Chapter 6: Off His Medication

Someone hit my loft door with a fist at one in the morning.

I came down the ladder in my nightshirt with a kitchen knife in my hand.

Dafydd was on the landing with his coat buttoned wrong.

"It's the veins," he said. "He sent me away. He said not to wake you. I'm waking you."

"Where is he?"

"Tower. The black's at his shoulder and it's moving."

I put on boots and a coat and ran.

A hundred and nine steps, and I took them in the dark with the knife still in my fist.

The door at the top stood open.

The round room was lit by one lamp.

Cadoc lay on the narrow bed in his shirt with his left arm flung out over the blanket.

The black ran from his fingers to the top of his shoulder, thick and raised and shining.

His whole body was drawn tight with it.

His eyes were shut.

His teeth were clenched so hard that the muscle at his jaw jumped.

"Go back down," he said, without opening them. "I told Dafydd not to."

"You told Dafydd a lot of things."

"Bronwen."

"I'm not touching you because I want to," I said. "It helps. That's all it is. It means nothing."

"Understood."

I set the knife on the table and sat on the edge of the bed.

I put my right hand around his wrist.

The black pulled back under my fingers.

His body went loose all at once.

Slowly the cords in his arm went slack.

His shoulders came down off the pillow, and the lines slid back along his arm one inch at a time.

"Better?" I said.

"Yes."

"How long has it been this bad?"

"Since the night I came down the stairs." His eyes opened, a dark gold in the lamp. "It was quiet for ten years. I think it was waiting."

"For what?"

"I don't know. For you, I'd say, but that's a vain thing to think."

"It is," I said.

He almost smiled.

I stayed where I was.

After a while, because he asked me to, I told him about the loft above the ovens.

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