He lost his temper. “You go on, then, but we're not leaving!” he snarled. “This is your fault you know!”
“How is this my fault?”
“You wanted to keep a woman with the troops, you must suffer the consequences of it!” He knew he was not being rational, but the sight of a pale-faced Dani curled up that morning with her arms wrapped around her abdomen, the blankets soaked in blood had shaken him to the core. He had been perfectly calm and reassuring with her, but now that he was with Phillip, he was like a kettle boiling over.
Phillip had a cautious look on his face. “We're not leaving you behind. We will delay another day.”
For some reason Phillip's calm only further enraged him. “And if we're not ready in a day?” he demanded.
Phillip stared at him.
“If you want to help, you'll send someone out to find a midwife!” he shouted.
Phillip nodded. “I will do that,” he said mildly.
“Fine!” he yelled and stormed out, knowing Phillip would not have stood for such insolence from anyone else. He spent the day by Dani's side, stroking her back or her head, promising her everything would be all right. She was afraid, and he had no idea whether her fears were justified or not. He'd never witnessed a woman miscarrying before. Hell, he'd never been close enough to a woman to witness her monthly bleeding. But she didn't look well. Her face was too pale—even her lips were grayish, and she was weak with the pain.
A midwife was found, and it was her worry that frightened him more than anything. She gave Dani a draught of motherwort and shepherd's purse to slow the bleeding. Phillip wouldn't allow the midwife to leave the camp, since she knew their whereabouts, and they didn't know if she could be trusted. So he had to deal with soothing a second frightened woman in his tent. The midwife bedded down next to Dani, but there was no way he was going to be able to sleep. He stalked back to Phillip's tent.
Phillip and Edwin were not in bed yet. “How is she?” Phillip asked.
He couldn't find the words. She's going to die. He felt sure of it. She couldn't continue to bleed at that rate through the night and live. She would bleed out and die. He rested his knuckles on Phillip's table, needing to touch something solid, something to ground him. It felt good enough that he cocked his arm back and punched into the wood. The wood split with a crack that satisfied the beast within him. He punched it again and again.
Vaguely, he heard Phillip commanding Edwin to leave and whoever had shown up to stay out. He bent at the waist and smashed his head into the wood, breaking it in half. He picked up one of the halves and smashed it into the leg of the table, splintering it even more. He continued, feeling more and more relief as he destroyed the table, tearing it into the smallest of pieces. When he'd finished, he stood panting and clenching his fists, and then he met Phillip's eye for the first time. Phillip had stood back, his arms folded across his chest, watching dispassionately. He did not need Phillip to speak any words of comfort. Phillip understood him. He allowed him this—knew it was the release he needed.
“Nay, the prince said no one enters,” he heard Edwin's voice say outside the tent, but the flap opened anyway, and Danewyn appeared, dressed in her shift, wrapped in a blood-soaked blanket, her big eyes huge in her ashen face.
“Ferrum?” she said in a tiny voice, her lips cracked and pale.
He was flooded with emotion—guilt that he'd disturbed her with his tantrum, an aching tenderness and overwhelming need to care for her, and fear at her wan appearance. He rushed to her and scooped her up, the bloody blanket sticky on his arm.
“Little flower,” he said tenderly. “Did I wake you?”
“Ferrum,” she repeated his name, resting her face into his neck. The way she spoke his name tore deep into his heart—as if she were truly calling him out. It was like the way she looked into his eyes and not at his scars. This woman saw him for who he was and was not afraid. Nay, she even seemed to want him, or need him—he knew not which. Either way, he wanted to give her everything she ever needed. He wanted to be the one who answered her call. He wanted 'Ferrum' to be the only name she ever uttered again.
He turned with her in his arms to meet Phillip's eyes again, and the sympathy he saw there did not weaken him. Phillip's understanding reassured him whatever it was he was feeling was real. He gave him a nod and carried Dani back to their tent, gently laying her on her bloody bedding and curling his body protectively around her, holding her back closely against his front.