The death of his Cordelhia. The night that had derailed his life. The way he had ended up in the camp.
He’d said something else at the end now, though. A word she hadn’t quite caught, and had never heard him say before in connection with his history.
And now he appeared to be fully asleep, his frown intense, but his breathing deep and even. Staring across at him, she still couldn’t believehis appearance, and she finally had to look elsewhere because she felt as though she were invading his privacy because he was unaware of her focus.
Glancing around, she was astonished at how everything was so neat and quiet—in contrast to the prison camp, especially the former one that had been a rabbit warren carved out under the earth.
Then again, the difference was the safety, not the silence or cleanliness.
It had been so long since she had not slept with one eye open. Part of it was the security of this hidden place, but more of it was Kane. His presence was a declaration of protection, and though she had not expected to find any rest, she had even dreamed during the day—and not had nightmares for once. In fact, in her repose, she had been back as she had once been, with flowing hair, and limbs that worked, and a future ahead in the human library.
And Kane might just have walked up to her front desk with a book in his hand… and warmth in his eyes.
“Stop,” she whispered.
Fantasies were not what she needed right now. What she needed was…
A real bathroom, with running water.
Yes, that was it.
Shifting around, she moved over the top of the bed to the far side, and gingerly put her bare feet down to the floor. The carpeting was soft, just like the bed had been, and both were a reminder of creature comforts, things she had taken for granted and then not known for what seemed like an eternity.
As always, she was careful settling her weight on her bad leg, giving the knee and ankle joints an opportunity to accept what she was requesting of them. When she was ready, she took the blanket she had slept on with her and limped across to the bathroom, shutting herself in. There was a tiny light plugged into a socket, the glow like a firefly mounted on the wall, and she was relieved she didn’t have to turn on anything harsh.
For a moment, she just stood between the white porcelain sink and the shower stall, and when she had trouble connecting to where she was, she put a hand out in either direction, feeling the pattern on the frosted glass door and the cool smoothness of the basin.
Then she reached in and started the shower, used the toilet, and removed her robing. It was impossible not to look down at her knobby knees and her bony calves as she tested the water. The acid attack had only impacted her face, neck, and some of her upper body, but that broken leg of hers, which had healed so badly, was going to be an equal problem for the rest of her life.
As she considered her frailty, her mind took her back to when she’d been chained to the pegs on that stained wall, the guard cutting the hood off and then staring at her as if she were a carnival exhibit he was determined to get his money’s worth of before the curtain closed.
Stepping into the shower, she shivered at the gentle fall on her skin, and for a moment, everything was too comfortable, too much as it had been before the acid attack—especially as she looked to the tiled wall and saw on a little shelf twin bottles of shampoo and conditioner. There was also a bar of soap still in its wrapper.
“Dial,” the logo read.
Her hand shook as she reached out and opened the soap’s folds of foiled paper. It was a small bar, an individual-use one, and it was orange as a mandarin. The smell was not pleasant, but nor was it offending to the senses.
Palming the bar, she created a froth by rolling the square over and over again under the water, and when there was a sufficiency, she took the suds to her face and her neck. The nerves in the skin that had been burned by the acid no longer functioned, and it had taken her time to get used to the one-sided nature of the sensations, only the ridges on her forehead, cheeks, and jaw registering on her hands, nothing else making any impression on her face.
The fragrance swelled as she continued to wash herself, including the top of her head and the straggled patches of hair. The shampoo andconditioner were just not warranted: She didn’t have enough or in good enough shape to worry about that.
How had she let Kane see her like this, she wondered.
Finished with her ablutions, she turned to the spray and tilted her head back as far as it could go—which was not that far. And then, she had to get reasonable.
Kane was right.
If she went back to the prison, she was as good as dead. That head of the guards was going to get her pound of flesh for that guard Nadya had killed, and it was going to be a very painful death. And if she died at the hands of that female? She was making a mockery of the risks Kane had taken to come back for her.
But she had not lied when she’d told him she would go back because she had nowhere else to go. The prison camp was a terrible place, but she had a routine there. She knew what she had to worry about, what she should be scared of, and where to go if she was in danger. And sometimes comfort could be found in the predictability of the unpleasant. It was easier than evolving past her grief and anger, for sure, and besides, she had been out of the human-dominated world now for forty years. Things were going to be very different than she remembered.
She wasn’t sure whether she had the energy to assimilate into all the modernity.
Where would she go, though?
Turning off the shower, she stepped out and debated whether to use the towel that was hanging on a rod mounted by the sink. The white terrycloth length was folded perfectly, and she didn’t feel as though her body deserved the disturbance of its careful arrangement.
As she turned to the sink, she discovered that even though she’d been preoccupied as she’d entered the bathroom, she had nonetheless placed the lid down on the toilet and precisely folded her robing, her loose tunic, her underthings, and her leggings upon it.