As soon as she disappeared, D collapsed into the dry leaves on the forest floor. His eyes rolled back into his head in agony, and his fist clenched around the wound, his long nails digging into his palm. His head spun and throbbed, and the wound spilled blood and burned. He passed into oblivion.
D woke up with Lefthand's voice in his ear.
"D? D! Wake up!" The pain was still crippling. D had never felt a physical pain as violent as this before. Lefthand spoke again. "D. Are you alright?"
D groaned.
"Well you're alive." Lefthand murmured.
"Can you destroy this spell?" D finally was able to moan through gritted teeth.
"I can try." Lefthand said, "But I'm better with external spells…Internal, not so sure… I can still try, though, can't I? Here goes."
He turned his face to within D's hand, and sought out the spell. "It's everywhere," Lefthand grumbled. And that it was. In every nerve it pulsated with a burning blue glow.
"How am I going to do this?" After thinking for a while and having no great revelations, he finally just began to suck in as he would normally, since his suction inhaled spells and magic, not physical elements, D remained quite unharmed. But this was a stubborn spell. It was very reluctant to be pulled from the nerves that it sapped pain from. Some of it he could not suck in, and in other places a residue remained. Once he'd gotten all he could, Lefthand turned his face back onto the surface of D's palm. "I sucked up all that would come. There's still some left though. Can you get up?"
D moaned again, and then slowly, he propped himself up. There was still residual pain, but most of the piercing burning agony that had been in him was no longer there. His arrow wound still hurt as well. He whistled softly, and his horse came to him. In the saddlebag he pulled out a short knife, a needle, and some linen bandages. He knew that a spell's wound would not heal so easily as others. With the knife he cut open a long slit in his shirt. He pulled out several strands of his hair and once twisted together, ran them through the fat black needle's eye. Carefully he knit together the flesh on either side of the puncture drawing it shut with care. He cleaned off the caked dried blood, and wrapped a strip of linen about his middle, to keep the injury covered. Then he sewed together the cut in his clothes, stood, and walked around a bit.
He felt stiff, and a memory of sharp pain still lingered. In some places he throbbed, but otherwise he could manage. He stretched lightly. It was mid afternoon. He'd lost almost three quarters of the day. He was lucky the place he'd fallen had been in the shade of the trees; otherwise, his injuries could have been greater, if he was in direct sun at noon.
Ziri had been more formidable and dangerous that he'd foreseen. He needed to be on his guard. Still, she probably thought she'd head back after tonight, and he'd still be lying, a swooning heap in the leaves. He leapt onto his horse and took off. It was his job, now, to prove her wrong.