Chapter 7: Twenty Lines

I woke the nurse and told her to stay with Ewan.

Then I followed Perrin down the tower stair, my hand on the wall, my back pulling at every step.

"Terms," I said at the second landing. "Nursery only."

"I know."

"I'm breaking my own rule. So the door to his room stays open, and you stand in it."

"I'll stand in it all night," said Perrin.

The king's rooms were at the top of the east stair, behind two guards who would not meet my eyes.

The inner chamber was hot as an oven.

The fire was banked high, the windows shut, and a bed as wide as a boat stood in the middle with its curtains torn down.

Lucan Hartmoor lay across it on his stomach.

He wore breeches and nothing else.

His shirt was in a heap on the floor, soaked through.

His black hair was plastered to his skull, and the muscles of his shoulders jumped and shook.

Two healers hovered by the washstand and did not come near.

"Out," Perrin said.

They went.

I walked to the bedside and looked down at the king's back.

Twenty thin lines crossed it, raised and silver-white at the edges, red in the middle.

They lay in the same places as mine.

The same angle, the same width, the same wicked little hook at the end of the seventh.

I had to put a hand on the bedpost.

"That isn't possible," I said.

"It started when you crossed the Silver Line," said Perrin quietly. "His hand opened first. Then his back. The healers cannot close any of it."

"He didn't have these in the yard."

"No."

"He laid the chain on me," I said. "Not on himself."

"I know, my lady."

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