The Unbroken by C. Clark (ebook reader .txt) 📕

“I’ll send for Adile,” Luca said curtly. “She’s already drawn up your bath. Dinner is ready, too. Which would you like first?”

Aranen took a deep breath, but she didn’t push Luca any further.

“A bath, Shāl willing.”

Luca stroked Touraine’s hair. The other woman’s forehead was warm still, even through Luca’s gloves, and damp with sweat. Even though Aranen said the sickness wasn’t fatal, it had been two days. She would have Adile burn the gloves later. Extreme, perhaps, but Luca was afraid of the risk. Luca wore a scarf wrapped around her face, and her breath was hot and cloying beneath it.

She caressed Touraine’s cheek and let herself imagine what things might have been like if they had been different people or met at a different time. Before her father grew more aggressive in his desire for Shālan magic, Shālans had visited La Chaise often. She’d known her Shālan tutor had had a Balladairan lover. She smiled as she pictured Touraine in the formal garb of a Qazāli ambassador or council member on a state visit. The line of her shoulders in elegant cloth, as dashing as she had been the night of Luca’s ball. And the tender strength of her hands on Luca’s leg the night before everything fell apart. Mere months ago, and yet it seemed a lifetime.

With a low mewling that might have been adorable under other circumstances, Touraine woke. Luca yanked her hand back, heat flushing up her cheeks. Not that Touraine would have noticed. Her eyes were still unfocused, and her mumbling was incoherent. More fever dreams. Inexplicable disappointment settled back into Luca’s stomach.

“Luca?” Then sharper, alarmed: “Luca, what under—” Touraine fell into a fit of coughing.

“Here.” Luca held a cup to Touraine’s mouth. The other woman hadn’t kept anything down for the last couple of days. The empty sick basin waited on the side of the bed, just in case.

Slowly, the fog in Touraine’s eyes cleared. She pushed herself up, then fell back against the pillows, too unsteady.

“Don’t move. You’re all right. I’m—you’re at my house. In the Quartier.”

Luca realized her hands were twitching in her lap while Touraine eyed Luca’s room suspiciously. She clasped them together and took a breath to steady herself.

“You killed her.”

“No, I—” This wasn’t how Luca had expected Touraine to start. “I tried to get Cantic to stop. She refused—military discipline is out of my purview until I’m crowned.”

Touraine turned away. The tendons in her jaw stood out. So did the ones in her hand where she clenched Luca’s plush blankets. Luca put her own hand over Touraine’s, expecting the other woman to jerk away.

Touraine didn’t. After several long, silent breaths, Touraine turned her hand over and clasped Luca’s fingers in hers.

Luca’s stomach fluttered like pages of an open book left in a pleasant breeze. It always came to this ache and flutter of her insides, this feeling that things could be more right if just this—

They stared at their linked hands, Luca’s in her black glove, Touraine’s bare and freshly scrubbed.

“Why am I here?” Touraine’s voice was hoarse. She still wouldn’t meet Luca’s eyes.

“Cantic wanted to arrest you, but I took you instead.”

“Why?” Touraine finally looked up. Her half-lidded eyes were bruised with sickness. Purple-red splotches crept along her skin, too. Up and down her torso, peeking from beneath the collar of the shirt Luca had dressed her in.

Because I owe you.

Because I wanted to take care of you.

Because I wanted to spite Cantic.

“Are you… in disguise?” Touraine asked before Luca could find the right response.

Luca blushed behind her scarf, suddenly self-conscious. With her other hand, the hand that hadn’t touched Touraine, she pulled the scarf down just slightly.

“You’re sick. The—doctor says you’ll get better, though.” Mentioning Aranen would only bring up more questions that Luca couldn’t answer.

“So you put me in your room. In your bed.” The look Touraine gave her was too much like Cantic’s.

“It’s quarantine enough. And we’ll sterilize everything. We’re all taking precautions.”

And they were. Every time she left the room, she stripped the robe she was wearing and the gloves and the scarf and left them in a bucket that Adile took away to boil. It was the best they could do, short of leaving Touraine alone in her fever. She didn’t want to bring Aranen back and face down that knowing stare.

Luca gripped Touraine’s hand tightly. She fought the urge to bring it up to her lips, instead just stroking Touraine’s fingers with her thumb.

“The things I said before, Touraine—” She couldn’t take them back. She still meant them. She had made the calculations. She was right. And yet there were some things she hadn’t calculated for. “I’m so sorry for the temple. Do you think that Djasha would accept funds for its repair?”

Touraine snorted a laugh that turned into dry coughs. “Repair?” she said when she caught her breath. “You haven’t been out to see it.”

Luca busied herself with a loose thread in her robe. “Gil and Cantic… advise against it.”

Touraine leaned back against the pillows. “Of course they do. You’ve really fucked things up, Luca. I don’t know why I hoped for better.”

“I hoped you would understand now.”

“Who gave the order for her death?”

“Pardon?”

“Who ordered Aimée executed? For what crime?”

“Cantic. Desertion. They caught her trying to escape to join the rebellion.”

Touraine closed her eyes and slipped her hand out of Luca’s. “I think I’m going to be sick again. Do you mind?”

The dismissal was so abrupt it caught Luca mid-justification, and it made something unpleasant lurch in her chest. Her eyes burned, but she stood calmly.

“Of course.” Luca retreated into formality. “Ring the bell when you’re finished. Adile will come.”

She took off her contaminated clothing, dropping it in the basket for Adile, and left without looking back. She didn’t want Touraine to see how much her words had hurt.

When Luca returned the next morning, Touraine was gone.

Touraine stumbled back into the slums, half-conscious. The fever was back. The rashes