L [o/i] ve is a journey

Sleep, Eat, Study, Repeat | A Curse

The receptionist looked up, tired, and having a hard time to keep the yawn in. Lunaris held the paper up, and looked at the man in expectation of a question.

„Huh? Are you threatened or something?" 

Clearly not a man of wits, asking a question like that to what he thought was a person threatened or in danger in any other way. Or maybe just way too tired for reasoning.

Lunaris shook his head, and gestured the same way to him like he did to Nerivie a while ago. He can't talk. „You're mute?" the tired employee asked and Lunaris decided, it would go faster if he just nodded. He pointed at the My lady is sick and I need some things to help her get better.- Part.

The receptionist took a moment to let it sink in: „Is she one of our guests?" He asked and Lunaris nodded again. Of course she was! What's with the meaningless question, he needed a tea to help her fever go down, and a large cooling pack in form of an Amoebius! He tapped on the part on his note, to draw attention of what was important now.

Nerivie was burning up in her room and this man kept asking silly questions! His somewhat concerned face must have finally turned on a switch in this tired man's brain, he nodded and said: „You need that Amoebius cool or cold?"

Lunaris sunk his hand. Oh no, he had forgotten the pen! He anxiously looked around, and then grabbed the pen that was laying around: „It's a really high fever, so cold."

The clerk dragged himself in a backroom, before returning with a bag of the items: a small pouch with some leaves, smelling like Minze, and two Amoebias. „Three Silver." He declaired, putting the items on the table.

Lunaris didn't even wait, he put the required coins on the table and paid. Then grabbed the linnen bag and hurried to return to the room. He ripped the door open like the first time he entered today, and looked for a moment to see her breathing deep.

Yeah. He had to undress her to make that work. He took a deep breath. 

Lunaris, she needs your help! She will forgive you, hopefully, because it's the only way to get the fever down! He thought, and a wave of anxiety overcame him. What, if she died? What, if the only person he knew, even for such a short time, died, because of the fever? What would he do, alone? Sure, he had found a purpose, an affiliation, but she represented that nearly completly by now.

No. No. Stay calm! She won't die! You have everything to keep the fever down! You need to look at her anyway, to see the cause for the high body temperature. Even if she looks at you differently afterwards, this is all better than being alone again!

He walked the few steps to her and looked at her for a moment. She was pale, her breathing felt fast, but flat. She probably was drained of fluids, with all that sweat and heat the city additionally provided. It was relativly cool during the day, compared to the outside, but still too hot when you have a fever...

He slowly got her in a lumped- over seated postion and got her out of the cloak. So she must have dressed to meet him when the fever struck. He folded the beige hooded woolen clothing carefully and set it on the chair next to him. The black overdress followed, and it took some time before he had removed the layers of clothing to the linnen dress she wore underneath. Insane, how many clothes she could wear at this heat! But he already had learnt, that the correct clothing protected the people from the burning blaze of the sun.

He paused, when his eyes caught a glimpse of some long streaks at her arms. They were thick, some didn't resemble a streak, but had weird forms. He had to open her last layer of clothing to put the Amoebius on her, so it would lower her body temperature. Lunaris removed the last, thin belt and pushed the fabric aside.

And froze.

He knew how a body that was been mangled looked like.

The very prevelent scar on her belly that went up to her chest and across it, must have been a very deep cut by a tool that rather ripped her flesh open than cutting it. It was clear that it wasn't by an animal, but a tool. Even an animal took better care of it's designed killing instruments than whatever caused this.

That giant scar hid a lot of others, just as straight as the one on her arms. He wouldn't need to check to see, how her back must look like, but he needed to see. He carefully lifted her and held her with his left hand, while removing the rest of the clothes.

Streaks.

Streak like scars. One over another. Her whole back felt like a valley of scars.

Lunaris' forehead rested on her sweaty back for a moment, trying to keep him for crying in empathy and rage. The pain she must have felt, when she received these was unimaginable for him. He grabbed one of the Amoebias, put it on her back, and had her lay on it very gentle. Then, he put the other on her belly and put a thin linnen sheet over her as a cover

Then, there was the Minze-tea he prepared with cold water. These would take an hour or so, it would be ready when her fever hopefully had sunken on an appropriate level.

Until then, he had to watch her...