Page 21 of The Crown of Moonlight
She’s blushing still, and I try to think of something to defuse the moment, to make her feel safer with me.I’m half afraid anything I say will only make the situation more embarrassing for her, and I stare at the beams on the ceiling instead to calm my body’s traitorous response.
Her hands brush my hips again and then my thighs as she pulls the breeches off.I pretend not to notice, but telling myself not to react only makes me unable to think of anything other than the touch of her fingers on my skin.
Clearly, there’s something to be said for forbidden fruit.I’m a Rider—there’s been no shortage of women happy to undress me and share my bed.Even here in Alba Scoria, more than a few mortal women have offered.I’ve had little interest, but that’s not the same as denying myself.The more I try to ignore Flora, the more I feel each little touch, every scrape of her skin on mine.
She finishes removing my clothes and slices through the bandage around my chest.The linen sticks to the wound, but she pries the fabric off with cautious fingers.
“There, now you can lie down for the rest of it,” she says.
Holding the plaid in place across my hips, she helps me shift back around so she can reach the full length of the wound.I lie back as she picks out the moss and melted fir pitch she used earlier to draw out the poison and stem the bleeding.Fresh blood trickles down my chest.
Her hands are gentle, and I’m careful to show no sign of pain.
“You’re good at this,” I say, partly to break the silence, and partly because it’s true.
“Between here and the two Dunhaelic villages farther along the road, there’s rarely a week when someone isn’t sick or injured.”
I raise my head to study her, unable to tell what I’m hearing in her voice.She’s hard to read, though I can’t decide whether that’s because she’s human and the small clues that reveal emotion are less familiar to me or because she is trying not to react to what she’s seeing.
“How bad does it look?”I ask.“Be honest.”
She darts a glance at me, then quickly looks away.“The blackening—the dead flesh—is too extensive to remove it all.Without knowing what kind of poison this is, cleaning and stopping the bleeding can only do so much.”
Light and shadow from the lamp play across her skin.In the hearth, the low flames hiss softly.Catching an odd flicker of movement, I glance over and see the long, lithe form of a Twilight Weaver pull itself from a dark corner.The creature studies me, then turns away and sets a fresh log on the fire before fading into the shadows again in the magical way of Shadelings.They like to make themselves useful, but they’re wary of humans and terrified of Siorai.After what Vheara’s done to them, I can’t blame them.
Flora hasn’t paid the Weaver any attention, and I’m starting to wonder if she can see the Shadelings at all.They’ve spent so long in the shadows that humans can only see them if they wish to reveal themselves.
“Did you understand what I said?”Flora asks.Her face is pale, and a drop of pinkish water falls from the cloth she’s holding.
“Did I understand that I’m going to die?”I respond more sharply than I intended.“Yes.You were clear.What makes you think it’s poison and not an infection?”
“I can’t be sure—I don’t know how different your bodies are from ours—but areas that were healthy tissue this morning have already turned black and died.And the odour…Your blood doesn’t smell of iron, but there’s a metallic stench to the wounds I can’t account for.”
“Thank you for being honest with me,” I say.
She opens her mouth as if she’s going to protest, then closes it.Her lips are tight as she pries away another clump of sap.The piece is large enough that I notice the gold-black sheen of something embedded in the amber resin as it catches the light.
If I hadn’t been thinking of poison and iron, I doubt I would have noticed the resemblance.But I’ve spent centuries watching the sun play on the gold-black whorls of celestial iron that are forged into my sword.
“Can I see what you just took out?”
“Why?”She picks up the clump from the table and hands it to me.
I bring it to my nose.The odour is faint but unmistakable, a smell like metal burned out of the stars.
Since the moment Tuirse stopped breathing, I’ve known I was going to die.But until this conversation, until this moment, I’d clung to a gleam of hope.Having that snatched away again is painful.
My death will not come on a battlefield with honour, nor as part of a hunt with the other Riders, nor even as an oathbreaker for resisting the promises I know I will eventually have to break.I will die with my duty undone and my tasks unfinished.Well, I suppose that’s better than being banished to the Pit.
“Is the pain worse?”Flora asks, searching my expression.
I toss the lump of fir sap back to the table and wipe my hands.“The powder trapped on the surface of the resin looks and smells like pure celestial iron.The swords that gave us these wounds must have been coated in it.”
Flora rinses the cloth again.“What’s the point of that in the middle of a battle?”
“This didn’t happen on the battlefield.Ordinary men with ordinary swords set an ambush for us the next day.At the time, the attack seemed pointless.But the wounds refused to heal.”
“So someone made certain you would die, even if they couldn’t kill you outright?In a cruel way, that makes sense.It’s surprisingly daunting to know you have to cut off a head or stab someone through the heart to kill them.”
