Dwyn nodded as he settled her in his lap and urged his horse around.
“How bad was the wound, Dwyn?”
She glanced around at the worry in his voice, and swallowed before saying, “Bad,” in a weak voice.
As quiet as the word had been, Alick apparently heard it. Expression grim, he spurred his mount to a gallop. Even so, Aulaywas still a good three horse lengths in front of them when they entered the bailey. By the time Alick reined in at the footof the steps to the keep, Aulay had dropped off of his horse with his burden and was carrying Geordie up the stairs, barkingorders as he went.
Dwyn slid off of Alick’s horse the moment he stopped, and chased after Aulay, following him up the steps as quickly as shecould.
“Dwyn,” Alick shouted, and then cursed behind her. She heard his boots on the steps as he hurried after her, but was stillstartled when he scooped her up off her feet.
“Put me down, Alick. I want to see if Geordie is—”
“I’ll carry ye, lass. Yer feet are bleeding again. There’s a trail o’ bloody footprints up the stairs,” he said grimly.
Dwyn glanced over his shoulder, shocked to see there was indeed blood on the steps. It wasn’t full footprints, but half abloody print, and just drops of blood from the other. Turning back, she raised her feet to get a look at the tops of them,and saw that her slipper was missing off her good foot, and the linen unraveled and hanging down from her ankle on the other.She wasn’t sure when she’d lost the slipper, probably when she’d been dragged backward so abruptly, but she hadn’t even noticed.Nor had she noticed her linen wrappings unraveling.
Sighing, Dwyn let her feet drop and turned to look for Aulay as Alick carried her through the keep door Drostan was holdingopen. She wasn’t surprised to find the people in the great hall all up and about. Alick had said they were just breaking downthe trestle tables when Geordie’s riderless horse returned and the alarm was called. She supposed the others had given upany idea of sleeping until the men returned and they knew what was about. Now the inhabitants of Buchanan watched silentlyas she and Geordie were carried to the stairs.
Dwyn heard her name gasped and glanced around as her sisters rushed forward from the crowd, her father close behind them.It was only then she realized it wasn’t just servants and soldiers in the great hall; many of the visiting women and theirescorts were below still too, and had been waiting.
“Oh, Dwyn, yer poor feet,” Aileen moaned as she reached them and hurried along beside Alick.
“What happened?” Una asked grimly on her heels. “Geordie looks badly hurt.”
“We were attacked.” Dwyn sighed the words, her head swiveling to look toward Aulay again. She had no idea when Geordie hadlost consciousness, but he obviously was now. His head was hanging over Aulay’s arm, his face slack and pale as death.
“Was it Brodie?” Una asked sharply, and Dwyn glanced around, a frown claiming her lips.
“I do no’ ken. They did no’ mention Brodie,” she admitted wearily, and then they’d reached the steps and Aileen and Una wereforced to drop back behind them as Alick started to jog up the stairs.
Dwyn forgot them then, her attention wholly on Geordie’s slack face as Alick carried her quickly up the steps and followedAulay into Geordie’s room as she heard Jetta say, “Set him on the bed, husband.”
Dwyn glanced around the room to see that Rory was already there as well, fresh linens and his medicinals at the ready.
“What happened?” Rory asked, his eyes finding hers as he stepped back to allow Aulay to lay Geordie on the bed.
“He took a sword through the back. It came out the front,” Dwyn said at once, knowing that was what he was asking. She thenadded, “His lower chest, mayhap his upper stomach. ’Twas too dark to see properly.”
Rory nodded and then stepped back up beside Aulay to cut away the strip of skirt she’d tied tightly around his wound. He andAulay then worked together to remove Geordie’s plaid and shirt.
Alick carried Dwyn around to the other side of the bed, and set her down. She resisted the urge to crawl closer on the bed,and stayed out of the way, watching anxiously as they held Geordie upright to get his chest bare. She winced when she sawthe wound to his back. It was a little more than two inches across, she saw, when Rory washed the blood away. He paused brieflythen—she assumed to see how quickly the blood bubbled back up—and then grunted and pressed a wadded-up linen to it with onehand as he shifted to look at the front of his chest.
Dwyn immediately crawled closer then so that she could help hold Geordie upright as Aulay had to release him and step outof the way for Rory to look at his front.
“Well?” Aulay demanded as Rory washed the blood from Geordie’s chest.
Rory glanced up and then frowned when he saw the way Dwyn was straining to hold Geordie upright for him. “Alick, climb onthe bed and hold Geordie up. Dwyn, move closer to the edge of the bed so Jetta can start work on yer feet.” Those orders given,he still ignored Aulay’s question and started to do something to Geordie’s chest that she couldn’t see, and then she was distractedby Alick climbing up the center of the bed.
Dwyn shifted her legs aside for him, and then released Geordie and shifted her bottom over too to get out of the way as hetook over holding him up. She continued shifting sideways until she reached the edge of the bed, and then glanced toward Geordieagain as Rory murmured, “It missed his heart. However, I think it might have nicked one lung. He’s lost a lot o’ blood. No’as much as he could have though, thanks to Dwyn binding
