The intruder's scent was still thick in the air. Even before she was fully awake, the bear knew this. She needed to escape. She groggily got up to her feet, snuffling about for the exact whereabouts of the intruder, and possibly of her missing cub. She spied the intruder not far off, leaned up against a tree...just staring. The bear gave him a warning growl but scooted away. A call out to her missing cub earned a frightened response. Her cub was near, but not here. With one last wary glance at the intruder, the bear disappeared into the brush to locate her cub.
Amelia watched the whole scene play out from her roost high up in a tree. She would have preferred Zelgadis being out of harm's way as well, but she feared he'd have leapt down at the bear, or if not that, would have possibly fallen. Far better to leave him tied up at the base of the tree to face off with a bear he'd made sure would want nothing more to do with him.
Amelia sighed as she started to descend from the tree. She'd have preferred just casting Levitation but she'd already used a great deal of magic, healing the bear only adding to that. She would need a decent meal and preferably a night's worth of sleep before she'd be slinging spells again. She dropped the last foot from the tree, landing near Zelgadis. He didn't so much as bat an eye when she approached, but by this point Amelia wasn't expecting him to. She studied his face intently instead for any sign of aggression.
Zelgadis' eyes were glowing an eerie white again. Not a good thing, but Amelia knew this meant he was back to only acting when told. She released the Lafis Seed spell, Zelgadis' arms falling to hang limp at his sides again. Amelia gave a tired sigh. "Mister Zelgadis, follow me."
Amelia didn't even know where she was going at this point. Preferably toward civilization, even more preferably far away from those cultists. She'd only taken a few steps when she spied Zelgadis' cast off sword laying in a pile of dead leaves. It was crusted with blood. Amelia shuddered. She wanted nothing to do with the weapon, but she knew that Zelgadis would have never willingly parted with his sword. With another tired sigh, Amelia dropped to her knees, reaching out for the weapon.
The sword felt heavier than Amelia would have expected, whether that was due to her not being used to wielding such weaponry or due to her fatigue she didn't know. Seeing the blood might have been sapping her usual strength as well. She couldn't help but retch at the sight of it. So many bad memories threatened to plague her mind that Amelia had to cast the sword aside again, clutching a hand to her forehead.
"You can do this, Amelia, you need to do this." She glanced over at the sword again, but quickly squeezed her eyes shut. "You really need to do this! For Mister Zelgadis!" Amelia could still feel bile rising in her throat but saw no other option. Even if she refused to fight with weapons, she'd certainly learned her fair share of care for such things, if only by watching Gourry and Zelgadis both tend to their weapons after combat. Leaving blood or any sort of liquid on the blade was a bad thing.
Amelia grit her teeth. "It's important to Mister Zelgadis," she repeated to herself again and again as she again picked up the sword. She grabbed some of the dead leaves from the ground and scrubbed at the drying blood. It wasn't a perfect solution since it smeared rotting leaf matter all over the blade, and Amelia managed to nick herself more than a few times, which only added to her work, but eventually she was able to get the sword's blade clean. Amelia climbed to her feet, sword still in hand. Zelgadis was still standing silently nearby. Amelia gingerly dragged the sword over to his side and rather awkwardly got it back into its sheath. Zelgadis for his part never budged.
Her task complete, Amelia took a moment to collect her horribly thick metallic tang of blood still hung in the air. Without anything to distract her, Amelia finally became aware of her senses being overloaded. Without a word Amelia fell back in a faint.
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Amelia woke to a low moan. It wasn't until her brain began to clear up that she noticed she was the one moaning. "Ugh," she groaned as she sat up, rubbing her head. "I can't believe I did that." She looked up, noticing that she was surrounded by darkness. She had been out for a long time. She jerked up. "Mister Zelgadis!" As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, Amelia was able to make out Zelgadis' still form nearby. He was still as he had been, standing at attention.
Amelia placed a hand over her rapidly beating heart, feeling relief. As her emotions calmed down Amelia could feel exhaustion setting in again. She glanced about her surroundings, knowing full well she was still in the middle of a forest. Sleeping out in the open would not be smart, especially knowing that lighting a fire might draw unwanted attention again.
Amelia got to her feet, knowing there was only one smart solution. "Mister Zelgadis, follow." She would keep moving until daylight. Maybe then she could take a much needed nap.
Walking along silently in the dark was almost unnerving, but Amelia knew she had to keep going. She had already lost a lot of time from passing out. She clenched a fist. "I need to be strong. This won't get the better of me!" She glanced back at Zelgadis who continued to follow along silently. Walking along in the dark next to Zelgadis would have been preferable, but she was still a bit shaken from his earlier reaction to the bears. "What if he were to do that to me?" Amelia shook the thought from her mind.
The two walked on in silence for what felt like hours. At long last the sky took on a lighter hue with the promise of sunrise. Amelia nearly collapsed to her knees at the sight, beyond exhausted by this point. Her tired gaze fell upon the base of a nearby tree; to Amelia it was the best thing she'd seen in days. She took a few more steps toward the tree, gently easing herself against it. She pat the ground next to her to invite Zelgadis to settle in as well, then chided herself for having forgotten he'd not respond to non-verbal cues.
"Mister Zelgadis, sit," she yawned. Zelgadis complied by sitting down where he'd been standing. At this point Amelia was too tired to care, just happy he at least understood the concept of 'sit'. Amelia fought off the overwhelming need for sleep just long enough to cast a Sleep spell on Zelgadis. As his head drooped forward into his lap, Amelia leaned back onto the base of the tree. She was asleep before she knew it.
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Author's Notes: Ever feel like you've fallen into a perpetual black hole? I won't even say how long this has been written up, but my school workload was insane enough this past semester that I completely forget I even had this! I really meant to post it up forever ago, especially since I wrote more... So, to make up for my incredible folly, I'm posting up two chapters at the same time. So far the workload this semester seems much more forgiving, enough so that I had a major bout of inspiration the other night.
Anyway, still feel free to post reviews. I wasn't too sure about this chapter when I wrote it up, but it sounds better to me now that it's..aged properly, or something like that.