Waiting for the Moon

Andrew winced. "You can trust me, Dr. Carrick."

"Good. Here's what I need: lots and lots of bandages, several sharp knives."

When Andrew turned and ran from the room, Ian surged to his feet and started barking orders like the doctor he'd once been. "Johann, get Edith and bring her here. Tell her I need willow bark and paraffin and laudanum. Mother, I need several bottles of alcohol. Not a drink. Bottles."

Maeve smiled brightly. "Yes, son."

"Victoria ..."

The old lady rapped him on the nose with her fan. "That's Your Highness to you."

He gritted his teeth. "Your Highness, bring me some sheets and a bucket of ice from the icehouse."

She frowned, looked worriedly to her left. "My footman?"

"Now!"

The queen blanched and ran for the icehouse.

Ian ignored little Lara and hurried back to the sofa. Taking the unconscious woman in his arms, he looked down at her, wondering fleetingly what she looked like beneath the broken, battered skin.

He eased the kelp away from her throat and let the slimy strand fall to the floor.

"Fight with me, princess."

23

She didn't move, barely breathed, but she was still alive, and there was a chance he could save her.

A chance.

He felt a rush of adrenaline. Just like the old days.

Chapter Two

Ian rammed a dusty bottle of carbolic acid underneath his arm and raced to his bookcase, pulling out one long-unused volume after another. He scanned the texts quickly for any help, but there was precious little written about head injuries. When he had all that he could find, he ran downstairs to the woman's bedchamber.

Maeve, Queen Victoria, and Andrew were all there, breathing heavily, their arms heaped with supplies. Weak light from a bedside lantern splashed the trio, cast their elongated shadows on the white plaster walls.

Queen Victoria sighed. "This ice is deuced heavy. I say?"

"Drop it and get more, Your Highness. You, too, Mother. We're going to need a lot of ice and more clean sheets. More!"

Andrew moved forward, his scrawny arms piled with pale, grayish white linen and a single knife that glinted silver in the weak light. "I-I got the sheets from the laundry room. I didn't see any bandages specifically?"

"Good. Start ripping them in two-inch strips. But first, wash your hands in soap and water and then rinse in this carbolic acid. Don't let the sheets hit the floor. Put them on the bed." Ian surged to the door and stuck his head out, hollering into the dark hallway. "Soap! I need soap, damn it, and hurry."

24

25

Within seconds, Lara appeared in the open doorway, holding a rough bar of ash soap.

Ian snagged it from her pudgy fingers and started washing his hands, rinsing them in the stinging carbolic acid before he returned to the woman's bedside. Kneeling, he looked down at her. He heard the rapid, uneven tenor of his own breathing in the quiet of the room; it lent this moment a strange, almost surreal feeling, as if he were somehow detached from the drama, watching it. Behind him, he heard Andrew thrust the knife into taut linen, heard the methodic rip-hiss of the fabric being rent in strips. The bedside lamp flickered, the yellow-red flame spitting and writhing inside the smoky globe.

The woman lay as still as death.

He pressed forward on his knees and slipped his hand beneath her head. He tensed instinctively, waiting for the onslaught of images. But again there was nothing.