Healer's Touch (3 page)

Gil made no reply. Aru ventured a glance up to find his friend staring at him, clearly unfooled. Aru sighed and came clean. “Thirty-four days.”

Gil's brows shot up. “Has she been entertaining clients in your parlor then?”

“No! That is, I'm not sure she's entertaining clients at all, these days.”

Gil grinned and leaned back in his chair. “You old dog!”

It took a moment for Gil's meaning to sink in. When it did, Aru felt his face heat up. “It's nothing like that. She finds the work fulfilling.”

“Does she now?” Gil's eyes crinkled at the corners, but the humor in them couldn't lift Aru's mood.

“I thought she did.”

Gil frowned, his amusement souring. Leaning forward, he took the bottle and refilled Aru's glass. “What's happened?”

“I don't know. We fought this afternoon.”

“About what?”

Aru only sat there, staring out the window at the lengthening shadows of evening, feeling his face fill with heat.

“Ah. You made an overture and she rejected you?”

Aru swallowed. “Not exactly.” He turned to look at his friend's well-meaning, sympathetic face. “She wants more than I can give her.”

“And what exactly is that?”

Aru reached for his wine. “She wants me to put aside my wife.”

Gil was silent for a long moment. “It seems to me that it is your wife who has put you aside.”

Aru scowled. “I took a vow before my god to be faithful to her.”

“You also swore to live according to your god's laws.”

Aru felt his chest tighten with defensive anger. “You would hold me in blame for that?”

Gil bristled, his eyes narrowing. If Aru had not been what he was he might have apologized for his waspish tone, but in truth he had every right to be bitter. They sat glaring at each other for a moment, before Gil's expression softened. “It hardly matters whose fault it was. The Maiden exploited your power without your leave, and used it to kill. And she's lauded for it—it is you who has lost everything, to atone for a sin you didn't commit and could not prevent.”

Aru stared at his friend, his throat tight, his eyes stinging. He thought of the Maiden Mira, of what she had done to him nearly twenty years ago, and couldn't hate her. She had saved lives, not just her own and Aru's, but countless others. The very nature of the change she had brought about in him by her heedless actions left him helpless but to forgive her transgression. In any case, he was no longer fit to judge her, or anyone.

“There is no way for me to appeal my sentence, no tribunal of judges to whom I can present my case. Even if there was, it would be no use. Any pardon offered would only be a tacit approval for other Darjhi to allow themselves to be used as I was. I may have been but a sword in the hands of another, but Paldir god is still entitled to cleave that sword in twain.”

“Just or not, your god has punished you, Aru,” Gil said softly. “How long are you going to punish yourself?”

Aru sat there, looking at Gil's earnest face, feeling his insides cave in like Inella's house had done. Gil didn't understand. He couldn't. It wasn't about punishment. It was simple reality. He lived in dishonor and would not add to it, but even so, dishonor was not his greatest fear. He was Omahru-azhi. Walking dead. His new life had ramifications that would freeze Gil's blood if he knew of them.

“Would you seek solace outside your marriage, Gil?”

Gil's mouth twisted with an unexpected wryness, and he opened his mouth, only to close it once more. Color stole into his cheeks under his beard. “I would never betray Lianon,” he said at last. “Tell me, does Zharina also honor your wedding vows?”

“I have no way of knowing.”

“Would you expect her to?”

A pat answer leapt to Aru's tongue and withered there. “No,” he finally admitted. “But she vowed to be faithful to Aru, a Darjhan. Not to Aru, an Omahru-azhi. I am no longer the man she married. I cannot hold her to her promise.”

Gil grinned. “Then neither can she hold you to yours.”

Aru stared, beginning to get annoyed. “I hold myself to my vow.”

With a groan, Gil put his face in his hands. “So you can never touch a woman again?”

“Not for as long as I live.”

Gil laughed. The sound was devoid of humor. “Guess it's just as well that won't be forever anymore.”

Against his will, Aru felt his lips turn up at the corners. Shaking off the foulness of his mood, he lifted his glass and drained it in one long swallow. Fixing Gil with a determined glower, he slapped a coin on the table. “This conversation is depressing. Let's go get drunk.”

Gil laughed and pushed to his feet. “Sounds like an idea.”

 

Viera lay Inella's daughter Krista next to her brother Vin, taking care not to jar the girl's splint. She pulled the blanket up over them both and doused all the candles but one. In the bed opposite, Inella already slept, overcome by poppy milk and the exuberant love of her little ones. Inella's mother Mai stood near the infirmary door, looking half grateful half lost. Her tired eyes met Viera's.

“It's kind of you to let them stay.”

Viera shrugged it off. “It will help Inella recover to have them near. Where will you go tonight?”

Mai's gaze dropped to her feet. “I…I don't know. Inella and her wee ones are the only family I have in the city. In truth, I don't know where any of us will go. The house is nothing but a pile of rubble.”

Viera took her arm and led her into the kitchen. She poured a generous cup of red wine, added some honey, cinnamon and clove, and a hot stone from the coals in the stove. Waving Mai to a chair, she handed her the warmed wine. “Where is Inella's husband?”

“Ned took a job on a ship. Dangerous, but the pay was too good to turn down. We ate well for two seasons. Bought the house. Even put a little bit away.” She took a long swallow of her wine, closing her eyes as it settled in her stomach. “Six years ago, they sailed for Qaranica. Never came back.”

Viera frowned with her tiny cup of absinthe raised halfway to her lips. “But Vin cannot be more than four.”

At last the woman's eyes filled, though she stubbornly refused to let the tears spill. “My Inella has had to endure much in keeping a roof above us and our bellies full. I do what I can to help, but there is little money in mending shirts. She has been forced to…”

“It's all right,” Viera said gently, covering the woman's hand with her own. “I understand.”

“Please, miss, don't judge her too harshly.”

Viera smiled. “I do not judge her at all. We do what we must to survive.” Mai didn't exactly look convinced, and Viera wondered with some amusement what the woman would say if she knew just what part Viera had played in healing her daughter.

“Come,” she said, rising and helping the weary woman to her feet. “I'll make up a bed for you on the settee in the salon. When Inella's well, Master Aru and I will help you find a place, and a means to pay for your own keep. Until then, you can all stay here with us.”

Mai pulled her to a halt and startled her with a hug. “Thank you, miss. How can we ever repay you?”

For about the tenth time today, Viera fought off a wave of weeping, blinking furiously against the stinging in her eyes and forcing the lump down from her throat. “Nonsense,” she said, more briskly than she'd intended. “Come on and let's get you settled for the night. We can worry about tomorrow when it gets here.”

But when Mai was settled and Viera found her own bed upstairs, the day's troubles were there waiting for her. She lay alone in her too-big bed, her body on fire, every inch of her flesh in a state of agonizing hyper-awareness. The linen sheets were cool and hot at the same time, slipping imaginary fingers across her flushed skin. Her nipples were hard knots of tender flesh longing to be touched by fingers other than her own. Longing to be kissed, licked, suckled. Her belly felt heavy with the imprint of Aru's hand—it was as if his touch was branded into her skin. She felt him there, above her womb, but not in the places she wanted him most.

How many times had Viera come during this afternoon's healing? Seven? Eight? And yet her body was as primed for sex as if it had not known release for days and days. She thought back to their altercation in the salon, to the arc of need that had sprung between them, to the bleakness on his face as he sternly denied himself everything a man should want. Thought about her own body's response to his anguish. Mere moments after rising from a pleasure so intense it felt like her body had been turned inside out, all it took was one look at Aru's turgid cock and she wanted nothing more than to drop to her knees in front of it and drink him dry.

And it would never happen. She knew he wanted her—she had only to picture the thickness of his organ straining the seam of his trousers to have her proof—but he would never touch her beyond that one, sterile point of contact necessary to draw her power. He would never use her the way she wanted to be used. And he would never allow her to give him anything meaningful other than the power of her womb. Not pleasure. Certainly not love.

As her eyes began to sting, she slipped one hand down between her legs. She was slick and swollen, her labia plump and hypersensitive, her clit a knot of agony. She began to rub, but it was no use. She didn't want to touch herself. It seemed as if touching herself was all she'd been doing for as long as she could remember.

With a sigh, she drew her fingers away and clenched her fist. Rolled onto her side and closed her eyes, forcing thoughts of Aru from her head, trying to remember instead the last man she had fucked. She lay there a long time before she finally came up with his name, and his face remained a blank circle in her memory.

Chapter Three

Aru let himself in and shut the door silently behind him. Creeping through the front hall to the infirmary, he assured himself that Inella was well, and took note of the two children asleep in the second bed. He stood and listened to the snores emerging from the salon.

The mother.

Something brittle inside him cracked and fell away at the thought of what Viera had done, how she had welcomed these people into his home. His eyes burned, his breath coming swift and hard, and he paused, holding his head in his hands until he was once more in control of himself.

His limbs were steady as he crossed to the stairs. He had half-carried Gil back to his own apartment in a state of inebriation bordering on coma, but it took a very great deal to intoxicate a Darjhan—even a fallen one. Aru's coins had vanished one by one down Aliannet's bodice until his purse was empty, and still, he was lamentably sober this night.

Sober and in pain. Even before he reached the top of the stairs, he was achingly hard, as if all it took was being in the same house with her. On the landing, he stood and stared at her door, then deliberately turned and entered his own room.

Gods, it was hot up here. With a muttered curse, he opened the window, jerking at the ties of his shirt. He tugged it off over his head and leaned on the window frame to let the chill spring breeze caress his bare torso. Across the street, a pair of whores plied their trade, calling offers to passers by, flashing their breasts at those who showed interest. There was a time when Aru would have watched their games, but he had no stomach for it anymore. His erection was like a steel rod, but it had nothing to do with any woman outside.

Crossing to the bed, he reached for the buttons of his trousers, but his straining cock reacted with a bolt of pain and a wet surge of fluid.

“Paldir help me,” he muttered, flopping facedown on the mattress. He closed his eyes, but she was there waiting for him, her pale skin dotted with freckles, her auburn hair like a river of silk pouring over his white hands, her breasts peaked with the dusky pearls of her nipples. Gods, he had seen her naked in all her glory, had sat beside her, one hand on her belly as she writhed and screamed in the extremity of her arousal. He had seen it. He had caused it! It was but a tiny step further down the road to madness to imagine her breasts filling his hands, her nipples pressed between his lips as he suckled her, his cream-slicked fingers sliding high up inside her heat. He groaned at the thought of that pink tongue of hers lapping at his chest, licking a wet trail across his belly and down to his shaft. Her face, smiling up at him as she took him between her sweet lips and sucked him in, hard and deep, her hair spilling across his torso and between his legs.

Damn. With a start, he realized he was grinding his cock into the mattress. Sitting up, he rubbed his hands up and down his face, hard enough to chafe his skin. He'd never be able to sleep. Downstairs in the kitchen, he had a large cask of mead—the closest thing to
hennath
he could find in Anduni lands—but he couldn't fetch himself any without risking waking Inella or her family. And to be honest, he doubted even a river of drink would soften his cock tonight.

Damn, damn,
damn
. Rising, he tiptoed to the door and peeked across the landing to Viera's room. Her door stood ajar, a bar of candlelight slanting across the floorboards. She always left one burning next to the bed, in case a patient needed her in the night. Before Aru realized what he was doing, he was standing just outside her door, peeking in.

She slept, her hair like a dark cloud against the stark white of the sheets. She wore no shift—the dusky tip of one breast peeked at him over the edge of the blanket, and one long, curvy leg thrust out from the covers. Her bare toes enthralled him—so mundane, yet so delicate. He thought about taking them in his mouth, one by one. She stirred, shifting so that her other breast emerged from under the blanket, and he felt his shaft thicken in response, hardening until he thought his trouser buttons might end up permanently imprinted along its underside.

Heat flowered from the root of his member to spread its licking fingers all along his limbs. He pressed a hand to it, closing his eyes on a wave of need that left him dizzy. When he opened them, he was somehow standing right beside her bed, looking down on her face.