Page 81 of Sunder

“I don’t want to read today.”

They were in the sitting room, Brum at her feet. He’d taken to doing that more, sometimes keeping to his cushion, other times choosing to physically push his body on top of her toes, holding her hostage beneath his weight.

Athan had tried to put a stop to it, but she shook her head, reaching down to rub her fingers against his head. He was trying, and so was she. They would be great friends before long, and that was a greater relief to her than she cared to admit.

He might be large and intimidating, but his heart was friendly. He knew to keep his teeth to himself, if not his tongue, and all that seemed to truly upset him was an upset to his routine.

She could well understand that.

They’d settled into one of their own. Easy mornings. Athan would spend an hour in the infirmary while she bathed and massaged soothing oils into scars and tight muscles. Then she would sit in the garden until he returned, and they took their midday meal.

Reading was in the afternoons.

Evenings were when he was teaching her to play games. They’d tried a few, and the last was much more to her liking.Less strategy and more luck. Rolling ornate shells that had been cut and filed with symbols he’d written out on a slip of paper so she might know their values.

They were making progress through her medical texts, seated on the chaise where Orma got to decide how much they touched. There were no more teasing caresses in the middle, although more often than not she’d reach out and hold his hand when his breath quickened and his temper flared.

She could not forget his confession. Did not like to think she was corrupting him with something so bitter as hatred, but she wondered how she might react if their places were reversed. If he’d suffered and been cut and experimented upon, when she might have been there to put a stop to it.

Sometimes she would even raise their twined hands and place a kiss there, just to feel his eyes drift from the page and look at her instead. Not quite whole, but not as broken as she’d been then. Well enough to sit beside him, to wonder if she might love him and if she could indulge in the other facets of mated life that were pressing at her all the more with each passing day.

But today, she hated the sight of them. Hated that the process was dragging on and on, and hated even more she could not bring herself to give Athan permission to simply read on for his own sake. Leave her be and learn it all for himself while she busied herself with other pursuits.

Like the cookery book she’d found in the kitchen cupboard.

Which led to needing a book on herbs and vegetables, preferably one with pictures.

“Oh?” Athan queried. He’d found a basket to hold all of the texts and papers, although he was seated in his own chair as Brum had taken up much of the floor in front of her. “And what would you prefer to do instead?”

A silly question, as she would rather do anything else than continue to read on. But that was not an answer, and she could not put him off just for the sake of it.

“You want to see patients again, yes?”

He’d taken a few. It started only two days before, when the case was a mother in distress and the fledgling did not even have its flight feathers yet. He’d looked to Orma, obviously torn in his duty, and she’d waved him off with a numb sort of silence to attend the infirmary.

He hadn’t been long, but he’d sequestered himself in the bathing room for a long while, and when he emerged he was scrubbed thoroughly, his hair still dripping onto his fresh tunic.

Orma took it all in, nervous and anxious. “Did the baby live?”

She did not know if it was as serious as that, but there was a sombre note to him that frightened her. “Yes,” he’d conceded, easing down into a chair. She should have had food ready for him, but she had only books and confusion so far, her education not proceeding as rapidly as she might have liked.

She could ask him for help. To take the time to teach her. It wasn’t pride that kept her quiet, but rather a determination to handle this for herself. She’d already compromised with herself and asked him how to use the stove, and she’d already heated the kettle without burning herself, so that was a very great victory.

He did not elaborate on the baby’s condition, and Orma wondered if she should press him on it. Surely they were entitled to their privacy, and her stomach roiled to think of her own healers returning home to their mates and families, telling tales of a little girl with visions they were most certainly going to sort out in a day or two.

So she kept quiet. Brought him tea.

Watched the heavy weight fall from his shoulders as he sipped, and he smiled at her and told her she’d done well, andshe was certain even he could be able to see how brightly the threads glowed at his praise.

“I will only return if you are agreeable. And if I can be assured of your care.”

Orma nodded. She didn’t know how agreeable she was, but to deny him his profession seemed as cruel as banishing the Brum. She could do it—he held reverence enough for their bond and her happiness he would do what she asked of him, but she could never be so selfish.

Even if the thought of disease, of Athan hurt, of her alone in the house without skill or companionship frightened her.

So she needed to acquire some.

Skills, at least. She wasn’t certain what she would do about companions. Friendships had become scarce as she grew older. When she could no longer play with the servants’ children. When her cousins grew old, when her siblings grew tired of her.

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