Page 36 of From the Noblest Motives
"Up the steps." Cyril pointed. "We have a room for him—second on the right. Gwyneth's waiting for him." He waited until Blaze moved to follow instructions before he turned to Damien. "It's good to have you here. I wish the circumstances were less dire, but there it is. I'm sure there's quite a story behind all this, but it can wait."
"Thank you." Damien managed a cautious nod before hurrying up the stairs after Blaze. Maybe his thanks should've been more effusive. Maybe he should've offered a hug. But his father was a stranger, his motives a mystery. Awkward didn't begin to cover the situation.
He followed the voices upstairs and found Blaze setting Shudder down on a chair in a surprisingly cozy bedroom. A woman stood next to Shudder, speaking softly to him, looking into his eyes and ears. Tall and thin, with a cascade of dark-auburn hair caught in a loose ponytail, her movements were gentle and her face kind. At least one knot in Damien's chest undid itself.
She was also obviously pregnant.
"Hello, you must be Damien." She offered him a quick smile. "You do look like Cyril. I'm Gwyneth, the healer for this site. If you gentlemen could get him undressed and up on the bed, I'll see how much we can accomplish this evening without depleting him or exhausting me."
"Oh good," Shudder murmured, barely keeping his eyes open. "I get to have handsome valets."
Blaze only snorted as he worked on getting Shudder's dirt-caked, comically mismatched shoes and socks off, so Damien started up top, peeling off Shudder's jacket. He tried to be gentle and slow, but Shudder still hissed as Damien pulled off his T-shirt. The bruises on his sides and arms, even after his first healing, still spread in dark, uneven pools across his skin.
"You've just had a terrible time of it, haven't you?" Gwyneth passed a hand over Shudder's ribs. "At least one broken. Let's get Shudder on the bed, please. Easier to get his pants off lying down."
With Shudder completely unclothed and the splint removed, he looked even worse, the bruising everywhere, his left leg disturbingly discolored and his foot swollen. Damien understood completely when Blaze perched on the side of the bed to hold his hand. Gwyneth took the chair on the opposite side and put a hand on Shudder's arm, which left Damien standing awkwardly in the corner. But he had no intention of leaving.
"Are you starting now?" Damien blurted out. "Will it hurt him?"
Gwyneth looked straight at him, seeming not at all disturbed by his sudden, overloud questions. "No. There may be a little pain if I have to realign anything, but a healing should be comfortable. Where the old belief came from that healings have to hurt to be effective, I don't know. But it's not true."
Blaze, with Shudder's hand in both of his, forehead pressed to their joined hands, let out a strangled sob. Damien no longer had to wonder where he should be and hurried over to stand behind Blaze, hand on his shoulder.Please don't cry. I might, then. And I can't. I never do, but now I might not stop. What's wrong with me?
"It's okay, Bailey," Shudder murmured, though his eyelids kept fluttering shut.
Taking pity on all of them, Gwyneth spread a sheet over Shudder and settled back with her hand on his shoulder. "There's a lot of damage. We'll do the immediate things tonight. The infection. The leg. Your poor head."
Unlike the first time Damien had witnessed a healing, there was no thrashing, no clenched teeth, and no desperate effort to hold back screams. Shudder relaxed under Gwyneth's hand and fell back to sleep. While he knew healing could be gentle, some part of him needed to see it to believe it on a bone-deep level.Animal instincts—they're too close to the surface right now.
Eventually, Gwyneth gave Shudder's shoulder a pat and rose carefully, her baby belly leading. "He should sleep for a bit. Someone should stay with him. He'll be thirsty when he wakes and should drink as much as he wants. You'll find the kitchen behind the stairs. And then, naturally, he'll need help to the bathroom."
"Where's that?" Blaze's voice was hoarse and he wiped at his eyes with his shirt.
"Two doors farther down the hall." Gwyneth laughed, a dry, self-deprecating sound. "The house has seven bathrooms. We've gotten three to work all the way. The bedroom next door is useable, too, if either of you decide on sleep."
"Thank you." Damien let out a slow breath, his heart finally calming.
Gwyneth gave him a long look, then shook her head as if she'd decided against saying something. "I'll be back to check on him in the morning."
In the silence that followed her exit, Blaze's shaky breathing was all too audible. "Be right back. Kitchen."
In his absence, Damien straightened the room. He folded Shudder's clothes and set them in a neat pile in the corner, since they were dirty. Their packs he lined up along the wall by the door. There was no way to line up Shudder's outrageously mismatched shoes, so he set the hiking boot on one side of the packs and the oversized sneaker on the other. The night was warm, but he still fetched a blanket from the closet and draped it over the end of the bed.
Then he recalled that Shudder liked having someone to curl up with when he didn't feel well, so he stripped down to boxers and T-shirt, left his own clothes in a neat pile on the chair, and climbed onto the bed on top of the sheet. A peek at Shudder's head showed just a pink line around where the scalp plate had ripped off—much better—and Shudder no longer threw out enough heat to power an office building.
Blaze raised an eyebrow at Damien when he returned carrying a pitcher and a glass. A sliver of hurt colored his tone when he said, "Guess you decided to take first shift."
"You, too." Damien pointed to Shudder's other side. "There's room."
Carefully, Blaze placed things on the nightstand, gave a hesitant nod, and climbed into bed after he'd only taken off his boots.
"Guns?" Damien whispered.
Blaze shook his head. "Staying on. Just not sure yet."
Nothing Damien could say to that. He wasn't sure, either. For a moment, he lay on his side, watching the rise and fall of the sheet as Shudder breathed steadily, quietly. Finally, he gathered the courage to lay his hand on Shudder's chest, just to let him know someone was there, and found Blaze's hand settling there as well.
Without a word, they twined their fingers together, and Damien suddenly found it easy to go to sleep.
