Page 41 of Kept to Kill
Before he realized it, he was beside the bath, though he felt like the worst kind of voyeur. Somehow this was more intimate than watching her undress. More personal. More terrible. Now that he was closer, he noticed a dark bruise on her shoulder where he’d pushed her down in the mud as well. He grimaced at it. She was close to breaking. He’d thought he wanted that, but now that it was imminent, he didn’t want to see her that way and he didn’t want to be the cause of it.
He leant down. So close. If she moved … Gods, he almost hoped she would. He poured the small packet of powder into the water; the antidote to the itching plant he’d put in her covers. He threw a pot of salve on the bed and then he left.
He didn’t go to their room at all, instead leaving the inn, climbing up the old stone steps that led to the back entrance of the old fortress and letting his demons loose in the place they’d been formed.
* * *
By the timeLily’s tears finally abated, she was feeling a little more herself. She sniffed as she found the soap she’d dropped and began to clean the scratches and abrasions she’d made with her constant itching all day. She’d thought it had been last night’s bed, but Bastian had slept in it as well and he hadn’t come down with any peculiar maladies. Should she tell Quin? She snorted. As if he would care. What would he do about it? Probably laugh in her face.
She stepped out of the water and dried herself, noticing a small pot on the coverlet of the bed that hadn’t been there when she had got in the bath. She opened it, finding some of the salve that Quin had used on her in the camp.
She didn’t like that one of them had been sneaking around her room, but she’d also learned in Vineri’s care not to look a gift horse in the mouth. Her skin had finally stopped its incessant and unbearable itching, thankfully, and the balm felt cool against her overheated skin. She dried her hair and put on her spare breeches and shirt from the pack that Quin had given her this morning to stow her own meager belongings in. The dusty clothes from the day’s travel she washed in the bath and left to dry by the fire.
A knock at the door brought a dinner of roast pheasant, sprouts, potatoes, and parsnips, which, with no one to watch her, she gobbled up as if she hadn’t seen food in days. She’d never realized before how hungry traveling could make a person, even if they were on horseback, it seemed.
She thought back over the odd day. It had begun normally enough after they’d left the inn, she supposed, though she’d ridden with Bastian. She’d been afraid he’d be a difficult travel companion, but riding with him had actually been quite enjoyable. He’d told her tales, asked her about herself. He’d seemed to want to get to know her, and she wasn’t sure what to make of it.
After she did the job they wanted her to do, what would they do with her? Would they take her back to the camp? Somewhere else?
She resolved to ask Quin. She wasn’t their slave. Surely she was entitled to know what was going to happen afterwards. She deserved that, didn’t she?
She lay on her bed and wished for the hundredth time that she’d brought a book or two with her. The nights spent in her own company with nothing to do were tedious and boring. Perhaps she should see what the men were doing.
Throwing on her tunic, she left her room, going down to the next door and pressing her ear to it. She heard talking inside, a man and a woman. Not that one. She walked back the way she’d come and went to the room on the other side. This time she could make out Bastian’s booming voice and Quin’s quieter one. She was just about to knock on the door when a shadow fell on her. She gasped as she turned to find Mal, a haunted look in his eyes that had her reeling. What could make a man like Mal afraid?
‘Are you all right?’ she asked.
He finally looked down at her as if only just noticing she was there. He scowled. ‘What are you doing out here?’ he said in that rasping voice of his that was sounding more normal every time he used it.
‘I was bored,’ she admitted, looking away from him and wondering if he’d order her back to her room just to be spiteful to her. But, to her surprise, he didn’t. Instead, he reached around her and practically pushed her into the room. The voices inside ceased as they stepped inside, Mal shutting the door behind them.
She looked around. Their room was identical to hers, except that they had one large bed and a second smaller one where she only had the one large. She wondered why Bastian wasn’t sharing it with her as he had last night but pushed the thought away as her cheeks began to heat. Riding with him all day had left her feeling as wound-up as she had been last night.
It made her think again of what Mal had done, as she had a thousand times over the day, and she shivered. Would he sneak into her room and do it again? Mortified, she shook her head, trying to get rid of these unwanted thoughts. Gods, if they knew about these sordid imaginings that were going through her mind … What was wrong with her? She’d never had such thoughts about any men before, not Vineri’s soldiers, nor even his massive gladiators who dwarfed even the Brothers with their hulking arms and chests. Why now? Whythem?
‘… Lily?’ she blinked at Quin, belatedly realizing he was speaking to her. ‘Is something amiss in your room?’ he asked again.
‘N-no,’ she stuttered, feeling like a fool for coming here. Then she remembered she still held the pot of salve. ‘Here! I was just bringing this back.’
‘Listening,’ Mal said from just behind her, glancing at her, then at Quin and jerking his head towards the door.
Eyes widening in denial, she gave the Brother a look. ‘I wasn’t—’
‘How much did you hear?’
‘I— nothing! I was only there for a moment,’ she said, taking an uncertain step back and bumping into Mal, whose gloved hands settled on her shoulders, hemming her in. Her heart began to pound in her chest. ‘Please! I didn’t hear anything,’ she whispered, staring at Quin with frightened eyes as he stalked towards her.
‘We can’t take the chance,’ he said to her and then to the others, ‘We do it now. Are we in agreement?’
‘Aye,’ Mal growled next to her ear.
Bastian stood apart from them, looking tense and uncertain, then his shoulders dropped under his Brothers’ scrutiny.
‘Yes,’ he said, his eyes closing in something that looked like regret.
Mal’s grip tightened on her painfully, but when she cried out, he loosened his hold.
‘What are you going to do?’ she asked Quin, hating the way her voice wavered and wishing she had just stayed in her dull room. She’d give anything for boredom now. Why had she thought coming to the lair of the beasts was a good idea?
