In the Time of Dragon Moon (23 page)

The yelping sounds lessened and faded. The great golden fire died away. I stopped, clinging to my hand in the swirling smoke. The silence was deafening. A figure raced through the thick smoke. Jackrun threw his arms around me. “Are you hurt? Did they hurt you?”

“I'm . . . all right. Sir Giles?”

We went to him. The knight's throat was torn wide open, exposing the muscle and bone. Sir Giles had trained up to battle men, not ravaging wolves. His chain mail hadn't protected him in this attack.

“I tried to fight the wolf off,” I said, my ears ringing. “It went right for his throat.” My shaking voice sounded very far away.

Jackrun tugged off his cloak and draped it over mine. It did not stop my trembling.

“You're bleeding,” he said, tugging my left hand toward him. He tore a strip from the hem of his shirt to bind the puncture wounds.

“I have bandages in my basket,” I whispered.

“Too late to tell me that.”

I clenched my teeth against the throbbing pain as he wrapped the linen strip around my hand.

“I'm hurting you.”

“No. It's good to wrap it.”

I swallowed, glancing down at Sir Giles's dull, unseeing eyes. His jaw was defiant even in death, but there was horror in his fixed gaze. I wanted to wipe the terror from his face. I didn't seem to have the power to kneel down and do it. I didn't even have the strength to drag the sob I felt crammed down in my chest all the way up my throat.

Jackrun said, “I could have saved his life if I'd come sooner.”

“You saved mine.”

He spotted my blade, fetched it, and wiped the blood from it. “You harmed one of the wolves at least.”

“It wasn't enough to save him. If I'd come in here alone he'd—”

“Alone to Dragonswood?” Jackrun put his arm around me. “It's dangerous in here.”

“You seem to be alone,” I said, my cheek against his chest.

“That's different. I'm a trained warrior.”

“So was Sir Giles.”

“What are you doing in Dragonswood?” he asked.

“Herbs.” I nodded at the bundles we'd dropped on the path. “For the queen.”

“Still fighting the good fight, I see,” he said.

I looked down at my bloodstained gown. “I had no choice but to come.”

“Why, what happened?”

I shook my head, too tired to tell him about the stolen medicines right now.

Jackrun knelt over Sir Giles and closed the dead man's eyes. “A good man. I used to fight him in the weapons yard. We should cover him with rocks at least before we go.” I shuddered, wanting to leave now, but the wolves might return to eat their kill if we didn't do something to cover him.

Jackrun was not afraid to stay a little longer. If the wolves tried to attack us on our way out of Dragonswood, he'd burn them again. We were safe enough. He gathered stones from the trail's edge, piling them in the crook of his left arm. I wondered at the powerful blaze I'd seen pouring out of him—too much fire for an ordinary man to house in his body, even if the man was Jackrun.

The task would take less time if I gathered stones too. I walked weak-kneed up the trail to seek out rocks the right size, using the time to think more before I spoke to Jackrun about the power I'd seen. We covered the knight's body, but for the base of his left leg and his booted feet. I went to gather a few more stones to finish what we'd started.

My back was turned when I heard a terrible guttural sound. I swung around. A wolf had pounced on Jackrun's back, knocking the wind out of him, flattening him on the trail. It had planted its paws on Jackrun's spine, pinning him down. A wild growl came up my throat. I flew. Hurling rocks at the wolf. I couldn't tell if Jackrun was moving or if the jolting motions were from the wolf shaking him in its powerful jaws.

I jumped on the wolf's back, threw my arm under its thick, furry neck and tugged with all my might until I forced its head back, drove my blade into its gullet, and slit its throat.

The wolf's eyes rolled back. It made a strange gurgling sound before collapsing atop Jackrun.

“Jackrun? Are you all right?”
Holy Ones help me!
I tried to push the wolf's dead body off.
So heavy.
I spread my hands on its furry side, heaving my full weight against it and straining. At last the wolf rolled onto the ground with a sickening thud.

Jackrun was motionless. His clothes and skin were torn. He was covered in blood.

Dragonswood, Wil
d
e Island

Death of Wolf Moon

September 1210

J
ACKRUN
!” I
TURNED
him over. So much blood. I couldn't tell how much was Jackrun's, how much the wolf's.

“Uma?” he said in a husky voice. I checked him more closely. Blood covered his ripped sleeve. There were teeth marks in his shoulder, perilously close to his neck. If I hadn't killed the wolf when I did . . .

“Where does it hurt?”

“Everywhere.”

“Where does it hurt the most?”

“My arm.”

“Can you walk?” I had to get him to a safer place where I could clean and stitch the wounds. We'd passed boulders not far from here. Jackrun clenched his teeth and moaned as I helped him up. “If I'd tethered my horse,” he muttered. “We could ride out now.”

“There was no time to tether it, and anyway, you couldn't ride out now in your condition.” At the boulders, I laid out the cloak Jackrun had given me, helped him to the ground, removed his short sword from his belt, and carefully peeled off what was left of his ravaged shirt and tunic.

“Press this against your skin to stop the bleeding,” I said, handing him a bandage from my herb basket. “I'll be right back.” I ran for the provisions bag and the rest of the things I'd left near Sir Giles's body, tossed them on the ground by our little campsite before soaking a bandage and potion sponge with a steady stream from my water pouch.

Jackrun winced as I washed the bite marks on his shoulder, the deeper wounds on his upper arm, and the bloody places below his elbow tearing down and through his dragon scale patch.

“Thank you,” Jackrun said shakily, “for killing . . .” He gulped in a breath, unable to finish. Pressing the damp gauze to his deepest wound, he watched me with utter faith as I threaded the needle. The look chilled me to the core. My hands shook. He did not know I'd never stitched a person, only a dragon's wing, and that was just this morning. I braced myself to tell him how little experience I had, glanced at his face, fixed with pain, and lost my nerve.

Somehow I managed to thread the needle. Jackrun's skin was soft and vulnerable compared to Vazan's. I was afraid I'd hurt him. “This will dull the pain,” I said, lifting the potion sponge.

He waved it away. “I don't want that.”

“Breathe in just a little.” I held it under his nose.

“Uma, you can't make me take this. I can handle . . .” He did not finish before his eyelids drooped over his eyes.

I bent over him in the last bit of daylight falling through the forest. I had to keep dabbing away the blood. My hands shook like windblown leaves. I couldn't work this way.
Help me!

Father's voice whispered through me:
Be present with what you are doing
. I focused my mind on Jackrun, thought of nothing but the wounds I had to mend, the needle in my hand, the way Jackrun's arm would look when it was whole again if I served him now with all I had.

I chanted
Ona loneaih—
be you well
. Ona loneaih, Jackrun.
Chanting in my home tongue warmed my chest. I took a long, slow breath. My hands no longer shook. The warmth had somehow steadied them. I would have called this feeling a gift of magic from this forest if I hadn't felt the warmth earlier in Vazan's cave.
Tuma-doa—
Thank you, Holy Ones. I bent closer, my sutures clean and straight and true.

The wound in the forearm wasn't as deep or ragged as the one above. But the dragon scales made it more challenging. I gently lifted the torn scales, and stitched the blue-green skin beneath.

Dusk had dimmed the woods by the time I finished bandaging his wounds. I wrapped the cloak around him, covered him with the Euit blanket, and leaned back with a sigh, thankful Jackrun was still asleep and not awake yet to pain.

He breathed in and out. His expression was determined even in his dreams. I touched his cheek and ran my hand along the landscape of his fierce, beautiful face inch by inch. My fingers traced his cheekbone, his nose and strong chin.

Ona loneaih—
be you well.
Leaning closer, I brushed his mouth with my fingers, kissed him in his sleep. His lips were sweet and smoky. When they parted in a moan, I kissed him once more, lightly this time, and was drawing back when he awoke.

“Hurts worse now than before,” he said with a half smile.

“That would be the sutures. Can you sit up?” He did so gingerly. “Drink now,” I said, handing him my water pouch. He took three long gulps and wiped the droplets on his chin with a shaking hand.

“No ale?”

“Water first, ale later.” We shared some food. Jackrun ate with his left hand, his right arm and shoulder too sore to lift.

“It pounced on me from behind. I didn't see it coming. How did you kill it?”

“Slit its throat.” Jackrun's shaking hand made it hard for him to eat. He needed food. “Let me help you.”

“No,” he said, but he took the bit of bread, and smiled, caught my hand and kissed it when I brushed crumbs from his chin.

“No more,” he said, leaning back and wincing.

“You will feel better in the morning,” I said.

“Lucky for me you brought your wound kit along, Adan.”

I let out a small gasp.

“I pronounced it right, didn't I?”

I put my hand to my throat as the word traveled through me. No one had ever called me Adan before. I had waited all my life to hear it. I wanted to claim the title, believe it, but . . .

“Only men can be Adans in my tribe,” I admitted under my breath. “A woman can't be a healer, only a healer's helper.”

“What?”

“That's the tradition.”

“You're more than a healer's helper. You're a skilled physician,” he said, raising his bandaged arm before he winced and lowered it again.

“The chieftain and the elders back home don't know that.”

“You can tell them when you return.”

“It's not that simple, Jackrun.”

“Why not?”

“It breaks all tradition for a woman to be the Adan. It's never happened before in the history of our tribe.” He gave me a wry look. “It wasn't long ago you English burned women who used healing herbs, calling them witches,” I pointed out, feeling suddenly defensive for our ways.

“They aren't burned now. Female healers haven't been put to the stake for practicing medicine here on Wilde Island since my mother was young.”

“Not too long ago,” I repeated.

He was out of breath. I'd only just stitched his wounds, now I was arguing with him.

“I'm in your care,” he said, leaning back and closing his eyes. “I won't call you Adan if you don't like it.”

I liked it. I wanted it to be true, not just here between us, but when I went back home,
if
I went back home. Wind whistled around us. Jackrun scooted stiffly back in the triangular cave made by the leaning boulders, using his strong left arm to pull himself along. Something was wrong with his left leg.

“The wolf didn't bite you there, did it?”

“Struck my knee on a stone when I fell, I think.”

I rolled up his breeches to check his sore knee. It was bruised and swollen, but the skin wasn't torn. I salved it and wrapped it using the last of my bandages. Some of the teeth marks in his shoulder were clean puncture wounds like the ones in my hand. They'd been too small to stitch. I gently rubbed them now.

Jackrun breathed softly, eyes closed, as I salved the bites, feeling the curve of his muscles below his skin. I wanted him strong again. I whispered the Euit plant names in the ointment. Four in all. Each joined the others to strengthen the healing effect.

Jackrun's eyes opened. “What about your bites? Have you stitched them?”

“No, better not suture the smaller wounds. They will close up on their own. I didn't stitch your puncture wounds either, only the tears.”

He reached out, unbound my bandage, and frowned at the arc of bites dotting my skin like small red burning stars. “Why haven't you put anything on it?”

“I'm all right. I don't need any—” I swallowed. He'd already dipped his finger in the jar and was gently spreading woundwort over the punctures on the top of my hand. “Stop,” I said. “We need to save the rest for you.”

“Just hold still, Uma.” He turned my hand over, dipped his fingers in the salve again to sooth the wolf's teeth marks in my palm, his fingers awkward as a man unused to careful work. “You should take better care of yourself.”

My eyes welled up. I turned away, bound my hand again, and went to lean against the far end of the boulder trying to breathe past the lump in my throat.

“Did I do something wrong?”

“No, I just . . . need to take a breath.” Night spread its stars across the sky. Earth, wind, fire, water. All was in balance here, but I was not in balance. I never used Father's medicine on myself.

I was losing mi tupelli, the hardened, studious boy I'd been for years—the uncomplaining boy who used to work alongside Father, who earned his trust, won the right to practice medicine with a stern, manly confidence. The change had been happening slowly ever since I met Jackrun. Mi tupelli slipped away with Jackrun's touch. He'd kissed it away, salved it away. I did not know how to be a healer and a woman at the same time. No wonder I'd felt strange when he called me Adan. As much as I yearned for it, the resistance the chieftain and the elders had against women healers was also in me. I didn't want to believe it, but it was true.