Time Heals All

Chapter: Three

Notes: My apologies on the recent lack of updates on this story. I've scrapped most of what I'd written in outline. The work progressing didn't want to go the way I'd written the outline, so I'm moving in a different direction with this than I'd originally planned.

~~~~~~~~~~

At first, the dim light hurt his eyes, but in gradual degrees he was able to surmise his surroundings. He was in a cottage, a small yet comfortably appointed one, and it was indeed a lone woman who tended him. Turning his head slightly on the pillow, he made out her form, small and curved. Her back was to him, long hair free to her hips.

The aches and pains of his body were horrible, though not as great as the last time he'd woken. By that, he concluded that he was getting better. He cleared his throat, wincing at that mistake when the action made him acutely aware how raw his throat was.

"Oh good. You're awake."

The woman turned and he found why her voice had seemed so familiar. Lady Jocelyn's maid, Christiana, was his nurse. He should have guessed, though years had passed since he'd last heard her voice. How many years was it? Two? Three maybe? The question distracted him from his hurts and he began counting the months since he'd spoken with her last. Let's see, he'd talked with her briefly, asking to see her lady, intending to give Jocelyn the news that Ulrich wasn't really Ulrich --

"I was beginning to think the fever had taken you after all."

Annoyance surfaced for the interruption of his thoughts. "Fever?" He didn't remember a fever.

"Yes. You developed it two nights ago, while I read to you. I looked up and you were so silent and still. You're skin...it was like there was a fire beneath it." She gave him a pleasant smile. "Obviously the fever has passed."

"Who brought me here?" Not that he really cared. It was conversation and conversation drew his mind from his hurts.

"I did."

He could not roll his eyes well, so he settled on something between a snort and a laugh. "You? A lone woman?"

"And my lord," she added with a nod. "I have cared for you several days. You were unconscious for awhile."

Her lord. Did she still serve the Lady Jocelyn and was that one still wed to William Thatcher? He didn't know. Did it even matter at this point? He turned his face from her, rolling half onto his back despite the pain and staring at the ceiling. "Was I close to death?"

"Very."

Adhemar glanced back at her. "You should have let me die."

She sat at the bedside, taking a cloth from a basin of water and pressing it to his face. Blessed coolness. "Why?" Her voice was calm, so...concerned. As though she really cared. But she couldn't care because she didn't know him; didn't know that he deserved death.

He reached up, stilling her hand, using only his fingertips so as to touch as little of her skin as possible. "You have bathed me, yes?"

"Yes."

"Then you know why." She had seen what they did to him. How could she not understand why death was preferable?

Gently, she returned his hand to his side, resuming her task. There was no spark of desire in her eyes, nothing that indicated she wanted anything from him, so he forced himself to not push her away. She'd spoken truth. She was caring for him, tending him as dispassionately as a person could. For a moment, she was silent, but then, she spoke.

"Women have had thus done to them and lived long lives. It is a matter of healing I believe: physical, emotional and spiritual."

"I don't want to heal. I want to die. I'm a man, a soldier. It should not have happened to me." He could hear his voice crack, the control he normally kept on himself in shambles and he forced himself to take deep breaths.

Brown eyes met his squarely. "Rape can happen to anyone, male or female."

He flinched at the word; it implied helplessness and Count Adhemar was not a helpless man. But...he had been helpless. He'd been tied and beaten and whipped, starved and weakened. "Not to me. It can't happen to me." He bit out the words slowly, as though each was a sentence in itself. "Now leave me, girl."

She shook her head. "No. You still need care. I won't go. Besides," the cloth was set into the water, wrung out and moved to his chest. "This is my home. Where would I go were I to leave?"

Adhemar closed his eyes, remaining passive under the soothing pass of that cool cloth over his skin. She avoided the cuts, bathing his chest and arms slowly and efficiently. He found he could stay still as long as he didn't think of her hands against him. When he felt the brush of a fingertip, or graze of a knuckle, he stiffened. It wasn't something he could keep himself from doing, but rather an automatic reaction to touch. Any touch. The thought of another person's bare skin touching his was more than repulsive. He had to swallow back dry heaves.

"Your back needs looked at. Can you roll further onto your side for me?"

The effort to roll was great, the edges of the cuts pulling and he winced from it. Her touch was so soft he barely felt it, yet when she would have lowered the covers, he caught at her wrist. "Do not." His grip hurt her and he knew it, squeezing harder in an effort to deter her.

She gasped, fine brows raising, gaze frank. "The sooner you face it, the sooner you shall heal." Pain flashed in her eyes.

"Let me die. Do nothing for these cuts and let the fever take me."

"No. I won't sit here and watch you die. I've done enough of that in the past year."

"Damn you, wench!" Thrusting her away, he yanked the sheet high on his chest. She fell, hand knocking the basin over, the water splashing her skirts as she landed hard upon the floor. Christiana gave him a chiding glance, then got up, dusting her skirts and resettling them. After she had picked up the basin and cloth, she set them on the table. Placing her hands flat, she rested her weight upon her palms and inquired, "What happened to the man I know who'd be screaming for someone's blood?"

"That man wishes for death. I deserve to die, to go into that darkness!"

"How did the thieves get you?"

He squeezed his eyes shut. "Silence, girl!"

"Had your self-destructive tendencies made you careless? Do you blame yourself for the deaths of your men as well as the abuse heaped upon you?"

"Stop," he forced through gritted teeth. She was right. It was his fault. He'd been careless and men had died. His capture hadn't been distressing at first. No, he'd welcomed the beatings, the whippings that stripped flesh from his body and brought him that much closer to the welcome arms of that numb void death. But then he realized they didn't intend to kill him. "Hateful wench."

Memories rushed forth and he turned his face into the pillow. He bit his lip until it bled and the pain made the memories retreat. He didn't want to look back at it, didn't want to acknowledge what had happened. "Leave me," he whispered. "Please just go."

She picked up the book and began to read aloud, her voice drowning out the sounds of his own sobs.

~~~~~~~~~~

Jocelyn leaned against the wall, not making her presence known. She rubbed her belly with her palms, hands moving in soothing motions as she listened to the exchange inside the cottage. She'd not gotten down to Christiana's home the day she'd wanted to. No, there had been other matters to attend to, so she'd waited. Now, she wasn't certain coming here was a good idea. Despair was a shadow over the tiny cottage, like a permanent cloud settled above it in the sky, blotting out the sun.

She'd brought a basket of goodies freshly baked from the cook and a new embroidery pattern that a merchant had brought, intending on coaxing Christiana into the out of doors for a little while. The day was warm, the air fragrant with wildflowers. A perfect day for a chat. The walk was slow and pleasant. It felt good to be outside, moving about and Jocelyn had taken her time, carefully paying attention to any twinges or aches in her body that would tell her she needed to rest.

She'd paused before knocking at the half-open door, paused at the voices. It was a private conversation, one that should not be over heard, but she couldn't force herself to move until it was done.

Women have had thus done to them....

Horror filled her at what the words meant, a deep sympathetic pain for the man. She wouldn't wish such a thing upon her worst enemy. He wanted to die. She'd want to die as well, were it her.

Christiana was calm, her voice soothing. Adhemar began to cry. Jocelyn's eyes went wide and she raised a hand to her mouth, biting on a finger to keep from crying out herself. His sobs were almost loud enough to drown out Christiana's reading. Almost, but not quite. In a way, that was what affected her the most.

Sickened by what she'd found out, Jocelyn returned to the manor and spent the rest of the day in bed.

~~~~~~~~~~

The courtyard was filled with men, many Will knew and many he didn't. Some were from this manor and some were from the town down the road. They were all here on his request, all here to do his bidding. He glanced them over, young and old alike, and saw they were more than up to this task, eager to do it.

"We'll take sections, slowly and as quietly as we can, moving outward from these grounds. I've sent men to their nest and it's been abandoned, but there have been reports that the thieves still roam here. We'll find them."

"Then what?" A voice called from the crowd.

He gave a grim little smile. "Then we kill them. I'll not have thieves here if I can prevent it, not with what I know them capable of doing."

And so they rode out, some on horseback and most on foot. Wat rode with him, out in the front of the line of men.

"It was an omen, Will," he said, shaking his head. "We're not meant to be here. We should go home."

Will sighed, rolling his eyes. "Stop that sort of talk. There's no omen. Adhemar was unfortunate, that's all." That he knew precisely what Wat was referring to made him straighten his spine a bit. He could have been referring to anything, from Jocelyn's last miscarriage, the recent deaths from fever or even the cows that had died almost overnight, but Will had jumped right to Adhemar. It's what Wat was thinking. The attack on Adhemar was a warning, an omen that they'd made a wrong move in coming here.

He was not going to resort to superstition. There was no strange force at work here. The move here to Jocelyn's family home had been hard on them, that's all. Nothing more. It was silly to think that witches and demons were working on them. Wasn't it?

A tiny part of him didn't think so. A tiny part of him agreed wholeheartedly with Wat, thinking that maybe, just maybe, they'd made a mistake.

"We should have stayed home, Will. You've been thinking it and so have I. Kate's talking about leaving and Christiana..." he paused. "She's become...strange." Wat made a face when he said the word, as though unable to convey what he meant by the word alone.

"We're not having this conversation. Christiana is perfectly well."

"Will, she talks to herself. And not only that, she pauses and answers like she's carrying on a conversation with someone who isn't there. I wouldn't call that being 'perfectly well'."

He had a point. Christiana did talk to herself. "People react strangely to grief." The look Wat gave him indicated that the man thought Will was living in a dream world. "Really, Wat, they do. We all behave differently. When Roland died, you stopped fighting, stopped losing your hold on your temper. You weren't yourself."

"It's hard to enjoy something when one of your closest friends isn't around to egg you on."

"Precisely. Now, think about it. Roland was Christiana's husband and they loved each other dearly. It's not strange to me that she should have trouble letting him go. I know I'd have trouble were Jocelyn to die."

"I'll think about it." And so he did, keeping quiet for a space of time, then returning to the subject. "She could be mourning, I'll give you that, but there's a chance, and hear me out, Will. There's a chance that there's something really wrong with her, like wrong in the head. I think she's touched."

Will glanced at his friend, then behind them. The men still walked and he didn't think any were close enough to be privy to the conversation. "Even if she is, I won't abandon her. She's part of the household, Wat."

"I'm not saying we should abandon her. God knows Christiana patched me up a few times and I'm grateful she did. I'd hate to see her go. What I mean is that, if you won't consider going home, we should watch her closely for...you know...other signs."

"Signs?" Will raised his brows. He knew where this was going. Wat had been on a demon and witch kick lately, resorting to superstition to explain the things that had plagued them in recent months. No one could convince him that they hadn't been cursed and unfortunately, Father Michel only fanned the flames, mumbling about mysterious lights in the woods. The only lights in the woods Will suspected were those of the thieves.

They weren't under demonic attack, or hexed by a witch. At least, he didn't think they were. He couldn't think of anyone who'd hate them that much. Of course, a man could have enemies he was unaware of couldn't he?

"Possession, Will. Think about it. Talking to herself, wandering about the grounds at night. She's creepy."

Will snorted. "Wat, will you listen to yourself? This is Christiana we're talking about. She goes to mass, goes to confession. She's just in mourning. Besides, she seems to be improving. She's got Adhemar to talk to."

"Doesn't mean she's talking to him." Wat shook his head. "Forget it. Father Michel has been talking again and he's about got me convinced there's sinister forces about."

Will stopped his mount, leaned to Wat when he stopped as well. "Listen. The only sinister force here is that nest of thieves. Get rid of them and that air of hopelessness will fade away as a morning mist under the rays of the sun. They've preyed on these lands for nearly a year I've been told, raping and stealing and burning. It's no wonder people have settled into despair. Now, I've no explanation for the cows or a few other things, but this I can say for certain. We get rid of these thieves and fortunes will turn in some way."

After a moment, Wat nodded. "I hope you're right."

"I am." Will fervently hoped he was, because if he was wrong, this could end very badly for them all.