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It took another ten minutes to leave town and five more to reach the first copse of trees on the trade road heading east.
There Edvard veered the horses off the road and into the thick trees where a small brook burbled nearby. He dismounted and tried to help Mina down, but she was already sliding off the gelding on her own, balancing on her good foot and catching her skirt on the saddle.
She mumbled a curse as she unhooked her skirt from the scabbard edge and pulled it down. She turned to see Edvard half grinning, one hand at his side.
"I don't think I've ever seen your knees before."
She blushed and settled her skirt better. "I think you have."
"Well, never both at once."
She was about to say something to change the grin on his face, but Yuila was pulling Sova by the reins to them.
"Edvard, you're all bloody," she said, throwing off her hood.
"Just a little. Take the animals to the brook to drink, okay?"
She nodded, eyes still fastened on the darkened blue of his shirt. Mina pulled his hand carefully from his side as the girl left with the horses and mule to the brook. The blue material was saturated and sticking, but had acted as a makeshift bandage for the last twenty minutes.
She looked to him. "This needs to come off. I'll get the packs from—"
"You can stay here and I'll get the packs."
She didn't argue with him. He returned a moment later with two bags from the mule and dropped them beneath the olive tree.
"Don't tell Yuila anything."
"She's going to be asking," she said, watching him gingerly pull off his shirt. It stuck where the blood had dried, and she cautiously eased it free. She groaned at the reddened area beneath his left ribs. "Geez, Edvard, how bad is it?" She touched one side of the wound where the bruising had begun to spread. "How many times did he stab you?"
"Just once, and it wasn't really a stab. I just didn't get out of the way in time." He held his breath as her fingers pushed gently around the two-inch laceration.
"Once is enough. Sit down."
He did and she knelt to sort through the packs. She settled beside him with a handful of items and handed him the dark bottle of whiskey from the night before.
"It's not that bad, Mina."
"It will be once I start sewing it up." She found the needle and cotton thread. "Where's the bottle of antiseptic?"
"That stuff for your foot?" He shook his head, leaning against the tree trunk. "We used it up last night."
"All of it?" She threaded the needle.
"Yup. And I don't need it, anyway. This isn't infected."
"Yet." She doused a cloth with water from one of the canteens and gave him the needle and thread to hold. "What happened in the alley?"
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