Page 9 of Highlander's Sinless Nymph
“Just hold that there a moment, lass,” he said.
Gently, he washed the crusted blood and dirt from the wounds. It was as he suspected, they were good, clean slices.
“Lucky it was a wee pup, rather than some mangy old tod,” he said to her, turning her arm slightly more towards the firelight and throwing on another log.
“How so?” Charlotte asked.
“Smaller, cleaner claws,” Edward explained, washing a little more dirt away. “And sharper, too. They cut. Older animals are more prone to tear.”
“It’s happened to you?” Charlotte asked.
Edward had no chance at stifling his laughter, it came bubbling up so quickly. “Nay! Nay, I’ve never heard of even a bairn bein’ so foolish as to approach an animal in distress!” he chuckled. “But, I have seen huntin’ hounds sustain many such lesions. Wait here a moment.”
Edward got to his feet and walked off into the cave.
“Oh, yes,” he heard the woman call from behind him. “I’ll just stay here, shall I? It’d be hard to go anywhere else to tell you the truth, for I’ve no notion as to where I am now.”
Edward grinned as he rummaged through his small sack of provisions and supplies. He pulled out a couple of bundles of dried herbs and a pot of salve.
“So,” he asked over his shoulder, as he hunted for some raspberry leaves that he knew he had put somewhere, “do ye have a last name? Or is it just Charlotte?”
Edward pulled another small crockery pot from his bag, squinting at it in the gloom of the cave. He could not make out what it might be. He opened it to take a sniff.
“Well, seeing as you are playing the role of nursemaid, I suppose it is only fitting that we should be properly introduced,” came the Englishwoman’s playful reply.
She is warmin’ to me maybe? Perhaps she can yet be persuaded that nae all Scotsmen are ravenin’, heartless men of the moors.
“My name is Bolton. Charlotte Bolton.”
The pot of unguent fell from Edward’s nerveless fingers.
4
There was a dull tinkle, as of something breaking, from inside the cave. Charlotte frowned.
It does not strike me as the sort of place in which a tea set is likely to play much of a roll.
“What?”
The single word issued from the deep blackness of the mouth of the cave like a blast of icy wind sweeping down from the Highland fells. Despite not being able to see Edward, Charlotte instantly picked up on the barely controlled rage that wreathed that one word like flame.
“Um, what do you mean ‘what’?” she asked.
“What did ye say yer name was?” Edward’s voice said, each word snapping off in the air like an icicle.
“Um, Bolton, Charlotte Bolton.” A sudden unease swept through her and she added, in a subtle attempt to inform this foreigner that she was, despite appearances, not really as alone as she might appear, “I’m traveling with the English Army…”
There was the unmistakable sound of breath being sharply indrawn at this statement––a sharp bestial hiss that raised the hairs on the back of Charlotte’s neck.
Then Edward emerged slowly out of the cave and into the firelight. He was clutching a bundle in his hands, which Charlotte assumed were the herbs that he intended to make the poultice out of.
However, most of her attention was taken up, not with what was in his hands, but his countenance. It had been amiable when he had entered the cave moments before––cheeky almost, except for its sad eyes––but now it was as if the Scotsman had pulled on a grim mask.
“Is everything all right?” she asked, her voice barely able to be heard over the crackling of the flames, the pop and snap of the green wood burning.
Edward sat down by her without saying a word.
“It seems to me that you’re upset, in turmoil,” Charlotte ventured. “Is it something that I––”
