Page 16 of Fought it Through the Teeth

Then Garrik is there.

He comes from the left, on foot, moving fast, a spear in both hands and his body angled to intercept. He gets between the boar and its trajectory with perhaps a second to spare and drives the spear forward and down, not into the animal's chest, but into the ground in front of it, creating a barrier that the boar has to adjust for. The animal swerves. The momentum carries it sideways, crashing through bracken, and the warriors on its flank converge and three spears go in and the thing finally, furiously, goes down.

Bohdi doesn't watch it die. He is already turning back to Morgan, who is on his knees in the dirt with his expression stricken.

"Up," Bohdi says, and gets his arm under Morgan's and hauls him to his feet.

Morgan comes up swaying. His hand finds Bohdi's forearm and grips it, and Bohdi holds him there, steady, solid. Morgan's face is still white. His hair has come loose from its tie and hangs across his face, and he is breathing through his teeth, each inhale a conscious effort.

"You're all right," Bohdi tells him, and his voice is still calm, and he keeps his arm locked around Morgan's ribs and holds him upright. He does not look at the dead boar and does not look at Ivan. He pointedly does not think about what he wants to do to a man who whoops while a prince lies winded on the ground.

Over the top of Morgan's head, he finds Garrik.

Ivan's ward is standing ten feet away, his spear still planted in the dirt behind him, breathing hard from the sprint. His eyes meet Bohdi's, and the look in them is steady and says I've got your back.

Bohdi gives him a small, direct nod, one warrior to another.

Garrik nods back.

Then the warriors are converging, the boar is being dealt with, and Ivan is striding through the clearing with his face flushed and his chest heaving and his eyes bright with savage delight.

"A triumph!" he bellows, clapping his hands together. "Bring the beast back to the stronghold. We feast tonight!"

He does not ask whether his betrothed is injured.

Morgan's hand is still on Bohdi's forearm. His grip has loosened from desperate to merely tight, and his breathing is evening out. When Bohdi looks down at him, Morgan meets his eyes with an expression that is part gratitude and part fury and part something else — something stripped bare by the fall and the fear, something that looks like it has been shaken loose from wherever Morgan usually keeps it locked.

Bohdi looks away.

"Can you ride?" he asks.

"Of course I can," Morgan replies, and then, under his breath, "I'm certainly not going to let him see otherwise."

Morgan releases his forearm, straightens, walks to where his horse is being held by one of the warriors, and pulls himself into the saddle with a wince he does not bother to hide and a set to his jaw that says the conversation about his physical state is over.

Bohdi mounts his own horse. He falls in beside the prince and they ride back toward the stronghold with the rest of the hunting party, the dead boar dragged behind them. Ivan laughs and tells stories about the kill and claps warriors on the back and does not once address the man he intends to marry.

Chapter 7

Morgan

Morgan's body is a map of bruising in a way he is truly not used to.

His back took the worst of the fall — a spread of deep, mottled purple that runs from his shoulder blades to his lower ribs, tender to the touch and agonizing when he twists. His right hip, where he landed hardest, is swollen and hot beneath the skin, a knot of damaged tissue that sends a spike of pain through him every time he shifts his weight. His left shoulder aches from the wrench of trying to catch himself on the way down, a dull, persistent throb that radiates up into his neck and down into his fingers.

He spent ten humiliating minutes alone in his room after the hunt trying to apply salve to his own shoulder blade, contorting himself in front of the polished metal mirror with his arms bent at angles the gods had not intended. Twisting and reaching produced nothing but indignity and a smear of salve on his elbow that served no purpose whatsoever.

He needs help and he knows he needs help, but there is not one single person in this stronghold Bohdi is going to let touch him. And after Dade's hands on his shirt that morning, Morgan does not want anyone in this stronghold touching him either. The prospect of a stranger's hands on his bare skin makes something in his chest constrict with a sharpness that is not entirely rational, but also not entirely unwarranted.

So, Bohdi apparently decides to do it himself.

He arrives after supper with a confidence that Morgan finds both reassuring and insufferable. He sets the pot of salve on the table and says, "Shirt off, your highness. Let's see the damage."

"I don't recall requesting a physician."

"Oh, I'm hardly qualified. Indrie would probably cough up a rib if he knew I was attempting to render medical aid. You should have seen the look he gave me when he saw Eskil's field dressing after the Jakadi ambush." Bohdi uncaps the pot and sniffs the contents, appraising. "Taking bets on whether this is medicinal or merely lard accented with rosemary."

"If you're trying to bruise my dignity then you're too late. It is already quite beaten."