Mervyn folded himself down onto the chest. His knees were almost level with his chest, and he fumbled one-handed at his coat until Rose Marie lost patience and cut the sleeve away with her scissors. The cloth was stuck to his skin with half-frozen blood, and she had to soak it free with a splash of the captain's plum wine.
There were two cuts on the baron's arm. One ran shallow and clean across the meat of his upper arm, where the blade meant for his head had found him instead. The second had torn across it at an angle, deeper, ragged at the edges.
"Squeeze my fingers," she said as she pressed two of her fingers into his left palm.
Mervyn followed her instructions, but his grip was weak. Far too weak for a man his size.
"The feeling will come back," she said, though her voice lacked the confidence she wanted to project. "Slowly. If you're lucky, and if you're wise enough not to haul on any lines with this arm for a week."
