Unbound (The Griever's Mark series Book 3) (16 page)

Chapter 24

LOGAN DOESN’T LET me take him through the Drift. By the time he reshapes us from the wind in the shattered courtyard of Heborian’s castle, he’s swaying with exhaustion and barely putting any weight on his injured leg. Raised voices in the city beyond make me tense for conflict, then I realize: they’re celebrating.

Can this be real?

I gaze across the crater of the courtyard, scanning the fragmented walls and the broken ends of the bridge that once led into the city. The castle itself shows equal damage. At least a quarter of the structure has crumbled into the sea. Several towers have toppled. In this quiet moment, I have time to wonder just how many people died yesterday. Yet, despite that, I suppose it
is
a day to celebrate.

The guards at the castle doors have recognized us and are picking their way through the rubble. Logan is limping badly enough that one of the guards tries to draw Logan’s arm over his shoulder to support him. Logan pulls away. He doesn’t like to be touched by people he doesn’t know.

As we make our way to the temporary infirmary, we pass dozens of servants busily clearing rubble from the halls.  At first this startles me, but maybe people are better off with work to do. I would be, if I weren’t so tired. Frankly, it’s a relief to see so many uninjured.

The Healers have established themselves in what looks like a recreational room. Racquets hang from pegs on one wall, and a net lies folded under them. In the open spaces between cots, the floor is marked with colorful lines. Most of the cots are occupied. Renald, the royal physician, and several young people who seem to be his assistants move from bed to bed. They check bandages and offer steaming cups to their patients. The Healers are occupied at the far end of the room, where the worst injured are gathered.

I guide Logan toward an empty cot. “Wait here. I’ll get one of the Healers.”

Logan sits on the edge of the cot but catches my hand. “No. I’m sure others are in greater need. I’ll wait my turn.”

I accommodate Logan only in part. I seek out the nearest assistant, waiting in the open space of the aisle while she finishes rubbing a salve into the gnarled fingers of an old man. Before I can get the girl’s attention, Renald spots me. He is a slight, balding man, and his movements are quick and businesslike as he hurries to meet me. Fatigue pinches the corners of his eyes. It was a long night for everyone.

“Astarti,” he says in surprise. “Are you injured?”

There’s nothing he can do for my hand, and the pinpricks of returning feeling give me hope that it will soon be back to normal. It’s rather bizarre, really, to have come out of this without so much as a bloody lip.

“I’m fine, but please come look at Logan.”

When we get to where I left Logan, he is leaning against the wall behind his cot, eyes closed. His good leg extends off the bed, foot on the floor. The injured one is stretched out before him, smearing the sheet with dirt, ash, and blood.

Logan doesn’t stir when we approach. I touch his shoulder so Renald doesn’t startle him. His eyes fly open.

Renald uses a pair of small, sharp scissors to cut off the cloth I wrapped around Logan’s leg. He examines the wound.

“It’s too swollen to stitch, and I suspect one of the ladies”—no need to ask whom he means by that—“would singe my ears if took a needle to you anyway. Dela,” he calls. “Warm water, soap, clean cloth.” He turns back to Logan. “I’ll clean it to make easier work for the Healers, though I’m sure they’ll be over as soon as they catch sight of you.”

“I can wait if—”

“Don’t be absurd.”

Logan looks faintly surprised at Renald’s brusque tone.

I grin. “A firm hand, I see. Thank you, Renald, for setting that example. Now I know just how to deal with him.”

Logan snorts. “Don’t even think about it.”

Renald, however, is busy pulling out a small table for his assistant as she approaches with a steaming bowl of water in her hands and white cloths draped over her arm. She freezes when she gets a good look at Logan, and water sloshes over the side of the bowl to splatter on the floor. That’s when I recognize her. Dela is the Earthmaker girl Logan brought back from Avydos. The one who was terrified of him.

Renald makes a sound of annoyance at the spilled water. “Dela,” he says firmly. “Patience, attention, a steady hand. Remember?”

“Yes, sir. Apologies.” She proceeds toward us, eyes flicking to Logan and away.

“Good girl,” Renald says with equal firmness as she sets the bowl of water on the table. “You see to his arm while I work here.”

Dela’s lips pinch, but she nods.

Logan says woodenly, “She doesn’t have to. She’s frightened of me.”

“She is under my command, not yours,” Renald says without looking up from the cloth he is wringing out. He hands it to Dela, and she quietly moves around the foot of the bed to get to Logan’s injured arm.

Logan doesn’t look at her as he shrugs his shirt up. He leans forward to pull it off.

“Dela,” Renald says inflexibly, and she grabs hold of the hem of Logan’s shirt and tugs. She gasps as she catches sight of Logan’s back in the moment before he leans against the wall again.

Logan pretends not to notice, staring down into his lap as Dela leans near with her cloth. The cut runs from his forearm, along the outside of his elbow and halfway up his upper arm. She dabs cautiously. When Renald begins to scrub at his leg, Logan makes a hissing sound that sends Dela skittering back. She returns to her work with a determined expression.

Personally, I’m a bit annoyed. Logan did save her life and got her away from Belos. I realize she’s very young and probably not used to the fear she experienced, but still.

“I’m sorry,” Logan says quietly. “That I hurt you.”

She pauses in her work. She looks up at him, drawing back a little at the sight of his eyes. He looks away. She continues to watch him, and I see the moment he becomes a person in her eyes. It’s in the parting of her lips, the faint confusion. She glances at the wound in his thigh, where Renald is busily wiping away blood and fluid. Her gaze returns to the cut in his arm.

“I’m sorry, too,” she says, her voice barely audible. “That I was so frightened.”

Logan’s head snaps toward her, then he slides his eyes away to spare her the sight of them. “You don’t need to apologize for that.”

“You took me away from there. Thank you, Primo Loganos.”

Most people don’t use his title. It surprises him as much as me.

Dela returns to gently cleaning the wound. I know it must hurt, but Logan holds himself still and silent. Even when Renald uses his cloth to scrub dirt out of Logan’s leg, he only freezes more, trying not to startle the girl again by reacting. When Dela is finished with her work, Renald dismisses her to attend other patients.

Logan notices me glaring after her and says, “She only a child, Astarti.”

I sniff loudly.

“At least she didn’t scream this time.”

There’s a hint of humor in his voice, so I joke back, “Progress.”

“I take what I can get.”

His humor vanishes when Renald dabs at his leg with antiseptic. Logan’s eyes widen, and he makes a choking sound.

I grimace in sympathy, but Renald says unapologetically, “The more I do, the less strain there is on the Healers. Amazing magic, you know. I don’t tell them that, and they could stand to pay more attention to the principles of medicine, but—”

“Astarti! Logan!”

The voice is Korinna’s, and she comes hurrying down the aisle, blonde braid flying behind her. She slows to a more sedate walk under Renald’s withering glare.

“Miss Korinna,” Renald chides, “what have I told you about running in the infirmary?”

“Oh, posh,” she mutters, and I grin. She gives me a sly smile as Renald returns to his work, shaking his head in irritation. “Horik told us to expect you.”

Something in the way she says Horik’s name makes me eye her. Spots of pink appear on her cheeks. Logan, oblivious man that he is, notices nothing. Of course, his thoughts are probably focused on the narrow tongs Renald is cleaning.

“What’re those for?” I ask.

“As I said, Astarti, the more I do, the less strain there is on the Healers. We have a system now.” He puts his hand firmly on Logan’s knee. “Hold still. There’s a piece of rock in here.”

Though Renald is skilled and efficient, Logan’s face whitens as Renald digs into the wound. I have a pretty strong stomach, but even I have to look away. Korinna winces slightly.

“There.” Renald holds up the bloody tongs to show off a fragment of stone. “This, Korinna, is what I keep trying to explain. The more you can do mechanically
before
Healing, the less energy you will expend. Always clean the wound first. Always take the time to—”

Once again, Renald is cut off by the rush of one of the Healers through the infirmary. He doesn’t, however, chide Gaiana as he did Korinna. With a sigh, he drops the tongs and bloodied cloths into the bowl. He nods to Gaiana and retreats.

Gaiana looks as tired as everyone else, perhaps more so. Logan notices.

“Mother, this can wait.”

Without a word, she seats herself on the edge of the cot and presses her hands to the wound. Logan tenses at the pain then slowly relaxes as it disappears. He turns a startled gaze to Korinna as she draws away from his arm, leaving the flesh whole. Korinna darts a look at Renald and looks relieved to find his back turned. Apparently, only major wounds are to be Healed. Logan raises a wry eyebrow at her. She winks, then hurries off to return to her duties.

“Why did you not come back with the others?” Gaiana asks softly.

I don’t expect Logan to answer, but he says, “I didn’t want to lose him.”

“Did you speak with him?”

“No. He was gone.”

“I would like to ask you to let him go, but—”

“But you won’t ask that. You’ve no right to.”

It is the firmest I’ve heard Logan be with his mother. She lets out a barely perceptible sigh.

Logan adds, “Especially after
you
went after them. What were you thinking that day, following them into the ocean?”

I anxiously await her answer. I’ve wanted to know this myself.

Gaiana frowns slightly. “I wasn’t thinking. I felt them, and I wanted to go. That is all.”

That doesn’t make a lot of sense to me, but Logan nods, accepting it.

“There you two are,” comes Bran’s voice from the doorway. “I heard you’d been seen. Thank the—” He cuts off the familiar expression with a slightly baffled look, finishing instead, “I’m so glad you’re both all right.”

I tell him, “You can say, ‘thank the Old Ones.’ It was Kronos who stripped Belos of power, not us. I haven’t the foggiest idea how he did it.”

Bran comes to the foot of the bed. “He’s in the dungeon, you know.”

I shudder. Somehow my mind hadn’t made the connection between Heborian bringing Belos back to Tornelaine and him actually being here, a few floors below.

Bran says, “Heborian brought him through the main streets. He had him contained in a...bubble? of Drift energy. I thought there’d be a riot. But you know what? When they reached the castle, Belos looked, if anything, bored. What do you make of that, Astarti?”

I shrug. “Either he thinks he’s got some card left to play—though I can’t imagine what—or it’s just another lie. You can never trust anything he says or does. Don’t forget he’s called the Liar for a reason.”

Logan is frowning at his hands, and I’m reminded of his words when we stood on the side of Mount Hypatia.
He says I want it, but I don’t.
Logan was desperate to prove wrong whatever Belos said to him. What did Belos say Logan wanted? And what was the grain of truth in it? I know Belos well, and I know much about lying. Lies only work—they only hurt us—if there is a grain of truth in them, however much that truth may have been distorted.

Koricus said something similar. That Logan wanted his mind taken. Does Logan believe that? I know little of what happened during his imprisonment, so I don’t know what these things mean to him.

Dela approaches shyly with a tray laden with bread, dried meat, cheese, and cups of water.

“Thank you, child,” says Gaiana as Dela sets the tray on the small bedside table.

Dela dips her chin and hurries away again.

Logan hands me a cup of water, which I drain in seconds, finally washing the dust and ash from my throat. He tries to give me the second cup, but I refuse it. Why won’t he ever take care of himself? He sucks down the water while Bran fetches a pitcher. We both refill our cups several times. Clearing my throat makes me realize how much dust is in my nose, but I’ll wait to take care of that later. We start on the food next, and while we eat Bran tells us about the feast being planned for tomorrow.

“A feast,” I say doubtfully.

“It’s not a bad idea, really. Everyone needs a chance to celebrate, to realize that this is over.”

I nod agreement, but I can’t help wondering: is it?