Elisha Rex by E.C. Ambrose Page B

shook his head as they drifted toward the bed and sank into the mattress. She draped the coverlet over his shoulders and lay on top of the covers at his side, making no move to unlace her dress. Wiping away the last of the oil from his face with a soft cloth, Brigit sang softly, one of his mother’s songs, one he used to sing as he stitched up the soldiers in the make-shift hospital at Dunbury. She played him like an instrument—or thought she did—knowing seduction would avail her nothing. Some part of him wanted to give in to her new modesty, accepting her at her gentle word and chaste deed. But, even as his eyes slid shut, his head buoyed by Thomas’s pillow, his deeper heart knew better. If London was a nest of vipers, then tonight he lay by their queen. Or one who wished she was.

Chapter 11

    H is wrists, shoulders, and hips ached, his knees throbbed from crouching too long, and every breath was labored. The inside of his cheek pinched with pain, but he let the blood ooze over his lip, quietly, quietly. The tang of blood mingled with the aftertaste of porridge. His open eyes saw darkness, the cloth that kept him blind was snug, but not biting. Never that. And he finally knew why. What a fool he’d been, not to realize! He could almost feel Elisha’s hand upon his brow, tracing a line of blood. How would he know if it worked? How would he know if—
    Elisha lay still a moment, bewildered by thoughts and sensations that were not his own. A jolt of understanding slapped the sleep from his mind, but he squeezed his eyes shut, curling into himself, reaching back. The softness of the king’s bed overlaid the damp, hard floor, the scent of the dying fire and the woman beside him mingling at the back of his throat with the taste of blood, the lock of hair bound inside his cuff gone suddenly warm. Elisha flung himself into the tenuous contact, searching. East and south—little but water. West? North? The ache in his bent spine intensified. Elisha whimpered, stretching himself, but the impression was dark, distant, steeped with despair.
    â€œElisha?” Brigit’s voice emerged from the darkness, her hand clutching his shoulder.
    He shook her off, the contact fracturing. No!
    â€œAre you in pain?”
    â€œHush! Don’t touch me!” Elisha scrambled from the bed, pushing away Brigit’s fallen cloak to kneel on the floor. He pressed his wrists together, anything that might strengthen the affinity he had briefly shared. He returned to the dismal place of his dream. Distantly, he heard a cry, turning his darkened eyes. “Rosie?”
    â€œIf he’s done eating, get him gagged,” ordered a thick voice in the dream, a rumble Elisha strained to hear.
    Someone touched his face, and he flinched, but the hand gripped his chin. “Shit, he’s bleeding.”
    â€œOh, Hell—not bleeding! What’d he tell us? No fucking bleeding!”
    The hand squeezed tighter, fingers digging in, promising more violence. Lower, thicker, “You’ll regret that when hisself comes back.”
    Cloth shoved harshly in his mouth could not stop the bright sense of triumph that cut the darkness. “Wipe it up—every drop—shit—” Water dashed over his head—
    â€”and the contact was gone. Elisha gasped, rearing back, shaking out the aches of Thomas’s bondage. His eyes snapped open, and the king’s chamber slowly resolved around him, made ruddy by the dim glow of the dying coals.
    Brigit lay on the bed, staring down at him, brow furrowed. “Nightmare?”
    â€œYes,” he said, but the word was a breath of exaltation. Thomas lived! Rosie, too. Somewhere to the north. They were fed, kept in darkness, bound, but alive.
    Brigit’s hand sank down to touch his cheek, and Elisha bestirred himself to offer the pain, the fear, the despair, rushing to conceal whose living nightmare he had suffered. It wasn’t enough, but it gave