“You checked?” he couldn't help asking, winking at her.
Her cheeks burned an even deeper red than before, but she continued, determined. “It's a miracle you didn't break your neck! For that matter, with your wounds, it was a miracle that you even got as far as the stairs. I don't know what in the world possessed you to try!” She glared at him, as if any silly plan by which he could put himself in harm's way was a personal affront to her. It almost made him chuckle. “But the bruises and the wounds aren't what bother me. It's the fever and the infection. Reuben... I... I don't know whether you will survive this.”
She buried her head in her hands again. He tried to lift his hand as before to comfort her, and this time he managed, pulling one of her small hands away and holding it in his. It felt natural, somehow, holding her hand—even if his own hand was unnaturally hot at the moment. Her soft, cool little hand felt incredibly soothing.
“I'm sorry,” he said softly, and realized with some astonishment that he actually meant it.
“For what?” she half sobbed, half snapped, gripping his hand with a force he wouldn't have thought her capable of. “I'm the one who let you wander off with a fever. I should be publicly disgraced! I've shamed my teacher and don't deserve to call myself a healer.”
“Don't talk like that.” Reuben's thumb began to stroke the back of her hand instinctively, trying to calm her. “None of this is your fault. It's mine, and I'm sorry.”
“What for?” she repeated.
“For yelling at you. For behaving the way I did, and... for wanting to leave at all.”
“Why shouldn't you want to leave?” There was a despair in her voice that cut Reuben to the heart. “We're all doomed here.”
A flash of anger shot through him at the thought of the men who had caused her anguish. If he wasn't lying here like an accursed invalid, he would...
“Well,” he said in a teasing tone, trying to lighten the mood and chase away his own thoughts, “I still haven't got my compensation. It seems I will have to stay and make sure you win this little war of yours so that I get what I want.”
His attempt at levity worked. A small, tearful giggle escaped Ayla.
“It's not like I could go anywhere, in any case, with this fever,” he added, his voice sounding a bit too happy for his own liking.
“Don't worry.” Her hand pressed his again, and she leaned over to stroke his face. He let her, and enjoyed it. Oh yes, he enjoyed it. “I will look after you. I... I'm so glad you're alive, Reuben. So glad. When I saw you lying at the bottom of the stairs, still and pale, I thought for a moment—”
She stopped speaking and looked down, struggling against the tears.
“Shh.” With all his remaining strength, Reuben raised their entwined hands to her face and stroked her golden hair. The glittering strands felt softer than silk. “I'm not that easy to kill, believe me.”
“Why...?” She broke off before she could finish the question.
Reuben raised an eyebrow. “Why what?”
“Why are you so nice all of a sudden?”
A weak laugh escaped him. “You sound so suspicious! As if being nice is something out of the ordinary.”
“Well,” she mumbled, “it is for you.”
“Thank you for the compliment.”
“You are welcome. So are you going to answer my question?”
“I don't...” his voice faltered.
“That's not fair! I want to know.”
He shook his head and felt dizzy from the movement. “No, I mean I don't feel too good. I... Satan's hairy ass!”
“Don't curse!” she scolded. But when he didn't reply, her voice became concerned. “Reuben?”
“I... feel strange...” His vision blurred. He felt blood pulsing in his ears.
“Reuben! Reuben, are you all right?”
“Ayla, I...” But he could no longer find the strength to speak.
Ayla, he thought as he sank deeper into the darkness.
“Oh my God, Reuben, stay with me! Dilli! Dilli, bring me cold water and my bag of herbs and clean linen! Now! Reuben, stay with me! Stay with me, Reuben!”
Admonishments by a Frightened Bunny
Reuben was in a wonderful and terrible place. A maelstrom of hot, unforgiving darkness surrounded him. In between periods of darkness, he saw strange flashes of light mixed with images of faces. Some part of him recognized the experience—he was slipping in and out of consciousness, as he had been after the accident, so many years ago. Only one thing was different: the face hovering most often above him was not that of a surgeon or a priest, it was that of a girl. What was her name again? Oh yes... Ayla.
There had been a girl back then, too. But she had never hovered over him, never had a moment's concern for his well-being as he lay, grievously wounded. She had been too busy for that. Ayla was always there. Or was that just his wishful thinking? Was he dreaming of her, and in fact she was not there?
Reuben didn't really care if she was only a vision or reality. Her deep blue eyes, dark as the cool waters of a bottomless lake, were the only thing that soothed and sustained him as he lay there, burning. Not burning in the sense the priests had wanted to burn him all those years ago, no. This time the fire was in his flesh. He couldn't feel the pain of it, but he could feel the heat. The merciless force of death eating its way through his body.
Would it succeed? Would he... what was the word again? Die? Yes, it was die. Would he die?
Hmm. One would have to see.
Looking back on his life, he pondered the question of whether, if there was a God, it would merit a trip to heaven or to hell. Hell, probably. Reuben knew his life's story. It was said that God was merciful, but he doubted anyone in their right mind could be that merciful.
When Reuben opened his eyes and saw a red glow, he knew he had been right. Hell. Oh well, he supposed he would find something to do here. It couldn't be much worse than the world of the living, now, could it?
Then he remembered Ayla and bit his lip. Yes, it could. She was still there and would surely never join him. He had been a fool! He had had his chance at life and wasted it.
Trying to keep the tears out of his eyes, he blinked—and suddenly realized that the red glow around him was illuminating a stone ceiling. A very familiar stone ceiling. He didn't know all that much about hell, but it probably didn't have the same ceiling as his room in the Castle of Luntberg. He also realized that the red glow looked suspiciously like the light of sunrise.
From behind him, he heard the light footsteps of a woman.
Could the devil be a woman? He rolled his eyes. What a silly question. Of course he could. But with all the other indications pointing to this not being hell, he was willing to have a look. The chances of him receiving a poke in the eye with a red hot pitchfork were pretty slim.
There indeed was someone in the room with him, and it wasn't the devil. It was a girl—not the girl, not Ayla, just a girl. But he had seen her before. Frowning, he tried to get his mind to work. If only his head didn’t feel this fuzzy...
“It's you,” he croaked, realizing who it was: the silly maid who had brought him the disgusting soup.
When she heard his voice, the maid jumped, threw him a look not unlike a frightened rabbit who was sneaking past a sleeping wolf only to discover he was, in fact, wide awake, and retreated into a corner.
Reuben scowled. “You don't need to be afraid of me, you know. I'm not going to eat you. I'm no monster.”
She swallowed. It was obvious she wasn't convinced on this point. “Y-you walk around with three arrows in your back as if there is nothing wrong with you,” she accused.
“Only on the weekends.”
“That's unnatural!”
Reuben gave her a devilish grin. “You think so? I could do it on Wednesdays instead.”
She pouted. It was probably supposed to be a frown, but she was far too harmless to manage one. Now, she looked like an angry bunny about to steel herself for a one-on-one with the wo
lf and not liking it one bit. “That's not all. You made Lady Ayla cry!”
She made it sound as if this was an offense comparable to mass murder. Reuben was inclined to agree, but there was no way he was going to admit that. So instead, he just shrugged, wincing when he almost couldn't get his shoulders to lift. It was humiliating to be so infuriatingly weak!
“I probably did. I'm so terribly sorry for falling down the stairs and almost breaking my neck because that distressed your mistress. I promise to do my best to avoid something similar in the future.”
“Don't you ever talk about something in a serious manner?”
“Not if I can avoid it.”
Her pout returned. “You made her cry! How could you? After everything she has done for you? She saved your life, and you only hurt her in return!”
“Why the hell do you care?” he asked angrily. “I thought you'd be glad, the way she has been treating you, and all her serfs!”
He waited for an answer, but none came. With effort, he focused his blurry sight on the maid and saw that she had stuffed her fingers in her ears.
“Take your fingers out,” he mouthed at her.
“Only if you stop cursing, you villain! Don't use the 'H'-word again!”
Rolling his eyes, he nodded, and she removed her fingers from her ears.
“Why would you care if I think ill of your lady?” he repeated his question in a calmer tone. “This castle is about to be besieged, and she's feasting, snatching food from the mouths of people who are desperately going to need it.”
The maid's warm brown eyes flashed indignantly. Apparently, the bunny had finally decided on a frontal attack. “She is not feasting! She's on reduced rations, the same as the rest of us!”
“But... you told me yourself that...”
“She told me to tell you that.”
A confused frown appeared on Reuben's sweaty face. “Why would she do that?”
The girl shrugged. “I think she liked the idea of that thought being served to you as the dessert for your fennel soup.”
For a moment or two, Reuben wavered, asking himself whether he should be angry. Then a wide grin appeared on his face, dispelling the frown in a heartbeat. “What a woman,” he said, shaking his head in wonder.
The maid nodded, her jaw set. “She is. Do you know what else she did, besides imposing the same restrictions on herself as on her people? She ordered a barricade built so that not just the men and women in the castle but everybody would be protected. When it turned out that there wasn't room for them all in the village, she took in the families of the farmers from the other side of the river. And when the Margrave's men attacked, she rode out herself to face them!”
She took a breath and continued: “She's the sweetest, bravest, most kind-hearted lady in the whole world! I'm going to fetch her now because she said to wake her the minute you woke up, but if you ever do anything to upset her again you'll... you'll...”
She floundered around for something fitting to say. It was obvious she wasn't very practiced at making threats. “...Well, you'll be sorry!” she finally finished. Glaring at him one last time from her safe corner, she gathered her skirts and fled from the room.
Reuben wagered she wouldn't dare approach him for the next week or so. She had probably only been brave enough for this encounter because he was lying in bed with a high fever, unable to move a muscle.
Yes, because of that—and because she loved her mistress dearly. Perhaps he had been wrong about that maid. Perhaps she wasn't so silly after all. Perhaps he had been wrong about Ayla, too. He would so dearly love to believe that she wasn't a heartless shrew. She was so bewitching. A witch.
He closed his eyes. Then, when he heard the door swing open, he opened them again and saw Ayla standing in the doorway. She looked a vision in a long blue dress with golden trimming that matched her hair and eyes exactly, and that didn't have mud all over it this time. Her lips parted to smile at him, and he felt pain, real, tangible pain, for the first time in years. Pain in his heart at the glorious sight of her.
What's the good of lying to yourself any longer, Reuben? he thought. You only need to be good at lying to other people, not yourself. Ayla isn't a shrew; she isn't a witch. She is a lovely girl, and she hasn't put a spell on you or bewitched you—unless it be in the way any girl may bewitch a man if his heart is willing to fall to her magic.
Again he felt the pain in his heart, the exquisite pain. Why this girl? Why did it have to be her? His savior. His sworn enemy. The one girl he could never have.
But then, you should never say never...
The Sweetness of Water
Through a crack in the door, Ayla peeked into the room. Dilli had told her that, finally, Reuben was awake, and so he was, lying on his back, staring at the ceiling. The door squeaked as she pushed it farther open, and his eyes snapped to her. Suddenly, their expression changed dramatically.
“Reuben!” Ayla rushed forward as she saw the flash of pain in his eyes—something which, she realized, she had never seen before. “What is it? What is hurting?”
“Nothing,” he said, gruffly. “Don't concern yourself.”
“Don't be ridiculous,” she chided. “I'm responsible for your welfare. If you are hurting and there's anything I can do to make it better, you must tell me.”
For a moment he looked up at her with a curious expression on his sweaty face—and then he started laughing. He laughed so hard; she would hardly have thought anyone capable of laughing this hard in the state he was in at the moment.
“Reuben?” Ayla's brow creased. “Did I say something funny?”
“No, I...” The laughter changed into a cough that wracked Reuben's body under the blankets and furs that were heaped over him to keep him warm.
When the fit finally subsided, he smiled up at her weakly and murmured: “It's not funny, really, when you think about it. But it sort of seemed humorous for a moment.”
“And are you going to tell me what you are talking about?”
There was that flash of pain in his eyes again. He hid it well, but it was there. “Maybe later, Lady Ayla.”
She didn't want to let it go, but then he was sick, so now probably wasn't the best moment for an argument. Instead, she said: “You can forget about the 'lady' part. I'm going to have to nurse you back to health after all, and I'd feel funny if you called me 'Milady' all the time. The patients at the cloister where I learned never did, either.”
*~*~**~*~*
He almost replied, “Well then, you must call me Reuben, not Sir Reuben,” when he remembered that she already did. He wasn't a sir here. Damned ruse!
“Err... thank you, Milady.” He made a little bow of his head. “But I think I owe you the respect of your noble blood.”
Plus, I'm already too interested in you. No need to make it worse by becoming more familiar.
With effort, he looked around. Still the same room, in the same castle. It was undoubtedly morning, with the sunlight streaming in from the east. But which morning?
“How long have I been out? What has happened?”
“Well, as to your first question—not too long, considering your condition, thank the Lord. It felt long enough to me, though. You were unconscious the entire night.”
Reuben studied the rings under her eyes. It looked like she had been up most of that night. So he hadn't been wrong. She had been watching over him.
“Would you like something to drink?” she asked, a tender look in her eyes. “You sweated out gallons last night.”
Only when she said it did Reuben realize that his throat was parched. “Yes please.” He grinned. “Do you have beer? Or better yet, wine? With a lot of honey please—I like my drink sweet.”
She scowled at him. “I bet you do. But water is much healthier.”
His grin didn't waver. “Somehow I knew you were going to say that.”
*~*~**~*~*
Ayla tried to be angry with him as she left the bedroom and ran to the kitchen to get
some water. She really tried—but she couldn't. She was just so overjoyed to see him alive, to see that stupid, arrogant, devilish grin on his face and see those steel-gray eyes twinkling as they looked up at her.
The last night had been one of the worst nights of her life. She had been working ceaselessly over Reuben, hoping against hope that he wasn't going to slip from her grasp and disappear into the darkness. More than once, when his breathing had been labored and the sweat had streamed down his face in rivulets, had she believed her efforts would be in vain. And even in moments like these, no, especially then, she could not stop noticing how incredibly handsome Reuben's face was, longing to touch it just once without a cold linen in her hand, without the thought of impending death in her mind.
She had really believed that he was going to die.
But somehow, he had survived. She didn't know how, and she didn't really care. He was alive, and he was with her.
Before that unseemly thought could take root, she pushed open the kitchen door and grabbed one of the pitchers of water that was left over from her efforts in the night.
Returning to Reuben, she knelt beside his bedstead and held the pitcher out to him.
“Can you hold it yourself?”
He lifted his hand and tried to hold the pitcher, really tried. You could see his jaw working and the massive muscles in his arms bunching—but it was no use.
“No,” he growled.
“It's no problem, you know. I can hold it for you. You're sick. Just because you're too weak to hold a pitcher full of water, you are no less of a man.”
He closed his eyes and groaned. “Will you just get on with it?”
Obviously, he didn't quite share her opinion. He didn't like that she had to hold something for him because he was too weak.
Smiling with silent satisfaction, Ayla put the pitcher to his lips with one hand, while with the other, she softly gripped his neck from behind and pushed his head up.
Reuben's eyes flew open in surprise.
“You don't need to hold me,” he protested. “I'm no infant that can't move on his own!”