Questions
"I'm D-dr. McGowan." Confusion causing her to stutter.
Both men frowned but neither said a word, merely shrugging and settling to one side of the crackling fire. Exhausted, Natasha sank to the ground, scooting closer to the exit, not wanting to be caught without an escape route if she suddenly needed space. It also made it easier to hide her wounded shoulder until she could be sure she could be treated without hurting them should they touch her. Legolas materialized at her side, startling her out of her thoughts, holding a golden wafer out to her.
"Here my lady." He said with a gentle smile full of amusement. "It's elvish waybread. Tisn't much but tis all we can offer you at the moment. That and a drink of water to wash it down." He winked and returned to his place beside Strider.
"Elvish? Will things never get back to normal?" she sighed and nibbled gingerly at the wafer, surprised when her mouth was filled with honey sweetness instead of the stale bread taste she'd expected. As delicious as it was however, she could only manage a bite or two more before her stomach protested its fullness. Legolas simply wrapped the remained in a large leaf of somesort and handed it back to her with another smile before going outside.
"What were you doing wandering alone in Mirkwood, my lady?" Strider asked.
"Trying to find my way home before my brother sends out an army to find me." She replied with a tired smile. "He must have noticed I haven't gotten back by now. I've been gone for hours."
"You're lost then?" Strider asked sympathetically, wondering to himself what settlement this woman could possibly have come from.
"Kidnapped."
"Did they hurt you?" his eyes were wide with concern, taking in a small bleeding cut on her temple from where the creature had struck her.
"They were going to kill me. Someone ordered them to, though I can't remember if they said who. I was more focused on their weapons. Though I can't imagine why anyone would want to kill me. I'm just a doctor." She shrugged apologetically, hissing in pain as the movement pulled at her shoulder. "But no they didn't hurt me. No, a rock bit me while you were pulling me up that cliff face."
Strider smiled gently at her feeble attempt at humor, for the first time noticing how pale her face was. Patting the place beside him, he reached around for a water skin and a bowl in one of the cubby holes. Natasha moved to the place indicated and presented her shoulder to him. Strider carefully cut away her shirt, baring the wound. A soft intake of breath was the only indication he gave as to the wound's severity and so she reached back and probed gently with her fingertips, hissing slightly at the sting.
Without a word, she retrieved a bottle of disinfectant and a cotton swab from her abd and handed them to him. He in turn stared at the bottle as though he'd never seen such a thing in his life. He cautiously opened the bottle, wetting the cotton swab.
"Such a small bottle for carrying water. You should have a larger one, my lady. Especially for travelling."
"It's not water. It's hydrogen peroxide. Take a whiff and you'll see the difference." She replied tightly, preparing herself for the sting to come.
Strider raised the swab to his nose, jerking back when the pungent odor met his nostrils.
"This is supposed to clean the wound?" he asked incredulously.
"Yes and a lot more effectively than water. How were you planning on preventing an infection?" she turned confused eyes on him. 'How could he not know what hydrogen peroxide was.' She asked herself. He seemed intelligent enough and he spoke with a flawless English accent, so he certainly wasn't a local. So how come he hadn't her of…she was brought out of her thoughts as Strider answered her.
"I was going to wash the wound and put a poultice on it." He stated simply, as though it were common sense.
"Oh well, this stuff cuts the process in half for you. It cleans and prevents infection at the same time. It'll fizz…bubble when it gets into the wound and that tells you it's working on killing any infection. Of course, that makes it STING!" this last bit was said explosively as Strider applied the doused swab to her shoulder. Her jerked his hand back in fear.
"It's supposed to do that." She ground out. "But damn that hurts like hell."
Strider stared at her dubiously for a moment before continuing, offering up conversation as a distraction.
"So how did you come to be kidnapped? Wander away from your party?"
"No, returning back to the Med Station after delivering a baby."
"You're a midwife then? I thought you said you were a doctor?"
"A general doctor, yes. Though we can do, and have had to, where I am, just about anything medical. And Doctors in the Field have to be prepared for just about anything."
"So doc-tore is your title then?" Legolas asked from the entrance, his eyes never leaving the forest outside, vigilant for any danger that might threaten them.
"Yes." 'ok just where the hell am I?' Natasha thought.
"And what is it that a doc-tore does that makes you not a midwife?" Strider continued, frowning as he noticed little pieces of rock still embedded in her shoulder. He pulled out his boot nice and had almost touched her when she flinched away from him.
"Don't even think about it until you've sterilized that. I don't know where that's been. Douse it with the hydrogen peroxide."
Strider nodded, not entirely sure what 'sterilized' meant but after seeing how the disinfectant had worked before, did as he was told. He then stopped and squeezed her shoulder in sympathy.
"This may hurt a little." He warned and pried a rock out.
"Ya think?" Natasha hissed through clenched teeth and scowled at him.
Legolas hid a smile behind his hand, earning himself a glare from his companion.
"So you were saying, my lady?" Legolas prompted.
"A doctor takes care of the sick and injured, helping them to get well again. At least that's the hope. If we can't do that, we try to make them as comfortable as possible." She replied through clenched teeth. "And please don't call me 'lady'. I'm not royalty."
"A healer then?" strider asked, working out another piece. "and we call you 'lady' as a term of respect."
"Yes."
"And 'doc-tores in the field' is…a land formation?" Legolas continued.
"No, it's an organization of doctors who work together to bring doc…erm, healers to areas that have too few or now any, along with medicines and food."
"A noble mission." Strider commented while working still another piece out.
"You mentioned a 'med station.'" Legolas pronounced the words carefully.
"That's where I tend the sick and injured in the area where I'm stationed."
"Ah, a House of Healing."
"Hopefully." She intoned regretfully, thinking of the two patients she'd lost in the last raid.
They all fell silent for several minutes as they became lost in their own thoughts. But Natasha soon found she didn't like the silence, it didn't give her something to concentrate on as Strider was now stitching up the gash on her shoulder, having sterilized the needle as well. She tried the normal distractions but when those failed she settled on watching Legolas, who had begun repairing arrows. His hands spoke of years of practice, so swift and sure, with little to no needlessly spent energy. There were obvious differences between he and his companion. But there was something she couldn't quite place…there! His ears..were they pointed?! Yes his ears were pointed! But how could…He must have felt her gaze for he raised his from his work and smiled comfortingly.
"The pain will be gone shortly, my lady." He winked and gathered up the repaired arrows, returning them to his quiver.
Strider had finished stitching the wound and now looked for a bandage. Natasha handed him a bandage roll wordlessly and returned to her study. Strider followed her gaze and chuckled to himself as he bound her shoulder.
"What do you find so amusing, melethron nin?" asked Legolas. "Is her wound not serious enough to hold your attention?"
"I believe, melethron, that doc-tore mack gow ann has never seen an elf before." Strider stumbled over her name, though that wasn't much of a surprise. Most of the locals…wait a minute!
"An elf? No way. They're only a myth." Natasha exclaimed, folding her arms as best she could and frowning at Legolas.
The hideaway seemed to light up with the sound of his wholehearted laughter. Natasha couldn't help but feel a warmth in her soul but chose to ignore the little tap dance her heart did in her ribcage at the beautiful sound.
"You must be from Gondor to believe such a thing." Strider commented dryly, tying off the bandage and returning the unused portion of the roll. "Is it too tight?"
She shook her head as she tested the bandage, and thanked him. He smiled in return and stretched his legs out towards the fire, reclining against the wall, his arms behind his head.
"There are more of us than many seem to think." Legolas continued. "Strider himself is half-elven, though one would never guess it with all the fur on his face."
Strider chuckled shaking his head, well used to his companion's teasing. Natasha looked between both men…elves…em…males, trying to decide whether they were pulling her leg or not. Deciding on a safer course, she asked the question that had been plaguing her since she'd heard the word.
"Umm, this is probably going to sound stupid but what's Gondor?"
Both elves stared at her in disbelief, and it was Legolas who regained his composure first.
"Is that not where you come from?"
"Nope." Natasha shook her head. "Never heard of it. Never heard of Mirkwood, either, for that matter."
"What about Lonely Mountain or Long Lake?" he asked hopefully.
"Nope." she shook her head.
"Dale?"
"Uh-unh."
"Rohan? Bree?"
"Nada."
They continued like this for several minutes, going through all the places he could think of where humans resided. Strider watched on in silence, his concern growing.
"The Shire? Isengard?" Legolas was getting desperate.
"No and no."
"May I ask where it is you are from then, my lady?" Strider asked, finally joining the conversation. "Your name and accent are unfamiliar to us, Dock-tore Mack-Gow-Anne."
Natasha laughed as he stumbled over her name once again. She shook her head slightly, pushing back an errant strand of hair that fell into her eyes.
"You can call me Natasha if that's easier for you. As to where I'm from…well the Med-station is in an area called the Balkans."
"Ball-cans?" Legolas said slowly as though trying the name out. Natasha nodded, frowning slightly.
'Just how out of the loop are these guys? Surely to goodness they've heard about the Balkans?'
"I have not heard of such a place. Nowhere near here, at least."
'Apparently not.'
Focusing on the ground before her, she went through all the events that had led her here, trying to find some missed passage of time she may have missed, not realizing that she spoke aloud. When she looked up, she found them deep in conversation, in that odd language they had used before. There was a nod of agreement and then they turned back to her.
"We've heard stories of other worlds before, but always believed they were fairy tales." Strider said quietly. "Seems we were wrong. Wouldn't be the first time, nor the last, I suspect. Tomorrow, we'll take you to the Palace. Gandalf should still be there; maybe he'll be able to help you return to your world. For now though, you should rest. It's a long trek back to the palace, and it will help your wound heal."
Natasha didn't really hear him after the first sentence, her mind in turmoil.
'Other worlds? Nice try, buddy. Even if it would explain a lot of things….no! Don't even go there! And who the hell is Gandalf?' Just then something hit her with the subtlety of a bullet through a plate glass window. 'Wait a minute, wouldn't this place be crawling with biologists if there were such large spiders? And wouldn't it have been mentioned in the dossier? The others mentioned that sort of thing! And things that size just don't go unnoticed. Another world? Really? Well cool, except it wasn't my choice.' She huffed a sigh and tuned back into the conversation just in time to hear her companions wish her good night.
"Get some sleep, Lady Natasha." Strider squeezed her uninjured shoulder gently as he handed her a blanket. "We have a long journey tomorrow."
So many questions floated around in her head, too many to answer at one time. And so many more with answers she didn't have. Natasha curled into as tight a ball as she could manage with her injured shoulder, closed her eyes and tried to follow Strider's advice. Behind her the fire cracked and popped and outside the leaves rustled gently in some unfelt breeze. Lulled by the gentle rhythms of the forest, Natasha soon fell asleep.