Page 47 of Her Highland Prophecy
She was distracted by her focus on making the preserves by a young boy who came running into the kitchen.
“Mistress Huntington?” he called out as he entered, only to be promptly scolded by the cook when he came too close to the pile of mushrooms she was mincing.
“I’m here,” Diana said. “What do you need?”
He turned around and headed directly toward her. He was out of breath and his dark hair was dusty. She could not imagine what he had been doing to get into such a state.
“Ye need to come straight away, Mistress,” he said urgently.
“Why?” she asked.
“It’s the Master. He was wounded during the hunt.”
“Show me the way,” she said, abandoning her knife and turning to follow him.
Mabel and Joan were both pale, their hands clasped together, but Diana did not even stop to speak with them. A wave of panic was rising slowly from her belly into her throat. She lifted her skirts with both hands and ran after the boy.
17
Her mind was going in a million directions as she raced down the hallways. She didn’t know what she would do if he was seriously hurt. He was the only person who knew her secret and she trusted him. Maybe she could still persuade the Clan to take her back to Ballachulish when the fair started.
And more than that, she did not want him to be hurt. He had become important to her even though they had only known each other for a few days.
The boy, seeing that she was able to keep up, went even faster. They were now practically sprinting down the corridors, so much so that when she finally reached Gordain’s room she bypassed it by several feet before she was able to stop her momentum and enter.
She could hear him even from outside the room.
“Ow! Shite! Hell. Ow! Kine-heided arse!”
The invectives got more and more creative as she walked further into the room, and a wave of relief went through her. If he was well enough to use such creative vocabulary, then it surely wasn’t life-threatening, right?
Her first look at him did not reassure her quite as much. He was lying half-naked, as pale as the bedsheets, with several bloody bandages littering the area around his bed as if he had soaked through them and they had needed to be replaced.
A man was sitting on a chair on the other side of the bed, his eyes focused on Gordain’s middle. He must be a doctor of some kind, she thought, though of course they wouldn’t have been called that in this era.
“Gordain?” she said tentatively as she reached the edge of the bed. His swearing stopped abruptly and he opened his eyes to stare at her. The doctor pulled on something and Gordain gritted his teeth, his eyes slamming shut again and his fists clenching. His entire body was taut as a bowstring and she could see his pain in every line.
She advanced toward him, her eyes never leaving his pained form. She was vaguely aware that there were other people in the room, but she barely registered them. She saw the boy who had guided her to his room walk up to one of the men out of the corner of her eye, but she paid no attention to their conversation.
The sight of Gordain bruised and bloody on the bed was enough to occupy her entire mind. What had happened while they were out on the hunt? Was it an animal that had done this to him?
She was close enough now to get a good look at the cloth that had been used as a bandage around his middle. Even without the blood that slowly had seeped through it in some places, the bandages were grey with filth.
She grimaced, knowing that they would have to be changed. But how could she explain it in a way that they would understand and that they would not consider witchcraft?
“Excuse me, sir?” she asked the doctor. The man turned to her, startled.
“I’m sorry to interrupt your, um, healing—” she started hesitantly. She needed to be very careful how to word her request.
“Aye?” he said, raising his brows.
“Well, our healer back home always insist on using the cleanest bandages whenever someone is hurt and it seems to help the wounds heal faster. Do you think maybe Gordain would benefit of something similar? I would hate for him to be bedridden for weeks.”
She looked at him as sweetly as she could while she delivered her speech, hoping that he would take her advice. If he didn’t, then she would have to take matters into her own hands once he left.
Thankfully, Gordain seemed to have caught on to what she was actually saying, even through his pain.
“That isnae a bad idea, Malcom,” he said. “Do we have any clean cloth on hand?”
