Meddle Not In The Affairs Of Dragons
Having decided that his broth and bread counted as lunch, he calculated it to be around mid afternoon to early evening. The quality of light seeping through his blindfold, of which there was not much, had changed, dimming and becoming a little less warm. Other than that he had no way of being able to estimate how long he had lain there, or rather been left propped up on pillows. Although it was always difficult to tell when one was left alone as a few minutes could crawl by like hours and hours in turn could feel as minutes.
His nurse had come in a while after feeding him and chucked a foul tasting, evil smelling potion down his neck. Macnair had choked and spluttered but eventually satisfied the nurse enough to be left alone. Having been warned it would make him drowsy, the bounty hunter was determined to stay awake and prove the nurse wrong. He had fought away the prickle of sleep and was now smugly reclining, waiting for his next meal. If it was as good as the last one, he would probably forgive his carer earlier negligence.
"Hungry?" The question caught him off guard as he hadn't heard anyone approach let alone alert him in more friendly ways to their presence. Not even so much as a 'good-afternoon'.
"And where've you been?" Macnair rasped, irritated at being left so long. A chill had crawled up his limbs by now and was settling on his chest.
"Sorry mum," His nurse was amused. That cocky little- Macnair stopped to smoulder quietly. Another meal was in the posession of his carer and Walden was hungry, his stomach attested to it with a plaintive gurgle. Again, he held out his hand to take cutlery and feed himself and again he was refused. But rather than the silent ignorance of before, cool fingers pressed lightly on his wrist and pushed his fatigued arm down. "Let me,"
Macnair was silent, torn between flooring the presumptive shit and being fed. He felt like a half-feral dog who might just bite the hand that fed it if pushed too far. But at the same time a shiver of civility in him, hidden somewhere in his musculature, was moved at the gentility to the nurses's hands.
The bounty hunter swallowed, swallowing his pride in turn, enough at least, to obey. Still, just because he was co-operating it didn't mean he had to like it and subsequently he spent his meal-time scowling deeply and concocting ways to exact his belated revenge. He had to admit though, his carer was just that. Not a drop was spilled on his chest nor did any dribble down his chin though he supposed it was a skill to be acquired, as a healer.
"I'll be back in the morning. Better to get your rest now." The footsteps were already moving away from him. What do you think i've been doing all day, arsehole? Macnair thought sourly at where he assumed the retreating figure of his nurse would be.
-
Macnair found himself almost unconcious shortly after the nurse had gone. His sleep was deep and undisturbed and the next two days passed much in the same way as before. His nurse would come, saying very little, while Macnair swore and railed between bandage changes, washes and meals.
His throat was feeling better, although the vile concoction he was forced to swallow between his lunch and dinner was not helping, so far as he could see anyway. His shoulder was tight and protested almost constantly. Each time his hip-wound was cleaned, a deeper shame surfaced and it was not entirely to do with the inability to it himself. A tiny, confused thought almost suffered the indignation and the precise movements of his nurse because he found it darkly attractive. Of course, he reasoned, it was completely because he hadn't been with a woman for a while and most definately because he wasn't supposed to find it appealing.
The previous night had been close and suffocating in his sheets. The cause was a second potion he had been given to fight the first signs of fever. As a result his sleep had been disturbed and he had lain awake for a time just listening. In the beginning he had heard only a pair of crickets trilling their quaint music but eventually the sounds of a curious animal had reached him.
It whimpered and whined, sending shivers down his spine with the unearthly song rising into a blackness he could not see. It was made the more terrifying that his imagination had gotten the better of him. Probably just a wolf, he tried to reason, a sweat beading on his forehead and upper lip, nothing to worry about. Big chap like you Macnair, nothing at all to worry about...
Dawn had come slowly but he felt it and with its arrival, the animal left. It was only then he allowed himself to return to his restless sleep. He decided he would ask his nurse what it was but the opportunity had not arisen. His nurse had not spoken a word and had left quickly, refusing any inticement into conversation. Unless someone else was seeing to me today... Walden wondered. Usually there was some hint it was the nurse he'd come to know and loath, a snigger, a formal warning of what was to come, something; anything.
A quiver of loneliness pricked his senses. He was getting used to the company of his carer, but outright silence left him vacant and alone. He found he had little to look forward too if the only person he knew to be there refused to speak and the bland landscape he imagined beyond held even less sound to punctuate his day. By his midday meal, Macnair had resolved to ask who his nurse was and where he was being kept. At least that way he would have something to muse over if his nurse was set on being unsocial.
"Hi, nice to hear you again," Walden hoped his smile was sincere when the pad of steps approached his bedside. "Whoever you are..." A stony silence met his attempt at subtlety.
"So..." He tried again while his nurse moved about, making ready to feed him "Where exactly are we?" The bounty hunter sighed and took his first mouthful of food. "Hopefully far away from that dragon, wherever it is I'm boarded. Which is a point, what are you after for all this? Cash-wise i mean?" He swallowed a second portion. "How do you know who I-"
"Macnair," This was it. The pause where his nurse collected the relevant data and told him what he wanted to know. About bloody time... "You talk too much,"
-
Brushing fingertips across his chest brought Macnair fully into consciousness later that evening. At first their pattern seemed random but soon it became evident they were tracking the myriad scars etched in flesh and muscle, like tattoos of his conquests and failures. A flicker of a frown whispered on his brow, uncertain as to the reason for this. It was his nurse; at least, he thought it was. The touch was familiar.
"So many scars…" The whispered statement sent shivers down the bounty hunter's spine. In the darkness of his bandages his imagination was running wild. When the gentle digits paused over the silver of his nipple ring he held his breath. "Though I wouldn't have thought you went for body piercings…Anyway," The fingers left his torso and with it went a sigh. "I've your dinner,"
Macnair didn't quite trust his voice. He was a little dismayed at the sudden physicality of someone who only this morning refused to speak to him and could only nod dumbly to show his acknowledgement. Soon enough he was being fed once more, the food slipping down his throat easier now it was not so raw.
"This is good, where did you learn to cook?" Walden offered by way of a silence breaker as his dinner neared its end. He didn't expect an answer though, he was beginning to anticipate his nurse's moods. "I'm not much of a cook myself, I usually burn things or manage to well and truly fuck it up," He chuckled around a mouthful of slightly more chunky food, though it was still a broth of sorts. It simply held some vegetables and shredded chicken.
"Though I can make a mean Griffon Curry – mum's old recipe," The nurse withdrew arranging something to his left. It sounded like crockery moving across wood. Silence lay thick and heavy now about them, punctuated by Macnair's breathing and faint wheeze it still contained.
"My mum taught me, though I'm nothing to measure her cooking on. I've not found a better chef yet," The nurse said as they moved, Macnair heard, and a metal latch rattled, being lifted. Something soft thwumped onto the floor and the trunk was closed. "It'll be cold tonight, I thought you might like another blanket,"
Before Macnair could acquiesce, a padded quilt was arranged over him and snug warmth crept into his limbs. It was arranged around his shoulders carefully. Walden reached out for his nurse's fingers, enclosing a calloused hand around them and squeezing. He wanted to let his nurse know he was grateful for what was being done for him, mostly though, he wanted to let that cool touch dance across his torso again.
The nurse pulled out of the grip slowly, easing away. Cloth fluttered as if a tent flap were being drawn back. A thought occurred to him that the dragon he had heard in his semi lucid state days ago, had not been a dragon at all, but canvas snapping in a breeze.
"I'm Charlie, by the way," Then the tent flap dropped back into place and Macnair was alone once again.
-
"I heard you last night," Where Macnair's first words to Charlie the following morning. "I heard you the other night but I thought it was an animal or something. What's so bad it haunts you at night?" The quiet that followed was sharp with tension, an acid taint in the air that threatened to smother all in its poison.
"You watched it, Macnair, you tell me,"
"What? Who-"
"Charlie, I told you. I'm Charlie Weasley," Macnair turned a pale shade of green beneath his bandages. It had been a few years since he had heard the name but he remembered it. Everyone knew a Weasley, there were that many of them, but Voldemort had lost the war and death-eaters were still being captured and killed by Aurors or anyone able to restrain them long enough.
"Charlie Weasley? The same Charlie Weasley who…" Icy dread, an oozing pit of blackness, churned in the bounty hunter's stomach at the realization of exactly who was looking after him.
The same Charlie Weasley whose sister death-eaters raped and tortured to death, whose youngest brother was left insane? The same Charlie Weasley I captured in my duties and handed over to the mercy of the Lestrange brothers?