Gilbert’s eyes darted to the barn. He ran and soon disappeared around the other side of the structure.
With only a moment’s hesitation Annabel left the line of men, who were still passing the buckets from hand to hand, and followed the path Gilbert Carpenter had taken. She ran past a huddle of maidens. Their arms around each other, they watched the fire as though dazed. Some cried and others yelled at her as she passed, but she didn’t hear their words. She ran as close to the barn as she dared, certain that the flames were singeing her eyebrows.
She came around the back side of the barn and nearly ran into Lord le Wyse and Gilbert Carpenter. Lord le Wyse’s arm was around the master mason’s shoulders as he seemed barely able to stay on his feet. Her lord looked alarmed. “Annabel! What are you doing? Where are you going?”
“I was searching for you.” Her mouth fell open as she got a better look at him. “My lord! Are you hurt?”
His hair stuck out in all directions, and his forehead and face were streaked with soot and sweat. He looked as though he’d been in the fire itself.
“I am well. The sheep are safe.”
Annabel’s gaze traveled down from his head and stopped on his arm. His charred sleeve, much of it burned away, hung from his elbow. His left forearm — the one mangled by the wolf years before — was covered with angry blisters. A lump formed in her throat as she imagined the pain he was feeling.
She tried to look into his face, to see his expression. Just then his shoulders swayed, like a hewn tree just before it collapses.
“We must get you back to the manor house and tend your burns at once.”
He swayed again as he and Gilbert started forward, walking slowly. They made their way back toward the manor house, neither of them even looking toward the barn or the fire, which roared louder than the worst thunder and hail storm.
Several men hurried toward them, asking questions.
“Leave me be.” The lord’s harsh tone stopped them cold.
Annabel remembered what her mother had done when Durand had badly burned his hand. “He needs water,” she told Gilbert. “Two buckets at least.”
“I’ll go get the water, as I can carry more than you,” Gilbert said. “You help Lord le Wyse to the manor house.” He lifted the lord’s good arm from around his shoulders and placed it on Annabel’s. Then he hurried away toward the well.
Lord le Wyse leaned heavily on Annabel as they walked. Neither of them said a word. She suspected the lord was silent because of the pain, and she was concentrating on getting him safely to the manor. He was quite heavy, and she stumbled a couple of times in the dark, but she was thankful he seemed to grow a bit steadier as they moved along.
When they reached the steps of the manor house, which were too narrow to safely accommodate two people abreast, Lord le Wyse stepped away from her.
“I shall go first,” he said gruffly, “unless you’re afraid I may fall backward and crush you.”
The glow of the fire illuminated his features enough that she could see the corner of his mouth turned up, showing him to be in jest.
“Perhaps I will be able to step aside in time to avoid being crushed.” She lifted her eyebrows.
He winced, drawing his injured arm closer to his body. “Shouldn’t you rather have said, ‘It would be a privilege to break the fall of my lord’?”
A strange time for a sense of humor, but perhaps it took his mind off the pain. “Yes, my lord. Pray, make haste. We must get your arm in some cool water.”
“As you wish.” He started up the steps.
She followed his slow progress, and in her mind she listed all the things she would need to treat his burn.
“Lord Ranulf!”
Annabel and the lord stopped and looked behind them. Mistress Eustacia came panting across the yard with a pitcher in her hand.
“Water from the well?” he asked her.
“Yes, my lord.”
Annabel hastened down the steps and took the pitcher from Mistress Eustacia, whose eyes were full of tears.
“Gilbert Carpenter is bringing two more buckets. Do you know what to do for a bad burn?” Mistress Eustacia looked at Annabel.
Annabel nodded. “We’ll need some clean bandages, a flask of honey, and some comfrey if you have it.”
“I shall fetch them right away.” Mistress Eustacia’s voice cracked, and she hurried away.
Chapter
8
Once inside the upper hall, Ranulf sat in his chair and watched the girl, Annabel, scurry to the corner of the room to fetch an empty bucket, still carrying the pitcher of water.
“Now, hold your arm over the bucket.” She set it down in front of him.
I was searching for you, she had said. He couldn’t get the look on her face out of his mind. When she almost ran into him, when she saw his burned arm … He was foolish to think about it.