Killeen grew stronger — slowly. For weeks she did little more than sleep and wake, the healers telling her that the magic Lady Vivienne and the Inquisitor had poured into her body had saved her life, but now flesh and blood needed to catch up.
At first, Cullen was there whenever she woke. Barely able to keep her eyes open for more than a few minutes, Killeen would sip water from the cup he held for her, and sleep again. Sometimes she thought he was about to speak, but if so, he thought better of it.
As she gradually mended, he began to pick up the reins of his work again. An errand took him to the Emerald Groves, and so the first time she managed to stand and take a few shaky steps, it was Dorian's arm she clung to.
He joked that she'd be ready to dance at the wedding as she staggered drunkenly to the wall and back.
Killeen lurched to the bed, crawled onto it. So that's what he was trying to find the words to tell me. "I need to rest," she said, and closed her eyes, kept them closed until Dorian left.
The healers insisted she walk, and so she did, a little further each day, first leaning on their arms, and then on two sticks cut to length for her. Very good, they said as she wobbled and sweated with pain and effort. You're doing well.
For a cripple, Killeen thought later, looking down at the atrophied muscles of her thigh. Side aching, she let the sticks drop to the floor, lay down and pulled the blankets over herself against the chill in the air.
The next day was one of those she still sometimes had, when she was so weak and tired she could barely sit up, the room spinning and tilting around her when she tried to stand. Over-doing it, the healers said, but later, through the open door, Killeen heard one of them mutter malingerer.
Cullen returned, the fair skin of his face and hands slightly darkened by sun, hair fairer than ever at the tips, eyes cautious when he looked at her.
"I hear —" Killeen ventured. "That there's a wedding."
"I'm afraid you've missed it," Cullen said. "Kill, I —"
She closed her eyes. "You'd better go," she said. "Don't keep the Inquisitor waiting."
"Kill, I'm sorry," he said. "I —"
"Yes," she said, to make him stop, to make him leave. "I understand." As hard as she tried, she couldn't force sincerity into her voice.
She heard him rise to his feet. "Forgive me," he said, very low, and left.
He did not come again.
Spring days lengthened into summer, which in the Frostbacks meant there were several hours a day when it was pleasant to be outside without one's coat. On the healer's orders, Killeen dragged herself outdoors on the days when she could, slowly and painfully making her way across the upper courtyard to sit in the sun and watch the soldiers sparring in the training ring.
Summer or not, she was still cold: was always cold. It might have been warmer in the garden, built as it was to catch as much of the heat of the day as possible for the sake of the plants, but the garden was up several flights of stairs and Killeen would have had to seek help to manage them.
She wanted to go down to the stables and see Firefly, Master Dennet's notes being far too short uncommunicative for her liking, but that involved stairs as well.
So she sat in the courtyard for the mandated hour, and then made her way back inside, to her cot, piled blankets over herself and tried to ignore the chill in her bones.
She was half-way through her hour one day when a slim, pale form turned up beside her.
"Why is it still winter?" Cole asked her with a sideways glance from beneath his absurd hat.
"It's summer, Cole," Killeen said tiredly.
"No." He shook his head. "Summer outside, but inside cold and grey, deep snow on the graveyard. Why?"
"I don't know." Her side twinged, and she shivered. "I just feel the cold more, these days."
"You really shouldn't. The healers don't like it." Cole said seriously, and then brightened. "I can help!"
And he was gone.
Killeen sighed, closed her eyes, and leant her head back against the wall behind her. Deep snow on the graveyard … the boy's words had hit the mark, that was exactly the image in her mind now he'd said it aloud. Drifts almost covering rows of grey grave markers, unmarked by any footsteps, the dead lying unmourned and forgotten …
Footsteps pounded along the battlement above and then down the stairs, two at a time, a big man in a hurry. Killeen turned her head to look, pulse picking up a little. Attack? Emergency?
Cullen swung around the corner of the stairs, hurried down the last few, and came to a stop. "Are you …?" he began, hesitated. "Are you all right?"
"Me?" Killeen asked. "Yes, fine. What's happened?"
"Happened?" He was studying her, frowning, and Maker, she'd almost forgotten how beautiful he was, almost forgotten how much she loved to listen to his voice, almost learned to live with the absence of him in her life until he stood there, gilded by the sun, a fleck of ink on one finger and new lines around his amber eyes.
She forced herself to look away. "You were running."
"Oh. No. Nothing's —" Cullen rubbed the back of his neck. "Cole turned up in my office saying you were cold, and since he knows how little I like his tricks I thought it must be — that there was something —"
Killeen sighed. "No. I'm just feeling the chill."
"Oh," Cullen said. "Would you — I could get a cloak?"
"I'm going in soon," Killeen said.
He nodded, and turned back to the stairs.
"Cullen," she said on impulse. "Cullen, I —" He turned back and her mouth dried, but she forced the words out. I don't always say things right, Cole had said to her once, but I try. "I'm sorry?"
A small, upright line quirked into existence between his eyebrows. "Sorry?"
"I miss —" You. "I miss what we —"
He sighed, shoulders slumping. "So do I."
"I'm sorry I ruined it."
"You didn't. It was my fault."
Killeen shook her head. "No. It was — who we are. What we are. I shouldn't have been surprised."
"I don't want you to think it was easy," he said quietly. "An easy decision. But — it was the right one. I had to make it."
"I know," Killeen said. "Do you think — can we be friends again, Cullen?"
"I'd like that," he said softly.
"So would I," Killeen said past the lump in her throat. She held out her hand, and after a moment, Cullen took it. She gave his fingers a light, brief grip, shook his hand formally. "Deal. Friends."
"Friends," he agreed, let her hand go, and smiled. "And as your friend, I'm going to tell you, you've gotten entirely too thin. Do I have to order someone to make sure you eat?"
"That's not friends, that's commanding officer," Killeen protested.
Cullen grinned. "Oh, no, it's a friend who is fully prepared to abuse his authority for his own benefit."
Friends, again, and so it became usual for Cullen to happen through the courtyard when Killeen was there, to pause, to talk. Often, it seemed, he was on his way from the mess hall with, just by chance, more food than he alone could eat. Often, too, it seemed, some business of the Inquisition brought him to the healer's rooms of an evening, and since he was there, it seemed natural for him to settle into the chair by Killeen's bed with his handfuls of parchments and reports, to seek her opinion and advice on this bit of business or that thorny problem.
Friends again, and so when Killeen woke from searing red lyrium fire washing over her searing scalding flesh burning to the bone she was not surprised to hear Cullen's low voice, Kill, come on now, wake up ...
She didn't ask what Cullen's pretty Inquisitor thought of him spending his nights in a bedroll on another woman's floor, she was just glad he was there, his familiar breathing in the dark when she couldn't sleep, his arms warm around her when a fit of shivering had her teeth chattering.
Friends again, and so when Killeen finally essayed the staircases down to the stables it was Cullen's strong arm around her waist, supporting her and at the end half-carrying her, and it was Cullen who tactfully turned his back and who chased away onlookers with a glare and a snarl as Killeen wept tears of frustration and shame at her weakness, and later, tears of pity and grief as Firefly limped from her stall, awkward on three legs, ears back and eyes dull.
"The leg will hold her," Master Dennet explained. "But she's convinced herself it won't. She won't let us touch it, goes wild if we try."
"I see," Killeen said thickly, and at her voice the mare flicked an ear, raised her head. She pulled against the lead-rein and, at Dennet's nod, the stablehand let her pick her way across the yard, slow, stumbling progress, until she reached Killeen and pushed her nose against her rider.
Killeen let her sticks fall and flung her arms around Firefly's neck, feeling the mare's heart pounding, hearing her laboured breath. "I'm so sorry, my darling, my sweet. I'm so sorry."
The mare nosed her shoulder.
"That's the closest anyone has been able to get to her without cross-ties," Dennet said. "She still trusts you."
"She shouldn't," Killeen said against the mare's warm skin. "It's my fault this happened to her."
"Stop thinking about yourself," Dennet said, "and think about your horse."
"Master Dennet —" Cullen growled.
"No," Killeen said, sniffed hard. "He's right. What should I do?"
"See if she'll let you handle her more," Dennet suggested.
Firefly did. Killeen worked her away around the mare, having to use her as a prop when her knees buckled. The first time she stumbled suddenly and had to clutch a handful of mane to stay on her feet she heard a hiss of breath from both Dennet and Cullen, but Firefly stood like a rock.
Finally Killeen reached that lame front leg, tucked protectively away from the ground. She ran her hands over the muscles of the mare's shoulder, slowly, carefully, talking all the while. "There now, my beauty, my darling, my love. Easy now. Trust me, now. Good, brave girl." Down to the knee, Firefly's skin twitching as if to rid herself of flies. "Good girl. Darling girl. Nothing to fear. It's just me. Brave girl." Lower, lower still, until her knees folded and she sat in the mud, Firefly's hoof cradled in her hand. "Put it down, now, darling girl. Down. It'll be all right. I promise." As Killeen applied gentle downward pressure, the mare let her leg straighten a little, a little more, sweating now.
"Dennet …" Cullen said quietly.
"Leave her be, man," the horsemaster said.
Killeen ignored them. Nothing existed in all the world but her and her horse. "A little more, darling girl. A little more. It's all right. Good girl, brave girl, darling heart, there you go." The hoof touched the mud and she held it there, vision blurring with tears. "Good girl. You see? It's all right. It's all right."
It lasted only a moment and then the mare jerked her foot up again, but Killeen was almost certain she had felt Firefly put at least a little weight on that leg, and when Dennet came cautiously forward to take the lead-rein up again, the mare snorted but did not pull away.
The stablemaster's hand rested on Killeen's shoulder for a moment. "That'll do," he said, and led the mare away.
Cullen helped her up. "That was … a little nerve-wracking. Are you all right?"
She nodded wearily. "Very tired."
"Let's get you back to bed," Cullen said.
The world faded to grey before they got there, though, and Killeen woke shivering in her bed. "You've been overdoing it," the healer said. "Rest. No excitement for a few days."
"I'll make sure of it," Cullen promised.
"No," Killeen protested. "I have to go back down tomorrow. She needs to walk. Every day. She needs to walk."
Cullen took her hand. "I'll do it, Kill," he said.
Killeen shook her head, the room spinning with the motion. "She won't trust you."
"She will if I wear your shirt," Cullen said, and smiled.
And wear it he did, to fairly comical effect since broad as Killeen was across the shoulders for a woman, Cullen was considerably broader. She waited in a fever of apprehension, imagining Firefly bolting and crashing through a fence, hurting herself again; or kicking Cullen, in stomach or back or head …
But he returned, unhurt and smiling, to report that Firefly had put the hoof down again, had done so twice.
When the healers let Killeen up again, he helped her to the stairs and settled her where she had a clear view of the courtyard, told her to wait and hurried down the steps and around the corner to the stables. Killeen leaned on the wall, shivering, hand pressed against the ache in her side, and after a few moments Cullen reappeared, Firefly on a lead rein, slow and limping, but …
Limping on four legs, not three.
Cullen led the mare in a slow circle as Killeen watched, stopped to stroke the mare's bad leg, encouraged her on again.
"She's still beautiful," Cole said quietly.
Killeen was too weary to be startled. "She is."
"Even if she never runs again, everything that makes her who she is, still there. Bravest of all, unflinching."
"Yes," Killeen said, heart aching as she watched Cullen lead Firefly back toward the stable.
"He hurts, too," Cole said sadly. "Wishes for more, tries to be content."
"What?" Killeen said, turning. The movement made her side twinge sharply and a wave of dizziness swept over her. "Cole, is Cullen hurting?"
He ignored her question, frowning. "Your side hurts, still."
"Yes, it's slow to heal. Cole —" It was suddenly hard to breathe. Killeen licked dry lips. "Can you … get me … some water?"
And then Cullen was there, helping her up, half-carrying her back to the healer's rooms, arguing with someone over the top of her head.
Killeen was too tired to follow it. "Lie down," she said, and was relieved when they helped her to her bed and went to continue their argument in the hall.
Cole, she thought, wanting him, wanting him to explain. Cole, if you're listening in on me now — Cole?
But he was not, it seemed, and her eyes were closing, and her memory of his words fuzzed and blurred into sleep.