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The dagger wavered for a moment, and she looked at the ugly face of her captor. “Why hesitate? You can kill me at any minute with your bare hands.”

“That’s truth,” the man acknowledged, and he slipped his dagger into its scabbard.

“Bring me water,” she commanded. “It’s there in that pitcher.”

“What do ye want water fer?”

His constant suspicion irritated her, but she held on to her control. She’d been trained to keep control, to hold her temper and keep her emotions hidden, and for her it seemed as if that training had been just for this moment. Losing her temper could cost Edlyn her life, so she infused a tone of command in her voice. “So I can wash the wound and see what I’m doing. Please do as I require for your master’s sake.”

The calm assumption of authority worked. The servant rose and brought the water silently.

“Open the door,” she said, trying out her new supremacy. “I need more light to see.”

He ignored the request and instead crouched beside her waiting for more instructions.

With a sigh at her lack of success, she began to work. Fortunately for the unconscious man, the sunlight had strengthened outside. She could see as she tucked pieces of skin together and sewed them with crude stitches of sheep gut. All through the long treatment, the servant assisted without questioning. He wasn’t cowed so much as he was just reverting to his training—when a lady spoke, a servant obeyed, even when the servant held the upper hand. For now, the two were united for this one cause. Later, Edlyn knew, they would be enemies once more.

Sometime during the long process of sewing the patient’s flesh, Edlyn became aware he was awake. He had been senseless, she would swear it, but now his muscles tightened when she probed and he stopped the moans that rose each time she pierced his flesh with a needle. He was either very brave or aware, even in his cocoon of pain, of the need for secrecy.

Remembering her own warrior-husband’s complaints when he was ill, she thought it must be the latter.

She began to speak to the knight in a low voice, trying to reassure him. He had, after all, lost consciousness after being wounded and returned to it now in a strange place. “You’re at Eastbury Abbey,” she said, “about ten leagues from the battlefield where you were wounded.”

His muscles relaxed as he listened to her, and she knew he understood. But his voice, when he spoke, startled her. “Wharton?” he asked, his deep voice reverberating in the depths of his great helm.

Edlyn cast an ironic glance at the newly named servant, and she could have sworn the ugly man blushed. “He is here beside me.”

“Who…you?”

“My name is Edlyn.”

The warrior flinched violently beneath her hands.

“Did I hurt you?” she cried.

And Wharton snarled, “Ye hurt him, ye clumsy cow.”

“Nay!” the warrior exclaimed.

She could hear each labored breath the warrior drew, and she held her own as she wondered if he would lash out at her in pain.

Slowly the wounded man relaxed. “Go on. Finish.”

Off to the side, below the warrior’s range of vision, she saw Wharton pull his dagger.

“Be more careful,” he warned.

With trembling fingers, she concluded her stitching and examined it carefully. “I suppose I’m done.” She didn’t know what to do for those places where the skin had been totally removed, and she didn’t like the way scraps of it puckered beneath the pull of her sutures. She wished for one of the nuns or even one of the fat-fingered monks who served the infirmary. Then it occurred to her that the warrior might be more reasonable than his servant, and she said to him, “I have no skills at this, but your man insisted I do what I could for you. If you would allow me to seek help at the hospital—”

“Nay.”

Edlyn recoiled from the force of that single word. Not that the warrior had been loud; quite the opposite. That one softly spoken word had simply proved him to be a commander, accustomed to unquestioning obedience.

She would give it to him, too, as long as his henchman remained between her and freedom. “As you wish,” she answered. She stood, stretching the kinks out of her legs. “Wharton brought you here, and if you can lie still a little longer, I’ll be done and you can rest.”

Wharton bounded to his feet. “Where are ye going?”

“The poultice,” she reminded him. “Why don’t you remove his helm while I finish preparing it? He’ll be more comfortable.”