At her twitching silence, he continued. “I’ll take most of the caravan with me to Domora, including Asil.” He bared his teeth in warning when a whine of protest escaped her lips. “She’s safer with me than she is with you and that hunter, and it isn’t as if I’m taking everyone with me when I visit the Maesor. You and a few others will stay behind for now, secure all the supplies and gifts Azarion has given us, and complete any outstanding business. Take your time and don’t be too enthusiastic with helping your patient heal fast. I’ll use the opportunity to put distance between us and make a profit from the bone artifact. He’s welcome to hunt for the thing in the Maesor all he wants after that, and good luck to him. Understand?” Halani nodded. “Good. When you go back, meet with Kursak to decide who goes with me and who stays. Whoever goes, send them and their wagons here. We’ll depart from the Savatar camp when they arrive.”
Halani wanted to weep. He didn’t take Asil to keep her safe but to punish Halani. To be away from her mother, unable to watch over her . . . she’d age a decade from worry before they met up again in Domora.
Once he was assured of her acquiescence, Hamod’s temper subsided but not his disapproval. A coldness settled over him as they finalized their plans. When Halani made to leave and return to the free trader camp, Hamod stopped her at the qara door. “Halani.”
She turned, hiding her shiver. She and her uncle had always had a contentious relationship, but his reaction to her now was different, darker and unforgiving. In that moment, she realized not all good deeds were necessarily wise ones.
“This isn’t a negotiation between us, nor a barter. Make no mistake, it isn’t me bending to your will. Your suggestion for selling the draga bone in Domora is a good one and stands to profit all of us. You kept your counsel and didn’t tell the others of the transaction between me and those traders, and for that I’m in your debt, but you rode the line of betrayal when you took in the hunter, knowing how I’d feel and the risk such an act exposed me to. Do something like it again, and I will exile you from the caravan. Permanently.”
She left the Savatar camp after that, reeling from his threat and speechless with rage. Despite the circumstances in which she now found herself, Halani still didn’t regret bringing Malachus to their camp. It was the right thing to do, though what was right wasn’t always what was convenient. The philosophy didn’t blunt the sharpness of Hamod’s threat or the way it cut through her as no other insensitive remark from him ever had. He would force her to leave, separate her from Asil, who wouldn’t understand why her daughter had abandoned her.
Kursak met her at the corral, took one look at her face, and pulled her into a brief embrace. “Didn’t go well, did it?”
Halani blinked hard to keep back tears. “No,” she said, voice unsteady. “Though it went much as you warned. We need to gather as soon as everyone is back from the market. Uncle has plans, and they include all of us.”
Still smarting from Hamod’s words, she sought out Asil at their wagon. The door was closed and the steps tucked away. During hot days like today, her mother liked to sit on a blanket outside the wagon and either sew or bead as she called out to or chatted with other caravan members. No blanket or Asil held court at the moment.
Halani had a good idea where her mother had gone and made her way to the provender wagon turned sickbed. She stopped at the tableau in front of her. A small crowd had gathered at the wagon, seated in a semicircle around a very pale Malachus, who reclined against a saddle draped in blankets. Shirtless, but with a cover draped across his lap for modesty, he was a scarred vision of ill health and healing wounds. Asil sat on one side of him, Talen on the other, both women alternately offering him food and drink or endlessly adjusting his covering as if the thing tried to creep away on its own. Three more women sat in front of him, two with their young children. All listened with avid expressions as he read from a book opened on his lap.
Five guilty expressions turned toward her when she cleared her throat to signal her approach. Malachus only smiled, gesturing for her to find a seat among his audience. “Welcome, mistress.”
Talen, wearing a rueful look, explained. “I know he’s still healing, Halani, but it was miserably hot in the wagon, so we helped him outside.”
“And took excellent care of me,” Malachus said in support of the decision. He held up a cup for her to see. “Sweet water, good conversation, and a cool breeze. I feel much better already.”
“Say you aren’t mad, Hali.” Asil gazed at her wide-eyed. “Malachus said he didn’t mind.”
Halani sighed. “I’m not mad in the least, Mama. I would have done the same as Talen, and it’s much too nice today to sit in a stuffy wagon, even if you’re injured or sick.”
“You really don’t mind?” Talen said in a low voice so the others didn’t hear.
“I really don’t mind.” Halani patted her arm. “I trusted you to know what to do while I was gone, and you did.” She clapped her hands and addressed the group. “Off with you. You can all visit with Malachus later. I want to make sure you haven’t exhausted him with so much socializing.” She caught Talen’s arm before the other woman walked away. “Help Kursak spread the word that I’ve called a meeting this evening just after dark. News from Hamod.”
A frown wrinkled Talen’s smooth brow. “Was he angry?”
“Furious, though we’ve settled things between us. It just means a few changes from our original plan for leaving Goban territory.”
Once the others left and she was alone with Malachus, he lost the half smile he wore. She knelt in front of him, grateful for the book’s distraction to avoid his searching gaze. She’d seen the tome among his belongings, nestled deep in one of the satchels Talen had brought when she retrieved Batraza from the stables. Her fingers itched to touch the pages filled with mysterious symbols. “You can read.”
“I can. In six languages.” The idea made her thoughts spin. “I assume you cannot?” There was no judgment in his voice, no disdain, just mild curiosity.
Halani shrugged. “No. None of us here can.” Though it had always been a fervid wish of hers to learn. The chance to learn one language seemed improbable.
“You always have solemn eyes, Halani. Even more so now. Will you tell this stranger what troubles you or is this a burden to bear alone?”
Halani touched the bandage covering his chest, checking the binding to make sure it hadn’t loosened. Her hand, browned by the sun, looked dark against his sickbed pallor. She raised her eyes to stare into his. So many secrets there. A grief as well, old and deep. He drew her to him with the power of a lodestone, had done so since she first crossed his path in the market. That fascination remained, and it had nothing to do with pity for his condition or her role as his nurse. “Alone,” she said. “Though I appreciate the offer to listen.”
“The offer stands should you change your mind. Not all wounds are of the flesh.”
Her vision instantly blurred at his words, and she stood abruptly. “I’ll be right back. I want to try a new poultice with some of the herbs I bought at market.”
She fled, using the time to wrestle her tears into submission. Malachus was her patient, nothing more, and she refused to humiliate herself in front of him with angry sobs and regrets. She had value in this caravan. Loved the people who were part of it and was loved by them despite Hamod’s willingness to cast her aside and bar her from ever seeing Asil should she defy his authority again. To tell Malachus some things, she’d have to tell him everything, so she chose to tell him nothing.
He hadn’t moved from his spot, though her mother had returned to keep him company while Halani was gone. “What took so long, Hali?” She grinned at Malachus. “Now that Hali’s here, do you need our help to stand and piss?”
Halani groaned and Malachus chuckled. “I’m fine, Asil, though if I need help, you’ll be the first person I call for.” He turned his attention to Halani. “Should I stand so you can reach the bandages?”
“You’re fine as you are.” She crouched down beside him, her bowl of poultice next to her, along with a towel to wipe her hands. She gestured for the book. “I’ll have Asil return this. I don’t think you want to get blood or poultice on the pages.”
She worked in silence, carefully peeling away the bandages to inspect his wounds before applying the new poultice and rewrapping them. Asil kept up a steady stream of chatter, skipping from topic to topic without pause like a hummingbird on a cluster of blossoms.
“Whatever you just slathered on me, it smells foul but feels good,” Malachus said.
“Stinks like a mule’s arse,” Asil volunteered. “But Hali always makes the best salves. You’ll feel much better in no time, even if no one wants to sit by you.”
Leave it to her flinchingly honest mother to lift her mood. Halani burst out laughing, which made Asil laugh as well, her face beaming at having pleased her daughter. In that moment Halani swore to herself she’d adhere to Hamod’s edict, do whatever was necessary to avoid banishment and the loss of her mother, even if it meant deceiving a man to aid her uncle’s larceny.
Unaware of her dark thoughts, Malachus joined in their amusement, holding a hand to his injured side to ease any twinges his laughter caused. “You’re like no other I’ve ever met, Asil. And that’s a good thing.” His enigmatic gaze settled on Halani. “Like your daughter. Unique. Memorable.”
Halani blushed at the unexpected compliment. She covered her embarrassment by sending her mother back to their wagon to return her supplies and bring a basket so she could gather laundry. Once Asil departed, she checked the knots she’d tied to keep Malachus’s bandages in place. “Had I not dug the broadheads out of you myself, I’d say these wounds were older than they are.”
“There is magic in your herbs,” he said.