Lon'qu blinked. How long had he been unconscious for? His vision blurred, and slowly a face swam into view. It was the girl from Shuo'li's mansion! He tried to sit up too quickly and a fuzzy blackness overcame his sight, and he was forced to lie back down again.
A few more seconds, and the nausea and dizziness had begun to fade, though he also gradually became aware of a dull aching pain in his sword hand. "Wha…what are you doing here?" Lon'qu forced the slurred words out of his mouth. He sounded like he was drunk. He hated it.
"Never mind that." The girl seemed preoccupied with some white binding cloth. "I need to treat your injuries."
"What injuries?" His head was starting to clear now, and the pain was getting sharper. Lon'qu glanced down at his fingers, and was startled to see them wrapped in layers and layers of gauze.
"I soaked the strips in ice water first," she said by way of explanation. "I think they weren't very severe burns, but they'll still blister and peel pretty painfully while they heal. What were you thinking, taking on a full blast elfire at such a close range?"
He tried to sit up again, this time with a little more success than before. Still, he toppled backwards again and was only stopped when the girl's hand steadied him. "Take it easy, will you?" she asked.
His mind was scattered, and he cast around, trying to remember what had happened. "The kid…what happened to him?"
"What kid?" the girl asked.
"The mage! You know, the one I was dueling. Before I got hit." Lon'qu added the last bit hastily, trying to clarify what he was talking about.
She shrugged. "Oh. Him. He just collected his prize money and got out of the arena faster than you can blink. I don't think I even saw him leave."
"Oh…" Lon'qu shook his head groggily, trying to clear his mind. "What are you doing here?" he repeated. Another thing occurred to him. "And how do you know my name?"
"Oh, I was just wandering around, here and there," she waved her arms around vaguely. "You know. Running errands, going to the marketplace, what have you. And you told me your name when we first met! Remember?"
He looked at her skeptically. "Actually, no, I don't. And you look far too flustered for somebody who is supposedly telling the truth. And what sort of errand brings you to the dueling arena? Only gamblers and fighters frequent this place."
"Well, too bad if you don't believe me, because that's the truth." She harrumphed and crossed her arms. "And I never heard you thank me for dragging you out of the ring and forfeiting that duel on your behalf."
Lon'qu winced as he stood up. "You're right. Thanks. Now I'll be heading home." He turned to leave but abruptly halted as she yanked on his shirt, stopping him in his tracks.
"Hey! You didn't actually mean that," she said, face scrunched up into a frown. "I went to all that trouble, running into the ring and risking my poor dainty little neck, and all I get is a 'Thanks but not really I don't even care what your name is'? How rude. And I ran into the arena with my injured ankle, too!"
Sharply meeting her gaze, Lon'qu bit back a retort and tried to reply gracefully. "Thank you. I really do mean it, and I appreciate that you went to all that effort to save my life. But I can manage on my own. I don't need someone to take care of me. To be honest, I don't really want to be your friend, but if you want to befriend me all that badly, you're going to have to start telling me the truth."
Lowering her voice to a softer tone so that Lon'qu had to lean forwards to hear her over the noise of the arena, the girl replied. "Let's go somewhere else. This isn't the best place to tell you that."
"I'm heading back home," Lon'qu replied stiffly. "I'm already late as it is, and I don't want –" he stopped abruptly. This girl didn't need to know about his mother. She didn't need to know anything. After all, she was the one who lied to him in the first place.
"Well, then, may I walk with you?" she replied.
He started, surprised. Lon'qu had not actually considered that she would be willing to accompany him to the slums. Thinking back to their past conversation, he reflected that perhaps she didn't know he lived in the slums. It was best if he got it out in the open first, rather than she follow him and be disillusioned later.
"I'm not sure if you want to. My home is in the slums."
"I know," she replied simply. She offered no explanation as to how she knew all these things about him. Typical of her, Lon'qu thought. It seemed as though he had acquired himself a stalker. He shivered, thinking about those long hours he had spent outside the mansion, listening to Ke'ri. This girl had been probably watching him while he had stood there, listening. If he hadn't been the one in this situation, he would have surely thought it was funny – while he had been creepily listening on Ke'ri, someone else had been creepily spying on him. The watcher had become the watched.
They walked back together in silence. He noticed how her footsteps were in time with his. For some reason, this annoyed him beyond belief, and he purposely altered his pace, trying to avoid falling back into sync with her.
A little while after they had passed a few villages and entered into the forests that separated the slums from the city, she spoke up. "So…" she began. "You probably want to know why I know so much about you, and I guess it's about time I told you the truth."
A/N: Midterms need to go away...haha. But I've been updating pretty consistently so yay for perseverance! :D Don't know if I want to try Nanowrimo though...Also, someone asked me if the mage was Ricken - I didn't even think about that possibility! But no, he's not.