Kushiel's Scion - Jacqueline Carey [320]
It could have been worse, much worse. The shallow slice on my left thigh was crusting over, and the triangular gouge on my upper right arm was narrow enough that it needn't be stitched. I'd taken a myriad of nicks and cuts during the fighting on the portico, but none that wouldn't heal on their own. Mostly, I was bruised.
There were massive constellations of bruises already blossoming beneath my skin, their hues indistinct in the lamplight. Except for the one on my right forearm where Valpetra's javelin had dented my vambrace, I couldn't even remember what had done it, whether they were inept blows I'd taken or impacts resulting from my own attacks.
It didn't matter. I was alive.
I eased my body into the washtub. Every wound, no matter how small, stung in protest. The gash on my thigh cracked open and bled, and the tub was so small that I had to sit with my knees drawn up tight. I didn't care. For a long moment, I rested the back of my head against the rim of the tub and simply sat there, luxuriating in the heat.
I sat there for a long time, until the water began to cool. Then I took up the ball of soap and scrubbed myself, thoroughly and methodically. My hands were stiff and aching from clutching weapons all day long, the knuckles swollen and split, battered against the shields and armor of my opponents. Although I'd washed them before tending to Eamonn, there was blood ingrained all around the beds of my nails. They looked like someone else's hands.
Someone good at killing.
When I had finished, I climbed dripping from the tub and dried myself on a clean towel, leaving blotches of fresh blood on the linen. I smeared salve on my wounds, bandaging the worst two, using my teeth to tie a knot around my right arm.
Somewhere in the villa, I heard the sound of Lucius' returning and his mother's glad cries, his father's voice filled with a new note of respect. I should go greet him, I thought, but I was too tired. No, let them have their moment. I was a guest in their household and I had fought for Lucca, but I had no place here, not really.
I wanted to go home.
I wanted it so fiercely, I ached with it. I wanted to walk into Phèdre's study and sit at her feet, leaning my head against her knee. I wanted to pour out my heart to her, while she stroked my hair and told me there was nothing inside me that I needed to fear, only shadows.
I wanted to be a child again.
Her child.
But I wasn't and I couldn't. And so I took myself to my lonely bed and lay awake for a long time, staring open-eyed onto the darkness, thinking about Canis and Domenico Martelli, the Duke of Valpetra, my fellow soldiers who had died and the men I had killed, until sleep took me unaware, and I slept and dreamed of war.
* * *
Chapter Sixty-Four
Three days later, we departed Lucca.
It took that long to get the city restored to some semblance of order. Marcus Cornelius' men loaned their aid unstintingly, helping clear away wreckage the flood had left, digging graves for the dead, posting a guard at the massive gap in the wall. There wasn't much to be done about the breach, not until the Masons' Guild could procure the vast quantity of materials needed to repair it. Between the breach and the short harvest, Lucca faced a hard winter.
Lucius spent long hours in council with the Tiberian commander, Gaetano Correggio and various Luccan aristocrats, the flamen dialis and his priests. They came to a settlement regarding aid from Tiberium in exchange for certain trade rights to be granted in the future.
They came to a settlement regarding Helena, too. The priest declared a mourning period of six months in order, after which she would undergo a ceremony to effect the dissolution of her unwanted marriage. In the spring, she would be free to wed Lucius.
I took no part in the discussions. At first, I spent my time worrying about Eamonn, who slept for almost a solid day, waking only briefly to eat. The chirurgeon who came at last to examine him peered at his eyes, slapped