Page 38 of Flanders’ Folly (The Curse of Clan Ross #7)

38

THE ENDINBURG HOUSE

* * *

F landers stumbled as the darkness receded, leaving him blinking in a light so bright it hurt his eyes. He stood in a chamber with walls as smooth and flawless as polished marble but without the shine. The floor beneath his feet was as flat as frozen water.

The future, at first glance, was perfection.

"Welcome to the Edinburgh house," Wickham said, steadying him with a hand on his shoulder. "Are ye sound?"

Flanders searched all around the space, but they were alone. "Where is she?" The hand on his shoulder tightened. He didn't care for Wickham's expression.

"The doctor is with her. Her skirt caught fire."

Flanders' heart lurched. "Ye’ll take me to her?"

That hand held. "Aye. Let's hear what the doctor has to say today."

"Today?"

Wickham smiled and nodded. "I waited a day before goin' back fer ye. Imagine my surprise when I saw ye headin' into the fire. A lucky thing I didn't trust ye to keep yer head."

"A day!"

"Auch, well, Time passes only where ye stand in it." He waved a hand. "No matter. Ye'll not need to worry about that again. Come on. Let’s remove those chains first." He strode away, deeper into the castle he called the Edinburgh house. Back home, if they'd traveled from Todlaw to that growing city of the same name, in less than a minute, it would have been miracle enough on its own.

He left him standing in a hallway, staring at a painting of flowers, and when he reappeared, he held small tools that made quick work of the locks on his shackles. They were similar to the ones James had used to free the chains from the chair.

Was that only moments ago?

They left the heavy shackles on the floor and continued on until they came across Bella sitting on one of two cushioned yellow chairs beside a closed door. She jumped to her feet, genuinely relieved to see him. The similarities between herself and her sister made his heart ache.

The door opened just then, and all else was forgotten.

A man in strange white garments stepped outside and smiled first at Bella, then at Wickham before he turned and looked up at Flanders. To Flanders' surprise, the man addressed him in French, though the words were oddly formed, with unfamiliar cadences that made them difficult to follow.

"I assume you are the man she has been asking for?" the doctor said.

Flanders blinked, grateful for the years he'd spent in the French court with James, but still struggling to make sense of this strange version of the language. He replied in his own rougher French, "I am. How is she?"

The doctor's brow furrowed slightly as he parsed Flanders' accent and phrasing. When he continued, he spoke slowly. "Most of her burns were superficial," a word Flanders didn't recognize. Then he clarified, "Not deep. But her pain is severe. The burns were contained to the front of her calves and her right thigh. The scarring should be minor. The pain should ease in a few days."

Flanders nodded, still struggling to follow.

The doctor continued, "I've changed her bandages and given her medication that will help her sleep through the night. I want no one except my nurse in the room with her for the next two days. We cannot risk infection." Another unfamiliar word, but Flanders gathered the meaning. "And you," the doctor sniffed pointedly in Flanders' direction, "should bathe before speaking to her from the doorway. In fact, bathe twice and burn your clothes. My nurse will see to your wounds once you are clean."

Flanders understood enough to know his condition offended the man. "Will she live?" he asked in his Norman French, cutting to what mattered most.

The doctor nodded emphatically. "Yes, she will live."

Wickham laughed and slapped him on the shoulder. "Should have said that from the start. Aye, she'll live. A rough few days is all. Come," he tried to lead Flanders away. "Let's get those fourteenth century germs off ye."

The doctor had started to walk away but staggered to a stop. He stood perfectly still for a moment, then started walking again as if a dog were nipping at his heels.

Wickham saw it and laughed. "Come on. I pay him enough to ignore such comments."

He led Flanders through more corridors until they reached a bedchamber larger than most crofts back home. The bed itself could have slept six.

"This is yer room," Wickham said. "And through here is the bathroom."

He opened a door to reveal a chamber of gleaming white surfaces and strange things affixed to the walls and ceiling, some of which lit up from within when Wickham touched a magical square on the wall. A large white basin stood in one corner, with silver handles protruding from it. Another, larger basin, like a massive white barrel sawn in half, took up the far end of the room with a wall of shaped glass enclosing it.

"This," Wickham said, pointing to the smaller basin, "is called a sink. For washing hands and face." He demonstrated the handles. "Hot and cold water. Mix to yer likin'."

Water flowed from a long silver nose when he turned the handles. Flanders touched the steady stream with his fingers, then smiled at the simple miracle.

"The toilet," Wickham continued, gesturing to a white chair-like object, "is yer privy, or garderobe. When ye're finished, press this lever to flush it away." He touched another handle. "There is water here, or paper, for cleanin' yer arse. The paper flushes away as well."

Flanders nodded, though he wasn't entirely sure he understood.

"And this," Wickham said, moving to the glass enclosure, "is a shower. Stand inside the tub, turn these handles, and water falls on ye from above. Like rain, but warm." He pointed to various bottles on a small shelf. "Soap for yer body, shampoo for yer hair. And this is a towel for dryin' afterward."

He handed Flanders the soft, thick cloth, then laughed at the wonder on his face.

"I assure ye, none of this is magic, but I’ll explain it another day. If ye prefer, ye can fill the bathtub instead." Wickham indicated the large basin. "The doctor suggested ye be thorough." He pointed to the bottom of the barrel. "Ye lift this to allow the dirty water to drain out, then ye can do it all again until ye're as clean as can be."

Flanders looked at the array of strange devices, overwhelmed but determined. "I can manage."

"Good man. I'll leave clean clothes on the bed. When ye're done, come find me in the hall outside Brigid's room." Wickham paused at the door. "And Flanders? Dinnae fash. Brigid will be as right as rain. I swear it."

Left alone, Flanders approached the shower cautiously. He removed his filthy clothes, wincing as dried blood pulled at the wound on his arm. The chains had left raw marks around his wrists, and his knee, where he'd fallen on chain, screamed for attention as well. But none of it mattered. Brigid was going to recover.

He was at a quandary as to how right rain could be, but he understood the gist of it.

He stood inside the barrel, inside the glass enclosure and turned the handles as Wickham had shown him. Water burst from above, startling him so badly he nearly slipped. It was cold at first, then warmed when he toyed with the handles. He stood beneath the rain and marveled at the aperture from which it flowed.

It was then he got the full impact of what the doctor had sniffed—the perfume of imprisonment, of battle, of burnt tar and smoke. It was a wonder he hadn’t been sent to the barn.

A long while later, after using up more than his share of the water in Edinburgh, he emerged, pink-skinned and clean. A new man.

The towel was softer than the fur of any living creature, and the clothes Wickham had left—though strange in cut and fabric—fit well enough. The colors were as gaudy as anything he'd ever seen in court, but he was given no alternatives.

As he deliberated how to keep his blood from the clean shirt, there was a knock on the door. He found a woman donned in blue from her head to her toes, holding a shiny silver tray covered with a blue towel and blushing as if she’d never seen the bare chest of a man before.

She spoke quickly. He recognized a few words. Panser tes blessures . She was there to dress his wounds.

He invited her inside and stood stoically while she tended to the cut the Rat Laird had inflicted on his arm. He only faltered once when she stuck the end of a wee needle into his flesh, and before he could do more than flinch at the burning sting, the pain began to subside. He’d felt nothing at all when she’d stitched the gash closed with a thread so fine that, if it hadn’t been such a bright color of blue, he couldn’t have seen it.

Over the top of the stitches, she attached a strip of thin white matter that adhered to his skin, then she wrapped it in a luxurious strip of cheesecloth. After she smeared some substance on the shallow wounds around his wrists, she covered them with the same fine stuff before carrying away every trace of blood.

He donned his thin shirt and followed her back to Brigid's door. She waved him away and stepped inside, all sympathy dispensed with.

Bella was asleep in the chair but had stirred at the sound of their approach. Upon closer inspection he noted her gown was of fine blue cloth, and she'd nearly smoothed all the gold wisps out of her hair.

"Well met, Bella," he said.

She straightened. "Leesborn."

"How is she?"

"Sleeping." She gestured to a small device on a table between the two chairs. "Wickham says this will tell us when she wakes. I cannot fathom how."

Flanders sat in the empty chair and studied the device, resisting the urge to pick it up. There was a tail attached, but without a face, it couldn't be a living thing. "What is it?"

"He called it a 'baby monitor.' It lets us hear her if she stirs, even with the door closed." She looked him over in turn. "Ye look...different. Clean."

"As do ye." He studied her, noting the differences. Bella's hair was shorter, her face a touch thinner than her sister’s. Her eyes held the same intelligence, but with a sharper edge. "How long does it seem ye have been here? Wickham said time passes differently…I didn't understand it, but…" He shrugged.

"Three days. The second day, he brought Brigid, and the third, you." She ran a hand over the chair's arm. "The beds are as soft as these chairs. In fact, I've seen nothing the same as…back home. No more board and trestle. The table we eat at gleams like the floors. Time has changed everything but for some of the plants I found in the garden. We're like babes here."

"But we're alive. And we're…the two of ye are back together."

She nodded. "I ken ye think ye love her?—"

"I only think it?"

She sighed. "Ye've known her days. I've known her since before my first breath."

"And ye worry I'll come between ye."

"Ye already have." Her eyes grew wet. "In her pain, it wasn't my name she called out."

"Auch, Bella. One day, ye'll call out yerself. And ye won't be callin' for yer sister."

She looked doubtful.

He tried again to make peace. "How ye feel about me matters not at all. What matters is that we both love her. And we both want her well. Let us cry pax until then."

Bella looked away, but nodded.

"We must be friends," he said. "How else will we survive these next days? We're the only ones who speak our language!"

She laughed, then they let silence settle around them, both staring from the door to the white box, listening for Brigid's breathing, begging for any noise at all.