Bleeding Flowers Chapter 2

In the hall of a priestess cries the wolf.

"Well, the way I see it, you can only do one of two things. You can relive the past every single day, or you can let it strengthen you and prepare you for what you'll face next. Fight against it, or wither." By the time I finished the words, I had forgotten the first half of them the moment they left my mouth. Pain seered my teeth to my tongue, weighty exhales clenched at the peek of my lungs.

"Like a flower in the desert.." A delicate, feminine voice spoke as her hands worked above the crimson dampness that was my busted arm. "Where's your cloudy friend?" Her voice was as sweet as the softest sky, hair so pale it was almost shaded with dusky tints of ashen blue. I'd almost envy her, but the thickly robed pale skinned healer was too kind of a person to feel nasty toward. My friend, my former fellow student at the College of Winterhold.

And someone I didn't want Bishop to meet. She was too soft for his kind of company, and the things she would think about ME after that. "He's..-ah! He's.. I told him I would find my best healer, took our last horse, his..his was dropped from a high height. Let's.. Talk about the flowers." Wait, WERE they talking about flowers? No that had been a metaphor..

A rich harmonic aroma of snowberry cobbler and burnt herbal offerings filled the quaint rustic space, homey and modest. Well kept and inviting. Firelight and filtered windows kissed down a yellow seam, lighting the old cottage room with a soothing sense of charm. Everyone was out to class or prayer work, leaving the creaking halls barren.

"I admire your positivity.." Aruka said as she knitted together the thin sinews of my forearm. I was half watching in fascination, a distraction, secretly hoping to improve my own discipline of restoration. At the same time, it made me feel a disorienting phantom pain. It was hard to focus, but something about her voice was like stepping into the front door of a comforting home.

Aruka passively bowed her head, unphased with the view of my open body, dabbing the blood away with a silken hand, a natural born grace revealing the pink flesh below. That was intimacy, seeing the inside of your best friend without blinking. "All I mean, is that.. What happened to you, was gravely traumatic. I just think that.. You may.. Have difficulty when those memories strike back, by just burying them."

"I'm not burying them." I insisted. "My damned arm is proof of that! If I was covering my fate, do you think I would be throwing my life before dragons?" The harrowing image of remorseless, blazing eyes flared into mind, the last living seconds of a house sized beast burning alive, its sword like teeth locked around my thin arm. If I shall die, you will burn with me.

The horrific sound the ranger behind me made as the arrow that pierced the dragon's eye was the snare that kept me bound to the erupting heat. The killing blow that struck the moment the dragon had seized me. I had no choice but to rip myself free to avoid burning alive, down some tonics to temporarily put the damage at bay, and come to the first person I could think of who could erase the damage and give me peace of mind.

The dragon had engulfed just behind me, an inferno with a voice that roared against the wind. That soul scorched into my core, sinking in with liquid fire. Or, it could have been the physical pain, it was hard to tell, but impossible to ignore that bitter taste of vengeance screaming in the air around me.

"We're almost done." Aruka brought me back home again. "There's been talk, you know."

"Of.." One of the exhales forced through my teeth, feeling the waves of energy pulse on my dampening pain.

"Little birds talking to proud bumble bees."

My lips turned in a frown. She wanted to talk about this NOW? "I have a companion." I stated simply.

"Mmmm-hmmmmmn. One who would risk their life to take on a dragon with you. People want to know who he is."

"Bishop. His name.." A smaller breath came. "His name is Bishop." My answer came automatic, I hid nothing from my friend.

Aruka smiled, and the room may have lit around the pastel pink of her lips. She had the kind of ambient warmth that could make a draugr smile. "Bishop? That's a strong name. Tell me what you think of this Bishop."

What did I think of him? That I kept reliving the moments he lay down nearby when I couldn't keep going on for the night, that he now chose a place in sight. Reimagining closing the distance between us, in order to force my mind to drop the weight so heavy on my thoughts by day dreaming about rising from my bedroll to approach his. I still blushed hotly thinking about his solid swell pressed between my legs, and the war raging in his fierce gaze when I turned around.

The look of disgust shot toward the woman was only because I couldn't tell her no. "I.." Where could I even start? He wasn't just 'strong.' "He has the soul that could rival a dragon- and I'd know- with the tenacity of a feral wolf." A laugh managed to stagger out as I finished, "And of course, the typical drinking habits of any Nord."

"So in other words.." Aruka sat back, her long braid swaying over her shoulder in the process. "If you left him 100 miles behind, he'd be here within a day."

I peered over my shoulder just to make sure we were really alone. Did she know something she wasn't saying? Studying her, she lifted my arm gingerly to begin applying a cottony bandage scented in something sweet and earthy, that little smile at the corner of her lips revealed nothing. I didn't like that look.

"I'm certain I'll catch more hell than the dragon gave me when he catches up. He's the best tracker in Skyrim, I'm almost sure." Why was she looking up at me through her lashes like that? Was there something on my face? "What?"

"I've never heard you speak so openly about a man since that lad who kissed your hand in alteration class."

Memories of a scraggly little mage in robes came flashing back. I had no idea what I was thinking when fluttering little sweet words were enough to make my heart beat. "Yeah no, I doubt that guy would kiss my hand right now." My bloody fingers wiggled, and Aruka caught them in a damp rag, attempting to clean away the caked grime of former reptile entrails.

She wiped a spot clean, and then picked up my hand to kiss it chastely. "My beautiful, lovely, fair Dragonborn." I wriggled away with a scowl, but didn't dare flex my newly healed arm. "Will you have all my babies?"

The immediate sound that came out of me was nothing short of a squeal. My nose wrinkled as she broke into melodic laughter, letting my hand go free. It felt SO good to ground myself back to a semi normal life, to meet a friend of the past. How long it had been, and it was like we'd never been apart.

"He's..not like that at all."

Her brows dipped into confusion. "Oh? Is he.."

I read her expression, and my eyes widened. Gay? "No! Gods no. All the women in every tavern we've been in are on his butt." We shared another round of girlish laughter.

I had been making walls. Walls of grass, of city stones, reservations, strongholds within me to hold back the awful reality of what being Dragonborn meant. Anything to survive, and keep the harsh world out. But Aruka, she didn't see the Dragonborn, or prey in the wilderness, she just saw me. The blockade that surrounded us now, made of hand shaped wood and not Imperial stone, was the halls of my heart. And that had no end, and no beginning.

This is exactly what I needed. To just retouch with what mattered. Everyone could sing songs about the Dragonborn or claim they could best her in a fight to make themselves feel alright, but few would follow her into battle. Bishop did. Aruka would, but she couldn't fight at all. Destruction was my forte. Restoration was hers.

"We're a good team.." Said about Bishop, or Aruka I wasn't sure. But I breathed a sigh, lifting my bandaged arm carefully to study it. The break was all healed up, covered for protection, but any jarring would resonate the feeling of the old wound. This would be tender for days..

"Wait.." Aruka got up, shuffling around the little cabin room connected to an outer hall of others. Priestesses in training lived here and attended to the sick and wounded. When she came back, she had in her small hands a slip of faded white velvet. Something glimmered, shining as she rewrapped the fold. "Here."

I took the velvet fabric, feeling something hard beneath it with many shapes. It was small, fairly light. As I tugged at the corner, she stopped me. "Don't open it right now.." There was a teasing look on her face, and I was confused. She reached, guiding my good hand to put the apparent gift in my pocket.

"It's cursed isn't it."

She looked like she was seriously giving it thought. "No.." There was so much insecurity in the word.

"No?" I repeated with definence.

"I mean.. I wouldn't say CURSED. You'll.. You'll understand when you're older."

I gave her an odd look. Woman, look at me. I have curves now, I'm old enough to 'understand better.' Still, her sense of subtle humor was contagious. Okay then..

A hand knitted throw had been laid on the floor for me to sit on, and as she stood above me, her robes swaying as she walked and turned about the room to stretch her legs, I watched.

"So." She turned to me, almost looking the tiniest bit mischievous. "Would you say that you may love him?"

My reply didn't come, lips drawn together tight. She patiently waited. Did I love Bishop? It's something I actually did shove away, trying not to think too hard about. All I knew for sure was one thing.

"I wouldn't want to see him get hurt.." It took some solemn honesty to admit, "I'm glad it was me and not him." My damaged arm was the elephant in the room, one I raised momentarily with shaky effort.

Aruka seemed to feel my shift and became serious. "You're lucky to have each other." Ever positive, it was all she said.

"I think I should just become a priestess." I half smirked to lighten the mood. "I don't know long I can do this. I can't find it in me to tell him to leave, but if I saw him go, I don't think I could fight anymore. Especially not a dragon..." And it wasn't because I entirely needed his help to take one down, as life saving as that potentially could be.

She saw the dilemma in my gaze, and moved to go sit down in a rickety old chair across the room. I waited for her words of wisdom, to somehow heal this all better, but she didn't. Not even a single word. It took a few moments, and she rushed out a question that seemed out of place. "Tell me about your favorite moment with Bishop."

What was with the questions about my personal life? It wasn't so much the question, it was how she said it so urgently, like it really made a difference to the moment. "Uh.. Well.." There were many instances to think of. Our bickering that lead into play, seeing the happiness on his face when he killed the bandits that trapped Karnwyr. "Watching him sleep." Of all things, that was the happiest, and it was hard to admit, so I looked down. "Next to me." My voice lowered, "His chest is strong and warm."

I looked toward Aruka, but she was looking away like a scolded dog, apparently the wall was more interesting than my childish simple words. Then I saw the presence in the room that hadn't been there before, the ranger's face torn between wild irritation and regarding me as if his eyes could move me to spill answers.

His voice was only the former. "Outside. Now."

From my spot on the floor, his eyes glowered down at me, steady. The same look as when he had an arrow notched, holding his breath. Sometimes I tried to get a glimpse of his face when he was intently focusing on a target, an expression so different than when he was focusing on me. Except now. His arms were locked over his chest, posture wide. Aruka was a little rabbit in the corner behind him, and she may as well have been invisible to Bishop.

"Do you want to do this in front of sick children and the homeless..?" It was a genuine question, for if they went outside, that is who would be watching. Long live the Dragonborn, she who gets yelled at in front of the needy.

"I can leave.." Aruka quietly offered from the corner.