"I cannot find the source of the bleeding," Dr. Pemberton informed them, brows furrowed.

"What do you mean you cannot find the source of the bleeding?" West demanded, scowling at the old doctor.

"Call for Dr. Kemper," Gabrielle said from where she was bound.

Rider turned to her and said, "You were not told to speak, woman."

West could feel everyone's eyes on him as he held Sasha's hand. The doctor focused on his work, bent over Sasha's midriff. He shook his head.

"What is it?" West demanded.

"I am quite certain no organ has been damaged. The bleeding is controlled, but—"

"She is still bleeding."

The doctor nodded.

"Who do you think sees over the king's health? Dr. Kemper is the best in the entire kingdom," Gabrielle insisted, her voice shaking. "She can be here fast if you call her now."

Rider narrowed his eyes. "I said, woman, that your—"

"Go to Sasha's villa and inform her maid to go to Belcourt and call for this doctor. Then go and get St. Vincent here now," West ordered to Darren who immediately ran out of the room.

Rider whirled away from Gabrielle to gawk at West in disbelief. "You cannot be utterly serious, West. St. Vincent?"

West turned to his friend. "We need all the best we can get."

Rider scoffed, looking around in disbelief. "A woman doctor and a bloody drunk. Perfect!"

"Get her out of here," West ordered, motioning his head at Gabrielle. "And that bloody bastard, too," he added, nodding at the unconscious Willoghby whose shoulder was covered in a bandage, courtesy of Tanner.

Rider and the two other men dragged Gabrielle and Willoghby out of the room with Gabrielle giving West a scornful look before she disappeared.

Tanner seemed restless as he paced about, hands on his hips. "I will get St. Vincent myself. I find the need to drag someone," he said, leaving West with Sasha and Dr. Pemberton.

"Sasha," West softly called, giving her hand a shake. She remained motionless. He turned to Pemberton. "You are saying that after the hundreds of duel wounds and other injuries you had to attend to, you cannot help with this one?"

The doctor started to tie a bandage around Sasha's wound, pulling it tight. He checked her pulse and murmured something under his breath.

"I demand to hear every bloody word you murmur, Pemberton."

The old man's wrinkled eyes slanted toward him. "Her pulse is weak."

West's hand tightened around Sasha. He had left her bleeding against the wall earlier. He could have saved a lot of time if he just went straight to her.

"Then what do you suggest we do?" he asked.

The doctor finished his task and slowly stood. He dragged a chair to Sasha's bedside and sat down. "We wait."

"You cannot be bloody serious."

The old man looked at him. "West, my boy, you know very well that it is the best I can do. Now, we wait and pray that St. Vincent will be less foxed than he normally is and that this doctor from Belcourt is better than me."

"There is no one better than you—"

"There is."

The finality in the doctor's words stopped West cold.

He looked at Sasha and swallowed.

And then they waited.

*****

In what seemed like hours of waiting, West finally heard someone laughing outside in the corridor and his jaw tightened.

Pemberton groaned in his seat. "At the very least, I cannot still smell the brandy from here," the doctor murmured just as the door burst open and a large man stumbled inside with a chuckle.

"Found him at Stark's," said Tanner. "He is bloody useless, West."

West let go of Sasha's hand and left the bed to approach the washstand.

"Oi, Eaton!" St. Vincent boomed, spraying droplets of particles over his unkempt beard that covered half his face. If that was not enough indication that he was awfully foxed, his drooping hazel eyes did. "I can't fathom why Leighton would drag me here. He said you are serving the best brandy, but I do not—" a hiccup interrupted his speech, "—why Leighton would drag me out of—"

West splashed the contents of the washbasin over St. Vincent's face. Tanner caught St. Vincent with a grunt as the man stumbled back. "Oh, bloody tarnation, St. Vincent! Your stench can raise the dead!" Tanner cried just as St. Vincent boomed, "What the bloody hell!" The man's hazel eyes were wide with fury. "I will kill you, you bastard—" he started to move—or rather, stumble forward.

"Later, St. Vincent," West said, turning away and walking over to Sasha. "I need your help."

"After splashing my face, I'll give you the help you need after a duel—" the large man stopped and frowned as he saw Sasha on the bed. "My eyesight is a blur at the moment, but is that a chit?"

"Yes, my friend, and she needs your bloody help," Tanner said, pushing St. Vincent toward the bed.

"Pemberton is here," St. Vincent noted, pointing at the old doctor. "Good God, Pemberton, you grow young every time I meet you!" He chortled at his joke.

"She is bleeding and I can't find from where," Pemberton informed St. Vincent, completely ignoring the man's statement.

St. Vincent narrowed his eyes. Then he shook his head, spraying more water around him. He blinked a few times. "If Pemberton can't help, what makes you think I can—"

"Stop with the pretense, St. Vincent. You know we know you are the best," West said through gritted teeth. "Please, see what you can do."

St. Vincent was the last one anyone would call if they needed a doctor, but he would be the first anyone would scour the entire kingdom for if they had nothing else to lose. Most in Sinclair claimed he bathed in brandy for the smell stuck to the man like a leech. He was merely a year older than West, but he looked far older with his long, unkempt hair and beard. His size was another factor that made people hesitant for how could they entrust their health to a man who was almost always foxed with such giant hands?

His skills were not to be questioned for he was indeed one of the best as many who took the courage to trust him would claim. It was simply St. Vincent himself that people abhorred. As the owner of the most prestigious hospital in Coulway, he was the most obnoxious, loud, profane and blasphemous brute anyone could come across with. He said what was on his mind because he often believed he was right and he had many reasons to claim so because as much as everyone who knew him hated to admit it, Oliver St. Vincent was brilliant and he was, in many sense, always right.

St. Vincent rubbed his face with both palms and groaned. "Why in the bloody hell am I even here."

"St. Vincent," West said, voice cold. "We might not have time."

The man raked his fingers through his long, brown waves with a groan and walked over to Sasha.

"Wash your hands first, young man," Pemberton ordered. "You just raked it over your face and filthy hair."

St. Vincent scowled at the doctor before he walked over to the washstand where a few pails of water were situated. He rolled his shirt up to his elbows and grumbled under his breath as he washed his hand.

Swaying across the room, his arms dripping with water, he returned beside Sasha and fell on the bed, causing it to bounce with his weight.

West scowled and St. Vincent gave him a wry look. "I am not fat. I am simply a giant."

And then, as if West witnessed a miracle, he saw St. Vincent's eyes clear in concentration after shaking his head to look down at Sasha's bandaged midriff. Considering his size and the fact that he reeked of brandy, his hands were gentle, almost gracefully, while he peeled the bandages off Sasha.

"Careful," he told the man.

"I did not waste years studying in London, the Americas, and the Orient just to be told to be careful, Eaton. Bloody shut up—ah, you are right, Pemberton, she is still bleeding," St. Vincent said under his breath, frowning as he investigated the wound. "Dagger?"

"Yes."

"No damage to the organs?"

"None as far as I have assessed," Pemberton informed him.

St. Vincent checked Sasha's pulse and leaned closer to feel her breathing. West held his breath as the man continued his assessment, pulling down on Sasha's lower eyelid.

"She has lost a lot of blood," he said, leaning away from Sasha. And then he sighed. "She will die."

"That is not the word I want to hear, St. Vincent," West growled.

St. Vincent took a lungful of air and grinned at him. "Lucky for you, Eaton, I am not very foxed. I have raised a man from the dead. Have I told you the story?"

"Too many times than necessary, my friend," Tanner dryly responded from the foot of the bed.

St. Vincent turned to Pemberton. "I need to operate."

West frowned. "And what does that entail—"

St. Vincent stood from the bed, swayed on his feet. "I need to open her up."

*****

"This is too bloody risky," West grumbled as he paced the room.

"It is if you do not stay away," St. Vincent dryly said behind his clothed mouth. "Stay at your corner, Eaton. You called for me, did you not? You are not even paying me for this bloody task. I need three bottles of your best brandy after this."

"You can have my entire liquor cabinet if you save her."

Pemberton was looking unconvinced beside St. Vincent, but the old doctor assisted the much younger—and larger—man without complaints.

West's head dropped, unwilling to look at Sasha being sliced open, which was what St. Vincent was doing.

"I demand to know you know what you are doing, St. Vincent," West said. When the man suddenly became motionless, West called out, "St. Vincent!"

St. Vincent snapped his head and lifted both hands in midair and shouted, "I am awake! Awake!"

West closed his eyes and took a lungful of air.

"Relax, Eaton," St. Vincent said with a yawn. "She is not yet a carcass. And as you can see, I am opening her up."

"You are bloody foxed, St. Vincent."

"Then you should not have dragged me here."

Dr. Pemberton cleared his throat. "St. Vincent has been drinking, but not as foxed as usual."

"Thank you, Pemberton, you did not have to patronize me." St. Vincent turned his eyes to West. "But I am indeed foxed, but!" he said, lifting a hand when West started to stalk toward him, "but not quite enough. I have a quarter of control over my faculties." He looked to his side at West. The covering on his mouth moved, suggesting a grin. "That is more than enough for me to save this woman's life."

"A quarter of—" West scoffed in disbelief. "You must be jesting."

"No, I am not. Pemberton, please tell the duke how you find me exquisitely intelligent and capable?"

"What are you doing?" he demanded as St. Vincent left Sasha's side and stumbled to a candle, in his hand a thin rod of iron. He placed the iron directly into the fire.

West could see from Pemberton's expression that this was not a common practice. "St. Vincent?" he asked with alarm.

St. Vincent held up one hand to keep him at bay. "Stop talking for a moment, Eaton. You are such a sore distraction," the man ordered under his breath. "Hold her," he ordered Pemberton who did as told. The old doctor leaned over Sasha and held her arms down as St. Vincent's giant body bent closer over Sasha's wound, the red-hot rod iron disappearing from view.

West held his ground, but his hands closed into fists as Sasha rolled her head to the side in pain.

"You may be looking younger, Pemberton, but your eyesight is getting poor," he told the older doctor as the smell of burnt flesh reached West's nostrils.

"Is this the woman from Belcourt, Eaton?" asked St. Vincent, searching for something inside Pemberton's bag.

West's jaw tightened. "Yes."

He saw St. Vincent pause. The man stole him a look, his hazel eyes alert and knowing, no sign that he had been drinking the entire night, if not for days. "Then we need her alive, yes?"

"Very much," he said through his teeth.

St. Vincent winked and whirled back to face Sasha. "One of her smaller arteries was seared. I had to close it with the hot iron. The bleeding should stop, but you must take precaution."

"What caution?"

The man sighed as if he was given a task he ought not to be doing in the first place. "You need to clean the wound and prevent microbe vegetation."

"Then she lives?" West asked, walking over to look at Sasha's face, covered with sweat.

"What?" St. Vincent asked, threading a needle with a squinted eye.

"Will she live?"

"I need to close the wound, Eaton. Step aside."

West had to turn around as St. Vincent did his task.

"You have to answer my question, St. Vincent," West said, looking at the wall. "Will she live?"

"If she does, she owes you her life," St. Vincent replied. "I would have not lifted a finger to help this woman." West scowled. "Contrary to common belief, if you see yellow liquid come out of her wound, it does not mean she is healing," St. Vincent added. "It means she will die in a matter of days."

West's jaw clenched.

"Clean the wound with the solution I will send from Sinclair—for a price, of course. And since she is from Belcourt, you need to pay more."

"What solution—"

"Something I have been developing to clean wounds and—"

"You mean something you have been experimenting on."

"It has proven to be effective, thus far." St. Vincent paused to muse at the wall over the bed and added, "On a few rodents. And a cat."

West closed his eyes to summon control. He ought to be used to St. Vincent by now, but in situations such as this, he could not help but wish that he were slightly bigger so he could outpower the bastard for once.

"You can turn around now, Eaton," St. Vincent's voice said.

West whirled and found the man taking off his cloth mask. "You have to be very clean," St. Vincent said. "Do not touch the wound and always dress it with fresh bandage twice daily." He looked over his shoulder at Sasha whose drenched face was being wiped by Pemberton. "If she feels hot to the touch, call for Pemberton."

"And you?"

St. Vincent narrowed his eyes at him. "How useful is she?"

"Very."

The man nodded. "You can search for me at Stark's—and only if you think she is dying."

"You bloody bastard," Eaton growled, eliciting a laugh from the man.

As his laughter died, St. Vincent looked over his shoulder. "I heard you have another Belcourt woman. I do not see her."

Wests' eyes were fixed on Sasha. "She will be taken to Keene."

"You will let Rider take her?"

"Keene will be the place."

"And Willoghby?"

"Will disappear soon," West replied, walking past St. Vincent and toward Sasha.

"Bloody hell, I am bloody," he heard St. Vincent grumble as he exited the bedchamber without a word of goodbye. "Remember, Eaton—do not call for me until she is dying! And send your liquors to Sinclair the soonest you can. I do not need the cabinet!"

West gathered Sasha's hand to his while Pemberton pulled out the blood-stained cloths that St. Vincent covered Sasha earlier. Staring at her torn nightgown, his hand tightened around hers.

He nearly lost her tonight.

"I will call for the maid to change her clothes," Pemberton said. Stopping at the door, the old doctor said, "I hope this will all be worth it, young man."

West did not reply.

Later that night, Iyana arrived with a doctor from Belcourt. Both ladies were told that the duke wished to inform them that Sasha had survived. Updates on her recovery shall be reported directly to Belcourt by the duke himself.

"They are gone, Your Grace," Darren informed him, voice solemn.

"She is not yet dead, Darren. Erase that bloody look on your face."

Darren swallowed and nodded his head, maintaining a strong mien, all the while her nostrils flared as he fought the tears.

West did the same. He looked at Sasha once again and closed his eyes. "She cannot die."