FIERCE: Sixteen Authors of Fantasy

by Mercedes Lackey

  The rest of the afternoon was a frenzied blur as they got him to the castle. Penny refused to leave his side during the entire affair, not trusting him out of her sight. Once Marc arrived, things got much more organized, and they soon had him in his bed. The Duke’s own physician, Sean Townsend, was sent to examine him.

  The room was full of people, and the doctor quickly waved everyone out, “I’ll need some privacy to examine him.” Most of them went. “Miss, you will have to go. It is hardly proper for me to examine the young man with a woman present. I’ll have to undress him.”

  Penny didn’t move, “I won’t leave him. So you might as well get to it.”

  The physician looked at her for a moment before appealing to the Duke, “Your Grace, if you don’t mind, I can’t have women in here while I work.”

  James walked over, reaching out to take her hand, but she stepped away, “Try it, you’ll draw back a nub next time...,” she glared at him. Then belatedly, she added, “Your Grace.”

  The Duke of Lancaster stared at her for a long moment, considering, then spoke, “Very well. Doctor, you will just have to work with a lady present.”

  “I have to remove his clothes, Your Grace, you can’t mean to let...” he started.

  “I won’t repeat myself sir, be about your work,” without another word, the Duke left the room. The physician was huffy at first, but when he saw that she had no intention of giving in to him after having faced down a duke he relented.

  His first move was to remove Mordecai’s clothing, which proved to be difficult, until Penny began assisting him. He gave her an odd look at first but said nothing. Once that was accomplished, he carefully went over Mordecai, checking his neck and chest, feeling his head and looking into his eyes and mouth. Eventually he sighed and stood up. “He’s got several cracked ribs, and I think one of them may have pierced his left lung. In addition, he certainly has a concussion from the blow to his head. From the description of his fall I’m surprised his neck wasn’t snapped, but something protected it. He should be dead already.”

  “Well he’s not dead, so what do you plan to do?” Penny asked.

  “There’s not much to be done, bleeding him might help a bit though. Let me get my case...” he headed toward the black leather bag he had left by the door.

  The doctors had bled her mother ’til she was too weak to survive the illness that claimed her life. “You’re not bleeding him. He’s bled enough already, if that’s the best you have to offer, you can leave,” she said, standing between the doctor and the bed.

  “Fine. You already seem to think you’re doctor enough.” Sean Townsend was annoyed. He had dealt with troublesome family members before, but this woman was beyond frustrating. “If he wakes, try not to let him go back to sleep, he might not wake again. Don’t get your hopes up though; he probably won’t make it through the night.” With that pronouncement he left. She could hear him muttering about stubborn women as he walked out the door.

  Some of those who had been waiting outside filtered back in, anxious to hear what the doctor had said. Penelope related the physician’s words to them. There was quite a bit of discussion over that, but eventually most of them left, and finally only Marc, Dorian and Rose were still there.

  “You should go get some rest Penny; fretting over him won’t help,” Marc said.

  “I’ll leave when he’s dead,” she replied frankly. “Take your own advice. I’m sick of people telling me what to do.”

  He started to argue, but Rose got his attention, “Let it go Marcus, she’s not leaving, and I don’t blame her. If you want to help, try to keep the rest of them out of here.”

  “I can manage that,” Dorian said, “I’ll be outside, making sure his lordship doesn’t come back to finish the job. In the end only Rose remained, sitting with Penny through the long evening and into the night.

  “You need some rest, Penny,” she said at last, when midnight was approaching.

  “I’ll sleep here,” Penny replied.

  “There’s only one bed, and it has a naked man in it,” Rose raised her eyebrow.

  “Everyone knows I’m a ruined woman anyway, what more can they say about me? Leave me be, I’ll lie with him till it’s over,” she never took her eyes off Mordecai. Rose nodded, then stood, and without a word she left.

  Once she was alone, Penny barred the door and removed her dress, she hadn’t brought her nightclothes, but she hardly cared. She eased under the covers and lay beside him, watching him breathe while the candles burned down and darkness covered the room. In the dark she still kept her hand on his chest, feeling it rise and fall, listening to the wet sound of his breathing. She never meant to sleep, but at last she did anyway.

  Chapter XV

  THEOLOGIANS GENERALLY DIVIDE THE GODS into two categories; the Dark Gods and those believed benign to humanity, the Shining Gods. Yet the ancients had other theories. They thought the nature and motivations of each particular deity must be related to its origins. The Dark Gods were thought to predate the Shining Gods, having arisen from the beliefs of some long dead race. The loss of their people may have driven them mad, for their relationship with mankind is anything but beneficial. While the Shining Gods derive their power from faith, in a mutualistic bond, the Dark Gods take their sustenance forcibly. Even those who worship them willingly are often subject to sacrifice and dark rituals.

  ~Marcus the Heretic,

  On the Nature of Faith and Magic

  I dreamt restlessly. I was swimming in a deep lake, one that held no light. I was drowning, choking on the water as I sought uselessly to breathe. The dream seemed endless, yet I never quite finished drowning, until at last I woke. Reality was not much better though. My lungs felt full of liquid, and each time I drew breath a burning pain shot through my chest. Everything hurt.

  The pain was so great that it was a while before I realized I wasn’t alone in the bed. The first sign was soft hair, tickling my nose when I turned my head to the side. Though it was dark I didn’t need my magesight to identify the owner of the hair, the scent told me. It was Penny, curled gently beside me. Her hand rested lightly on my chest, but she had been careful to avoid placing any weight on me. If everything hadn’t hurt so damned badly, I might have been excited, but the pain drove all such thoughts from my mind.

  What the hell happened to me? I thought. A moment later I remembered. The hunt, the chase, my folly; I had been a fool. Next time, shield the horse too—if there was a next time. At the moment I was none too sure about that. I didn’t want to move and disturb Penny, and just shifting my weight immediately told me I wouldn’t be moving anyway. The slightest motion caused a stabbing pain in my chest, great enough to make me aware that the previous pains had just been playful warnings.

  I lay there for a long time, aching. The worst part was the constant sensation of drowning. My lungs weren’t working properly, and they felt heavy, full. A short cough blinded me with pain, and I resolved not to do that again. I tried to distract myself by examining the room with my special ‘sight’, feeling the room with my mind. Then a thought struck me, perhaps I could do the same with myself.

  Turning my mind inward, I slowly explored my body. My task was made difficult by my ignorance; so much of what I found was strange. A few things were easy to recognize, such as my heart, which was steadily beating. I worked out from there, finding my lungs and ribs. One lung was very different, filled with blood, unable to work at all. A sharp piece of one rib had pierced it and torn arteries were still pushing more blood into it and the space around it. I almost panicked then, as I could tell I was dying. Slowly but surely, the blood was filling the other lung, drowning me. Worse, while I thought my abilities might be able to fix some of it, I didn’t know the words to use.

  Ignorance left me helpless. Still, I decided to try anyway. I already knew magic could be done without words; it was simply much harder, requiring perfect focus. I sent my attention to the rib that had pierced the lung and imagined it sliding away, back
to its normal location, meeting the other part of itself. At first I wasn’t sure if anything was happening, but then it began to move, sending waves of pain through me. I clenched my teeth, fighting a scream, but then I didn’t have enough air to scream anyway. I nearly passed out by the time it was back in its place, and then I was horrified to feel it sliding back as soon as I took my attention from it. Fighting against my fear, I held on grimly and tried to envision it joining the other bone, becoming whole again. At last it stayed, and I slowly relaxed, letting go of it.

  Next, I tackled the problem of my punctured lung. It took me long minutes, but finally I felt that the hole in it was sealed, though that still left me with a lot of blood to deal with. Unsure how to get rid of the blood, I decided to seal off the arteries still leaking blood into my chest cavity, that was easier. That done, I considered my lung again. I tried using the aythar to inflate it a bit. That sent me into painful spasms as my body began to cough, heaving to try and get the blood out. The other ribs were splintered and sent stabbing pains throughout my body.

  Ok, ribs first then, I thought. One by one I eased my other ribs back into place, trying to fuse each with its estranged parts. The agony was excruciating, and I could feel my strength fading. At last I thought I had them all in place and began to consider the task of coughing up the blood that still choked me. There should be a chamber pot under the edge of the bed. I wondered if I would reach it in time.

  Steeling myself, I sat up and got out of bed. Well that’s what was supposed to happen. When I sat up, my head made its own issues known. The room reeled about me like a drunken sailor after a three day binge. My attempt to get out of the bed ended with me falling to the floor, still tangled in the sheets. The coughing started the moment I sat up, not having the consideration to wait for me to be prepared, and blood was everywhere.

  Naturally enough, Penny woke to find me lying on the floor, coughing and bringing up volumes of—well you get the idea. It wasn’t pretty, and the coughing was bad enough I thought it might finish me off. I felt her hands on my shoulders as the spasms shook me. Long minutes passed while I sputtered and choked, until at last I was able to stop. Each breath threatened to send me back to coughing, but I held myself still.

  Lying there, I looked up to see Penny crouched over me, stroking my hair and shoulders. Her nakedness surprised me, but I didn’t care, all that mattered were her hands on my skin. Finally I managed to choke out a few words, “You look awful,” I said. The words caught her attention, and her eyes snapped to my face. Until then I think she must have thought I was dead, or nearly so. A sudden involuntary laugh started from her then turned into a sob.

  “I thought you were gone already.” she said in a small voice. Something about the way she had her head positioned told me she couldn’t see me, and I realized the room was black. Someone was pounding on the door.

  “You’d better answer that, before Dorian breaks the door down,” well I would have said that, but it was still too hard to speak, I managed to croak, ‘the door’, and I think she understood me. Soft lips touched my shoulder, and then she was gone.

  Penny opened the door to find a wild eyed Dorian standing outside. She could see Rose standing beside him. As the light from the hallway spilled over her, Dorian stepped back and turned his head aside. “It sounded like you needed help,” he said, seeming bashful of a sudden. The light spilling from the hallway had revealed Penelope’s state of undress.

  She was embarrassed but had no time to indulge her modesty, so she merely stepped behind the door. “He’s coughing up blood. Rose would you mind fetching towels and water? Dorian you can stay outside.”

  Dorian was already facing away when Rose answered, “I’ll have them brought up immediately. Dorian will make sure no one enters, so leave the door unbarred for me.” Then she was gone.

  Closing the door, Penny stepped to the side table and lit the lamp sitting there, the candles were gone, burnt to nubs earlier. In the warm light she could see Mordecai, still lying on the floor, dark splotches of blood dotting the floor around him. He was pale, and his face was the image of death itself, but his breathing seemed easier. Crouching next to him she tried to move him away from the mess on the floor. Then she straightened the sheets, replacing them on the bed. By some miracle they were largely unstained.

  Rose entered a few minutes later carrying a bucket and several large towels, Dorian stood at the door holding an assortment of rags and a second bucket. He kept his eyes averted until Rose had emptied his arms, and then he shut the door. Together the two women eased Mordecai onto his side, placing a small pillow under his head, so that he could breathe easier. Then they cleaned the blood from the floor as much as was possible.

  At one point the two women shared a glance and Penny was overcome with a feeling of gratitude. This is what true nobility looks like, she thought, looking upon Rose Hightower. She had never known a noblewoman of such resolve and kindness. “I will not forget what you have done for me,” she said. She knew not what else to say.

  “You’ve got blood all over you,” Rose answered, lifting a towel to daub a spot away from Penny’s face. “Do you need my help cleaning him up?”

  “No, thank you, I can handle it,” Penny answered her.

  Once Rose had left the room, she took the second bucket and some of the rags that were still clean and began carefully sponging my body to remove the stains on my skin. It took a while, and throughout it all I kept my eyes shut, too weak to protest. After I was as clean as she could manage, she went to the mirror and began working on herself while I drifted off to sleep again.

  A few hours later I woke, lying on the cold floor with a small blanket over me. I might have shivered from the cold, but Penny was pressed against my back, and her warmth had kept the chill from me. I tried to sit up again, and the world swayed around me. Another cough started, but I managed to reach the chamber pot this time and avoided making more of a mess.

  A warm hand fell upon my arm, “Let me help you back into the bed.” I thought I could manage on my own, but that proved false. Penny wound up lifting me by main force, with her arms under mine. Agony ran through me as my ribs took some of the strain, and it gave me the strength to help her with my legs. Finally I was in the bed, and she drew the covers over me.

  “Penny you don’t have to do all this for me.” I spoke to her as she leaned over me, her dark hair falling about her face in a shower of curls. My power of speech amazed even myself. She looked at me oddly then, eyes wide, her face close to mine. Time stopped for a moment then, held in its course by a power I could not understand, till at last she brought her face to mine and kissed me softly.

  “I will do as I please Mordecai Eldridge, and neither death, nor dukes, nor doctors will keep me from you.” I might have cried then, but I was far too weak and my body was dry. A thousand responses ran through my mind, but I had neither time nor strength to say them.

  “Thank you,” I answered simply, and I closed my eyes again as she slipped into the bed behind me. I wanted to talk to her, to explain many things, but instead I fell asleep, safe within her embrace.

  I awoke hours later, near dawn. I had somehow managed to roll onto my side, which must have been painful, but I didn’t remember doing so. I could feel Penny breathing softly against my neck. Of all my childhood fantasies, to think this would happen, and I am completely unable to take advantage of it, I thought to myself. I shifted a tiny amount, just enough to give me a better feel of her against me. I’ll admit it, even near dying, I’m a dirty, dirty man.

  After a while I became aware of her looking at me. She had woken quietly and was avoiding moving. She must think I’m still asleep, I realized. “I’m still alive,” I said.

  “I know,” she whispered into my ear. Half dead as I was, it still sent electric tingles down my spine. She kept her arms around me, and for my part, I didn’t complain. Thirty minutes went by and I found I had to ruin the moment.

  “Penny...”

  “Yes?”
she replied.

  “I need water. My throat is so dry I can hardly swallow, and then I think I need some privacy for a moment.” My bladder was finally making its demands known, despite loss of blood and lack of fluids. She brought water, and I drank an amount that was probably unwise given the state of my stomach. Then she looked at me.

  “So how are we going to do this?” she said.

  I knew what she meant, “We? I may be an invalid but I’ll be damned before I let you do that with me.” That led to an argument, which I lost, but we finally worked out a compromise. I draped a sheet over myself and stood near the window, leaning against the wall for support. She stayed a few feet behind me, ready to catch me if I started to fall.

  Several embarrassing minutes later I was back in the bed. I thought surely at this point she would dress and leave. She still had a job after all. I was wrong. She slid back under the covers next to me. I thought of her kiss the night before and wished dearly I was in better health. The wish fairy ignored me.

  We didn’t sleep then, instead we rested, wide awake. Well, I did anyway, I’m not sure what her reason for being in the bed was at that point. “The doctor said you would die,” she told me.

  “I hope he’s wrong more often then,” I replied. “I think I would have, but I managed to fix some of it last night.” That got her attention, and I spent the next few minutes explaining what I had gone through during the night. After a bit I had a question of my own.

  “I think Rose left you a night dress, I saw it on the table,” I hated myself for mentioning it.

  “She did.” It was a statement.

  “Why aren’t you wearing it?” Stupid never dies, I must be getting better to have regained my idiocy so soon.

  “Are you afraid you’ll do more damage to my reputation?” she asked.

  That made me tense up, but she still seemed relaxed, “Yes. Wait. No, that’s not what I mean.” My general lack of eloquence, that always seemed to appear around Penny, was back in full force.