Wow, I am terrible. I need to update this more often. If you guys are still reading, thank you so much!
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I became conscious quickly, eyes fluttering open to a dark room and a fiery pain blossoming from well, everywhere. There was a thick wool blanket draped over me and it itched terribly, not to mention the fireplace roaring in my room already kept the place at quite a warm temperature. A blanket was just overkill. My throat and mouth were drier than the deserts of Elsweyr, and I desperately wanted a drink. From where I was going to get one I didn't know, however, when I forced my unbearably heavy legs over the side of the bed and tried my damnedest to stand up. Just as I did so, however, the pain in my legs and skull grew to new heights and I collapsed to the wooden floor with an ear-piercing scream, my pale white hands clasping around my ears.
It was then that I noticed something was different. Everything was…more. The insides of my eyelids were brighter pink than I remembered, I could feel every bump and splinter and crack on the boards in the floor, the clanking of glasses in the next room and the murmurs of a pair of people was an annoying roar in the back of my mind. I dug my fingernails into my scalp, curling into a tighter ball and groaning unhappily as the pounding of incoming footsteps matched the pounding of blood through my brain.
"She's awake! Lydia, get some water would you?" I recognized Baragma's voice and held back a shriek when the door to my room flew open and allowed the dratted light in to bother me.
"Shut the fucking door, please." I barked, waving one hand in what I thought was the man's direction. He did not comply, and instead slid his giant hands under my armpits and pulled me to my feet and into my very first hug. I tensed up automatically, and my muscles protested violently, but I just sort of looked around the room nervously and gave him a single pat on the back. "What are you doing, Baragma?" he didn't answer my question, much to my chagrin.
After a few seconds had passed I was released from the man's death grip and after a fair bit of wobbling and stumbling, I managed to stay on my feet. "Sorry. I uh-I just didn't know if you'd ever wake up or not. You've been in a coma for nearly a week now." He looked sheepish, eyes cast to the floor and hands held behind his back.
I raised my eyebrows, trying to remember anything past a few minutes ago when I had literally fallen out of bed, and found myself drawing a blank. "What happened? Why was I passed out for so long?"
He gestured at the general area of my body, "Somethin' attacked you when you went out ridin'. When your horse showed up at the stables all covered in sweat, lookin' scared and most importantly without you, I knew something had happened. So I managed to convince the Jarl to let me steal a few guards away from their posts and went lookin' for ya. Found you laying in a puddle of blood and all torn up, head to toe." When I asked if he knew what had attacked me, he just shrugged and scrunched up his eyebrows in an 'I don't know' fashion.
"I'm really thirsty.." I said, peeking over Baragma's thick shoulder and wondering where his servant had gone off to. He nodded, gestured for me to come out into the main room and hollered for Lydia again who screeched back at him to be patient. I smirked, admiring Lydia's feistiness and yet still wishing she'd hurry up. My ears could pick up the sound of a mouse scratching around in the attic, and some sort of large animal snorting outside. The whole house smelt of sweat and dirt, I noticed. This was only the second time I'd ever been in Baragma's house, and yet I remembered everything as if it were yesterday. It was odd how I could remember how many wardrobes were scattered around the place yet I couldn't remember what sort of animal had nearly mauled me to death.
Soon, Lydia appeared with a few jugs of mead, some grilled leeks and slaughterfish balanced on one arm and a plate overflowing with various chopped fruits on the other. I resisted the urge to make a remark about her being a lowly maid these days for fear of her finishing the job that the wild animal hadn't and killing me right there. "It's dark now, so I'm not going out to draw any water from the well so you'll have to make due with mead for now. I brought some food too, but I don't know what you like and that's all we had around the house. Eat it or don't, it's the wee hours of the morning and I'm going to bed." She sniffed, padding off to her upstairs bedroom, nightgown swishing behind her as if to punctuate her annoyance at being woken up.
I dug into the fish at once, only chewing it just enough to get it down my throat. "Ease up, Luma. You'll make yourself sick," Baragma said from my left side over his own mouthful of food. I ignored him and shoveled in a handful of apples, which I hadn't even liked before now. They were almost overwhelmingly sweet, and I enjoyed it greatly. Never before had an apple tasted like this, and then I noticed that the fish tasted pretty heavenly as well. And then I took a long swig of mead, and I could literally cry at how wonderful that tasted. Secretly I wondered why everything tasted so much better than usual, but I chalked it up to my having not eaten in a week as well as maybe some side effects of a potion that'd been used to help heal me. Besides, there was more food left and I couldn't be bothered with thinking at that moment.