Chapter 104

In the doorway stood Marten. He had been smiling with a tray in his hands, holding a bowl and a few small piles of herbal remedies he must have been about to give Daniel for his morning medicine. But when his eyes fell upon Beth and Daniel in the patient bed together, his entire face went red as a tomato and he half-turned, as if about to leave.

But that would have made the situation worse, so he stopped and cleared his throat. "Excuse me, I apologize. I should have knocked, but I wasn't thinking you would be up so early since I..."

Beth was also still blushing, but she hurried to slide off the bed without taking the covers with her. "There's no need for any apology!" she exclaimed as she half-ran to the apprentice with her arms out. "Let me take that from you."

"No, no, I can bring this myself."

"Not at all. You look exhausted, have you even slept?"

Marten mumbled something about a doctor's apprentice being trained to stay up the night when there were critical patients, and Beth smil