She could argue. She could fuss and fight and still it would happen in the end.
So with a sigh, she reached for the cord at her clavicle and gave it a sharp tug, grateful for the bindings for her breasts that meant she was not wholly nude before this stranger.
She would not think of another time, when the man had not been a stranger and she had been bold and unashamed.
Not a seduction. They had always been very clear about their intentions.
But memorable all the same.
The bruising showed well enough the troubles of her wrists, and the doctor peered at her, his fingers probing, before he sighed and nodded toward the bed. “If you would not mind changing locations,” he instructed, and although Penryn hated the idea, she loathed the thought of prolonging the examination more, so she acquiesced.
The clothing yet to be hung and folded took up the one side, so Penryn made use of the other, too nervous to fully appreciate the luxuriousness of the mattress beneath her. But it was soft and accommodating, and although her heart fluttered wildly at the thought of Donlov inspecting her, there was comfort here as well.
He followed, a looming presence all in black, and when fingers probed she bit her lip, trying not to allow nerves to sour to outright fright.
“Have these been bound?” he asked, pressing against the worst of the bruising, yellowed now and sickly green about the edges. “Yes,” she assured him, the pain that his attention elicited a dull soreness, but not the scotching spread of agony through muscle and bone when she was not particularly mindful of their abuse.
“I do not believe they would benefit from being so now,” Donlov mused, his tone indicating perhaps he was speaking more to himself than to her. “But you must be mindful of them, yes? Careful in your activities?”
Penryn blinked, biting back the retort that welled up. What activities did he imagine she would be doing, locked away in her rooms until the Introduction?
He frowned, looking at her expression, before it smoothed into a smile. Evidently some looks transcended the need for words. “Of course. You will be resting and the bruising will continue to go down on its own. If there are any accidents, however, you will have me contacted so I may ensure nothing has gone amiss. Do you agree?”
She likely would agree to most anything if it meant he would leave all the sooner, leaving her to the return of the sleep she craved.
The rest went much more quickly. Once she had righted the top portion of her dress, he quickly pulled up her skirts to examine one leg at a time, leaving her as much modesty as he could while allowing him to do his job to, doubtlessly, the sages’ satisfaction.
There were a few bruises there as well, but the bones were sound and they gave her little trouble, only the perils of the road and a clumsy misstep with her footing. But she could not tell him that. Could not indicate that she had walked the entire distance here rather than road in a cart or on a beastly mount.
Or flew.
Terrifying and exhilarating, and everything she had always wondered.
If her life had been something altogether different.
He had asked her to turn this way and that, but never fully over, which meant the scars should not have been visible. Most especially if the bruising was what held his attention. She had not been given an adequate story for their presence, which meant she would have to improvise if ever they were questioned. The truth, obviously, was out of the question. A fall was absurd, their symmetry and location problematic for accidental infliction. Intentional then. Ritualistic harm? She shuddered just to think of such an explanation, for a world where scars were given on purpose, for patterns to be inflicted into healthy tissues.
But she supposed that was almost what had been done. There were rituals, and excuses, and she knew that her presence here was necessary, but that particular sting was one that had yet to dull with time.
“I believe that will be all,” Donlov announced, when he had finished at looking at a callous on her foot. Evidently there was a potion he would send to her that would help soften any discomfort, and she nodded, sitting up and pulling her skirts about her, tucking and hiding, although she knew she should not. She had done no wrong, and quiet, unflappable dignity should be her air.
A lesson she had never excelled at.
“Thank you for tending to my wrist,” she acknowledged. The rest would receive no gratitude from her, not when she had already assured him she was well, yet her word had not been thought sufficient.
“It is a pleasure to serve,” he intoned, and she knew that inflection well. As if the words were not his own, but had been drilled there by another, forced and repeated until the dry delivery was as close as it could come to natural.
He collected his bag and bowed low at the waist before he departed.
Leaving her alone once more, with a wrist of blazing red.
She wanted to roll over, to indulge her exhaustion with a deep and thorough sleep.
But she made herself rise, to open the wardrobe doors and finish the task Mara had begun.
She had sent the woman away, perhaps a tad unfairly, and she would not allow another to enter this room and assume she had been inadequate in tending to her duties.
There was a pleasant monotony to the task, but it was not lost on her how unnecessarily decadent it was to have yet another article to stuff into a wardrobe already lined with garments so alike to the one beside it. She had grown used to living with so little and finding it more than adequate when paired with—
She had to stop thinking of him. Had to stop imagining his face, even now, that desperate look in his eye as she shut
