Coulter, Catherine. Rosehaven / Catherine Coulter.

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looked astonished, and fell right on top of her rosemary and horehound. His right boot landed on the small patch of mugwort.

Severin felt the deep twisting pain before he opened his eyes. But it was pain, nothing more, and he knew from long practice that he could control most pain. He’d fainted. Like a damned female, he’d fainted. He’d had to be carried and laid on his bed. He felt shame curdle in his belly. He couldn’t help it. Then it wasn’t shame curdling in his belly. He lurched up and vomited in the basin she held for him. He drew a deep, steadying breath and said, “You will go away. I don’t wish you near me.”

“Why not? Had I not been here, had I not known that your belly would probably rebel, you would have puked on yourself.”

He wanted to kill her.

“Do you still have that trowel?”

“Nay, I threw it at the man I felled.”

She had saved herself, damn her. And she’d saved him as well, curse her to hell and beyond. A girl who was half his size and she’d hurled herself at him, knocking him to the ground. If she hadn’t knocked him off balance, perhaps he would have seen the man in time. Perhaps. He’d seen her rip the man’s face with her fingernails, kick him in his groin. Who had taught her that? A lady would have swooned, surely, not knocked him out of danger and flung herself upon the attacker. His voice was sour as he said, “What are you doing to me?”

“Ah, a reasonable question. It’s about time. But your mood is foul as your breath.”

“Don’t mock me, lady. He felt the bed give when she sat down beside him. She wasn’t looking at his face, but at his shoulder.

He reached up and grabbed her wrist. “What are you doing?” He sucked in his breath at the pain. He closed his eyes a moment, gaining control. He had to, she was watching him.

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“Drink this.”

She held a goblet to his lips. He tasted the sweet, crisp liquid, felt the foulness ease in his mouth and through his body.

“Good. Now hold still.” She added in a matter-of-fact voice, “I’m cleansing the wound with a paste I make of eryngo root, and bandaging it. You will survive, my lord.”

“What is this eryngo root?”

“Many call it sea holly. It grows just above the tide line. I mix it with pearl barley and water boiled with just three leaves from the gentian plant. Don’t fret, my lord, it won’t kill you.”

“Finish your bandaging and leave me be. I must question that other man.”

“Keep on your back for a bit longer, Severin,” Graelam said from just beyond Hastings. “She has got the bleeding stopped. I have spoken to the man.”

Severin felt a movement on his belly. Trist poked his head from beneath the covers that were pulled to Severin’s waist. He realized he was still wearing his breeches, but not his boots. He said gently, as he brought his hand to lightly touch the marten’s head, “I am all right, Trist. Don’t fret.”

The marten made a strange, soft purring sound, then flattened his chin on Severen’s belly, staring up at his master’s face.

“He wouldn’t leave you,” Hastings said. “He did leap away when you vomited, but you felt too wretched to notice. Then he crept back. He wasn’t with you this morning when you came to my herb garden. When Graelam and Beamis and your man, Bonluc, carried you in, he leapt onto you, yowling, sort of. I could not make him leave and I did ask him very politely.”

This damned wit of hers. Where had it come from? Why had she hidden it from him? It annoyed him. He looked at her then and said, “This would not have happened had you obeyed me.”

“No,” she said, surprising him, “it would not have.”

“The man,” Graelam said, looking from one to the other, “won’t

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speak of anything to the point. He won’t even admit to being Richard de Luci’s man. He just keeps whining that he’s from the village, here to trade furs. Indeed, he did have four or five pelts fastened to his belt.”

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