"Sir Gavin," Sparrow said. "Sir Gavin, look at me."
The old man's eyes flicked to meet Sparrow's.
"Good. Can you speak? Tell me your full name."
"Theowin Gavin Leofrick," came, barely a whisper.
Sparrow frowned. "I think he is stunned."
Achan snorted. "What gave it away?"
"I mean, his mind is frozen with the shock of pain to his body. It happens sometimes, physically. It happened to you with the Poroo arrows."
Achan had little memory of that day. "Oh."
Sparrow dug in his satchel. "His boots, Achan, please?"
Achan tugged off Sir Gavin's boots, then his trousers, which streaked blood down the old man's leg. At first Achan couldn't see where the wound was, then he saw black seeping into the green blanket just above Sir Gavin's right knee.
Sparrow stood. "Help me turn him over."
Achan jumped around to the other side of the pallet, and he and Sparrow rolled Sir Gavin to his stomach. A dark hole bored into Sir Gavin's right thigh. Blood trickled down his inner leg and pooled in a new place on the bedspread.
"The water, Achan," Sparrow said. "There is a basin of cold beside my hearth. Add hot water from the kettle until it is warm to your fingers."
Achan ran to the other room and did as Sparrow asked. He heard the front door scrape over the floor in the next room and several sets of boots clump over the wooden floor.
"I'm glad you've booked rooms above The Ivory Spit, I am," Kurtz said. "I nearly died for lack of ale and female companionship in the Pit all those-"
"What is wrong with him?" Elk's voice.
"A barbed arrowhead is buried in his thigh." Sparrow's voice, eerily calm.
"Ouch, eh?"
"Do you have an arrowspoon?" Elk asked.
"I do not," Sparrow said.
Achan carried the basin to the floor beside Sparrow. The boy held Sir Gavin's wadded trousers against the wound.
Elk stood looking over Sparrow's shoulder. "What are you planning to do?"
"Stopper up the bleeding until Sir Caleb returns with linen."
Elk nodded.
Inko stood on the other side of Sir Gavin's bed, eyes wide as he took in the scene. "How is he being?"
"He has lost much blood." Sparrow glanced up at the faces watching him. "Is anyone else wounded?"
"A bit scraped up," Kurtz said. "We'll manage, eh?"
Elk peeled off his guard's fur cloak and slung it over an empty chair. "I was once a healer. Would you like assistance?"
"Have you ever removed a barbed arrowhead?"
Elk raised his dark eyebrows. "I have. Many times."
Sparrow sighed. "Praise be to Arman, then, for I have only ever removed bodkin arrows."
Elk tucked his beard into the neck of his shirt. "You are young to have accomplished such a feat." He took a small bowl off the mantle. He dipped it in Achan's basin of water and set it on the table, then plunged his hands in to wash them. "I shall need two small blades I can sterilize in the fire."
"I'm having some in my pack." Inko slipped past Achan and into the other room.
Sir Caleb burst through the door carrying a stack of white linens.
Elk took them from him. "All of you go into the other room to clean up. Allow us some room to work."
Achan cast one more concerned glance at Sir Gavin's leg and retreated with the others. Inko sat on the bed nearest the door. Sir Caleb sat on the edge of the other bed which Kurtz lay on. Achan squatted before the fireplace and held out his numb hands. He slapped at a twitch behind his ear and searched for the cursed mosquito. Wasn't it too cold for mosquitoes?
"Whoo!" Kurtz screamed.
Achan spun around on his toes, still squatting.
Elk appeared in the adjoining doorway. "Do you mind?"
Kurtz turned on his side, head propped on one hand. "We're free, Elk. Free, we are!"
"I realize that. Do try to keep it down." He closed the door with a soft clump.
Kurtz sat up. "Going off that tower…thought I was dead. But then I flew, eh?"
"I thought I was dead when you dropped me," Achan said. "Again when I hit the wall."
"I could not stop myself either," Sir Caleb said. "Perhaps the hooks did not need oil."
They talked more about the rescue. Kurtz's glowing rendition of Achan's time in the Pit so enhanced the story it sounded like something a minstrel might turn into a song.
Kurtz jerked his head to the door. "Who's the minnow, eh?"
"Vrell Sparrow joined us in Mahanaim," Sir Caleb said. "He's a bit of a healer."
Kurtz's brown eyes raked Achan up and down. "And you're the mirrorglass image of your old man, you are. Couldn't tell so much in the pit, but here…"
"Aye," Sir Caleb paused to look at Achan. "I thought the same when I first saw him."
Kurtz grinned and folded his arms across his broad chest. "I'm sure you've heard many tales of me, eh?"
Achan scratched behind his ear. "Nothing, actually."
Kurtz clapped a hairy hand over his chest. "Caleb, you wound me. How could you not tell him of the Chazir, eh?"
"I didn't want to give the lad nightmares."
"Bah." Kurtz stood. "I'm starved, I am. Let's go down to the tavern, eh?"
"No, Kurtz," Sir Caleb said. "There will be no tavern."
"But tavern food is hot, it is. And I can dance while I wait."
Achan scoffed. "I can't imagine any woman would look at you. You look like a scavenger."
Sir Kurtz clapped his hands. "The prince raises a good point, he does. We need water in here for a shave, eh?"
Sir Caleb walked to the door. "I'll have some food brought here. After we eat, we'll go to the bathhouse. No tavern."
Achan went to check on Sir Gavin while Sir Caleb was gone, but Sir Eagan and Sparrow looked to be in deep concentration, so he left them to their work.
Sir Caleb returned with two serving girls dressed in white blouses and red skirts. One carried a smoking pot, which she hung on an iron hook above the fire. The other held a stack of wooden bowls. "Where's your table?"
Inko took the bowls. "It's being in the next room. We'll be bringing it back before we are leaving."
"Try these." Sir Caleb handed a pair of brown leather boots to Achan. He turned to the girl at the door. "Might you bring up a bathing tub next?"
"Aye, but that'd be too much water to haul for all you men. Wouldn't you rather use the bathhouse?"
"We will. But we have a sick man who'll need a tub."
Achan pulled on the boots. They didn't fit as nicely as the pair Trajen had given him, but they would do. He wasn't picky.
The women left and Sir Caleb dished up a bowl of stew for each of the men and set out a stack of clean clothing for Achan. After everyone ate, Kurtz, Sir Caleb, and Inko left to go down to the bathhouse. Achan, not permitted to leave the room, was to bathe in the tub as soon as it arrived.
Achan found Eagan's Elk under Inko's bed and started to polish it as Sir Caleb had taught him. He may as well return it to its owner in pristine condition.
The women delivered the tub and filled it with hot water. Once they had gone, Achan stripped off his clothes and inspected the scrapes on his knee from the dagfish hook. No more than cat scratches, really, but they stung when he settled his bruised body into the warm water. Dozens of mosquito bites peppered his chest and arms and itched something fierce. He was scrubbing his neck with a brick of honeysuckle soap when Sparrow opened the adjoining door.
Sparrow's eyes popped wide and his cheeks flushed.
Achan asked, "How is Sir Gavin?" but Sparrow backed right out of the room. Odd duck.
Elk came through a moment later, face completely shaven. With his round face and dark hair, he looked no older than forty. "Everyone has gone?"
"To the bathhouse," Achan said. "How is Sir Gavin?"