shoulder and lower arm were answer enough, as were the blooming bruises down his back, the scrapes on his hands.
“What do you mean,no? What do you call that?” Kadou shouted. “How did this happen?”
“Is the princess asleep? Don’t yell, my lord,” Evemer replied.
“And you said he wasn’t the baying type,” Eozena muttered to Tadek, who had sat beside her on the bench. “Did you forget he’s a Mahisti?”
“I said, how did it happen?” Kadou said again, turning on them.
“Collective fuck-up, Highness,” Eozena said, straightening her posture as much as she could. “We got caught.”
Evemer looked grim, which was all the confirmation Kadou needed. Pinar came back with an armload of blankets, and Kadou snatched one from her, shaking it free and flinging it around Evemer’s shoulders. “We’re going to have words about this later,” he hissed. “All of you! Always scolding me to be careful, and here you are, gallivanting off and getting yourselves cut up and half drowned! I thought this was supposed to be a reconnaissance mission!”
“I’m sorry, my lord,” Evemer said.
“And you!” Kadou said, kneeling by Eozena. Fear and alarm twisted in his gut—three of his people, hurt again. All four of them, if you counted Melek’s bad arm. Gods. “You can’t die, all right?” His voice cracked on the emotion that was welling up in his throat. “You can’t. I forbid it.”
Eozena laughed weakly. “Haven’t died yet, Highness. We all came home safe.”
The doctor arrived a few minutes later, a large leather satchel slung from çir shoulder. Kadou, far too distinctively a Mahisti, was obliged to hide in Madam Hoskadem’s workshop for the duration. Çe made quick work of Eozena’s injury. Her trousers had to be cut free of her leg, the remaining shaft of the arrow pulled free, releasing a new gush of blood. Çe washed out the wound and applied cleansing poultices, wrapping the leg firmly, and turned to attend to Evemer and Tadek, only to discover that Melek had already done so, placing neat stitches to close their wounds and wrapping them in the same poultice and bandages.
Kadou could only pace uselessly in the workshop and watch from a crack in the door.
He dove back out as soon as the doctor left. “A reconnaissance mission,” he spat again. “You could have alldied.”
Madam Hoskadem silently went into the basement again and came up with a couple bottles of ale. She poured a cup and pulled Kadou toward the fire. “Guests,” she said sharply to Evemer, who was occupying the chair, and Evemer obediently moved to the floor by the hearth, his movements stiff and sore. Kadou sat when Durdona prodded him. “Drink, Your Highness,” she said, nudging the cup toward his mouth. “Too late for tea and coffee.”
Kadou drank, glaring at each of his kahyalar in turn.
“None for you, unfortunately,” Madam Hoskadem said to Eozena, handing around cups of ale to the others. “Not for any hard feelings against what you dragged my only child into,” she added primly, and Kadou decided at that moment that he liked herferociously. “It thins the blood, that’s all.”
“Fair point,” Eozena said. “I don’t think I’d be in the mood even if I didn’t have a hole through my leg.”
“Let’s not talk about that,” Tadek said, a little ashen, and accepted his ale from Durdona with a ghost of his usual smile.
“We’re going to talk about what happened, though,” Kadou said viciously. “Who wants to start?”
“Well,” Tadek began, leisurely sipping his ale as if he weren’t the second-most-injured person in the room. “Pinar and Evemer were pulling some stunt on top of a rock so they could look in the windows, and Evemer nearly fell off and broke his neck, and then hedidfall off, but strategically. Made a hell of a noise, and we got caught. We scampered off into the night, took a couple hits, Evemer saved my life, we all piled into the boat, they shot us a bit more, and there you have it,” he finished airily. “Durdona, this ale is very fine, could I have a splash more?”
“Oh,” Evemer said, giving Tadek a puzzled look. “I did, didn’t I?”
Tadek lifted his refilled cup to him in a little toast and took a huge gulp. “We’ll be best friends by the end of the week at this rate.”
