Not Krol, Bosse thought as he stirred awake. The castle king would send no one for Bosse, the only one needing to heal right now.
The women who came down here weren’t healers but servants who brought water and food. They would do their best to treat a shifter in human form with a guard holding a crossbow standing watch, but not if the shifter was Bosse. Occasionally, the servants tossed rags through the bars of his cage and sloshed water into his bowl if they found him turned away as he was now.
The female servants feared him.
All but the one with the two different eyes who smelled of cinnamon and cardamom. He’d hear her moving around. She had a distinctive soft step. She’d started leaving part of a goat or deer leg hidden in a rag she’d push through the bars and drop beside the empty pottery bowl used for water or porridge. In the last two weeks, he’d often find the bowl filled with water to the rim.
If she tossed additional rags inside, more food would be hidden in the wadded-up material.
And cookies. Spicy honey cookies.
He hadn’t known what to think the first time she’d left the treat, but he never hesitated to scarf them down. Those extras appeared late at night, usually while the guards who came on after midnight were on duty.
Why was she down here in the dark hours of early morning? He only knew it was morning because the two guards who should have been relieved at midnight had complained for the past hour about being stuck with a second shift.
He’d first seen her face the evening she’d caught his eye while he moved around the arena. She’d just served Krol and turned to leave, looking over her shoulder directly at Bosse.
That’s when he’d been injured badly by not paying attention to his opponent, for which Titan had given him a tongue-lashing.
Worth it.
What woman baked cookies for a monster?
The guards’ voices got louder. Bosse just wanted some peace and quiet. They were arguing with a servant. What could be the problem now?
“She doesn’t want to go in there,” a female sounding like the young woman who brought him cookies said.
No woman should have to enter a cage with a monster, especially not a human female.
Bosse shook off the drowsiness to clear his head. If he spoke up to say he needed nothing, his comment might draw negative attention to the women once the guards reported the incident to Krol.
He could hear the heartbeats of four people, which likely meant he’d been correct about two servants down here. Twisting slowly, he caught sight of the other woman, a younger girl with red hair.
That one was terrified of all the guards and shifters.
The big-nosed guard who seemed in charge yelled, “Get in there and patch him up.”
“Please, no. I... I can’t do that.” Her breathing got faster and shorter until she fainted.
“For the love of... Get this bitch out of here.”
Bosse glanced through the only opening between the bars on Beast’s cage and his grotesque shape hiding half of the view.
The second guard flopped the redhead’s body over his shoulder and stomped his way upstairs.
That left only the cookie fairy.
He didn’t want her to be the one to clean and patch him. Bad idea. That might draw the attention of the guard in charge, who now blocked her way and warned, “I won’t be so nice to the second female who doesn’t do her job.”
Huffing in anger, his cookie fairy retorted, “I’m not a healer. Just a servant.”
“I don’t care if you can heal or not. Krol said to get his pet wolf patched up. Youtell Krol you refused.”
She argued, “No. I don’t—”
The sound of a loud slap cut her off.
Bosse jerked his head up, rage igniting inside him. He’d never allowed a female to be harmed, no matter if he liked her or not. For the first time since being captured, he suffered an emotional pain at not being able to jump out and protect her.
