Chapter 4

Arthur felt the warmth soaking into his body, chasing away the chill that seemed to have taken up permanent residence in his bones. He found himself laying on his back on a blanket-covered pallet of straw made up in front of the fireplace, which, thankfully, had a roaring fire burning. Where was he? He tried to sit upright, but changed his mind once his stiff aching muscles screamed in protest. He craned his neck from his supine position and found himself alone in a small, single-room hovel of some sort. The lone small window told him it was still nighttime. The last he could recall, Merlin had been holding him up as they moved through the woods to get away from Ragnor and his band. Where was Merlin now?

A moment later, the answer to his question walked in, bending his lanky form through the low doorway. Merlin broke into one of his cheeky grins when he saw Arthur, awake and peering up at him.

"Ah, you're awake now. Good." He set down the bucket of water and the small collection of kindling sticks he'd been carrying on the small table against the wall. As he knelt by Arthur, he inquired, "How are you feeling now?"

"Better...warmer certainly is better."

Merlin held out his own hands to warm them on the fire, and murmured his assent. "But we need to do something about your arm, and it looks like two of your ribs are cracked. What about your back? I can see the bruising on your skin, but I'm not sure if it is anything more than that."

Arthur shrugged, not answering and turned his gaze to the ceiling. Merlin frowned at him, urging, "I'm serious here, Arthur. You need to tell me as the Physician's Assistant, even if you won't tell me as your friend."

Arthur just snorted. Merlin was at his most infuriating at times like this, trying to order Arthur about. Arthur turned and buried his head in the blanket, making it clear to the idiot he wasn't going to continue the conversation. That should shut him up.

Merlin evidently was being particularly dense tonight and wasn't reading Arthur's body language. He always had trouble with any of Arthur's non-verbal signals. Merlin continued with "You know, Arthur, I won't think any less of you for admitting you are in pain. It doesn't mean you are weak."

Another snort from Arthur. "What makes you think I care what you think of me?" Of course, Arthur knew deep inside that Merlin's opinion was of utmost importance to him, but he could never let the manservant know that. He only admitted it to himself when Merlin got in one of those moods where he started saying Arthur would become Albion's greatest king. The rest of the time he was just clumsy Merlin, his foolish manservant, or so he told himself. A king shouldn't be concerned about his servant's opinions.

Merlin was especially persistent today. "Arthur, look,I know there is something wrong with you internally. There's blood in your urine."

"What? How would you know that? Have you been watching me pee?!" He turned to glare at Merlin while propping himself up on one elbow. Aghast, he demanded, "How dare you?"

With a pained sigh, Merlin shifted his gaze away from Arthur and into the flames of the fire. He muttered, "Well, I could hardly leave you to do it by yourself. You couldn't stand upright without my help."

Arthur narrowed his eyes into slits. "How could you tell there was blood? It's dark out there."

"There was snow on the ground, remember?"

"Oh." Exasperated at the truth of what Merlin said, the king plopped down flat on his back, shielding his eyes with his good arm. Not to avoid seeing Merlin's concerned (actually it looked almost fond, for some reason) expression, of course.

"So? How does your back feel?" Merlin repeated, returning to the subject Arthur was trying to avoid.

Arthur caved, quietly admitting, "There's some pain on the lower right side. Deeper than a muscle bruise or strain."

Merlin help him roll on his undamaged side and pulled his hauberk, gambeson and tunic up above his lower back. Just above the waist of Arthur's trousers, his long fingers gently touched the reddish-purpling skin, and he asked "Here?"

Arthur took in a quick breath at the touch, but still managed to utter a low, guttural assent, "Uh huh."

Lowering Arthur's clothing, Merlin directed, "Okay, let's get you out of your hauberk and put a splint on your arm."

Manhandling Arthur into a seated position, Merlin lifted the heavy mail off his body while trying not to jostle his broken arm. Arthur still took several sharp intakes of breath as the pain jabbed fiercely at him whenever his right arm was moved. Merlin helped him settle back down on the pallet and warned him, "This is going to get worse before it gets better. I have to straighten the broken bone before I can apply the splint."

Arthur nodded. He'd seen enough broken bones at tournaments and on the battlefield to know what had to be done and it wouldn't be pleasant.

Merlin began ripping strips off his neckerchief and set several aside. He looked over his collection of sticks on the table and brought several back over to Arthur. He explained, "The straightest two I'll use to form the splint along with the fabric strips from my neckerchief. These shorter ones I want you to hold in your fists, and this one, for your mouth, to bite down on. So you won't hurt yourself."

Arthur accepted the wooden sticks stoically and tried to prepare himself mentally for the pain that was coming. He closed his eyes and felt Merlin straighten his right arm and get a tight grip on it at the wrist and elbow. Then, there was just the white burning pain roaring through his mind. He could hear the screaming faintly in the background, only realizing as it didn't stop, that it was his own voice. Then the blinding white began to turn grey at the edges, which faded to black as he fell into the blissful silence of unconsciousness.

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