Firewind

Chapter 42-Diero

"Leshanna, get out of my face, I'm fine!" I waved my hands at her, I sat up on the bed I was laying on. I must've been in a sort of temporary hospital, with white curtains separating beds and little carts on wheels with a variety of herbs drying on a counter in the corner."What happened?"

"Your face looks awful," she giggled, "Although it's almost an improvement from the usual."

I lifted a hand to my face and felt my swollen cheek, eye and nose and winced. She looked at me and grimaced.

"Don't look at me like that," I snapped. "What happened?"

"It was your leg."

"My leg? What do you mean it was my leg?"

"When you blacked out," she smirked. She knew I hated this game of hers. 'Keep everything a secret from Diero,' is the best way to put it. She and Althaea both loved making me angry.

"I get that," I said. "But what about my leg?"

"Your cut in your leg. You passed out from blood loss and face-planted. Your eye and nose are bruised terribly," she said, passing a mirror.

It was truly hideous. My eye was red and purple, half-closed due to the swelling. My cheek was on the verge of yellow and my nose was bruised on the bridge, an ugly shade of blackish purple. Not including the hidden wound of my pounding headache.

Rhea walked in then, carrying a very squirmy Talkinn. He played with the beads in her long coiled hair. He brightened when he saw me and reached his chubby toddler arms towards me. I realized now that they were slimmer than usual. He was almost three after all. My baby brother was growing up and I wasn't even paying enough attention to realize it!

"RORO!" he squealed when he saw me. "I saw you getted a big ouchy!"

Rhea set him down and Leshanna helped him onto the bed. He enveloped me in a hug with his small arms and I held him tight. He then proceeded to touch my "ouchies". I still winced even though he touched the bruises with the very tips of his fingers.

"He was very concerned about your face," Rhae smiled.

"Yeah big ouch, hey buddy?" I said, guiding his hands away from my injured face.

Po joins us in the room and opens his arms wide, attempting to hug me. I resist but he manages to anyway.

"I knew you'd be fine!" he grinned from ear to ear. "I told the little tyke his brother is tough as nails. If you're anything like your father you'll be right as rain in no time."

"Thanks, Po."

"Not a problem. I did the patching up on your leg, so it's guaranteed to be healed swiftly. You lost a mighty amount of blood there, friend."

"Thanks. I'm sure you did a fine job. And I'm also sure that I will be bored as heck needing to stay in bed so long."

"Oh, I'm sure you'll manage somehow," Rhea said.

I did manage. But only because Leshanna wouldn't leave me alone for more than a second. She attempted to read to me but both of us were so bored by it that we barely made it past the first chapter. What confuses me most about books is that someone came up with an idea, or a discovery and found it so important that they decided to write it down; a permanent marker of their history on Usnae Ari. Yet, no one would truly know them other than by name and accomplishments. That's never seemed important to me. What matters more: a fan that will never meet you, or friends that last forever and know your favourite sweets? To me, it was the latter.

Other than Leshanna to keep me busy, I slept often, a small attempt at accelerating the healing process so we could get on the move north.

I still couldn't believe what I was doing. Trusting a stranger to lead me north, to somewhere I had never been in the hopes that I might assist my sister in some danger in the future? What would Thaea think of that?

To be fair, I had no idea what she was doing either. She could've left because she couldn't bear what had happened. She could already be dead for all I know.

Either way, my third night in the infirmary was unsettling.

My sleep was disturbed by dreams often. I was used to it. But this night, the images that filled my head chilled me to the bone.

It started with a barren landscape that was almost peaceful. Trees were dotted here and there on the map of my brain. No thoughts filled my head.

It soon turned dark. The trees rotted into nothingness. The ground sprouted with jagged rocks that rose into mountains. The sky felt heavy as if I were miles underground yet there was no ceiling visible when I looked up. A roar sounded that shook the earth. The source it came from was angry, furious. I could feel it in the air. I could feel it as though it were my own fury.

Then it stopped.

Two voices I recognized from somewhere were whispering. I couldn't make out what they were saying completely, but I heard the words, silhouette and mistress. I felt as if I should know what they were talking about, or that it seemed familiar. Almost like I had heard the same thing before.

I woke up surprisingly calm. The infirmary was still dark but I felt the need to get up and stretch or maybe go for a walk.