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Reeve went to his brother’s side and as soon as he put his hands on him, he said, “He burns with fever.”
Chapter 16
Tara woke, springing up in bed, a sense of dread causing gooseflesh to rise along her arms and a tightness to settle in her stomach. She glanced around the room and saw that she was alone. She dropped back on the pillow, and memories of Reeve’s hands easing away her aches rushed over her.
Lord, his touch had felt so very good, and she hadn’t been the least worried that he would take advantage of the situation. He was a man she could trust. It was she, herself, she couldn’t trust. The truth of it was that she hadn’t wanted him to stop; she wished that it had turned more intimate between them. Even though fatigued, her body had tingled with desire for him and relieved she had been to have exhaustion claim her before she had done something unwise.
She would have liked to have lingered in the luscious memories, but gooseflesh slowly continued to claim every bit of flesh. She grew uneasy and she realized something was wrong, very wrong. And as much as she wished to simply linger in bed with thoughts of Reeve, she jumped up and quickly got dressed. She twisted her hair up and pinned it in haste, several black ringlets falling willfully loose.
She slipped her boots on, never noticing that the swelling had all but disappeared. The anxiousness had now turned to extreme worry, and she hurried to the door and ran, knowing exactly where she was needed.
Tara burst through the door of Trey’s bedchamber and was horrified at the scene. Reeve and Mara were fighting to keep his brother in the bed.
“He’s wild with fever,” Mara said.
To the bewilderment of them both, she ran from the room. She all but flew down the stairs, slipping on a step and twisting her injured ankle. Pain shot through it, but she ignored it, grimacing while she kept moving.
Once in the great hall, she called out to Bryce, sitting with Roan by the hearth, “Trey needs you.”
He sprang off the bench. “Where do you go?”
Tara grabbed two buckets near the hearth. “To get snow to bring your brother’s fever down.”
The wind blew furiously, snow continuing to pelt the ground. Tara shivered but paid no heed to the cold. She hadn’t wasted time to grab her cloak. She didn’t have time, and with two bucketfuls of snow, she entered the keep and ran up the stairs.
She refused to acknowledge the throbbing pain in her ankle. She was intent on her mission and wouldn’t let anything stand in her way.
When she entered Trey’s bedchamber, she went directly to the bed, dropped one bucket to the floor, and emptied the other on top of Trey. She picked up the full one after discarding the other and emptied that on him as well.
She hadn’t realized that Trey had calmed until she began spreading the snow evenly over him. Mara’s hands soon joined hers, and they had him covered in snow in no time. Tara then took a handful and rubbed it over his face.
Trey moaned though it was more a sigh of relief, as if his suffering had been relieved.
Mara grabbed at her arm when she was done. “How did you know?”
Tara shook her head. “I woke feeling something was wrong and came here.”
“And the snow?”
“I watched the women in our clan do it. Some they saved; some they didn’t.”
“Then he has a chance,” Mara said firmly.
“We’ll need to get him dry when the snow melts and be ready to use more if necessary,” Tara explained.
“Whatever it takes,” Mara said.
It wasn’t until hours later, with them all working together to bring his fever down and settle him comfortably in a dry bed, that Trey finally lay resting, and for Mara to notice Tara limping.
“Your ankle,” Mara said, and everyone turned to stare at Tara.
“I gave it a twist on the stairs,” Tara admitted.
“You’ve given enough,” Mara said. “It is time for you to rest.”
Reeve went to her side, but she limped away from him. “You may need me.”
“Trey’s fever is down, and he rests comfortably thanks to you,” Mara said. “It is now time for you to take care in case you are needed again.”
