Beatrice was silent, but she squeezed his fingers.
Reynaud closed his eyes, trying to keep his voice steady, remembering the horror of being in another’s power. “My being alive deeply wounded Sastaretsi’s pride. He took it as a personal affront that I hadn’t been tortured to death for his greater glory. When we were so close to death that winter, I think he bided his time because the band needed another able-bodied hunter. But when I grew ill that summer, he saw his chance.”
“What did he do?” she asked.
“He came for me in the night. I was tied down and still weak from fever. I had no chance, but I fought anyway. I knew that to be in his clutches would be fatal.”
“But he caught you despite your resistance?” she asked softly.
He nodded. The words seemed stuck in his throat, and his chest hurt as if he could not draw breath. The feel of another man’s hands on his throat, the knowledge that he wasn’t strong enough to dislodge him. Suddenly he smelled bear grease, hot and sour and strong. Impossible. He was imagining it. No one smeared themselves with bear grease in England. But Sastaretsi had in that land so far away. The stink had been thick in his nostrils that night.
“Reynaud?” he heard Beatrice call. “Reynaud, you need not go on.”
“No,” he gasped. “No. I’ll tell it this once and never again.”
He lay for a moment, just breathing, trying to get the smell of bear grease out of his nose. Then he said, “He took me and bound me to a stake, and he beat me. Over and over. He broke sticks against my back, carved long lines into my flesh, and when I’d pass out, he’d wake me to start it all over again.”
She was silent, both of her hands wrapped around his now.
“He meant to kill me. To torture me until I begged and then burn me alive.”
“But you didn’t die,” Beatrice said. She sounded urgent. “You survived.”
“Yes, I survived,” he said. “I survived by refusing to utter a sound. No matter what he did to me, no matter how he beat me or made my blood flow, I remained silent. And then a miracle occurred.”
He looked at her, his sheltered wife. He should’ve never told her this story, never let her hear about the darkness he’d been through, the shame.
“What happened?”
“Gaho and her family returned,” he said simply, the words in no way conveying the wonder he’d felt at the event. “She told me later that she’d had a dream. In the dream, a snake was wrestling with a wolf, and the snake had its fangs sunk into the wolf’s neck. She said that the voice of her father told her that the snake must not win. When she woke, she cut short the festivities and came home.”
“What did she do?” Beatrice asked.
Reynaud’s mouth twisted. “She saved me from death. She freed me, gave me water, washed and bound my wounds, and on the morning of the next day, she gave me a knife and bid me to do what I must.”
“What did you have to do?”
“Kill Sastaretsi,” he said. “I was weak, suffering from the loss of my blood and the illness, but I had to kill him. He knew what I would do—even without Gaho’s permission, I could not let him live—and he could’ve run in the night, but instead he stayed to fight me.”
“And you won,” she said.
“Yes, I won,” he said, feeling no victory at all.
She sighed and settled against his shoulder. “I’m glad. I’m glad you killed Sastaretsi. I’m glad you survived.”
“Yes,” he said softly. “As am I.”
If he hadn’t survived, she wouldn’t be in his arms right now. That at least was good. Reynaud closed his eyes and felt the warm softness of his wife, the scent of woman and flowers surrounding him. He listened as her breathing evened and deepened as she fell asleep, and he gave thanks that he could experience this moment, this woman.
Perhaps it made everything that had come before worth it.
“YOU RISE EARLY for a man newly married,” Vale said cheerfully a week later. “Perhaps you got too much sleep last night.”
Samuel Hartley, walking on the other side of Vale, snorted. All three men were strolling a fashionable London street to discourage eavesdroppers, their pace swift, for the wind was quite chilly.
Reynaud scowled at them both. It was a beautiful morning, and he’d left his new wife sleeping in their warm bed so he might come consult with these two jesters.
And they didn’t even appreciate his sacrifice. “We can give you some help, if you need it,” Vale continued, as mindless as a jackdaw, “on the wonders of marital bliss. At least I can.”