The Highlander’s Healer (Blood of Duncliffe Series) Read online

  “Sorry, sir,” she murmured. Her hands were pressing down on the wound, staunching the new blood that welled there, washing where the old clung. She could feel it throbbing, feel her fingers already damp and sticky with it. Her heart ached.

  Don't die.

  “I agree,” Maybrooke said. She stared.

  “What, sir?”

  “I don't like cautery either,” he said. “And don't call me that. Have you a needle?”

  “I do,” Prudence said, heart soaring. So he wouldn't be burned with the cauterizing. That was a relief! So often in the last week she had treated men fevered where the burns were festering, worse than any wound she'd ever seen.

  “Then get it quick. He's already lost too much blood.”

  “Yes, sir. I mean, Maybrooke.”

  “My name's Horatius,” he said mildly, when she handed him the needle. “You may use that.”

  “Thanks, Dr. Horatius.”

  He snorted. She recognized it as a laugh. While he stitched, she held back the flow of blood and watched, heart in her mouth, as the wound was closed.

  When it was done, she felt weak.

  “Right, now we have to bandage it,” the physician – who had suddenly, mysteriously become Horatius to her – said, wearily.

  “Yes,” she murmured. She reached for the linen bindings. While the doctor held up the patient, she wound them round. She couldn't help but notice the white, strong shoulder laced, as it was, with blood, peeking through the torn cloth of the shirt.

  He is so handsome.

  Again, she looked away, feeling ashamed of herself. Fancy thinking such a thing! The fellow was dying!

  All the same, she thought as the doctor gently lowered him back onto the bed, she couldn't help it. The patient laid still, eyes closed. He had sniffed once or twice, as if about to wake, during the stitching. However, he slept yet.

  “There,” Horatius said, his gravelly voice indescribably weary. “He's as well as we can make him. We need a rest. It's getting late,” he said, stretching.

  “Will he wake, do you think?”

  The doctor raised a brow. “I don't know, Prudence,” he said. Hearing her name on his lips, so tender, made her heart ache. She hadn't realized before now that he'd come to care for her.

  My name is Horatius, she heard him say. She closed her eyes. “I hope he'll wake,” she said.

  “Aye, lass,” the doctor nodded, and laid a hand on her shoulder, protective. There was tenderness in his eyes, and regret. “I pray so too, then.”

  Prudence bit her lip and turned back to the bed, waiting for him to go out of the room. It was her job to fetch Bates, the orderly, and help get Alexander to an unoccupied bed.

  “Bates?” she called out of the door, voice ragged. “Can you help me?”

  “Miss?” Bates appeared, basket of dirty linen on one arm. He set it down. “Fellow needs carrying?”

  “To the ward upstairs,” she confirmed. There was a free bed there that morning.

  “Aye, Miss Prudence.” Bates grunted, lifting him as though he weighed nothing.

  Heart aching to see Alexander so motionless and still, Prudence bit down hard on her lip and followed Bates up.

  “I'd even like to hear him swear again,” she murmured to herself. The lively, arrogant Alexander was the one she missed. This still, pale, hollow shell distressed her terribly.

  “Here he is, miss,” Bates said, leaning down and laying him on the empty bed closest to the fire. “Don't distress yerself...doctor did his best.”

  “Yes, Bates,” she murmured, feeling too sad even to think, or offer him a caring smile. “I know.”

  Bates went out.

  The ward was almost empty, she noticed with mild detachment. A soldier slept soundly two beds away, but the two others who had lain there that morning were gone. One of them had been Greer, she recalled. They might as well have been alone together, she and the wounded man.

  Sighing, suddenly weary beyond belief, Prudence felt her legs give way below her and she sat down, heavily, on the bed.

  “Don't die,” she whispered to Alexander. “Please, don't die.”

  She didn't know why she felt that way, but a light would go out of her world were he to do so. She would do whatever she could to preserve him.

  Light, strange and flickering, played across Alexander's vision. He was warm, which surprised him. Where was he?

  The forest. The shots. The running.

  “Men..?” he murmured. “What have we…?”

  He opened his eyes. Firelight met them. For an instant, he wondered, terrified, if he was in some kind of antechamber of the Afterlife, expecting judgment. Why else would he be in a room, surrounded by walls?

  “Where is..?” he began.

  “Shh.”

  Alexander turned to his right, alarmed. He sent a wave of pain through his shoulder with the tug of motion.

  Closing his eyes, he bit his lip, a muttered oath escaping him. When he looked up, he was staring into green-toned eyes. “You!”

  He hadn't meant to say it so loudly, but it was an utterly involuntary response. He stared into that pale gaze and saw her eyes widen in surprise, and then soften.

  “You're in hospital,” she explained, seeming to guess at his confusion. “You've been shot.”

  “I guessed,” he said grimly. His left shoulder burned as if someone had poured acid into it, and the scent of blood, cloying and metallic, wafted up to his own nose, making him feel queasy. He shifted on the bed, strangely relieved to see her face.

  “How's it look?” he asked.

  “It's a big hole,” she said, and he saw her lips move in a grin, though her eyes were worried.

  “I guessed as much,” he said again. He let out a wry chuckle. “Am I likely to survive this big hole in me, or do we expect to be carrying me out feet-first tomorrow morning?” Oddly, he felt resigned to that, as if he didn't care too much about it either way.

  “Don't say it,” she snapped, surprising him. His eyes widened.

  “What?” His heart thumped in surprise. Did she really care about him? Even a little?

  “Don't talk like that,” she hissed, clearly angry. “You'll get well. You're going to walk out of this room by yourself in two weeks' time, or I shall want to know why.”

  He raised a brow. He laughed, but it hurt, so he stopped. “Two weeks?” he asked. Somehow, he hadn't thought it would take that long.

  “That's the least amount of time I'm keeping you here,” she insisted.

  He saw her lips quirk and wondered if, after all, she wasn't enjoying this. The thought made him smile, too, if wryly. “I suppose I must take orders,” he said, his voice a whisper. Why was he so tired? He tried to sit up, but he found it drained him instantly and he lay back, feeling impatient.

  “You must rest, and get well,” she said insistently.

  “I must?” He opened one eye. She was grinning at him. Again, he saw tenderness in her gaze, which surprised him. Perhaps she does care after all?

  “I insist,” she said. “Though I think you would have the good sense to do it anyway, for yourself.”

  He did grin then. She had her own particular brand of caring, this woman. Some nurses might have drowned him in a mix of pity and horror, while others would have been bracing. She alone was incredibly direct.

  “I'll do my best,” he murmured. “Now, is there any chance of a pillow? Or a blanket? I'm freezing and my shoulder aches.”

  Her eyes widened in surprise. She laughed.

  “Och, you're an arrogant one, aren't you?” she teased, mimicking his accent, which surprised him still further. He felt his mouth twitch with a wry grin. “If you insist, I'll see what I can do. Though most fellows would give their back teeth for that blanket you have there – it's the warmest we've got.”

  “Well, if they still have their back teeth, they're welcome to keep them,” he said, with a touch of asperity. “I'm freezing. And a pillow, if you please?”

  “I'll look in the
other ward,” she said, standing. “Though I warn you, Captain, such intransigence won't be encouraged.”

  “Och, it won't?” he asked, feeling his heart start to race. Oddly, for all his lethargy and weakness, her teasing still affected him. He bit back his big smile.

  “No,” she said, and this time she did not try to hide her smile. “It won't.”

  She went out of the room, leaving him alone.

  Having silence return around him again, Alexander leaned back on the headboard, winced as his shoulder ached, and considered his circumstance.

  Here he was, cut off from his men, forced to stay in bed for two weeks, at the mercy of a woman whose house he was – indirectly, admittedly – responsible for destroying. “I need to see Jenkins,” he said aloud.

  Setting aside his thoughts of Prudence, or the strange tug he felt in his heart when contemplating her, he focused on urgency.

  First, I need to find Carter or Miller and find out what happened after I got hit. Then, I need to find Jenkins. Find out if any of the men still live. And if they are on their way to relieve the colonel.

  That was his biggest worry. His miscalculation – splitting himself from the men, leaving them stranded in the woods with Jenkins – could have led to the colonel's downfall. He had been so stupid!

  “Well, I paid for it in part,” he thought wryly, looking at his shoulder. Blood had soaked through onto the whitish linen bandage, and he hazarded a guess that much more had spilled from it in the intervening time. He felt drained and weak.

  Here I am, he thought wryly, stuck in bed with a sharp tongue to attend me.

  He grinned, thinking of Prudence's brief reprimands. Was she, after all, glad to see him? He tried to recall the way her green eyes had lit when they looked at him, but the expression evaded him.

  Probably just glad to see me brought low, he thought to himself, forcing himself to be glum about it. Why would she like him, after all?

  I haven't done much except argue with her. Everyone in this infirmary seems in love with her, even the orderly. And that blasted physician!

  He was surprised at the stab of envy he felt, recalling the way the physician's eyes had softened when he'd looked at her. Mayhurst or Mayworth or...something.

  He sighed, irritably. He could well understand the doctor's admiration and besides, in many ways, they were far better suited than he and Prudence ever could be.

  Be sensible, you fool, he reprimanded himself sharply. You're the heir to the earl of Tillmore, and she's nobody.

  He winced, even thinking it. However, hard as the truth was, it was nevertheless true. Whoever she was – a widow, a faithful daughter who had somehow inherited the family home – she was nevertheless a peasant, at least in his world. His father would have disowned him.

  And I should have more sense.

  He sighed and made himself sit up against the boards of the bed, wincing as the wound in his shoulder pulled and stretched.

  “If you don't move it, the damn thing will heal skewed.” He told that to himself fiercely, knowing that he would be useless if he lost the use of both his arms. He would not be able to fight without both of them, for even with the cavalry-sword in one hand, he still needed the left to hold the reins.

  I suggest you stay in bed for two weeks. Her comment echoed back to him, bluntly.

  “I don't care what you say,” he told himself, and was surprised as a pang in his heart belied that. He did care, he realized, very much indeed.

  “As soon as I have enough strength to walk, I'm getting out of here,” he vowed.

  He heard footsteps coming back up the hallway. For a reason he only half-fathomed himself, he shut his eyes, feigning sleep.

  He heard familiar footsteps draw close to his bedside. Felt her stop, her shadow falling on him, the warmth of her body discernible on the cool air of the ward.

  “Fallen asleep. And stiff against the boards,” she sighed, and he could almost hear her click her tongue in mild reproach. He bit the inside of his lip, not wanting to move and betray he overheard.

  “You stubborn ox,” she murmured, infusing it with great affection. “Here, now.”

  He felt his eyes stretch and fought to keep his face still, surprise overwhelming him, as she bent closer and, very gently, tucked him in like a child. His heart thudded as she stroked a hand, gently, across his brow. She slid the pillow under him, cushioning his shoulders.

  “Goodnight, you silly fellow,” she whispered. Then, leaving him completely confused and amazed, she left.

  FROM A CLOSER PLACE

  Alexander shifted in bed. Sunshine, pale and surprisingly-bright, fell onto his face, making him wake.

  He lay back for a moment, slowly coming awake, and taking stock of his surroundings. His shoulder was aching with a familiar throbbing heat that he recognized, and that disturbed him. It was, he knew, the first sign of corruption in the wound. That, he thought grimly, was all he needed.

  He listened, his hearing a little hazy and distorted with weariness, to the sounds around him. Somewhere in the courtyard, a cart drove over cobblestones, the wheels grinding and rolling. Closer, someone swept floors. He heard voices, low and murmuring, in the hallway nearby. One of them seemed to be a woman.

  “Prudence?” he murmured.

  He felt his own lips twist in a wry smile. What was he thinking, mooning about after her? Probably half the fellows in the ward were in love with her. Moreover, he reckoned grimly, half the fellows in the ward had more chance to get to know her than he ever did, or could risk taking.

  Your uncle would chase you from the door of Lachlann Hall.

  He sighed, noticing the ache in his shoulder now. Prudence, and any interaction he might have with her, was not worth thinking about. When he left here, he would have to forget her. He had to.

  “What does a man have to do to get fed in this place, eh?” he said aloud a moment later. His stomach ached furiously and he recalled that he'd eaten almost nothing the previous day. No wonder he felt so light-headed! It certainly wasn't going to help.

  “What's that, sir?” the fellow two beds down murmured, low-voiced.

  “I said,” Alexander said, annoyed for having spoken loudly. “Does a fellow have any sense if he wants to get fed around here?”

  “He does,” a voice from the hallway answered briskly, “but only if he asks nicely.”

  “Oh,” Alexander grumbled, though his heart soared. “You.”

  “Yes,” Prudence said, gentle face touched with a teasing grin. “Me. Are you wanting breakfast?”

  “I'm wanting someone to let me out of this hellish bed and let me go and find my men,” he said cantankerously.

  “Well, I can manage breakfast. And I think your men are already waiting for you...? A fellow called Carter was here earlier, looking for you.”

  “Carter's here?” He shot upright in bed, and then closed his eyes as his head began to throb. The room revolved, slowly, pounding with the gray fuzz in his mind. His shoulder throbbed, distantly.

  “Yes, Carter's here,” she said. “I told him to wait downstairs until we'd finished our rounds. I don't know if you're in any fit state to see him.”

  “Send him in,” Alexander managed, grinding words past the blinding pain in his head.

  “You don't have to shout,” Prudence said acidly.

  Alexander sighed. “Fine. Please, can you send Lieutenant Carter?”

  However, she was already gone. A moment later, he heard booted feet in the hallway.

  “Carter?” He sat up in bed quickly, then recalled the blinding throb of his head and moved more slowly instead. “You're still alive. News?”

  Opposite him, the smooth face of Lieutenant Carter split with a grin. His eyes were worried. “Aye, I'm alive, sir,” he said, grinning. His hat was under one arm, and he looked gray in the face, as if he'd been awake all night. “I'm more surprised the same can be said for you, though, sir…?”

  Alexander grimaced. “Half-alive, at any rate. I might be more
so, if they would only feed me.” He directed the words to carry, suspecting that someone was within earshot in the hallway. To his edification, he saw a shadow moving there.

  She is listening.

  He bit back a grin.

  “Sir, I rejoice to see you alive. We were so worried! We rode directly back to Jenkins, with you with us. We thought...” Carter sounded tormented.

  “I know, you thought I was dead,” Alexander cut him off, feeling in no mood for a fuss. “What happened? Is Jenkins here?” he asked quickly, suddenly eager for news about his men.

  “Jenkins made it to the fort, sir,” Carter said.

  “Whew.” Alexander felt a weight drop from his back that he hadn't known he carried. He had half-expected that Jenkins and his men would have been slaughtered in the woods on their pathway, condemned by his carelessness.

  “Sir, we told Brewer of what happened.” Carter continued, after giving him a moment for the first news to digest.

  “Good,” Alexander said raggedly. “And? Did he...”

  “The message-bearer was questioned, sir,” Carter interjected. “Apparently, other people have seen this Bradway too, so his story was not false. It seems someone is deliberately sowing disinformation.”

  “I thought so,” Alexander sighed, gritting his teeth in frustration. Because some clever sort thought to cut them off from Falkirk with deception, he must lie here in a hospital bed, with a festering wound in his arm, without even a decent breakfast?

  “Sir? If you like, we can...” Carter started, ever eager to prove useful.

  “If you really want to help,” Alexander ground out slowly, “you and the rest will gather a platoon and head south to Sunderland, and leave me here, with a decent breakfast.”

  Carter's eyes widened, then he nodded, smiling gently. “Yes, sir. Sir? You are certain?”

  Knowing he would be cut off from his troops and likely miss out on the most decisive battle in their recent history, Alexander, frustrated, nodded. He could have wept. However, what could he do? “Yes, I'm certain.”

  Saluting, moved, Carter nodded. “I'll take your word to the fellows, sir. They'll be most grateful. And we all send our wishes for your speedy recovery.”