The Pirate's Legacy: New Horizons

Chapter 44: The Queen and Her Knight

He lay on a bed, a very soft bed. After months of sleeping on hard ground, the bed felt like a cloud. Even the beds in Onus's sanctuary hadn't been as welcoming, especially when all he had thought about was killing the dragon. Demitri opened his eyes and saw the horizontal beams holding up the ceiling. A pair of voices spoke to his left, straining to stay low so as not disturb him. He recognized Em's voice. It hurt to turn his head, so his eyes slid in the direction from where the voices came.

The queen of Tarym and her personal physician, a sturdily-built man with a balding auburn head, stood in the threshold of the room's only door. Demitri could not see Dr. Forsythe's face, for his back was to Demitri, but he could see Em's face. Distress marred her features. She wore her sailing clothes, indicating that her visit hadn't been an official royal one, trailing with guards and servants. Demitri had no doubt she may have come on her own.

Dr. Forsythe was saying, "To be honest, Your Highness, I do not think that I can perform the surgery without upsetting the fragile equilibrium that his body has established."

"That's why there is anesthesia, doctor." The queen's voice was hard-pressed to keep a polite tone. Her hands at her sides were balled into tight fists. "He should at least be able to go with as little pain as possible."

"Yes, I would agree, but the rib is so close to his lung, 'tis a wonder that the cavity hadn't been punctured."

So that explained why it was hard for Demitri to breathe deeply without flinching. The sharp pain came near the center of his chest, close to his right lung. However, that pain was an infinitesimal microcosm in comparison to the rest of his body. His skin was very sensitive to the cotton sheet weighing down on his body. To the patient, the sheet felt like an entire body lying on top of him. Moving was not an option. His back burned, and so did his arms. And face. And legs. And almost any place where he had skin. Except perhaps his right side. He felt nothing from the limbs on his right side. Sensation stopped below the elbow and the knee. Carefully and quietly, so as not to attract his visitors' attention, Demitri slipped his right arm from out of the bed sheet. He could not stop the gasp of horror that burst out of his cracked lips at the sight of his right hand missing.

"What? Demitri!" Em was at his side in an instant, but his eyes were only for his missing limb.

"My arm," he rasped. "My hand." Now he knew why he couldn't feel on his right side. "O gods, my leg."

"No," said Dr. Forsythe when the patient attempted to raise himself up to see the other missing limb. The physician was instantly on Demitri's other side to force him gently onto his back. Demitri hissed through clenched teeth as he irritated the burns on his back.

"Demitri!" Em said urgently. She leaned over him while Dr. Forsythe scrambled around to find a chair for her. "Demitri, who am I?"

In his cloud of pain, Demitri spoke without thinking. "I have not lost my memory, if that is what you want to know."

The worry slid away from Em's face. Her lips thinned. "So, Leo has told you of what happened to Dread Robin."

Demitri lowered his eyes from her grim face. "My apologies," he gasped, "Your Majesty."

"Oh, Demitri. I was not reprimanding you." She sighed heavily. Dr. Forsythe set a chair behind her upon which she gladly sat. As the physician moved to the medical table near the door, Em fixed watery eyes on Demitri. "I've been sorely remiss without my most trusted advisor these last months, and even now I'm going to lose him."

Dr. Forsythe spun around, his eyes wide. "Your Highness!" he exclaimed at the same time Demitri felt his stomach drop.

"What?" the patient demanded. "Will I not live?"