22

E lizabeth awoke with a gasp. She kept her eyes shut tight. Slowly, carefully, gingerly, she began the inch-by-inch inventory ritual. She started with her toes. Not a full wiggle—a slight, experimental flex.

Her knees twitched in response, which caused her hip to jerk, which caused her lower back to grip her in the sharp talons of a vicious muscle spasm.

Perfect. Splendid.

She didn't bother checking the rest of her body. She just lay there, concentrating on evening out her breaths, in through her mouth, out through her nose, slow, steady. There. Like that. She would get through this. She always did.

She cracked open one eye. Early morning sun streamed through the windows. She'd survived the night. Somehow.

Her fingers flopped at her sides, then found something light and smooth and sticky. Her flask of gin. Empty. She'd probably guzzled its contents in one swallow.

Now there was nothing to take the edge off. Her head was pounding, her mouth thick, and her body ached as though she'd spent the night being beaten with a mallet.

It was tomorrow, then. Twelve or more hours of semi-consciousness had slipped away. The bedchamber door was locked tight. She vaguely recalled several knocks at it, intermittently. And a voice. Probably Stephen's. She'd called out that she was fine. Unless she'd dreamed the interactions.

She forced open the other eye. The high stone ceiling greeted her. Relentless gray. Cold. Pitted. Unfeeling. God, she hated this castle. Why had she ever thought she liked castles?

A few minutes passed. Or an hour.

She tried her toes again, slower this time. Her knees tensed, but didn't flinch. Which meant her hips stayed stable, and the muscles of her back didn't rebel against her.

Good. An excellent sign. Moving her toes meant she was at fifteen percent Elizabeth. Sure, it sounded like a lot less than fifteen percent, until you factored in that she'd moved her toes without pain . That was the key. If she took it slow, she might get up to twenty percent today, or twenty-five. Maybe even thirty.

The problem was, holding still only tempted her muscles to stiffen. The more she babied her limbs, the more vehemently they reacted when she tried to use them. On the other hand, doing too much too fast was the quickest way to drop back to zero. The trick was to do the gentlest of stretches. As constant of motion as she could stand, without pushing her body too far. Coaxing it back to life. Limbering one joint, one muscle at a time.

It was a good plan in theory. Backed by years of firsthand experience. It was also boring as bloody hell. Lying here, doing nothing. Stretching her toes, testing her wrists.

Usually her upper body was all right. But not her lower back. Her hips were often a mess, and the knees not so great, but the rest of her often returned to form within a day or so of the first onset of a flare-up.

She tested the theory by moving one arm, then the other, then raising them toward the ceiling. Everything was fine until she lifted her shoulders a little bit. Her back decided to take umbrage with the movement. She sucked in a sharp breath and let her arms fall back to her sides.

Bloody hell. She was helpful when swashbuckling and worthless when convalescing. There was nothing Elizabeth hated more than waking up like this.

Ordinarily, she could go reasonably long stretches between flare-ups, but the castle was physically challenging. It had only been a matter of time. There were countless stairs, low overhangs, crooked steps, uneven floors. Stretching, crouching, crawling, hammering, twisting. A bloody swordfight.

And now she couldn't do any of it. She was letting Miss Oak down. Letting the whole family down.

Letting Stephen down.

She definitely wasn't going to open that door and show him just how bad things really were. How bad she really was. What if she lost his interest, or his esteem lowered?

She'd rather him think her a rude, moody curmudgeon than to know her body was broken and she was lying here, helpless as a baby, unable to do the simplest of tasks.

Hiding the truth was always better. Never show weakness. Never . It had been her mantra for as long as she could remember. Long before Bean or becoming a Wynchester. This was nothing new. Elizabeth had learned to grit her teeth and hide before she was three feet tall. Maybe younger.

It was difficult to remember those days. Or rather, she'd tried so determinedly to forget them, to refuse to succumb to the memories, that it was all now a blur of pain and tears and the sharp crack of the back of a hand.

I don't see anything wrong with you. You're lying. I'll give you something to cry about.

And then, when they finally had believed her… That day had been so much worse.

She shook her head to clear it. Concentrate on the ceiling. That was safer. Make your mind cold and gray and blank, just like the slabs of stone all around you. Don't think about the past. Don't think about the pain. Worry about your stretches. You know they help. Try it again. You can do this.

Horse hooves thundered outside the castle. Her head pounded along with it.

She turned her head toward the window, then squeezed her eyes shut. Reddington. Six days sooner than agreed. He was relentless.

And she couldn't do a bloody thing about it.

Wetness coursed down her cheek. She really had let everyone down. Sweet Miss Oak and all the children who could have been living in comfort right now, if Elizabeth could get off her arse and find the will. She'd even abandoned Stephen, who had no experience at all with duels or defending himself against an army of Crumps.

In short, she was ruining everything for everyone. Reddington would win. And it would be all Elizabeth's fault.

Loud knocks banged at her door. Each strike caused her splitting head to blare with pounding pain.

"Go away," she whispered, her jaw clenched tight. She wished she'd had a chance to finish her new book on war strategies. A good offense could help in moments like this.

The pounding grew louder.

"Elizabeth?" came Stephen's voice. "Answer me!"

"Go away," she gasped, then rallied her strength to say it loud enough for her voice to carry. "Go away!"

A key turned in the lock and the door flew open.

Stephen burst into the room in obvious panic, face pale, eyes wild. "Elizabeth! What happened?"

She struggled up onto her elbows, and earned a horrific muscle spasm for her labor.

"Get out!" she screamed. "I didn't invite you in! This is a gross invasion of privacy."

"Are you injured?" He ran to her bedside and began patting her body, each touch setting off new paroxysms of excruciating agony.

" Go. Away ." Her vision blurred, half from pain, and half from involuntary tears caused by him witnessing her fragility like this. "You're hurting me."

"But what's wrong with you?" he asked plaintively, clearly at a loss.

What's wrong with you?

Wrong with you.

Wrong.

Her body occasionally failed her. Yes. No sense denying the obvious. But she didn't want to be defined by her disability. For her to be the problem, rather than the flare-up. For Stephen to stop looking at her like a goddess and treat her like an invalid. For eyes that had heated with sexual intent to fill instead with pity.

Just like he was doing now.