Duty-Bound [ Lore of Penrua: Book II ]

13

It seemed there would be no end to the suffering. Each day was hell, each night a torment. Why had they not simply let him die?

With an effort, Kaori pushed his bitter thoughts away. He knew he was lucky to be alive. Were it not for the neverending pain, perhaps he could see that. Except...

He looked down at the arm of his favorite chair, at the place where his right hand would once have rested. The empty space was a cruel reminder that there was part of him missing forever. He clenched his eyes shut.

"Kaori, are you all right?"

The sound of Aun's voice breaking into his thoughts no longer startled him. Since they had been back in the palace, she had hardly left his side. Although Aun had seen as much of him as was needful given her role in his life as his healer, and although she was always free with orders and advice, she had mercifully maintained a professional distance. Even when she helped him to change his clothes or to bathe, as she had just this morning—things that filled Kaori with restless frustration and shame—she was calm and courteous, leaving him to believe that the embarrassment and inconvenience was completely one-sided.

Kaori had begun to know her a little, this woman who had saved his life. She misliked idleness and could seek out something to keep her busy no matter where it might be hiding. She had a frank manner unlike that of any woman he'd ever known and a sense of humor that was bright as a copper coin. For some reason, she'd been a constant presence since he'd been wounded in the Battle of Hanpe, although Kaori had not been a willing patient. In his darkest hours, he had craved solitude, and more than once he'd longed for death, but none of his hard words had turned Aun away.

He heard her moving close at hand, heard her set something down on the table before him. The click of a cup against a saucer told him it was tea.

"Tell me there's something in there," he said.

"There isn't. I can only give you so much," she replied.

"Aun." The stump of his severed arm and the slash across his chest still gave him constant pain; Aun's tonics were an occasional relief, the only thing he looked forward to as the hours crept by.

He felt her cool fingers on his brow. "Do you feel feverish?" she asked.

Kaori opened his eyes. Aun's expression was calm, but there was concern in her voice. "No," he admitted. "But I do not see why that stays your hand. Have some mercy on me, woman."

"Good," she said, calm as ever; she usually ignored his biting comments. "Drink this tea, and then...Then I will bring you some wine. One cup."

With a sigh, Kaori reached for the cup of tea with his left hand. It had always been the clumsier one; he was weak now, his fingers constantly atremble, and the tea sloshed over his fingers. "I always considered myself easy of nature, but I'm beginning to chafe under all these orders."

"Beginning?" She raised her eyebrows with a purse of her lips. "If you can joke, it's a good sign. You remind me of Matei—" and here she stumbled, her brow creasing— "which, I suppose, is logical. It's strange...Not just to see a little of him in you, but to know that he has a brother at all."

"Brothers." Kaori sipped the tea. It was hot and strong and not too sweet—just as he preferred it. Kaori wondered why Aun, a healer and a woman of skill, chose to spend her afternoons making tea for crippled men. She was Arcborn, but even so. "Koreti has two brothers."

"That name...Koreti...it doesn't suit him." Aun sank into the chair next to his. Again, Kaori recognized how different she was from other Arcborn women he'd known. When he had been a prisoner in her camp, the power dynamics had been clear: she had been in control. But here, in his own parlor, in his father's palace, it was disorienting to watch her sit next to him without so much as a by-your-leave. It would be easy to explain away her manner as ignorance, but Kaori did not think ignorance explained it all. She used his name and no title, made forays into conversation, and joked with him; all of it seemed deliberate, as if it were her intent to assert that she did not see any difference between them.