Page 55 of Kept to Kill
‘You hurt her,’ Mal snarled menacingly, the tone making Quin’s skin prickle.
‘So did you,’ Quin retorted, though he knew he’d done wrong.
‘Different when I do it. She didn’t likethat.’
Quin sighed, getting to his feet to meet them head on. ‘No, she didn’t,’ he agreed.
‘She shouldn’t have been punished for whatwedid,’ Bastian spoke up. ‘And punishment isn’t personal. It’s meant to be as fair as it can be.’ He sounded calm, but there was an anger simmering under his cool expression that Quin hadn’t seen in him before. ‘But you took your wrath out on her, Brother. I saw the look on your face as you did it. That’s not how you treat members of your unit,Commander.’
Quin inclined his head and stood his ground. There was nothing to say.
Surprisingly, it was Bastian who stepped forward to deliver the first blow. He’d have put money on it being Mal. It made him see that he didn’t know the man Bastian truly was.
His huge Brother’s strike to his cheek sent him staggering back and, dizzily, he fell to one knee. Struggling up, he regained his footing only to be winded by Mal’s well-placed fist to his stomach. Bending over in pain, he tried to recover and straighten, take his punishment as a Brother should, without complaint. But he had trained for this, passed trials by combat and tests of his endurance. Lily hadn’t, and he’d treated her as a Fourth the way that Maeve was a Fourth, he realized. Callan, Jax, and Seth loved Maeve with everything they had, but they would punish her as a Brother because she’d grown up in the camp, passed the same trials that he himself had.
Lily had spent years alone in a room. Her endurance was of the mind, not of the body. And tonight, he’d taken even that from her. How could he have done such a thing? He’d never thought of himself as an overly callous man, but he’d been crueler to her than Vineri ever had been. That thought sent him to his knees as Mal hit him in the face.
He vaguely felt the water as he fell into the stream, clogging his nose and mouth for what seemed like an eternity before one of them dragged him out and laid him out on the bank on his front to come back to his senses.
After that, they left him there in the darkness and the cold to make his own way back when his head began to work properly again.
It was still dark when Quin was able to stand, grunting in pain as he washed off the blood he could feel caked over his nose and cheek. He made his way back to the camp, threw some wood on the fire, and got under his blankets. Lily was in his line of sight. Her eyes were open and she was staring at him. Where he might have expected gloating at his own punishment at the hands of his Brothers, he saw only sadness in her eyes as she looked over his injuries. Her eyes widened slightly, so it must look bad, he thought, but she said nothing, closing her eyes again after a few moments of staring into his. The intimacy of it made him want to go to her. And do what, a voice in his head jeered, cuddle her? Tell her he was sorry for losing his temper? Too little. Too late.
He let his head fall back and stared up at the clear night sky, letting his eyes close.
The next morning came quickly and he awoke to the sun streaming through the trees as it came up over the rise of the adjacent hill. The others were just stirring as he was rubbing the sleep from his eyes. He stifled a grunt as he sat up slowly, his body protesting after the beating he’d received last night. Next to him, Lily had clearly forgotten what had befallen her as she rolled onto her back and didn’t hold back the whimper that bubbled up from her throat when she put weight on the welts he’d covered her arse with.
He watched her from the corner of his eye as she bit her lip in an effort to keep silent. She got to her feet, not looking at any of them, and walked from the camp in the direction of the stream, her gait stiff.
The other two were still under their blankets, so after waiting until she was gone, Quin got up, grabbed the last of the salve from Mal’s pack, and followed her. He wasn’t sure what he intended, but he didn’t like her wandering off by herself.
When he got to the stream, he stayed in the trees close by, watching silently as she cupped her hands in the clear water and drank deeply. She took off her tunic and washed her face.
He looked away as she took down her breeches and saw to her morning needs, but his eyes were drawn back to her as her hands lightly traced the welts his belt had left before she pulled them back up. She turned as if to go back to the camp, and he did as well. But out of the corner of his eye, he saw her stagger to the side blindly, bracing herself on a large boulder by the bank. He watched as he sank to her knees and began to cry quietly. Alone.
Whatever there was left of his heart broke in that moment. He had done this. And he had not the first idea of how to undo it. He turned his back on her, leaning against a tree and putting his head in his hands.
If she knew that he had seen, it would make things worse. She kept her thoughts and her feelings to herself. He left her by the water, making the short journey back to camp at a run and finding the others there.
They eyed him warily, though the anger he’d seen in their countenances last evening had been greatly diminished. That was the reason Army discipline was usually carried out within the unit. Everyone felt better after it … almost everyone.
‘She’s by the river,’ he said to Bastian, throwing him the salve. ‘She doesn’t want to see me this morning.’
Bastian gave him a hard look as he caught the pot. ‘Fucking astonishing.’ He walked silently into the underbrush, disappearing from sight.
Quin gathered his possessions, finding his belt that he’d thrown down last night and buckling it around his waist. He packed Lily’s things as well.
‘What do we have to eat?’ he asked Mal.
‘Fuck all.’
‘Find something for her,’ Quin ordered. ‘You know she needs more than she lets on.’
Mal mumbled his assent and found some hard biscuits in the bottom of one of the packs just as Bastian returned, Lily walking behind him.
Quin noticed Bastian frowning as they drew near. His Brother looked pointedly back at her and Quin followed his gaze. Her eyes were cast to the ground. She didn’t look up even when Mal handed her the breakfast he’d found, though she mumbled her thanks.
They smothered the fire and mounted their horses, Bastian settling Lily up with him. She didn’t make a sound, though Quin knew how her wounds must be smarting. She still didn’t look at any of them, holding herself stiff and straight as she rode with Bastian. They all shared a look as they began the last leg of their journey, slowly traveling up the final crest.
