The Kindling by Tamara Leigh Page B

from the pot. He did not want to be angered by their betrayal, and yet he felt that emotion stir at the glaring evidence he was no better able to grip a medicinal pot than a sword hilt.
    And so will you once more embrace self pity, Abel Wulfrith? Earn her contempt with your childish resentment? Lose the ground gained in soaking your garments with the sweat of journeying from chamber to stairs to hall and back again?
    “Nay,” he said.
    “Nay?” she questioned, and only then did he realize he had spoken aloud his response to the disgust-stained voice in his head.
    He smiled grimly. “Aye, yours is the answer I seek, Helene of Tippet.” Though his brother had already told that, with reluctance, she had agreed to remain, it was strangely comforting to hear her tell it herself. And he wondered how, having so passionately wished her absence on the day past, he now near hungered for her presence.
    Her frown dissolved and she drew a deep breath. “Then we shall soon see you fit enough to return to Wulfen Castle.”
    She made it sound easily attainable, and yet the stench of his efforts still wafted to his nostrils though he had changed out of his damp garments. What he needed was a hot bath, deep water in which to soak, rather than the towel and basin of water he had endured all the days since he had fallen to the brigands.
    “I hope the staff served you well.” She nodded at where he had set it upon the mattress.
    With his left hand, he lifted the pot from his injured hand and put it on the bedside table. “It served,” he said, the return abovestairs having required far greater strength than his descent. Indeed, if not for the staff upon which he had leaned heavily when the stairs were before him, he might have had to call for his brother’s aid though he had refused it before leaving the hall.
    “I am glad.” She glanced at the chair and table before the brazier. “Should I bring you the mirror?”
    “For what?” The question came out sharp, but she appeared unmoved. And he did not like her being unmoved—as if she had made bricks of the angry words they had exchanged in the hall and walled herself behind them.
    “That I might hold it for you while you apply the ointment,” she said.
    Though tempted to respond yet more sharply, he said evenly, “My fingers know the scar well enough that I have no need of a mirror.” He caught his scent again and thought she must have a strong disposition not to distance herself. Of course, as she had forcefully pointed out, she was no lady. She was a healer and a commoner, surely accustomed to the odors of sickness and hard labor.
    “However,” he added, “I would not be averse to a bath, which you must know I am much in need of.”
    A corner of her mouth tugged and, for a moment, he thought she might smile. “You speak of a tub rather than a basin.”
    “Aye, filled with water as hot as can be had.”
    She nodded. “I believe your injuries are well enough healed that a bath will cause no harm. Indeed, there are certain herbs that, added to the water, will be beneficial to your healing.” She started to turn away. “I shall ask that a tub be delivered to your chamber and water set to boiling.”
    “Who will tend my bath?”
    She looked across her shoulder. “Not I, Sir Abel.”
    As he would not wish her to do, though it was not considered unseemly for a healer to assist with a patient’s ablutions. Still, he was fairly certain that, if not for his deception on the night past and their argument in the hall this day, she would have seen to it herself.
    “I am sure your brother will lend you his squire,” she said and turned her back to him.
    “Helene!”
    He saw her stiffen and guessed it was due to his use of her name without the formality of matching her with her village—and perhaps even the note of desperation in his voice.
    “Aye, Sir Abel?”
    “How is your boy?” He knew it was best to remain silent on the matter, especially since he truly did wish to