I broke off, then ducked again for one more touch. “They can’t have you,” I whispered to him. “You’re mine.” I kissed the corner of his mouth. “And I look at Gisbourne and he don’t know he’s weak. The prince don’t know he’s cruel. But you know your most dangerous parts and you act like a hero anyway. That’s what will make you a wonderful sheriff, Rob.” I stroked his face. “But if you ever wanted to run, I would run with you. This will be brutal and punishing, Rob, and if you ever think you can’t fight in true, I will run with you in a breath.”
“I can’t run,” he said. “But I fear I can’t win, either.”
The guards outside spoke to someone, and I sat up straight as the healer came in. He came with a tray of jars and knives, and my lip curled. The monks disliked the practice because of its weakening effects, but I forgot how common it were for these noble healers.
“No,” I said as he crossed the threshold. “No bloodletting.”
The man’s mouth dropped. “My—my lady, his humours must be brought into balance.”
“Poultices, tinctures are fine. No bloodletting.”
Rob squeezed my hand tight.
The healer’s chest puffed. “With respect, my lady, his Grace instructed me to bring the young man to full health.”
“You bring a knife near his skin and I will have it at your throat,” I snapped.
He went red and started sputtering, but Rob managed a weak chuckle. “Please, my lord, denying her wishes would be much more hazardous to my health.”
“If the lady would remove herself,” the healer said, “I must examine his lordship.”
“I’m no lord,” Rob said. “And I would like you to look at her hand first.”
The man’s eyebrows what were thicker than the feathers of a ruffled chicken rose up, but he didn’t say anything as I drew the hand slow out of the sling. He unwrapped the wet bandages careful, and when he were done he looked at my face in a way full different than he had before.
He handed me the pain tincture. “Several drops of this should help, my lady,” he said grave.
I shook my head, but Rob sat up, sliding one arm around my waist and taking a dropper full with the other hand. He held it up and I opened my mouth as he tapped it in. I shut my eyes against the taste and turned full against him as the healer put a salve to the wounds that looked sick already.
It were so raw and sore that his touches hurt more than the cut what did it. To my horror I started to sob, but Rob held me tight, squeezed against him.
When it were done, I were shaking violently and Rob held me, kissing my cheek and temple and hair. “Go on,” he said after a moment. “Rest. You need it.”
“I’ll come back,” I promised him.
He nodded, kissing my cheek once more.
Careful to walk proper out of the room so Rob wouldn’t worry, I near collapsed outside the door, and one of the guards caught me in his arms. “My lady,” he said. “His Grace asked me to see you back to your chambers.”
I nodded, fair grateful. It seemed miles back to my room. We started walking and I were more grateful for the earl’s care when I fainted dead in the hall.
When I woke, it were to a soft, metal noise and the cracking of fire. I were in the bed I didn’t like, and my whole body felt like a sack of flour. I struggled to sit up in the bed; the day-old dress had been taken off me and I was just in the long, loose gown, deep under blankets and warm.
Gisbourne were near the fire, and I could see the glint of steel as his whetstone passed over the sword, sharpening the blade careful and slow.
“Do you care to tell me where you were this afternoon?” he asked, not turning to me.
“A healer checked my hand.” Which did feel much duller, now.
“The earl’s healer.”
“Yes.”
“And how did you come by that?”
I sighed. “I reckon you know just where I were, Gisbourne.”
The whetstone stopped. “Yes.”
Pushing from the bed were awkward with one hand, but I struggled free of it and went for the other chair by the fire. “Did you win the melee?”
He tossed his sword down so it clattered loud. It were meant to intimidate me, I think, but I were far beyond such. “Does this marriage mean nothing to you, Marian?”
I frowned at him. “Of course it doesn’t. You knew that from the first.”
“Then why come here at all?” he growled.
“Did you hit your head?” I demanded. “The annulment. All I’ve ever wanted were the annulment.”
“And to make a fool of me!” he roared, throwing himself back in the chair.
“I never lied about what and who I am. You knew that. You brought me here. If I make you a fool, it ain’t my fault.” I tucked my legs up, cold and simmering with anger. “Fool indeed. But what the hell is wrong with you, that you defy the prince to protect me in one moment—what, so your honor remains intact?—and then help him cut off my damn fingers the next?”
He stood, scooping up the sword and slamming it into its scabbard and throwing it on the bed. “Because there is one line I won’t cross—and that’s the whole reason I agreed to this exercise in idiocy to start with. You think you were my first choice, Marian? You think I was desperate to marry Leaford’s younger, uppity daughter? With an unmarried, beautiful older sister hanging about?”
This stole my breath. “You wanted Joanna?”