did not shake. The ropes that held Elban’s son to the bed were soon as bloody as the rag. The muffled screams that escaped the gag were harrowing.
Judah’s, from the other room, were worse.
* * *
By the time Nate made his way back across the parlor to Judah, she lay as if lifeless across the Tiernan’s bed. She wasn’t lifeless; she’d passed out. Nate had seen to that. The boy in the other room was in the same condition. She had bled more, though. Someone had thrown a towel across her to absorb the blood.
Lady Eleanor sat next to the bed, her face greenish but her eyes dry. “I told them to leave her here, on my bed,” she said. “She’s actually been sleeping in Theron’s room since the betrothal, but—”
The Seneschal, standing over the unconscious girl, said, “Have you tended Lord Gavin?”
Nate peeled the towel away. It was ruined, sodden with blood. “He’s fine,” he said. Seeing her blood spilled like this gave him a pang. The only consolation was that none of the idiots in this city were smart enough to know what they were wasting. He looked for somewhere to put the towel.
Two pale white hands took it from him. He looked up at Lady Eleanor. “Leave it by the door. I’ll take care of it,” he said.
She nodded. On her way into the parlor, she glared at the Seneschal. “You’ve had your show,” she said. There was nothing quiet about her now. “Let him tend to the wounds you caused.”
“Lady,” the Seneschal said.
“Without you here,” she snapped.
He inclined his head and left.
The marks on Judah’s back were gruesomely familiar. After watching them drawn in blood on Elban’s son, they were like a map he could almost read. The Seneschal was right; there would be scars. But at least Nate already knew which wounds needed stitching. By the time he had the needle threaded, Lady Eleanor was back.
“I checked on Gavin. He’s asleep, too. I assume—his back—” All the fierceness was drained from her voice.
“Like hers,” Nate said, indicating Judah’s mangled back. Then he remembered that this girl would be married to the young lord eventually. “There’ll be scarring, but it shouldn’t be too horrible.”
“Oh, I’m not concerned about that.” She managed a thin smile. “Don’t think I’m callous. I assume they told you about the two of them. You saw the scars on his arms?” She was holding Judah’s hand, although the girl couldn’t have felt it, and when Nate nodded, she gently turned the limp arm over. Judah’s wrists were bloody from her bindings, too, but beneath the bracelets of blood were the same fireplace-poker curlicues he’d seen on the highborn. His had seemed years old; hers were mere weeks healed, still a livid pink. “The one who’s not actually hurt scars the least. Judah has all the best scars, of course.” Her voice almost broke, but she held it back, and her face grew hard. She nodded toward Judah’s bare feet.
Nate looked, then looked away. Oh, how he hated these people, he thought, as he sewed the bloody mouths on Judah’s back shut. He hated all of them. All of them that had ever lived. He would hate them even if their ancestor hadn’t strangled the world, all those generations ago. He hated them for this girl, whose soles were crosshatched with scars and whose back would be, too, now. When the whole point had been to keep her alive, to keep her from being hurt. They found reasons to hurt her anyway. Because they could.
“You’re taking all of this very much in stride,” Lady Eleanor said, wiping a wet cloth across Judah’s forehead.
“So are you,” he said.
“My father liked public canings,” she said curtly. She dipped the rag in water again, wrung it out and began dabbing the blood away from Judah’s wrists. He would have to bandage those, too. “But I meant—the thing between them. Elban says it’s unnatural. Most people are afraid of unnatural things.”
Nate tied off the last stitch on the worst split, then began on the next one. “The natural world is very big.”
“You’re kind. I suppose it’s awful to say this, but I’m glad Arkady is dead.” She picked up the girl’s hand again. “Poor Judah. Her one happiness. Did he make it out?”
“He did,” Nate said, and Lady Eleanor said, “Good.”
* * *
The Seneschal was waiting for Nate outside the parlor door. Standing straight upright, not even leaning against the wall. “We can have a room made