A Royal Affair (11 page)

I took his suggestion to heart, and he became that day my doctor and I his patient. Freezing northern water did the trick, and I slept more soundly that night and rose with a clear head. He was looking particularly well too. We looked at each other and knew it was time to return. We both realized neither of us was addressing an obvious concern: he was well because he had been removed from the reach of the poisoner. This enemy was still hidden from us, but he
was
back where we were heading—and presumably awaiting our return.

To be honest, I’m not sure which of us was dreading the return more.

A
T
LEAST
I now felt the king was well enough to be somewhat responsible for his own continued good health. He had agreed not to eat or drink anything that had not been tested by a number of people. I had already demanded that all his bedding be changed, so I felt confident that he was safe for me to leave for a while, so I could return to my own apartment and make myself respectable.

Stephen was waiting for me, as the guards had alerted him to our return. I dispatched him for some hot water and stripped off my filthy clothes. I was startled by my own reflection. I was extremely lean and, with my new shorn hair, almost a stranger, even to myself. I heard the door and turned, expecting Stephen and the water, to find Aleksey striding toward me. He swept me up in a hug and kissed hard onto the side of my head, as if I were a beloved brother returned from far longer than a month’s exile. He immediately held me off, considering my new look with astonishment.

“What have you done to your…? Are you entering a monastery? Taking holy orders?”

I huffed, grabbed my shirt, and pulled it back over my head. The tails hung just low enough for decency. “Your father accuses me of being a heathen. Why are we discussing my hair? And remember—we agreed about the knocking thing?”

He laughed and punched me on the arm. “You’ve cured my father. I’ve just seen him. He looks… almost as good as you.”

I was very grateful to be compared to an old man who had only just survived death and told him so, but he was clearly in too good a mood to be deflected from it by anything I said. I caught some of his excitement. Indeed, I had my own excitement enough from his hug and kiss, and turned my back to him as he paced around. Fortunately Stephen arrived with the requested water, which gave me a legitimate excuse to keep my back to the room as I shaved.

I had expected Aleksey to leave, but he seemed to find my ablutions fascinating—or he was too bored to actually bother to go. Instead he flung himself on my bed and proceeded to ask many questions about my month away. He managed to make it sound as if I had been to a spa for my health, and I quickly disabused him of this notion, telling him some of the agonies involved in the removal of poison. At the first mention of the more messy aspects of the cure, he paled, became noticeably squeamish, and quickly changed the subject. I asked him, smiling privately, what he had been up to while I had been away. This subject clearly interested him much more, and I was treated to an excited declaration. “We’ve been at war!”

“War!” I turned, my razor in one hand, a finger of my other hand over a small bleeding nick. “What do you mean?”

He rose from the bed and held out his hand. “Here, give it to me.” Then, not waiting for my compliance, he took the razor from me. “I learned to do this for men when I was no older than Stephen. You have been spoiled, sir.” I frowned but allowed myself to be seated on the edge of the bed. He straddled my thighs, eyeing me up with a ludicrous expression he thought resembled one a barber might make. He put his free hand to my cheek, smoothing it wide over my warm skin then grazing the razor edge lightly across the stubble. I pulled the bedcovers across my lap. It was cold in the room, and I was dressed only in my shirt.

Oblivious to my discomfort, he shuffled closer, the insides of his leather-clad thighs tight against my naked ones.

I closed my eyes. “I am not spoiled. I was raised by men who did not grow hair on their faces until they were almost old men.”

I felt his hands still, whether from astonishment that I had volunteered some information about my past or from considering this odd fact, I do not know. It did sound unbelievable retold in this place. He carried on with his work, silent and thoughtful for a while.

I needed distraction from my increasingly obvious state. “Tell me about your war.”

At this he laid a finger across my lips to prevent me speaking more as the razor scraped along my chin. I don’t know how I managed to resist drawing that finger into my mouth. It seemed I was good at dissembling, for Aleksey sensed nothing of my desire from his touch and appeared to read nothing from the clenching of my fists upon my lap and my shiver of need.

“There was a raid across our borders on our grain stores. Very boring. We raided back; then we were invaded. A vast mounted army of
twenty
with some attendant hangers-on. My men were roused to great deeds of heroic valor, mainly to gain access to the hangers-on who, I’ve been reliably informed, are now hanging on to my men instead. We repelled the invasion, and Hesse-Davia is safe to limp its way out of the Dark Ages for another day.”

However much I questioned him, I could not untangle this odd story and make any truthful account from it. I had learned from the lesson of the belly scar that Aleksey liked to play down his achievements, and so I could not tell on this occasion where the truth of the events lay. He seemed to enjoy my skepticism. He made a theatrical cross over his heart in a particularly childish manner and then pouted when I continued to disbelieve him.

Eventually he declared himself done. Quite why, therefore, he continued to stand straddled over my naked thighs, I had no idea. I pushed him off and stood, pulling on some clean breeches, my back turned. Still he did not leave.

I said, a little more testily than I intended, “Do you not have somewhere else to be? I have much to do, as I wish to leave before the snow comes.”

I cursed inwardly as I swapped to a clean shirt. I had not thought about leaving until those unguarded words left me, but as they did, I knew it to be the truth. My job was done, and I had a very long way to go to get home. I realized Aleksey was still there, sitting now on the bed. He was turning my razor in his hands, running it idly over his skin. I went close and plucked it carefully from him.

He held on to my hand. “The bruising has gone.”

I had not realized that he had noticed my bruised hand. I wondered if he had been told how I received the injury. His hand was warm. I smiled faintly as I saw his nails still needed a good scrub. He had little injuries all over, bruises and nicks, as if, indeed, he had been in a battle. I switched the hold slightly so I had his arm in my hands and turned it, inspecting more damage. I went into the next room and returned with a small jar of ointment. I eased a finger full gently into each cut and graze. He did not speak. I did not either. I watched his lowered head as I stood over him. I felt the warmth of his skin under my fingers and tried to embed the sensation into my deepest memory so I would be able to recall this moment anytime I wanted, relive it when I no longer had it. He pushed up the sleeve of his shirt, and I saw a deeper cut on his bicep. Silently I eased his shirt from his waistband and pulled it up over his head. As I suspected, his torso was equally abused from his little war. I cupped him around the back of the neck, his short black hair rasping under my palm, easing him forward so his forehead lay warm against my belly. The curve of his pale, lean back entranced me.

“Lie down.” He looked up at me, my hand still at the back of his neck. I had given the prince an order. I think we both knew I had not given it in the spirit of a doctor to a patient. He eased back on the fur covering laid across the bed for winter warmth, his chest pale against the rich softness of the hide. After dipping my fingers into the ointment once more, scooping out the mixture, and warming it in my hands for a moment, I touched a finger to a cut that lay hot and red across his ribs. He closed his eyes, his long black eyelashes fanned upon pale cheeks. He had a light scattering of freckles on the bridge of his nose. I took the time to count each one. It was new and wondrous to me that a man could have such beauty.

The door flew open. A mob crashed into the room. In reality, it was only three men, but my mind had leaped to a far more unfortunate conclusion. I thanked the God I did not believe in that my horror at being so discovered led to a detached calm. I did not remove my hand from Aleksey’s wounds or step back from him. He only craned his neck back to peer upside down at the intruders. I considered our little tableau from a stranger’s perspective and saw only a doctor treating a wounded man. They could not detect my heart beating so rapidly that I felt my shirt flutter from its drumming. They, thankfully, could not detect many things as I stepped away with deceptive calmness and asked what they wanted.

“The king cannot breathe. He has been bewitched. You must come.”

Immediately I began to move toward my study to collect some instruments, but one of the men strode forward and grabbed my arm. “You misunderstand, Doctor.”

“Take your hand off him.” Aleksey had risen from the bed. Despite being half-naked and clearly caught off balance, his voice was obeyed. Perhaps it was the vast wolf in the corner of the room, muzzle retracted, that hastened their obedience to the spoken command.

I rubbed my arm and said as coolly as I could, “I must go to the king. What is this about?”

“You have been accused of bewitching King Gregor.”

“What! I have just
cured
him. We have only been back a few hours! He was perfectly well, and now you say he is sick again, but I have been
here
the whole time.” I wasn’t at my most persuasive or coherent. I would challenge any doctor accused of witchcraft to be calmer. Much that we did could be called enchantment, for it went against or in spite of accepted dogma. “Does the king know you are here?” At this they faltered in their certainty, and I pressed my advantage. “Take me to him.”

Aleksey sighed, took my arm himself, and shouldered us past the three counselors. “Of
course
we’re going to speak to him. Get out of my way, Vencoir, or I’ll have you dangling from your balls on the gibbet. Or shall I have you burned? Out! Out!” His bluff and bluster did the job, and we were out into the hallway and on our way before I could point out to him that he had no shirt on and we were both barefoot. Fortunately, Stephen had been lurking outside the door (something I noted to be very aware of in future), and I indicated for him to run and fetch a shirt for the prince. He nodded and scampered off.

We were alone, heading very swiftly through passages I was beginning to recognize. Suddenly Aleksey shouldered me into a side room. It was empty. He slammed the door and barred it, effectively shutting Faelan outside. “What are you
doing
? I must see the king. He can’t
breathe
!” I pushed him aside and began to lift the bar.

He grabbed my arm. “We still have the ship ready and waiting. You must flee.”

“Oh, don’t be ridiculous! Stop being so melodramatic. I’m not fleeing anywhere. But I must go.
No
!” I threw off his arm. He tried to grab me again, but I rounded on him and put an elbow to the side of his head. He was not expecting that. No man ever is—particularly from a doctor. He went down like a collapsing piece of laundry when the wind ceases to fill it. I sighed as I lowered his head carefully onto the stone floor, unbarred the door, and ran. I confess my anxiety for the king’s life was not the only thing driving me. The thought of Faelan’s reaction when he saw inside that room also hastened my steps.

His Majesty was on the floor of his chambers, surrounded by useless people caught between being desperate to do something and terrified to act. I shouldered them all out of the way. I felt for breath. There was none. But the heart was beating strongly. Swiftly I released the bindings at the king’s throat, tipped his head back, held his nose, and kissed him full on the mouth. At least that is what the court thought I was doing, for I dimly heard a vast collective intake of shocked breath. I was too busy concentrating on watching the old man’s chest and breathing for him to be concerned at their horror. Just because they still lived in a previous century, there was no reason why I should not use the knowledge I had. I was extremely worried about the king’s throat. It looked swollen and red from where he had been tearing at it. If swollen inside, then none of my efforts would prevail. I carried on, steady breaths giving him the air he could not yet take for himself.

Time seemed to stretch forever. I was surprised that I was left unhindered, as the number of people surrounding us multiplied from the rumors sweeping through the castle. Suddenly I felt that moment that every doctor longs for, when those near dead take back responsibility for continued existence. I felt the king shudder. I sat back on my bare heels, cradling his head. All eyes were upon me. In menacing undertones, I heard the word
magic
.

I hoped they’d stack the faggots high around me so I would burn fast—best not to linger at times like those.

T
HE
KING
had unquestioned power in Hesse-Davia, something for which I was to be profoundly grateful over the next few hours. He had not been aware of my arrest. There was no more talk of my being a witch or of using magic, first to try and kill the king and then to save him.

For my part, I was incandescent with rage that all my good efforts seemed to be so easily overthrown. Whilst I had been amusing myself with his youngest son, the king had almost been killed. Something had to be done. He had eaten nothing since his return, merely had some wine to drink, which four other men had shared with him, and then he had gone to pray. He did not appreciate my joke about the dangers of Christian prayer, but I could think of nothing else to offer him.