Blood of the Redd Guard - Part Two Read Online Free Page B

fetch Elaire. She had a little bit of medical training and would be better than nothing until the doctor got here. Helam’s guards were aware of the tension between Helam and his wife, but none of them were aware of the actual issues. He’d gone to great lengths to keep it that way.
    Having his wife followed would change that. How faithful would his men be to him when they learned she was a member of the Kopal?
    Shaking his head, he focused on his son. He needed to stop the flow of blood.
    Casting his eyes about the room, he looked for anything that would do. His first thought had been the clothes he’d just cut off Molach, but they were dirty, scuffed up with what looked like soot. They also stunk of sweat. Helam’s eyes settled on the pillows he’d tossed to the floor. Picking up a white one, he dusted it off and pressed it against the wound.
    “Melyah!” Elaire gasped from the doorway, Tymy was standing behind her. “What happened?”
    Helam had been so busy focusing on his wounded son that he hadn’t thought to ask how his son had come by the injury.
    Molach went from looking at his mother to Helam and back to his mother again. He swallowed and looked like he was trying to formulate an answer when the doctor walked in. He was escorted by Gregary, another of Helam’s guards. When the doctor ordered Helam back, a look of relief crossed Molach’s face. A suspicion formed in the back of Helam’s mind and he avoided looking for a reaction on Elaire’s face.
    Would he have seen relief there as well ? Or perhaps evidence of guilt?
    Pushing it all away, Helam went to stand beside Elaire while the doctor worked. After a moment’s hesitation, he placed his hand on her shoulder. She tensed at his touch but relaxed a moment later. The doctor did his work with skilled hands, cleaning the wound, numbing up the skin, stitching it up, and then wrapping it in a bandage. Throughout the whole ordeal, Molach remained lucid and avoided looking at either Elaire or Helam.
    After the doctor had given them instructions and left, Helam realized that the doctor hadn’t asked Molach about what had happened. When had Helam ever been treated by a healer and not had to answer questions? It was as if the doctor knew he wouldn’t like the answers. Or that the answers would reveal secrets he knew needed to be kept.
    Elaire shifted, pulling his hand from her shoulder. He anticipated what she was going to say next and frowned.
    “I will talk with Molach alone,” she said.
    Helam locked his eyes onto his son and measured his reaction of fear and determination. When Helam turned to Elaire, she met his gaze without looking away. His worst fears had been confirmed.
    “Molach was off limits,” Helam whispered, “what have you done?”
    “Alone.” Elaire motioned to the door.
    As he passed through the doorway, Helam nodded to Tymy who followed behind Helam as the door shut.
    Helam’s other personal guards were waiting at the front of his home. Elaire had refused to allow them quarters and Helam had been forced to build a shelter for them at both the front and the back of his home to keep them out of the elements while on duty. Helam wasn’t the only general who kept a retinue of personal guards, but he had to be the only one that kept them for the express purpose of keeping his wife or any of her friends from taking him out. In the house, with her, he was in little danger. But out here, were it would be harder to trace back to her, it was different.
    He’d told himself over the years that the deal he’d made with Elaire had been for the best but now he realized that he’d been played for a fool. She had come out into the open and declared war; by stealing the heart of Molach and pointing him to a false belief, she had spurned their agreement long ago.
    The other guards fell in behind Helam as he walked out into the street. He told them to hang back while he spoke with Hanri, the captain of the guard. In short, clipped sentences, he