WindLegends Saga 9: WindRetriever (15 page)

"Shut up," Sajin was ordering, ignoring the garbage spewing from his friend's mouth. "I don't know what you're saying but just shut the hell up!"

"He doesn't understand what's happening to him," Rupine said. "Khamsin, please! Lie still!"

Raphaella came to the bed and looked down at Conar. She bent over him and took his face in her hands. "Stop it before you do more harm to yourself, McGregor."

"Buh...chuh!" he spat. "Fuh...cuhn...buh..chuh!"

"I may be a fucking bitch," Raphaella answered, "but I did not do this to you. It was the tenerse. You were given too much."

Conar stopped struggling, but he was still panting and still glaring up at the woman with intense fury. "Ruh....puhn?" he questioned, his gaze trying to find the man above him.

"It was not Rupine's fault." Raphaella motioned Sajin to let go of his captive. When the man did, she sat down beside Conar. "All the tenerse you've been given over the years has been building up in your system, destroying your body's ability to absorb it, and it's caused the reaction that brought on the stroke."

"Stuh...ohk," Conar repeated, seeming to grasp his situation finally. He stared at her, although he couldn't actually make out her features.

"You have finally had an allergic reaction to the tenerse, Conar," Raphaella explained.

"Toire didn't know you were allergic to it. None of us did. I doubt Kahlil would have given it to you in the first place if he had known."

Yuri moved aside as Catherine tugged on his arm, demanding he release his hold on her husband, too. Rupine lifted his hands from the Serenian's temples.

"How is your vision?" the sorceress asked, noticing the way Conar kept squinting at her.

"Bluh...duh."

"All right," Raphaella said, letting out a long sigh. "I was afraid it might be. I want you to relax. Give yourself time to heal. If your speech hasn't improved by morning, we'll start working on some exercises that will help. As for the blurred vision, that will correct itself."

"You...suhr?"

She smiled at him. "Yes, beloved, I am sure."

Catherine tensed at the endearment. She had been following most of the conversation and now knew Conar had been told all the pertinent information concerning his condition. He seemed to settle down and the anger was leaving his face.

"Cath...ren?"

Raphaella got up from the bed. "She's at your left side."

Charlotte Boyett-Compo WINDRETRIEVER 67

Conar turned his head and searched for her. As her hand caressed his cheek, he moved to her, turning so that his head lay cradled in her lap.

"Stuh...wuh...muh," he begged.

Catherine looked up at the other woman. "He wants you to stay with him," Raphaella told her. Catherine nodded.

Sajin caught Raphaella's arm, once more feeling the intense sexual thrill coursing through his veins when he did. He had to fight the urge to drag her against him and wondered why her touch had not seemed to phase Conar like it did him.

"Because he's immune to it at the moment," the woman answered, surprising the Kensetti.

"If he were himself, he'd be slavering over me, too."

Catherine snorted, glancing up and away.

A dull red blush spread over the nomad's cheeks and he dropped his hand. He had to stammer his question to her for he was acutely aware of both Yuri and Rupine looking at him with commiseration. "Will he be all right?" Sajin asked.

"In time," Raphaella replied. "I would be greatly surprised if he is still having speech problems come morning." She looked behind Sajin to find her son staring at her from the door.

"We will be up the rest of the night to insure that doesn't happen."

"He's not really seeing us all that clearly, is he?" Sajin wanted to know.

Raphaella shook her head and lowered her voice even though she knew Conar wouldn't understand what she said. "No and that concerns me. I was overjoyed to learn there was no paralysis and, as I said, I feel the speech problem can be corrected. But the sight..........." She shivered. "I fear that is irreparable, but he doesn't need to know that for now."

Fear nudged Sajin's heart. "Could it get worse?"

"He could go blind," Raine said from the doorway. As his mother turned an irritated frown to him, the little boy shrugged. "Of course, we will do our best to see that doesn't happen, either."

Sajin frowned, as well. "I never believed in witches before now," he mumbled. He shook his head. "But now that I've seen you women in action, first at Abbadon and now here ...." His voice trailed off and he looked down at Raphaella. "My sister says ...."

"Sybelle," Raphaella said, making the word seem obscene. Her mouth twisted.

The nomad was surprised. "You know her?"

Raphaella flung her waist length black hair back over her shoulder. "I've heard of her."

"Is she ...? I mean, can she ...?" Sajin scrunched his shoulders. "You know."

"Your sibling is about as adept at her craft as a nomad bitch can be," Raine spoke for his mother. When Sajin turned a fierce glare on him at what he thought was an insult, the little boy smiled. "Bitch in the scientific usage only, Prince Sajin. I meant no disrespect to your sibling."

"I can't believe you're Conar's son," Sajin snapped. "Your father has more personality in his little finger than you do in your whole body! And despite his arrogance, far more tact!"

"I'll learn," Raine answered, unperturbed by the man's accusations. "I have an excellent teacher in my sire, don't you agree?"

"Conar needs to sleep," Catherine told them, wanting them all to leave so she could be alone with her husband. She looked up at Rupine and the physician nodded his agreement. "All this talk is keeping him from doing so."

"You will be staying with him, then?" Raphaella asked her. The sorceress watched the Outer Kingdom woman's face harden.

"Good night, Mistress Chastayne," Catherine replied.

Raphaella's gaze narrowed. She stared at the younger woman for a moment more then took Charlotte Boyett-Compo WINDRETRIEVER 68

Sajin's arm. "Come, my love. Perhaps we will get some sleep, as well."

Yuri glanced over at Rupine. Neither man thought Sajin would be sleeping at all. From the deep red flush that spread over the Kensetti's face, he didn't think so either.

Conar had been listening to the words being spoken, but he had not understood any of it.

He hadn't recognized the little boy's voice, but instinct told him it was the son Raphaella had taken from him long ago. He had lifted his head to see the boy, but all he had been able to detect was the nimbus of gleaming blond hair and the thin little body. There had been no inflection in the boy's voice and Conar wondered if there was any emotion in him, either.

"Jubra est nilius, Conar?"

The Serenian turned his head in Catherine's lap and looked up at her. His brows drew together. She had asked him if he wanted anything in a language he didn't even know she knew.

"Wuh...tuh," he answered.

Catherine had to strain to reach the water pitcher. Her husband's arms were around her waist and he was holding her as though he never meant to let her go. She poured him a tumbler of cool water and helped him to drink.

"Foler chunst myrmos," Catherine said as she smoothed the hair back from his forehead.

"Everything is going to be all right."

"I...nuh," he said.

"Susta chun uci." I am here.

"Luhf...you...Cath...ren."

Catherine bent down to kiss him. "Susta amat exclu, assi, Conar."

Charlotte Boyett-Compo WINDRETRIEVER 69

Conar woke with a start. It was still dark out and he had trouble at first remembering where he was. Lifting his head and looking about the room, he crinkled his forehead with confusion, for he did not recognize the furnishings. A light sigh at his left side made him turn his head that way and he found his wife sleeping beside him, her hands tucked under her pillow as she lay on her side. He could barely see her through the darkness, but her scent was as familiar to him as Liza's had been.

Laying his head down, he continued to watch her. There was a faint smile on her face and he wondered what dreams she dreamt that made her pretty face so soft. He turned to his own side, the better to see her, and slowly scanned her relaxed features.

Marie Catherine Steffenovitch McGregor could not be called a classical beauty, he thought, but she was a lovely, lovely woman. Her face was oval with a slight point to her chin. The eyes behind the faint tint of purple at her lids were a shifting shade of hazel that sometimes turned pale green when she laughed and a darker verdant hue when she was angry. She wasn't tall, maybe five foot five, but she had long, tapered legs that made her seem taller. Cat, as her friends called her, was a bit overweight with a lush cleavage that made him want to bury his face in the crease between her breasts. Her nose was a bit too big for her face, but her lips were perfect, he thought as he stared at them: full and sensual, given to easy smiles. In all, to him, she was astonishingly beautiful.

"Has no one ever told you it is impolite to stare, milord?"

Conar jumped, his gaze going immediately from the suddenly smiling mouth of his wife to her teasing eyes. He felt the color creep into his face at being caught studying her.

"Conar," she laughed, reaching out to touch his cheek, "you look like a little boy caught with his hand in the cookie jar!" His blush deepened and Catherine tweaked his nose. "How are you feeling?"

"Fine," he mumbled. He eased over to his back.

Catherine held her breath. "No headache."

He thought about it for a moment. "No."

She didn't know if he remembered the events of the night before, but he was responding to her questions easily and his words were no longer thick and slurred. She raised up on her elbow and looked closely at him.

"Do you know where you are?" she asked.

Conar shrugged. "Some keep." He shifted his gaze about the room. "What time is it, anyway?"

Catherine breathed a sigh of relief. "I don't know." She flung her covers back and got out of bed. "With the windows painted black, I can't see outside to gauge the sun." She flung Raphaella's silk wrapper around her.

"Why the hell did the bitch paint the goddamned windows?" Conar snarled, looking over at his wife. "Is she afraid of people looking out or people looking in?"

There was not even a hint of difficulty with his speech and Catherine was greatly relieved.

As a matter of fact, his testy mood was even normal for him. Conar had never been a morning person.

"And how the hell did I wind up in her goddamned keep, anyway?"

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Catherine smiled. Not only testy, she thought, but displeased with where he was. That made his wife very happy. "She's a healer and …."

"I
know
that, Catherine," Conar interrupted. "What I want to know is why you brought me to her of all people!" He flipped over to his side. "I hate the woman."

That statement pleased Catherine even more. "I think we all understood that when you tried to strangle her last eve," she giggled.

Conar looked over his shoulder at her. He might not have been able to see her face clearly in the gloom, but he had not mistaken her smug tone. "What'd I do?" he asked, not really caring.

"When she told you about the stroke …," Catherine began, but he sat up so quickly in the bed, she stopped.

"Damn it!" he thundered. "Now, I remember!" His jaw clenched. "It was the tenerse!"

"Will you lower your voice?" she asked, coming back to the bed and sitting down. "The rest of the keep may not be up as yet."

"The shit could have killed me, Cat!" he protested. "I've had so damned much of it." The memory of his garbled speech and his inability to understand what was being said to him made his face turn pale. "That shit could have destroyed my mind!"

"But it didn't," Catherine said in a reasonable voice. "You don't seem to be suffering any lasting side effects from it."

He pondered that remark. No, he thought, he didn't. He hadn't been left paralyzed from the stroke and he could talk as plainly as before. There wasn't any difficulty in understanding what Catherine was saying to him. He put his hand up to his temple. The headache seemed to have left him and he was hungry, which was always a good sign after a migraine episode. The only problem he could see was his blurred vision, but the darkness of the room probably accounted for most of that.

"Well?" Catherine inquired, watching the play of emotions crossing his expressive face as he thought through the problem. "Are you content no grave damage has been done?"

"I suppose," he mumbled. He looked about the room. "I've gotta piss, Catherine." He turned his gaze to her. "Real bad."

His wife laughed and scooted off the bed. Stooping down, she fumbled under the bed for the chamber pot and dragged it out. She stood by the side of the bed as he crawled over and got up.

Her smile slid away as she saw him waver for a moment. "What's the matter?" she asked.

"You'd better hold it for me," he answered, feeling a bit groggy. He put one hand on his wife's shoulder to steady himself and the other to his manhood.

"Don't you dare splatter me, McGregor," she warned. His hand was heavy on her shoulder and she wondered if he was aware that he was not just bracing himself against her but holding on as though he might fall.

The hollow ching of his urine flowing into the chamber pot seemed to amuse him although he didn't smile. Catherine thought back to the last week and a half and realized she hadn't seen him smile or heard him laugh since Abbadon fell to the Daughterhood. Nor had any of them seen him cry or appear to grieve in any way for the friends he had lost in that hellish place. It was almost as though he had put all his emotions on hold.