My Lady Midnight by Laurie Grant

Author:Laurie Grant [Laurie Grant]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781459275508
Publisher: Harlequin

Chapter Thirteen

Alain passed through the hall an hour or so later, just as the household was sitting down to their much-delayed supper. He still wore his bloodstained mail, and sighed as he held out his arms to his children and let them reassure themselves that he was, indeed, unhurt.

“Ye look exhausted, my lord,” Claire said, coming up behind Peronelle and Guerin. “Sit ye down and take some supper, and rest ye.” Exhausted barely began to describe the haggardness of his lean countenance. His eyes, drained of all life, made Claire’s heart ache.

He managed a ghost of a smile at her gentle commands. “Nay, I want no supper. Not…yet, anyway. I would just have someone to disarm me…” His voice broke. “That was Verel’s task…”

“I’ll come to your chamber and assist you, my lord,” the seneschal announced, rising from his seat on the dais and snapping his fingers to a servant to attend him. “I’ll have hot water brought for you as well.”

“Verel—is he…” She couldn’t bring herself to say the words, to add to the pain in his eyes.

“He still breathes,” Alain said, his arms around his children, and looking over their dark heads at Claire. “The bolt has been removed, and the wound bled grievously, but Father Gregory’s managed to staunch it. Ewald cut away his hauberk so that we would not have to cause him more agony by pulling it off of him.”

“Is he…awake?”

Alain shook his head. “He…passed out when we were pulling the shaft from his belly.”

Claire thought Alain looked as if he could very well pass out himself, and she wished there were some way she could force him to sit down and take some nourishment. Something in his eyes warned her not to try, though. He was doing what he had to do in order to live with himself.

She could only watch as he gestured to Sir Gautier and trudged up the stairs as if each one were a mountain.

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