Now she leaned close, taking his hand in hers, and studied his burn. Her long blonde braid slipped over the shoulder of her shapeless work dress to dangle by his arm. Her eyes were gentle and the touch of her fingers was cool on his burning skin.
“I have to clean the burn so I can see the severity, and the cold water will be good for it.” She began, slowly, to pour the water over his arm. It was painful and soothing at the same time. The water ran out just as the door opened and Gilbert Carpenter came in bearing two buckets. Mistress Eustacia trundled in behind him.
“Oh, Lord Ranulf!” Her voice was soft but agitated. She had always grieved over every scrape he got into. He didn’t like to remember how she reacted to his wolf attack; the poor woman cried for weeks.
“My good woman, ‘tis only a burn.” The pain caused his voice to sound more like a snarl. He regretted taking his pain out on her, but she was used to his gruffness.
Gilbert set the buckets of water down beside him.
“Here you are, child.” Mistress Eustacia set a flask of honey and strips of clean linen on the table beside her.
Annabel stepped aside.
“You do it, my dear.” Eustacia got a stool and set it down in front of him, then motioned for Annabel to sit. “You seem to know how to treat a burn. I will watch you.” She wiped her eyes and her nose on a corner of her apron. “I looked in my store of herbs, but I’m afraid I have no comfrey. I shall send someone to pick some as soon as it’s daylight.”
Ranulf’s arm throbbed considerably more now that Annabel had ceased pouring water on it. He was relieved when she dipped the pitcher into the clean bucket of water and began pouring it over his arm again.
“It doesn’t appear as bad as I at first feared,” Annabel said. Her small nose and full lips made a pleasing silhouette against the low fire that still smoldered in the fireplace. I should stop staring at her.
She took hold of his hand — his ugly, mangled hand — and held his arm up to the light.
“Does it hurt much?” Her bright blue eyes filled with compassion as she looked into his face — his scarred cheek, his patched eye, his beard that covered the worst scars.
He grunted, wanting to reject her pity.
Just then, the door burst open and Gilbert’s little boy, Adam, came running into the upper hall. “Father! What happened? Did you see the fire?”
Gilbert tried to shush the boy, but Adam came straight up to Annabel and peered down at Ranulf’s burned arm.
“Oooh. That is the worst burn I’ve ever seen!”
Ranulf looked to the boy’s father, hoping he would remove the child posthaste.
Before Gilbert could take more than a step, Annabel said very softly, “Adam, I need to bandage my lord’s arm, so why don’t you go with your father to see if the men need help fighting the fire?”
The boy’s eyes grew twice their size, clearly believing Annabel thought him capable of assisting the other men. She smiled at the child, and then he ran out of the room.
Gilbert started after him then turned and asked, “My lord, do you need me? The men may need help — “
“You may go.”
As Gilbert left the room, Mistress Eustacia came closer, watching as Annabel continued pouring water over his arm. Then she placed a hand on Annabel’s shoulder. “Such a good, gentle lass you are. How did you come to know so much about healing a burn?”
“My brother burned himself very badly a few years ago. I watched how my mother and our servant, Alice, treated it.”
She looked a little self-conscious after admitting her family once had a servant. She kept her eyes on his burn and didn’t look up at him.
Ranulf couldn’t help comparing her circumspect behavior to some other serving girls he’d encountered, including the one who had tried to flirt with him at the evening meal.
“Such a fine lass,” Mistress Eustacia murmured, and blew her nose on her apron.
A fine lass. Ranulf stared at her. She was the most beautiful girl he had ever seen, with the most flawless features, and he would have needed to lose both eyes not to notice.
And her outward beauty wasn’t even the comeliest part about her.
Mistress Eustacia caught him looking at Annabel and raised her eyebrows at him. Ranulf scowled.
Eustacia turned to Annabel. “How fortunate Lord le Wyse has such a gentle, knowledgeable nurse among his servants.”
Instead of blushing and looking embarrassed, or smirking and taking advantage of the situation, as most maidens would have, Annabel frowned and shook her head. “I’m merely fortunate to know a little about caring for burns.”
The old woman raised her eyebrows at Ranulf again. He answered with a glare so menacing a growl escaped his throat.
Annabel jerked her hands away. “Did I hurt you?”
He made an effort to compose himself. “Nay. You’re as gentle as a kitten.” He looked at Mistress Eustacia. “You may go.” Though he hadn’t intended it, the words came out as a bark.
She smiled at him. “I’ll go comfort the servant girls. They looked terrified, they did.”
She obviously wasn’t afraid of him, more’s the pity.