Centuries

Chapter 11

When I woke up the wound in my side was only a small ache, I must've been taken to a Healer. I sat up and saw that the Darkling was sitting in the chair next to my bed.

"Hey thanks for saving my ass."
I said, my throat was so dry it hurt to talk. The Darkling's face softened with relief, was he really that worried?

"No problem, I'm glad you're okay." he said while handing me a glass of water. I still needed to apologize. I realized after a moment of awkward silence.

"I'm sorry for what I said last night."

"It's okay I was already mad about what General Janazain said and I took it out on you too much."

I almost forgot General Janazain had said something even worse than I did, it felt so long ago. I was surprised he forgave me that easily.

"I honestly didn't think you would accept my apology."

"I was too worried to be mad at you."

"That doesn't mean you're off the hook I still want to know what you were doing."

I half expected him to refuse but the Darkling sighed and said

"The man I was meeting with was a Kerch trader who does a lot of trade with Fijerda and I was bribing him into telling me what they were ordering to get a better idea as to what they were doing."

"Why didn't you just tell me that?"
It didn't seem like that big of a deal.

"If anyone were to question you, you couldn't give answers."

That was a light way of saying that if I were tortured I wouldn't be able to reveal anything no matter how badly I wanted to.
It made perfect sense but I still wished he told me.

"Does anyone else know?" I asked
the Darkling glanced at the ground, breaking eye contact with me.

"Who else knows?" I repeated

"Just Willow, the only reason she knows is because her brother is the one who hired the Kerch trader and I just get the information and bring the money."

"Why does Willow's brother want that information?"

"I don't know exactly, he works in Ravkan trade, I only do it because it's useful for me to know too."

"Why doesn't Willow just do it?"

"She's not on good terms with the rest of her family other than her brother. If something were to happen the consequences would be far higher for her than me." the Darkling explained

Even though I still had questions I didn't press, I knew it wasn't my place to ask. The Darkling left the tent after that and I was about to as well when a Healer told me that I needed to rest for a day and let them make sure that everything healed correctly. I was grateful when Kate walked in a few minutes after the Darkling left.

"How are you?" She greeted
"I'm fine, just bored."

I'd been awake for about ten minutes and I was already bored.

"I can get supplies and you can make the maps you need to catch up on." Kate offered

"That's more boring." I teased

"Well you're going to need to do it sometime soon, we're going to attack the nearest Fijerdan camp when our scouts find it."

"What? When was this supposed to happen?"

I'd clearly missed a lot while I was unconscious.

"Aleksander must've forgotten to tell you, we've had so many problems with them in the past week he started planning an attack." Kate explained

I'd only been here for a week so I just thought this was normal but apparently it wasn't. Why didn't the Darkling say something about this when I woke up? I doubted it was just because he forgot. Was he trying to protect me? I wanted to go despite the possibility that the Darkling might not want me to. Hell, that made me want to go more.

"Fine," I said to Kate, "I'll work on the maps."

She smiled and headed to the cartographers' tent to get what I needed. Kate kept me company while we worked on a map of the area we were going to attack.

The next few days after I was able to leave the Healer's tent passed in a blur of hauling weapons around and drawing maps to use for plans. I didn't see the Darkling much since we were both so busy getting ready for the attack. One night I caught him talking to General Janazain.

"Do you have any idea how reckless attacking is?" General Janazain whispered sharply

"We've had increasing problems with them and pretty soon people will die."
the Darkling snapped, keeping his voice low.

I didn't really want to hear an argument right now. I was intrigued.
Why was General Janazain just now questioning the Darkling's decision. We'd been planning for several days. Branches snapped behind them breaking up their argument.

When I knew I wasn't in danger of the Darkling suspecting I overheard him I followed him to his tent. I didn't exactly have a reason to talk to him but I wanted to.

"Hey, I had a question." I said,
he was slumped in the wooden chair behind his desk. The candlelight illuminated how exhausted he looked.

"What is it?"

"I'm just a little bit confused about what exactly I'll be doing during the attack."

"You'll be here."

"Why?" the saltiness in my voice came out more than I intended

"I don't want to risk you after you were hurt so recently."

"I want to go, you're forgetting that I've had experience and killed several Fijerdans." I was expecting him to fight me but he just said

"Okay, you can go, just don't expect me to help you again."

I left him and went to my tent. I slid my bag from under my cot. The stag's antlers were buried underneath my extra clothes, I pulled them out and tied them to fit around my neck. If anything went wrong I'd need them.