earth, as far as I can tell. I know she has only ever mended pots and healed minor wounds, but I have taught her a lot, to no avail. She must be resisting me.'
The Prioress regarded the Sister with some respect. From the flickering of Melina's eyelids, she could tell the nun was fighting the urgent need for sleep with every fibre of her being. Nonetheless, she endured. It would be almost a shame to heap further privations on her…
'Very well, Sister; the Supplicant will undergo a full day of Penance of the Second Grade, and you are to oversee her. Wake her in two hours, and be sure to let her know our disapproval. Let her know why she is being punished.'
Even in her semi-comatose state, Melana managed to jerk herself upright, her eyes bulging. “Reverend Mother, I must protest!” she cried, her voice harsh and rasping. “I cannot maintain focus and a clear head on one or two hours’ sleep a night!'
'Mind your manners, Sister!” Lizaveta snapped. “Remember who you are addressing!'
Melana's bloodshot eyes met those of her Prioress. “I intended no disrespect, Reverend Mother,” she croaked. “But I need sleep badly!'
Lizaveta smiled. Give with one hand, and take away with the other. It's time to play Lady Bountiful.
'Very well,” she said. “Although I am a little distressed at your lack of fortitude… you were about to speak, Sister?'
'No, Reverend Mother.” The words came through clenched teeth.
'Good. You may have eight hours of sleep, Sister.'
'Thank you, Reverend Mother!'
The Prioress regarded the stunned expression on the Sister's face with some satisfaction. “In two-hour steps, that is: two hours with the Supplicant, followed by two hours’ sleep. The Novices may tend her while you lounge in your bed.'
Go on, girl; just you dare to remonstrate with me! Lizaveta watched a complex range of expressions flood across the nun's face in succession: initial rage, self-doubt, fear, and finally, acceptance of her lot.
'Thank you, Reverend Mother, for having mercy on my human frailty,” Melina said, lowering her eyes. “May I leave?'
'Of course, Sister. Please, do take some rest. Just bear in mind that I want results from this little slut as soon as possible. Fail me, and you'll find that many hungry Novices will be only too eager to take your place in the Score; Novices you've abused over the years.
'Just think how they'll treat you, then.'
The Prioress waited to see if Melana was willing to remonstrate now, but the rebellious tart seemed to have more sense than she had thought.
'Thank you, Reverend Mother,” the nun said at last, bowing and staggering out of the room like a drunkard.
Lizaveta yawned and stretched like a cat. I'll have two willing slaves out of this little exercise, she thought. Either that, or a slave and an example to anybody else who thinks she is above the Rule.
She walked from the bare, forbidding room to her sumptuous bedchamber; a room that only her trusted, mute body-servants ever saw.
One of the speechless maids slipped from under the vast feather bed and made to undress the Prioress, while another scuttled over to a cherry-wood armoire and withdrew a silk night-dress. A third girl began to comb her white tresses, and another stood ready with water, soap and sponge.
Once prepared for her night's sleep, the Prioress slipped into the soft, yielding bed. The pale maids slotted themselves underneath it, like obedient, animated toys putting themselves back into their box.
Lizaveta slept with a smile on her face, her dreams pleasant and untroubled.
[Back to Table of Contents]
Chapter 7: Integration
Grimm inspected Harvel's wounds: a pair of dark pink slits in the swordsman's flesh, held closed by a series of stitches.
'How do they feel now, Harvel?” the mage asked.
'Itchy, Lord Mage, but they don't hurt any more, unless I move awkwardly. What do you think?'
Grimm leant close to the wounds and sniffed, but he detected no taint of corruption.
'I think you got away with it, Harvel. The wounds are knitting well, and it looks like you've avoided infection so far. The shoulder wound looks all right, too. I think we ought to leave the stitches in for a few more days, but I think you can remove the sling now. How's your arm?'
Harvel, slipping his left arm from its restraint, exercised the limb. He whirled his arm in a few experimental circles.
'Not too much, now, Harvel,” Grimm warned him. “You don't want to risk opening the wound again. How does it feel?'
'The skin feels a little tight, and my arm's a mite on the weak side, but it doesn't seem to be permanently damaged. I've survived worse.'
Grimm felt dubious at this claim: although he noted many scars on the warrior's naked torso, none seemed of a life-threatening nature.
Harvel must have noted a trace of disbelief on the mage's face, as he pulled up the right leg of his loose trousers to show a livid, jagged scar run running from mid-thigh to half-way down his shin.
'Shattered,” the warrior said, his voice tinged with apparent pride, “my thighbone and the bones in my lower leg. The physician told me I was lucky to be alive, and I had my entire leg immobilised for nearly six months.
Harvel pointed to a series of small, round scars running down either side of his shin. “See these little marks?'
Grimm nodded.
'Metal bolts held the leg together while it healed. For quite a while, it was touch and go, and it hurt like a bugger when he took them out, even though I was full of brandy at the time.
'Do you see that bigger mark there?'
Grimm noticed that one of the scars was larger and deeper than the others, a hemispherical crater just under the knee on the left-hand side.
'That's where one of the bolt-holes got infected, and I got really sick. The Doctor had to cut out all the stinking, rotting flesh, and he treated it with green, mouldy bread, would you believe? It seemed to do the trick, though, and here I am to tell the tale. Even so, the heel and sole of my right boot are over an inch thicker than the ones on the left. That costs me a fortune in cobblers’ bills when I buy a new pair.'
Grimm felt impressed: this had indeed been a life-threatening injury. From what he knew of healing, such a compound fracture of the leg could be very dangerous, especially when the thighbone was involved.
'Did you receive the wound in battle, Harvel?'
The swordsman shrugged. “That's for me to know and you to find out, mage.'
Crest looked up from the whetstone on his lap, on which he was honing the edges of his collection of daggers, and he laughed.
'He got it leaping out of a married woman's bedroom window when the enraged husband found them galloping the two-backed beast, mage! The trouble was that the drop was a little further than he thought.'
'Thanks so much, elf,” Harvel growled. “You really know how to wreck a man's reputation.'
'I think you do a pretty good job of that yourself, Harvel,” Crest replied. “One of these days, some outraged husband's going to be quicker even than you, and he'll hand you your overactive gonads marinated in a white wine sauce.'
'Won't ever happen, Crest,” the swordsman said with a smug expression.
Grimm smiled and wandered off to find General Quelgrum. He found the old soldier sitting cross-legged by the rear of the wagon. His face calm and intent; he was cleaning and oiling the disassembled parts of some of his Technological weapons, which were spread out on a tarpaulin before him.
