The Redeeming (45 page)

“’Tis done,” Garr said. “Now you must only decide whether to bathe yourself or allow the healer to assist you.”

Abel snorted. “As already told, I can attend—”

Despite having warmed, a chill spread across Abel’s every pore. Garr could not possibly mean
her.
He would not have brought her here—unless their sister, Gaenor, who had recently wed Baron Christian Lavonne and believed she saw more than there was to see, had told their older brother of the healer and her son, neither of whom Abel cared for beyond concern for their well being.

Holding his feet tight to the floor lest his leg further shamed him, Abel looked around. “Of what do you speak?”

Garr squeezed Abel’s shoulder, then stepped to the side. “Helene from the village of Tippet has come.”

She stood inside the chamber to the right of the open doorway, hands clasped at her waist, chin up, dark red hair woven into a fat plait draped across one shoulder.

The chill left Abel, and though he knew the color that rose up his neck was mostly born of anger at having his wishes ignored, he knew it also bore shades of shame.

The last time he had seen—and held—this woman, he had been a man in full. One whose hands knew well the ridges and furrows of a sword hilt. One with two legs solid beneath him. One who had thought it a worthy challenge to face not one but two opponents at once. One whose countenance many a woman had found pleasing.

He was none of these, and yet the woman who stood a half dozen strides from him did not wince or look away, as if accustomed to what her eyes beheld—so accustomed that no pity shone from her. And it was the lack of that detestable emotion that permitted Abel to contain the anger that might otherwise have exploded from him.

“I shall leave you to decide,” Garr said and strode from the chamber.

Helene, all five feet and few of her, was the first to speak, though she did so only after his brother’s footsteps receded. “How shall I best assist you, Sir Abel?”

Her effortless Norman-French surprised him, though not as much as it had that first time when she had eschewed the language of the commoner in favor of his own. More, he was unsettled by how familiar her voice sounded though it was some time since last he had heard it.

Keenly—painfully—aware of his every move, he turned to fully face her. “You are not needed.”

She glanced at his injured hand that, until that moment, he had not realized was attempting to shape itself into a fist. “Would it not be better said that I am not wanted?”

Though tempted to shout down the implication that he was incapable of caring for himself, he controlled his emotions and, feeling the strain upon his hand, eased his fingers. “Regardless, you may go.”

“That I may, for it was my decision to grant your brother’s request.”

“Why did you?” He did not mean to ask, and yet the question rose so swiftly he could not check it.

“I am indebted to you.”

She surely referred to her son, John, whom she had been forced to leave behind weeks—or was it months?—past, although Abel had initially believed she had abandoned him. “Your boy but followed me around like a puppy,” he said, “and I did little more than toss him scraps. For that, you owe me naught.”

He heard her breath catch and knew it was cruel to equate her child with a dog, but if it offended her sufficiently that she would all the sooner be gone, it would serve.

She stared at him and, when no response was forthcoming, he gave what he hoped was the final push. “However, if you insist upon being indebted, I vow your absence will be payment enough, for I am most eager to see your back.”

Drawing a breath that raised her shoulders, she stepped forward. “Ah, but then Lord D’Arci would have to continue tending you when it is the business of Castle Soaring to which he ought to turn his attention.”

Abel narrowed his gaze on her. “Just as I do not require your services, I no longer require his. Now leave.”

Still she came, the coarse, heavy material of her homespun gown rustling almost obscenely upon one so slight and comely. As she neared, she slowly raised her chin to hold her gaze to his and, when she halted before him, he could pick out the many shades of blue that colored her eyes—and the dark shadows beneath that told she had either not slept well or been ill.

When she reached forward and lifted his crippled hand, he was so stunned by her boldness that, before he could think to wrench free, she had turned his palm up and bent her head to it. Worse, his traitorous fingers curled toward hers as if they remembered them though never had he held her hand. For that—and only that—he was glad his range of motion was so limited.

She probed the flesh on either side of the scar and looked up. “It heals well.”

Though her smile was one of approval, he was unsettled by his body’s response to her brief bowing of lips and show of teeth. He pulled his hand free and, unable to put space between them without limp or loss of balance, said, “The physician did all he could.”

She lowered her arms to her sides. “Then Lord D’Arci has told you that hand will not hold a sword again? That you will only impede its healing by forcing it to do what can no longer be done?”

As if her smile had never been, Abel’s left hand made the fist his right could not, his knuckles aching for want of something hard to drive against. “I need none to tell me that.”

Her gaze flicked to his clenched hand, but when she once more lifted her eyes to his, the wariness there was so fleeting as to have been imagined. “Know this, Abel Wulfrith,” she said with a surprisingly hard edge to her voice, “do you raise a hand to me, I shall defend my person with all that I have. And, I vow, I will not be the only one bruised and bloodied.”

He stiffened. Did she truly believe him capable of beating a woman? Ever he had defended the weak and vulnerable, using his blade and fists only against those who preyed upon others—or nearly so, for he had done his wife no harm when he had wrested from her the dagger with which she had sought his death. And yet this woman believed—

In that instant, he recalled the ill that had befallen Helene when he had failed—and misjudged—her the day they had met. Though he had not witnessed the beating given her by Sir Robert, the leader of the brigands who had stolen her from her home, he had seen the remnants of that violence upon her face, neck, and wrists on the day of the last night that he had wielded a sword against those same miscreants. Of course Helene of Tippet did not trust him. Likely, she did not trust any man.

He forced his hands at his sides to relax. “I have never hit a woman, and I never shall.”

She delved his face and slowly inclined her head. “Then, it seems, we shall be at peace with one another.”

He frowned and, in so doing, was made all the more aware of his scarred face that he had yet to look upon though the ridge of its sweeping path evidenced it was unsightly. “Were you to remain at Castle Soaring, that would be most desirable,” he said, “but you shall be gone from here this day.”

She settled into her heels. “Only if you yourself deliver me beyond these walls.” She ran her gaze down him and up again. “Most unfortunate for you, Sir Abel, in your current state of apathy and self pity, that is something of which you are incapable.”

Only remembrance of that glimpse of wariness in her eyes held him from once more manifesting his anger in the form of a fist. “Go,” he rumbled.

“I shall—
after
I have cleaned and examined your injuries that I might determine how best to tend you.” She pointed her chin toward the bed. “Can you reach it unaided?”

In that moment, Abel wanted nothing more than to lift her off her feet, carry her across the chamber, and deposit her in the passageway. But as well she knew—and boasted—that simple act was beyond him. And it made him feel more abhorrently helpless than before.

“You think I will meekly lie down at your command,
Helene of Tippet
?” The laughter that barked from him was so coarse it felt torn from his throat. “That I shall willingly bare myself to you?”

She parted her lips as if to answer, hesitated, then said, “Like it or nay that I am a woman, healing is my gift and profession. However, if you fear I will be horrified by what is beneath your tunic, know that already I have seen it.”

Abel was certain her meaning was different from how it sounded—that she referred to similar wounds upon others she had tended. And yet, that was not what he saw in her eyes.

Containing the impulse to step nearer her, he asked low, “What say you?”

“Whilst you slept ere the dawn, I did come to you and look upon your leg, as well as your face.”

All of him tightened. She had been here? In the dark of his alone? When the sleeping draught had held him down? When it had fed him dreams across which he had bled?

He felt something then, heard something, saw something—pieces of a heretofore forgotten dream. Rather, what he thought was a dream. She
had
been here. His hand
had
known her hand, his ears her voice, his eyes her eyes.

Abel could not remember the last time he had thrown something against a wall, but surely he had not been beyond five years of age, for his father would not have tolerated such loss of control. Though he was now well beyond his twentieth year, in that moment, the longing to break something upon the stone walls of his chamber was almost overwhelming. And the woman before him must have felt it, for wariness once again made a fleeting appearance in her eyes. Still, she did not retreat, though he wished her to. Not that he feared he would do her harm, for he had spoken true that he would never hit a woman, but he wanted her gone—no matter the cost to his pride, especially since she had already ground it underfoot.

Hardly able to hear above the sound of blood rushing in his ears, he wrenched up his tunic. “Did you look upon this as well?”

Rather than turn away as expected, and as he had intended she should do, she cautiously lowered her eyes down his bared chest and fixed on the old and new scar that intersected. H
ead tilting, smooth brow furrowing as if his injuries, rather than his behavior, was of great interest, she said, “Nay, I did not trespass that far.”

Struggling to keep his breath from sounding loud between them, he dropped the hem of his tunic. “But still you trespassed.”

“I did.”

His protesting legs protested with greater urgency, and he knew it was because his every muscle had tensed—and that if he did not soon rid himself of this woman, he might collapse at her feet. Regardless, he demanded, “Why?”

Movement at her sides drew his gaze and he saw her clench handfuls of her skirts. However, she surely noticed what had captured his attention, for she immediately splayed her fingers. “I did it that I might prepare myself.”

“Do you always prepare yourself by stealing upon your patients? Invading their privacy?”

“Nay, ‘tis just that…you are unlike most who require my services.”

He nearly asked in what way he was different, but he knew. “I am disfigured.”

She blinked. “I do not speak of that. You know I have tended far worse—”

“Aye. How could I forget the heinous Aldous Lavonne whom the devil so admired he allowed his spawn to survive a fire that nearly melted the flesh off his bones?”

Helene stared at the gaunt, unshaven Abel Wulfrith. That was, of course, how he would remember the old baron. And she could not blame him. Lacking the cooperation of his legitimate son, Christian, Aldous had enlisted his misbegotten son, Sir Robert, to do whatever was necessary—including murder—to thwart the king’s attempt to unite the warring Wulfriths and Lavonnes through marriage. But, unbeknownst to Sir Abel, Aldous had come as near to repentance as he could before death had seen him out of this world. Even if the scarred, suffering old man had not made it to heaven, he surely could not be as deep in hell as those he had harmed would wish.

Hating the convulsive bob of her throat that she feared sounded as loud to Sir Abel as it did to her, Helene determined she would bend to her patient’s will—this once. “As there are others who await my services, I will leave you to see to those needs for which you believe you require no assistance.”

“What others?” he snapped as she turned away.

She paused. “You sound displeased.”

His nostrils flared. “I am but curious.”

She did not believe him, though neither did she know what to make of his reaction. “Since you are not in such a terrible state as to need my full attention,” she said, “I am to tend any others who have yet to fully recover from the injuries gained in defending Castle Soaring.”

“Sir Durand as well, then.”

She frowned. “I do not know who that is, but if he needs me, certainly.”

“’Twas he who took the prize I was after—the death of Sir Robert.”

The leader of the brigands who had beaten her following her near escape that had also been her first meeting with Sir Abel.

As she stared at the man before her, a caustic smile rose amidst his beard, putting a face on the hatred he exuded. “You might want to thank him,” he said.

Though she tried to keep her expression impassive, she could not. Thus, she pivoted and, subduing the impulse to hasten away, measuredly crossed the chamber.