Chapter 7: Stage 2-1
My first thought when I came back to consciousness was pain. My head throbbed with it and the rest of my body wasn't much better. Luckily, my second thought was comfy. I was resting on something warm and soft.
A real bed!
I hugged my pillow closer and breathed in its nice spicy scent. It was like Song peppers, smoked mutton, and…
"Morning," a familiar male voice rumbled.
Huh?
My eyes popped open. It was daytime. I was not lying belly down on a bed. I was being carried like a pack on a broad back that I knew instantly.
What was going on!
"Rosemary!" Davion rasped, "Could you ease up on my neck? Please!"
Oh.
I loosened my grip.
"Look, I realize you probably have questions," Davion said in a much steadier voice, "but before you tear into me, answer one of mine first: do you have any idea of where we are?"
Uh…
I looked around me. On my left side, there was a river that was rapidly gushing past us probably thanks to the fact we were on a slight incline. Beyond it, were stout trees with red and gold leaves and on my other side, there were even more trees with the same warm colors.
I frowned.
Why had the trees changed color from green to this? And why were there trees in the first place? I thought we had left the forest. I thought we had made it to the city. I was positive that Davion and I had parted ways. I remembered leaving him, so again:
What was going on?
I was so confused.
"You know," Davion began conversationally, "shaking your head works better when I can see you."
I wasn't shaking my head or more accurately, I wasn't shaking my head on purpose. I had begun looking for Mirana, hoping that she'd be able to explain all this.
She wasn't hovering nearby.
Where was she?
I removed one of my arms from Davion's neck. It slipped through some sort of cloth knot that was wrapped around my forearms before coming free.
Davion must have interpreted this movement as a request to get off his back because he said, "Hey, don't rush. You have a head injury, so let's take it easy. Give me a minute to find a good spot to set you down."
While Davion searched for that good spot, I explored the pouches that were slung along my hips. I felt around and found that one of my larger pouches had Mirana in it. She was in her lotus form. Her light was weak. Thankfully, her petals were still soft with life.
That was one mystery solved.
"Alright, here we go," Davion suddenly said. He knelt down and carefully unhooked his arms from my legs.
"Easy there," he warned me as my sore feet hit the ground.
Ow.
Worse, my right foot apparently decided it didn't feel like carrying me. My leg gave out and my butt hit the bark of a fallen log soon after.
Double ow.
And to finish things, I fell backward off the log and hit my head on the ground.
Pain!
I squeezed my eyes shut. That had really hurt!
"What happened? Rosemary, are you okay?"
Did I look okay?
"Here," Davion said before his two strong hands grabbed mine. "Let me help." He pulled me into a sitting position back onto the log.
I opened my eyes even though they seemed to hurt a bit. It was too bright out here. I really hated being up this early.
"I'm sorry about that," Davion said over my discomfort.
I focused on him. The Dragon Knight was crouched in front of me. He, at least, was looking good and familiar in the daylight. The shadows from the trees on our right didn't hide the fact that Davion was once again naked and this time, I had no sacred robe to lend to him as a loincloth.
For both our sakes, I did my best to keep my eyes above his waist and tuned back into his words. He had finished with the rest of his apology and was asking, "Are you hurt?"
Yes.
I nodded.
"Where?" he asked me.
Everywhere.
But that wasn't very helpful, so I pointed to my head which he already seemed to know about, and then, after some consideration because my whole body felt achy and raw, I also touched my right foot.
It was a mistake.
I winced.
"May I?" Davion asked. His hand was reaching for my right boot, but his eyes were on me.
I nodded grimly.
Get it over with.
Davion's gentle touches felt like torture and not the fun kind. Even though he was undressing me, I was in way too much pain to guiltily enjoy it.
It was a relief when he finished and informed me, "Well, I don't think you've broken anything. There's that bump on your head which might be trouble, but for now, it looks like it's just a scratch. The biggest problem right now is your foot. You have a serious burn on it along with some older scarring that has gone all red and aggravated. I can only imagine that…" He kept speaking, but I was too stuck on what he'd just said.
A burn? And old scars?
I hadn't had any unholy scars in years. What could have…
Oh.
It finally came back to me.
Some time ago in the middle of the night…
I had been in that Fae Quarter butcher shop with the dragon and my cleaver about to harvest another sacrifice for Selemene. The butcher knife had been inches from the dragon's neck when the creep moved or rather, the creep was moved. A metal chain had whipped out from the hole the dragon had created in the butcher shop. The pointy end of the chain skewered the creep's torso and the dragon was jerked away from my strike.
With that, I lost control of the situation.
The dragon had transformed from a docile creature to a raging monster. It roared and breathed fire as its claws scrambled to grab something to stop it from being forced out of the butcher shop.
What its claws found was me.
The dragon grabbed my right foot. I had barely begun my silent scream of pain before I was flung onto the ground and dragged outside with the creep.
As I was trying to get my bearings, the dragon dug its free claw into the dirt street. There was a screeching sound and I saw that the chain through the dragon's torso extended across the canal to some sort of large spool device. There was a slew of armored men around it, pushing the device's wooden handles. A few of the men wore burnt orange armor and the others looked like the soldiers from before.
There was a yank and the creep and I slid a few inches forward towards the water.
"The beast has someone!" a kind and good person said.
"Forget her! Keep reeling it in, men!" one of the orange people responded.
Fine! I could take care of myself. I dug my own fingers into the hard dirt and kicked the dragon with my free leg, but it held fast managing to avoid my strikes to its head. As we struggled, people seemed to be shouting on every side.
"Come on, men. Pull!"
"Tresdin, I want your soldiers gone!"
"Nearly there!"
"Dragon Knights aren't soldiers, Merchant King!"
Then there was another yank. The creep lost its hold on the street. For an instant, I felt the force of dozens of men with only my fingertips to resist them. Then a tremor of pain gripped my stomach. Fatigue washed over my limbs and I too lost my hold. In the next instant, the creep and I were jerked backward through the rest of the street and straight into the cold and fast-flowing canal with a splash!
The chain went slack when we entered the water, but we were still being pulled. Thanks to the dragon's weight, we were sinking and fast. I tried to keep kicking partially to attack the dragon and partially to try to swim back to the surface.
It wasn't helping.
The dragon was too heavy and my movements were weak and disjointed. My worst enemy wasn't the sadistic creep or the dark water that was pushing us sideways, it was exhaustion. Yet another wave had crashed through me making my stomach hurt, my right foot throb, and all the rest of me feel heavy, clumsy, and sore exactly when I needed to be at my strongest.
This wasn't working. I hadn't gotten to take a deep breath before entering the water. I was running out of time and air. My throat started to burn and I felt a desire to open my mouth.
I couldn't breathe.
I couldn't breathe!
I needed—
No!
I pushed away the memory of smoke, death, and loss. Instead, I reached deep inside myself and appealed to the goddess:
Selemene!
Lend me your Strength!
My prayer scars flared to life, flooding the dark water with holy light and turning it violet. Then I twisted and kicked my free foot one more time with the full power of the goddess.
At the same time, the dragon tugged me down. Instead of hitting the creep's head, my foot struck the chain hook embedded in the dragon's torso.
The creep grinned at me. His eyes glowed with the false god's light.
I made to kick it again right in its sharp unholy teeth, but to my surprise, the creep suddenly let go of me. Without him holding me down, my kick propelled me upwards.
I flew out of the water like a cork off of a bottle. I didn't have time to notice there was something overhead before my head slammed into hard stone and I lost consciousness.
"You remembered something?" Davion said, calling me back to the present and the horridly sunny forest we were in.
Yeah, I had definitely remembered something. I could still see the creep's uncanny joy and almost feel its tight painful grip on my foot. The unpleasant memories melded with old ones of the fire. That's what the dragon's eyes had been like, a living fire ready to devour everything and everyone.
I swallowed hard.
"Rosemary," Davion said, "What is it?"
I made myself look at the Dragon Knight and see Davion's brown eyes and handsome features instead of that monster. The Dragon Knight's concern was like a physical thing. That brought forward a different memory that did not comfort me at all because it forced me to realize something:
Davion and I were once again alone without Mirana and he wanted me to talk.
As if on cue, Davion asked, "What's wrong?"
I tried to smile and wave off his question, hoping that would be good enough.
It wasn't.
If anything, Davion became more insistent, saying, "Rosemary, come on. Don't be like that. I can't help you if you don't speak up." He made it sound so reasonable, so easy. Then he said the words I hated:
"Talk to me."
No!
I was not doing this right now. That conversation by the river had been bad enough. I didn't want to try and explain. I didn't want to see the look on his face when he…
I didn't want to see it. Life was hard enough right now and anyway I had a cover to maintain.
It was time to leave.
I attempted to stand up. My foot practically screamed at me and I fell back down onto my log seat almost immediately.
"Shit!" Davion yelped. "Rosemary, weren't you listening before? You're hurt. You can't—Rosemary," he said as I tried again, "Stop."
I did not stop.
"Just stop," he said again, "Stay still."
No.
I needed to get away.
My foot needed to listen to me.
My body needed to—
"Shit," Davion repeated, pity replacing his panic as my mental state started to break down just like the rest of me, "Rosemary, please, don't cry."
I didn't want to cry. I didn't want to be in pain. I didn't want to be trapped on this cursed log, for my foot to be worthless, for Mirana to be unconscious, for that monster to be on the loose, for us to be lost, for me to be so weak and useless, for my mission to be going so horribly, or for Davion to keep asking me to do the one thing I couldn't do because—
"Hey," he said. Davion's hand landed on my shoulder before I could make my fifth attempt to get up.
I looked at him in surprise. His face was level with my own.
"It's alright," Davion told me in a gentle voice as his free hand helped wipe away my tears. "I can tell you saw some scary shit, so we can forget about it for now, okay? We can talk later."
What?
Davion gave me a lopsided smile that almost looked real. "I know I'm not the best company," he lied, "but I still owe you. So, if you'll have me, I'll carry you to somewhere more defensible. Then I'll do some foraging, fetch us some dinner, and you can cook us up one of your excellent meals. How does that sound?"
My stomach growled in response.
Food?
For a moment that was all I could think of: A huge hunk of meat suspended over an open fire, seasoned with just salt, smoke, and its own fatty goodness.
Oh…
I licked my lips in anticipation and then tasted my own tears which thrust me back into reality.
Davion was watching me. I could tell he really wanted to laugh at me. His eyes sparkled with it and his smile had turned genuine.
And suddenly, I was smiling too. Just a small one, but that felt a lot better than crying.
"There we go," Davion said approvingly, "I'll take that as a yes, then?"
I nodded.
"Good," Davion said. "Now, pardon me." He reached out and gathered me into his arms like I really was just another damsel in distress.
Heat spread through me as my body was pressed up against his large chest. I felt a few more tears trail down my probably very red cheeks. I wiped them away in embarrassment. I did not know what was wrong with me. It was like I was feeling a million things at once. I knew that if Mirana was awake, she probably would have said something snarky about me turning into a drunk Traxex or a sober Rylai or something even wittier to try to cheer me up or at least anger me back into shape.
The Dragon Knight didn't do that though. I don't know if he saw my additional tears. All he said was, "Alright, let's go." Then he started walking and that was the end of conversation for a while.
With time, I did manage to calm down. My horde of emotions settled and I was able to enjoy the gentle hum of pleasure that came from being held by someone like Davion. The feeling almost made it possible for me to ignore my hunger and all the other bodily pain I was in.
Almost.
Taking in the view did quite a bit to help too. The colorful trees which were so different from the ones in the Nightsilver Woods were a decent distraction. However, the Dragon Knight was an even better one. His skin was so warm and he really was comfy. I completely forgave myself for thinking he was a bed before and for the sake of aiding my healing process and no other reason, I allowed my eyes to linger on the Dragon Knight's body.
Though his chest remained bare of hair or clothes, I noticed Davion's beard was filling out. I was not a beard person, but I always found it fascinating to see facial hair grow over time. I traced Davion's emerging beard with my eyes for a while before moving on to today's star attraction: Davion's scars.
He had so many and they were different sizes and shapes. I was so close to them. I really wanted to touch one.
Davion must have sensed my intense staring because he bent his head to look at me.
In response to the movement, my eyes flicked up to meet his.
"You want to know how I got these scars?" he asked.
How had he guessed?
I nodded.
"Well…" Davion began, going into what I recognized as his grand storyteller voice, "most of them have some kind of tale behind them, and mind you, Bram tells every one of those tales better than I can, but these," he pointed at four thin scars near his collarbone, "represent one of the funnier stories. Would you like to hear it?"
Yes!
I smiled and nodded eagerly.
That was all the prompting Davion needed to launch into the tale of his first air dragon raid. As we continued on, I did my best to ignore my pain and worries about what would happen when we stopped for dinner. And Davion helped with that. His friend, Bram, might tell the story better, but I liked Davion's version. I had to bite my lip more than a few times to stop myself from letting out a silent laugh.
It was nice.
As temporary as this time was, I felt safe in Davion's arms.
A/N: And so in commemoration of Book 3 coming out, I have released another chapter of High Priestess Marci. I realize you all might have questions about what happened to that dragon or where Davion and Marci are...
For now, I will willfully change the subject and say: I have mixed feelings about Book 3 coming out. It seemed like just yesterday Book 2 had come out and I was publishing the first chapter High Priestess Marci. HP Marci is only on its second stage (Not an ice level, but an autumn forest in summer).
And yet DOTA: Dragon's Blood is over...
On 8 am BST 8/14(Sun) aka 12am PST 8/13(Sat), my discord group will be doing a viewing party for the first episode of Book 3.
Please PM me if you want to come!
I mentioned ErrantTalisman last time, but BarrissOffee99 will also be there. They are a newcomer to this site but have been on AO3 for quite a while. Their specialty is Luna fics and stuff about Dark Moon Order. I love how they show Luna as a deeply flawed person who is doing their best to be strong. If you haven't given one of their one-shots a try yet, then I recommend Life of the Morning After because I like lighter stuff. But if your thirsts tend to be a bit dark...well, they got you covered there too.