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chapter five
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There was a boy in my bed, and he was bleeding all over my sheets.
Despite the obvious bruising, and the aforementioned blood that was slowly drying on both his face and my bedsheets, he looked sort of peaceful. There was something about the way his eyes fluttered behind his eyelids, behind the blood and bruising, I could see now that I couldn't really call him a man. He was a boy, no older than me, parading around as a man.
It felt wrong to leave him blood-stained, so, feeling my lack of magic once more, I run a rag under warm water and began delicately clearing his face. With the blood gone, I could clearly see the dark bruising on his face, layers upon layers of colours. Dark purple bruises surrounded his eyes, cheek and jaw, hiding the deeper, greener bruises, telling me that this wasn't a one-time injury. This boy had been repeatedly hurt over a span of days, or even weeks, I couldn't tell. Hesitantly, I lifted the bottom of his t-shirt up slightly. The rip around his neckline showed that the bruising continued down his neck and chest, but it was his stomach that concerned me. I had spent enough time in St. Mungos to know that bruising like this could often mean there was something worse going on inside his body. Internal injuries or something. It had been what they explained to me was their biggest concern when I woke up, or rather, what they had spoken to Christina about while pretending I didn't exist.
I was right about the bruising continuing down his body, and the only thing bringing me more relief was the sight of his chest rising and falling with his steady breath. The boy was alive, that was for certain, but I wouldn't know why he had come to me, or why he was so hurt in the first place, until he woke up. I also knew I wouldn't understand my innate need to help him. This amount of hurt could only be bad news, and with my lack of memory, who knows what his sudden appearance in my life could lead to.
It felt wrong to leave him alone. Whether that be because of his injuries, or the feeling that he was bad news, one couldn't be sure. So instead I sat in an arm chair across from him, reading one of the many books on magic I had stashed in my room. It was comfortable enough, so much so that I woke up hours later in the same position.
Jolting awake to the sound of something breaking downstairs, I stand quickly, the book that was resting in my lap tumbling to the floor with a thud. He was still asleep in my bed, meaning one, it had to be either Christina or Irving moving around the kitchen downstairs, and two, whoever it was hadn't come up to check on me as yet. Something about a random, injured boy in my bed didn't seem like something Christina or Irving would appreciate, nonetheless overlook.
Merlin's beard, I had to go down there and hope that he didn't choose this moment to wake up. And if he did just happen to wake up, that he would stay put. With a final glance at his sleeping figure, I made my way downstairs into the kitchen.
