Page 40 of Shadow Queen
The captain was quiet.
“Perhaps you can reason with her,” Mikael said. “She seems to listen to you.”
Caspian hesitated. “I’m not sure she’d see that as my place. And I’m not sure she’d hear me. Not on this.”
Mikael nodded again—it was as he’d feared. “Is it beyond repair?”
Caspian gave a reluctant tilt of his head. “I don’t know.”
Mikael crossed his arms and brought his fist to his lips. “I can’t lose her.”
“Give it time, then, Salar. I won’t say that she’ll forgive, but I don’t think she can lose you either.”
Mikael looked at the captain curiously. “Why aren’t you angry with me, Northman? Why don’t you hate me? For what I’ve done to you, your men, your kingdom. And now to your justice, whom I can see you’re close with.”
He watched as the captain drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I have been angry. Sometimes I still am. But I know war makes men no longer men. And we’ve warred for so long that none of us should recognize ourselves, including me. I don’t like your decisions. They wouldn’t have been my own, but I don’t wear the burden of the crown.”
“I don’t know what to think of you, Captain,” Mikael admitted. He looked out over the wall at the city. “I have to travel to the Horsemen tribes of Caan. I won’t be gone long, but perhaps long enough that Salara may settle a bit. Will you tell her, tell her that I’ll be eager to return to her?”
Caspian nodded. “Of course.”
Mikael gave him a nod in thanks and left the wall.
Washed but not rested, Norah made her way back to the sanctuary. She worried Alexander and Soren would try to kill each other again, or disappear to tend to themselves. But in peeking through the door, she saw them still resting on their beds.
She tried to enter quietly, but Soren was awake and turned his head toward her. She glanced over at Alexander, who was still asleep.
“You’re still here,” she said softly, drawing close to the commander.
He gave an annoyed snort. “I thought you might see me lashed again if I left.”
She couldn’t help a small smile. Norah picked up the bowl of salve on the table and sat carefully on the bed beside him. She touched his back gently, testing the wounds. The lacerations had started to scab over, but they still needed care. She dipped her fingertips into the healing mixture and spread it across the torn skin.
“You don’t have to tend me,” he said.
She shrugged. “Well, I’m here, you’re here, and you need it, so that’s how this works.”
Norah finished applying the salve and wiped her hands on a cloth. She picked up a rolled strip of clean linen. “Can you sit up?”
He pushed himself up, wincing.
She held the end of the linen roll against his chest, and he raised his arms, letting her wrap it around him. She looped the wrap over his shoulder and pinned it, then picked up another.
“You’ll send him back to the North?” Soren asked as she worked.
She knew he would press her to send Alexander back. It was the right thing to do. It was what she should do, and she had agreed. Why was she struggling so much with it?
He grabbed her hand, stopping her. “You’ll send him back?”
Reluctantly, she nodded. She pinned the second wrap, then pulled some fresh clothing for him from a side chair.
Soren rose gingerly from the bed. He pulled on his breeches but eyed the shirt she held for him.
“You should keep covered while you heal, and not let the wounds dry out,” she said, stepping close. “Let me help.”
But he pulled away. “I don’t need help to dress myself,” he said sharply.
She knew he felt vulnerable, and that it unsettled him. “I know you don’t,” she said back, with her own sharpness, trying to keep from sounding too caring. “But I don’t want you messing up my bandaging.”
