When she came to again, a different, older nurse was replacing her bandages. Deryn started to mumble her protests and ask for the other stupid nurse, but the one working on her pushed the weak hands away and said, "Don't worry, love. Nurse McIntyre already told me. Your secret's safe with us."

Deryn nodded, leaned over the side of her bed, and threw up in the dirt. She winced and wished she hadn't twisted her abdomen like that.

"I don't suppose you'd object to a little more morphine?"

Deryn was given a rag to wipe her mouth off on. "You calling me weak?" she muttered almost incoherently, the obvious, boyish response.

"No, I'm inferring that your punctured leg, shoulder, grazed internal organs and shattered rib are causing you grief." The nurse produced a needle from a tin and pumped liquid into Deryn's arm before she could carry on with her stubborn display of machismo. "By the way, you'll be on a liquid diet for a while." The girl vomited again, but the nurse was quick to catch the thin mess in a bucket. "And that's precisely why."

"Alek…"

"Will probably live."

Deryn looked to her neighbour's bed. Alek looked battered and pale, and more of him was bandaged up in fabricated linens than wasn't, but otherwise he looked more or less alive.

"No thanks to you," the nurse continued.

"What?"

"All that thrashing about you did—you could have severely worsened your condition, young lady!" The nurse caught herself halfway through the appellation, thankfully, and the 'lady' came out nearly inaudibly. Her voice was notably lowered for the remainder of the lecture. "You were lucky this time, but it's pure idiocy to do anything so daft for a boy. Word of advice: don't do it again."

Deryn narrowed her eyes—either that, or the morphine was dragging her lids down. "He's not just a boy."

The nurse sighed. "Suit yourself. Just do the both of you a favour and get some sleep. You need to rest, love."

Deryn willfully complied.

.

She didn't know how much time passed like this. Everything was a blur of bandages, morphine, stupid nurse and older nurse, and soup. Lots of throwing up. Apparently the bullet that hadn't ricocheted off her rib had upset her tummy a wee bit.

Deryn had caught sight of Alek's lacerated side once or twice, and pity, but his handsome face would have a couple of scars as well. Seeing him so injured made her stomach churn again, so she would promptly turn away.

It took a while before the both of them were awake and sober enough to have a proper conversation. And apparently there was quite a conversation to be had.

"Alek."

He obviously wasn't asleep. Just ignoring her.

"Alek."

Slowly, he opened his eyes. "Dylan," he murmured in response.

Why was he acting so somberly? All of his men had made it through, more or less intact. Mind you, the only thing keeping her attic relatively unscrambled after that bloodbath was the hopeful fact that Alek was alive. "How're you holding up?"

He composed his expression into some semblance of a smile. "Just peachy, actually. I was thinking of going for a brisk jog after lunch."

She chuckled, then grimaced. Her gut was really not having this. "I think I might go out for the caber toss myself." This was a laughable notion, considering her one arm would be in a sling until her shoulder healed up.

Alek made a pitiful, choked laughing sound, after which the two of them lay in silence and tried to be big boys. Finally Alek spoke again. "I thought I heard a girl screaming at me the day before yesterday, but I haven't decided yet if it was real or not."

Her heart began to thud, working its sluggish way through all the painkillers. "Day before yesterday?"

"When we first got here."

This caught her off guard. Had it really only been two days? Was that a long time to be in a medical tent? She really had no clue how these things worked—how long it took a Swiss cheese girl to heal was not covered in any of her aeronautics manuals.

Alek continued. "I was pretty out of it, mind you, so I could be mistaken. Though the more I think about it, the more real it seems." His expression looked like he wanted to shrug, but didn't have the physical capability to do so. "I thought it might've been one of the nurses."

"Uh huh…" Deryn murmured.

"Possibly an angel."

"No kidding?"

"Except she'd been swearing up a storm, this girl. Like a sailor. Or an airman."

Deryn dared to glance to her left. Alek was looking very pointedly at her.

Blisters.

Words couldn't have made it much clearer than that betrayed look in his eyes.

"I—" She felt like throwing up, but not because of her messed up stomach. It would take her a second to compose herself enough to form words. "I…" And even then, she could do nothing but spit a string of all her most colourful curses. Deep breath. "Alek—" Unheeded, her voice returned to its normal pitch. "Blisters, I meant to tell you."

"I know." It sounded much too tense.

"I tried several times, in fact."

"I'm sure you did."

Listening to him, she could sense that he'd long since burned through all the raw anger, and what she was dealing with now was but a deep-rooted, aching bitterness. She supposed she should've been grateful to have been spared the full force of his ire by a little near-death experience and morphine, but somehow this seemed worse. This would take longer to heal.

Deryn, however—once the room stopped spinning—decided she was not feeling particularly patient.

"And just what do you expect me to do about it? Apologize? Grovel? Beg your princeliness for forgiveness?"

He shot her a dark look. "An apology might be nice, yes."

"Then I'm barking sorry," she growled. "But whatever resentment you feel towards me for keeping this from you long past its due, you'd better deal with now, because ignoring me for the rest of your bloody life won't do anyone a squick of good."

"I wasn't going to ignore you," he muttered.

"Well fine. Whatever you were going to do, just get it over with. What's done is done. I was a coward; there's no reason for you to be as well."

He sighed heavily, clearly exhausted. "You know what…?"

"What?"

"I think I need to sleep on it."

"You're going to ignore me."

He narrowed his tired eyes. "I'm going to think long and hard about why I should forgive you."

She grinned dryly. "Want me to write you a list?" But he'd already rolled over onto his good side. She didn't see that stricken look for a while.