Before she could dwell on her own pain, or even allow herself to look at it, she released her arm and crawled back to the beast. “In a few minutes I’ll inject more. In the meantime, help me stop the bleeding.”
“Your arm, Elizabeth.”
“It’s fine.” With her hand pushed onto his wound, she tried untying the sleeves around him with her other.
“It’s not, and Henry would want you to take care of—”
“I’m not doing what Henry would want,” she interrupted, turning to him while her hands still worked. She tried to remain steady, but her hands shook and her arm burned, from deep in her muscle. Her back and shoulder muscles were sore, too, from pushing so hard and steadying him so long. “Henry isn’t awake, and right now I’m calling the shots.” She looked back to the beast as she took a large wad of new bandage with her free hand—real bandage—and topped it over the hood, placing more pressure on the area—as much as her strength allowed.
Kneeling beside her, Arne sloppily wrapped her arm with a roll of bandage. She flinched, still unable to look. “This will have to do then, until you get him taken care of. But I do think it’ll need stitches.” She glanced at him, nodding, and he added, “I’m glad you’re here, Elizabeth.”
She wanted to smile, but couldn’t. Her brows pulled together instead.
“He’ll be all right, dear,” he assured. “He’s a fast healer.”
Many minutes passed in silence and with the weakening of her arms, she no longer felt blood saturating the cloth. She removed it carefully, then the jacket hood, and though blood caked his fur and surrounded the laceration, it didn’t spill from it. She worked quickly, and from the corner of her eye, her own bandage appeared saturated. Ignoring it, she opened another cartridge of morphine and another syringe. She contemplated only briefly before popping off the caps and injecting it into a different place on his glutes. Arne stood back when she did, but the beast made no movement this time.
After lathering the two-inch laceration just above his hind leg with Betadine, she opened the suture kit Arne had placed beside her. Her fingers were unsteady when readying it and doing so seemed to take an eternity.
A deep breath in, a slow one out. Closing her eyes, she tried to still her hands. Arne was silent, allowing her to work, but she felt his eyes on her arm as she hooked the beast’s furry flesh with the curved needle and weaved the thread through. It was a meticulous process and by the time she’d knotted each stitch, she wasn’t sure how much time had passed. While wiping her brow on her bare upper arm, releasing another deep breath and giving in to the tremors in her hands, she counted nine stitches—perhaps too many, a doctor would say. But right now, she was the doctor.
She snipped extra thread away. “I would say he will need these removed in a few days, but given that he heals fast…I don’t know.” Her voice shook as much as her hands.
“How long will the morphine last?”
She released a deep sigh, sitting back and resting her hands on her knees. At her stillness, pain raged in her weightless muscles and throbbing forearm. In the hopes of once again steadying her spinning head, she took another deep breath before looking at a concerned Arne. “Who knows? Four hours, maybe. I’ll check his heart rate then. He may not need more at all.” She paused. “I find it disconcerting that you have it and know nothing about the way it works.”
“I’ve never had to use it,” he said sheepishly. “Like I said, I’m glad you’re here.” He smiled.
“Arne…did you not hear him in the forest? I would bet the whole town did.”
Again, he looked sheepish. “Without my hearing aid, I don’t hear much, I’m afraid. That was one jab Eustace hit on the mark.” She had forgotten about his hearing aid, and noticed it in his ear now.
He reached a hand to her, no doubt to help her stand, and said, “I’ll let you tell me the story another time, but for now, you need to get home. You need to take care of you.” He handed her another suture set and she recoiled.
“I’m not leaving, Arne.” She knelt over Henry again. “Will you please get me some warm water and rags? A towel, too?”
“Elizabeth, let me handle the cleaning. You need to fix yourself up, or Henry will have me hung for not taking care of you.”
She didn’t look at him. “I’m not finished.”
He sighed, but after a moment left the room. Upon his return, he placed a large glass bowl of warm water beside her, as well as three terrycloth rags and a large towel. She dipped a rag in the water, where it swirled with red from the blood on her hands. First, she gently wiped the incision site, cleaning away extra blood and Betadine. After rinsing the rag, she cleaned his neck, where the blood on her hands had transferred to his fur. She washed as much of him as possible, and that was when the other cuts on his hind leg reared their ugly faces: claw or teeth marks, possibly from when he and Diableron had fought before Elizabeth found them. The flesh was ripped and raw, but not deep enough for stitches, and she took extra care when cleaning them. When she finished, she dried him with the towel as best as she could.
When she looked up, Arne held the other suture kit in her direction, eyebrow raised. “Your turn now.” He handed her a bottle of vodka and added, “Just in case.” Then a clean and folded t-shirt, one she assumed was Henry’s. “You can change into this after you clean yourself up.”
She took them both, even though she was practically used to the fire in her forearm by now. He directed her to the closest bathroom, and when she was inside, safe behind the closed door, she braced herself on the sink and released a breath as though she’d been holding it the whole time. With uneven exhalations, she bent over the sink, her tears filling it, and again it amazed her how easily they came, when they had been absent for so many years.
After a moment, she gathered the courage to look at her arm. She unwrapped the bandage to find three large scrapes, two superficial, but one deep. It opened like a ragged canyon, a view of her muscle at the bottom. She tried not to give in to lightheadedness as she cleaned it and then took a long, burning swig of the alcohol, coughing afterward. It burned her nostrils and esophagus, and her head shook in response. She took another swig, coughing again. Then, with a deep breath, she began stitching the slice down her arm, biting down hard on the leather suture case as she exhaled heavily through her teeth. She even groaned a few times, especially because the time it took felt endless. The canyon of a slice was at least three inches long, and just like the beast’s incision, she hadn’t known how many stitches she’d tied until the end. And just like the beast’s incision, she ended up doing nine, even though the wound was longer.
More than her hand trembled now, and with a weak sigh, she looked around the bathroom the size of her bedroom at her old apartment. This bathroom, just like the sitting room, was all marble—floor and countertop. She stripped and turned on one of the shower heads, standing eagerly beneath it. Leaning against the tile wall, she let it wash over her head and down her body, taking all the blood with it. The water burned hotter than she usually liked, but it jerked her back to life. It brought all her senses into focus and left her buckling over in the shower, breaking down until she forced herself to breathe.
Chapter 21
Elizabeth gave herself permission to explore Henry’s home for the first time—at least this section of it. Gold-trimmed crown molding; a wide spiral staircase made, again, of heavenly white marble; high ceilings painted with demons and angels, a mural depicting some heavenly war: every inch, even those ceilings, was clean and immaculate. The house even smelled clean, like exquisite, natural pine.