“Press this against the wound,” I say. “The pressure will help stop the bleeding.”
He stares for a long moment at the blanket, like he’s trying to assess whether or not the cloth could be dangerous. Then he nods sluggishly and obeys, pressing the blanket against his wound. His hand trembles with the simple exertion.
“You’re hurting,” I murmur.
“No.”
“Don’t be a tough guy.” I gesture to my bed, realizing a moment too late that he can’t see me with his head down. “Go lay down.”
He sighs, the sound defeated, and then lifts his head. He stares at me hard and nibbles at his lip, and I can only guess that he’s trying to decide whether or not to trust me. Then he spots my bed and struggles to his feet, wobbling over to it. I try not to smile, but I can’t help but feel like his compliance is a victory. I walk behind him, careful to keep a few feet between us. He’s hurt, but he could still be deadly.
Lor glances over his shoulder at me. “I’m not going to hurt you, you know. I’m not stupid enough to risk my own life.”
I raise an eyebrow, careful to hide my relief. “Why should I believe that?”
“I’m a man of my word.”
I scoff. “You lied about all Angels looking the same.”
“How did you figure that out?”
“Why should I tell a man who can’t keep his word?”
He rolls his eyes at me, and then collapses on the bed. He pulls himself up on it and buries his face in a pillow, his words coming out muffled. “I had to lie about that, sweetheart. No choice. You were barking up the wrong tree.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Why should I tell a girl who doesn’t trust me?”
I sigh. “Touche.”
He makes that little hum-growl noise again. I approach the bed and stop about five feet away, peering at his side. Blood seeps from the wound that broke open, staining my bedspread a dark maroon color. It needs to be restitched, and immediately.
I take four steps forward, closing the gap between us. One, two, three, four. And then I breathe deeply. In and out, one and two.
“You know, sweetheart, this bed is awfully comfy,” Lor mumbles into the pillow. He reaches over and pats the opposite side of it, the side where I always sleep. “I’d be happy to share it, if you want.”
“You’re insane,” I mutter, and then quickly amend myself: “No, you’re injured.You’ll be more rational when you’ve recovered a little.”
“Don’t count on it, sweetheart. I’m usually about as rational as that Southern Wolf I took out.”
“Meaning if I stab you in the brain, you’ll die and leave me in peace?” I realize a moment too late that I’m being overly harsh, but my mind feels like it’s been stuffed with gauze, and I’m not in the mood for tact.
“Hmm…” He shrugs, seemingly unconcerned. “Hadn’t quite thought of it that way.”
As he shrugs, his shoulders pull up and stretch the wound. Why isn’t he screaming? The wound is a four-inch gash across his ribs, and it’s deep. Stretching it like that should be painful enough to make Lor pass out.
But he doesn’t. He just lets out a long sigh and hugs my pillow. “I missed pillows. And sheets. And beds. Do you know there’s no beds in that prison? You should do something about that, little princess.”
“I have no power. I can’t do anything about it.”
“Then pay someone to do it. Or you could sleep with someone powerful. Isn’t that what you human royalty do to get what you want?”
“I’m a princess, not a whore. And shut up before you say something you regret. You’re being obnoxious.”
“Says the girl telling me to shut up.”
Lor hugs the pillow tighter, his arms pulling at his chest and bandages. I cringe as I think of what the movement must be doing to his wound. Tugging it apart, putting pressure on the remaining stitches…
But he remains nonchalant, even as a fresh stream of blood seeps out the open wound. It’s just a few drops at first, but quickly turns into a small crimson stream.
I press the back of my hand to my mouth. Usually, blood doesn’t bother me, but the sheer amount of it coming from Lor’s wound… It reminds me of that spear piercing Ashe’s wing.
I take in a shuddering breath, and it inflates my head with a tingling sensation. Focus, I tell myself. Or count, or do something to keep from fainting. Anything. Lor’s tattoo catches my eye, the uninjured part wrapping around his shoulder, and I stare hard at it. It’ll work as a distraction.
Blood trickles over his chest, blending with the black of his tattoo, seemingly giving life to the inked flames.
I know those flames so well. Every curve of them, every highlight and boldly shaded area. The tattoo looks just like I remember it on Ashe: beautiful and stunning. But somehow it’s… different. It had been a piece of artwork on Ashe; he’d never gone shirtless, because people would stare, and he’d be ashamed.
But on Lor, it isn’t artwork. It’s like another limb that he proudly carries close to him. Still beautiful and stunning, but completely natural.
“You want something, sweetheart?” He’s lifted his head off the pillow, and is staring at me with one eyebrow raised.
“No.” My voice is a little weak, but stronger than I expected.
“You’re staring at me.”
I shake my head, clearing my thoughts, and take a hesitant step toward Lor. “I’ll stitch you back up. Just let me grab my medical kit.”
I make the offer before I can stop myself. The smart thing to do would be to call in a male healer to do the job, one who hasn’t been ordered to kill Lor. But right now I feel curious, not smart. I want a closer look at that tattoo. A small part of me is suspicious that it’s drawn on with charcoal, or that it’s nothing but an illusion that’ll disappear the moment I touch it again.
Lor’s grin returns, although it’s not as vibrant as before. “You? Sweetheart, you do remember you’re a princess, don’t you?”
“Yes,” I snap. I walk over to my closet, where I keep everything but the things I’m supposed to. There’s no clothes in here, but instead shelves of books and everything required to search for the man. Maps, pens, ink pots, letters, money. All the things I need, and all safely hidden in a place no one would dare to look. After all, princesses are given certain amounts of privacy.
I shuffle through my belongings, and pull out the medical kit I remember stashing in the closet a while ago. Nine months ago, to be exact. The month after Ashe died. I’d decided that I would never be caught in the same situation as Ashe, and that I needed to be prepared to run. So I’d stashed some money and basic traveling items into the closet, including a medical kit. That way I was always ready to flee.
If only I’d been this prepared ten months ago.
I walk back to Lor and sit next to him on the bed. He watches me closely, trying to cover his suspicion with a look of nonchalance. It doesn’t work. Every day, I wake to see my own hard, scrutinizing gaze in the mirror. I’m too familiar with the expression to not recognize it right away.
“Relax,” I say. “I know what I’m doing.”
He grunts and eyes the medical kit. It’s a wooden box with a willow carved into the lid, the branches of the tree criss-crossing into intricate runes of the Old Language. ‘Power’ is what the runes spell, according to Jackal. He said the box was originally made to hold pen and paper.
I open the box’s lid and take out a needle, pushing a strand of flax thread through the eye-hole. I try not to think of how close I am to Lor, of how foolish I’m being. One grab, one punch, and he could…
No, I really can’t think of that. I need to focus, because I haven’t stitched a wound in years. Not that I’m going to tell Lor that.
It’s not like I’ll make a mistake; I might not have Ashe’s perfect precision, but I have his memory for details. And I remember perfectly the day Jackal brought an uncooked pot-roast into my chambers, dumped it onto my desk, and demanded I
sew a line of stitches into it. A straight line, not to deep, not to shallow. And I remember failing, and the weeks of pot roasts it took to get that line absolutely perfect.
“Roll on your side,” I say to Lor. “Your good side, I mean. I need to be able to get to that gash.”
He nods and shifts positions, all the time keeping an eye on me. My breath catches as I see his back; two jagged scars rip down his skin, one on either side of his spine. They’re an inch thick and still a light pink, as if the wounds had only healed recently. The tattoo still shows on the pearly skin of the scars, but it’s still impossible to not notice the raised marks.
I shudder as I try to imagine what could have caused the scars. “Your back…”
He scoffs. “Are you squeamish, princess?”
“What happened?” I choke out.
“I already told you in the prison. I got my wings ripped off.”
I don’t know what to say to that, so I glance up, meeting his gaze for a fleeting second. The red of his eyes is haunting, and as it focuses on me, it’s alluring.
“You’re hurt pretty badly,” I mumble, focusing my attention back on his more recent wound. I realize a moment too late how stupid the words are. Of course he knows he’s hurt badly. He can feel the throbbing pain, the torn flesh and ligaments.
“Yeah.” He shrugs. “But I’m alive, so it doesn’t matter much.”
I look over his expression; it’s still suspicious, but not pain-filled. Not pained at all. “Does your species have a higher pain tolerance than humans?”
“No.”
“Then why don’t you look like you’re hurting?”
“Because I’m not. I can’t feel pain anymore.”
For a moment, I’m relieved. Lor may as well be a pot-roast, and if I make a mistake, it won’t matter all that much. But then I see his expression. His suspicion has vanished, replaced by sadness and something else. Anger.
“You miss feeling pain,” I say, and it’s not a question.
He runs a hand over his head, as if trying to push away his angry thoughts. “It sounds crazy, but… yeah. I miss it. I mean, pain is such a natural thing. It’s vital. So when you can’t feel pain, it’s like… I don’t know. It’s just…” He trails off and bites his lip.
“It’s like someone has ripped away a part of you, and you’re no longer whole,” I say slowly. “You can’t feel, you can only react. And reacting is so much less rewarding.”
He raises an eyebrow at me. “You can’t feel pain either?”
“I don’t think I could really feel it properly before… someone. Now I feel it too clearly.”
“You’re not talking about physical pain, are you?” he asks.
I narrow my eyes. “Why would you say that?”
“You’re so careful with the needle. And you forget to do that kind of stuff after you lose physical pain.” He cocks his head to the side. “Emotional pain. That’s your issue, isn’t it?”
I close my eyes, trying to shut him out. “You don’t know that.”
“Yeah, I do. Your eyes tell the whole story. They’re scarred.”
I wince and don’t reply. After a few moments, I work up the courage to open my eyes. Lor is staring at me, this time his gaze more evaluating than critical. Then he smiles. It’s not that crazy grin of his, and not a façade. It’s just a small, reassuring smile, and it looks nice on his rugged face.
“You shouldn’t miss the pain,” I whisper.
He shakes his head and replies in a voice just as soft, “And you shouldn’t hide from it.”
FIFTEEN
I’m not hiding. I won’t hide. I can’t.
I repeat the words to myself over and over as I move the needle toward Lor’s chest. He flinches away, probably from some instinct that hasn’t vanished with his ability to feel pain. Then he clears his throat and stills, his fist tightly clenched at his side.
The tendons running down his arm are so taut, they look like they’re about to burst from his skin. He stares at the needle, eyebrows furrowed, like he thinks the thing might attack.
A small smile twitches at the corner of my lip. Of all the things an Angel could be afraid of… “You’re scared of needles.”
He clenches his other fist into a ball. “It’s a long story.”
“What kind of long story?” I inch the needle closer to him, careful to keep my hand steady. If I wobble, and Lor gets much more scared, then he won’t let me sew him up. And if he loses too much more blood… No, I can’t think about that option.
“It’s… complicated,” Lor replies.
“Meaning you have no good excuse for being afraid of them, so you’re just going to avoid my question?”
“In a nutshell? Yeah.”
I scoff, but don’t question him any further. “Hold still. I’m going to start.”
He nods and squeezes his eyes shut. I spend the next few minutes re-stitching the gaping wound, pulling the pieces of flesh close and sewing them together. It’s tedious work, especially since I have to be careful of the already-stitched clawmarks above the one I work on.
But I find I don’t have to be gentle with Lor. At first, I do my best to move slowly and delicately, purely out of habit. But I soon find Lor isn’t lying about his inability to feel pain. He doesn’t react at all to the needle, or to my fingers tugging the torn flaps of skin back in place. He just stays stock-still, his eyes squeezed shut.
“Do you feel anything?” I ask after a moment. “Any sensation at all?”
His eyelids relax just a little bit, and I know he’s considering an answer. “All my senses are intact,” he finally says. “But the pain is gone. All I feel in its place is pressure.”
“I’m sorry,” I say. And we drop the discussion after that. I continue suturing his wound, taking my time and completing the task properly. And also taking the time to examine his tattoo again.
It’s not charcoal, and it doesn’t disappear when I lightly run my fingertip over it. The tattoo is real, and just like I remember it. I pause every minute or so to stare at it for a few moments, wondering how I should approach its topic with Lor.
Ashe never told me much about his tattoo. He told me he hated it; it was a reminder of his past, the past he couldn’t remember a single thing about. And he told me that, like the rest of his life before being captured, he didn’t know anything about it. Where he had gotten it, who had completed the intricate artwork, what it meant… It was all a mystery, both to him and to me.
I finish suturing Lor. He hesitantly peeks open his eyes when he doesn’t feel my hands for a few moments and glances down to his chest. He gives an approving nod at my work.
“You really are experienced, aren’t you?”
“Mostly on pot-roasts.” I stand from the bed and walk over to my dresser, searching for a cloth to wipe the blood off his chest.
He gives that little humming growl, and I begin to form a theory that it’s his version of a nervous laugh. He doesn’t know what to say, or how to respond, so he makes that sound.
I pick up a washcloth from my dresser, and dip in in the basin where I usually wash my face in the morning. There’s only a tiny amount of water left, most of it having evaporated during the day. But it’s enough to wet the cloth. “Where did you get that tattoo?” I ask. “It’s beautiful.”
“I was born with it,” Lor says.
I walk back to him, cupping my hand under the cloth to keep it from dripping on the carpets. Not that it matters much, anyway, since Lor has already covered them in blood. “That’s a strange thing to say,” I reply as I sit on the edge of the bed. “No one is born with a tattoo.”
“I was.” He smirks at me and winks.
I ignore the flirtatious gesture and offer him the washcloth. “Here. Get rid of that blood. And tell me more about this tattoo.”
He takes the washcloth and begins wiping at his chest. It mostly just smears around the blood; he’ll have to take a bath if he wants to actually get clean. And, even if he doesn’t want
that, I’ll still force him to take one. He stinks from his time in the prison. Apparently, baths are just as rare as beds in there.
“Why are you so interested in my tattoo?” Lor asks.
I shrug. “I’m just trying to make small talk.”
He freezes, and his gaze turns up to mine. I swear his eyes have actually darkened; they look more like blood now, and less like the soft clouds of sunset. “Don’t lie to me, sweetheart. I know you didn’t save my life on a whim. You want something from me. And I’m not just going to hand anything over. I’m never going to.”
I swallow hard. My heart pounds again, and for the third time in one day, adrenaline takes control of my body. I stumble away from the bed until I reach the far wall. Somehow, I know I have to get away from Lor.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I’m telling him the truth before I can stop myself. And then I realize that it probably is my best option, after all. “I… I just wanted to know about the tattoo because of a friend.”
He raises an eyebrow and glares at me from under it. Even lying on the bed, seeping blood, and covered in grime, he looks intimidating. “A friend? A friend wants you to get information about my tattoo? Where can I find this friend?”
I shake my head. “My friend, he’s… dead.” That word sounds so hollow, like it always does. How can you describe something so horrific with one tiny word? “He died ten months ago. Someone accused him of treason, and my father killed him for it. But he was innocent.
“I’ve been trying to find his killer ever since. My search led to you—you look just like the man who got Ashe killed. And…”
I’d said his name.
I trail off as I realize this. I had broken my promise to myself; I said Ashe’s name, something I’d sworn to never do. Because the last time I said Ashe’s name, I’d said it to him as I looked into his eyes. And that was how I wanted it. Forever.
It wasn’t like that anymore.
Counting Shadows (Duplicity) Page 9