The Sword Bearer

Chapter 3

I was panicking. I checked his pulse. I could still feel it faintly. I breathed out a sigh of relief. He was still with me but only for a while. I knew he would bleed to death. I looked at the gashes on his skin. They were deep and bleeding horrendously. I had to bind them before he lost too much blood. I took the second mound of blankets and knew I was going to regret this but I took a deep breath and started to rip them into smaller pieces to tie them on top of his bleeding wounds. I finally managed to reduce the first blanket to a pile of shreds. I started to tie them on the biggest of his wounds but saw that they need to be cleaned. I grabbed a water bottle and dropped the contents on a second blanket and cleansed each of his gashes carefully hoping the contact wasn’t hurting him. Finally the wounds were clean so I started to tie the blankets shreds on his large wounds cautiously. There were four huge gashes. One extended from his shin to his ankle, one was slashed across his abdomen, and another two were on his arms. The worse one was on his shoulder and it looked like the muscle had been sliced as well. The other one was just as long but not as deep. Blood usually made me nauseous but I pushed that feeling away I had to bandage his wounds.

I finally finished wrapping the wounds. Every last one was covered from the harsh outside world. I sighed in relief and slumped. Now all I could do was wait for him to come into consciousness. I stared at his face. There was a small scar on it but I didn’t think it was a threat to him so I left it unbound. He looked so peaceful and innocent as he slept. His eyelashes were abnormally longer. I had never noticed them because of the color of his eyes. They captivated me in way that I couldn’t see anything else when I looked into them. I could search those eyes forever I thought longingly. His hair was all ruffled up. I tried to push it to one side like he did. I failed horribly. His hair still was falling in both directions. I wondered if he was okay. I wanted to know so badly. I just also concerned about if the pursuers would find us here. There was no way we could leave until Daren was at least partly healed. Especially with the wound on his leg. I doubted he could even walk until it closed properly. I touched his forehead softly. His fever had gone down. That was a good sign. I looked at his hand. He was surprisingly not hurt there. I let my fingers edge toward his hand and I gently intertwined my fingers into his. He shifted slightly and tightened his hand’s grip around mine but he showed no sign of arousing now. I couldn’t move without disturbing him so I sat by him waiting patiently. The hours trickled by slowly with nothing to do. I knew he would not be able to start moving again today even if he woke up. I was so bored and tired all of a sudden.

I was aroused by a slight groaning. I turned to say Daren’s face only about a foot away. My hand was still in his. I blushed madly. Thankfully he was still asleep so he didn’t see. His grip had loosened while I was asleep so I slipped my hand out of his slowly. “Just where do you think you’re going” he whispered slyly. I smiled shyly and asked him “I can see your better already”. He opened his eyes and looked at me, then down at himself.  He gave me a confused  look then peeled back one of the blankets shreds. He flinched at it and let it fall back. I started to stand up to leave him but he grabbed my hand yet again. “Stay” he said simply. I sat back down and started to take the blankets off his wounds. He seemed not to like to look at them very much. He stared up at the sky until I uncovered all the wounds then he covered them up again my unfolding his cloths over them. All I could see now was the small cut in his face. He tried to sit up but winced in pain as he sank back down. I put my pack behind his back and helped him sit up. I left the camp to fill over water skins with water from the nearby lake in the forest. Daren looked at me with a longing look. As I caught his gaze he averted his eyes embarrassed.

As I filled the water skins in the lake I pondered his embarrassment. The water was so cold under my fingers. After the bottles were filled I cupped the water in my hands and started to drink. As I let the water trickle in between my fingers I saw that it had a silvery sheen to it. I touched the water just at the top. It felt harder than when I pushed under. The substance ran around and in between my fingers as I pushed my fingertips downwards in the water. It came back up and joined the surface again. I stared at the water transfixed. It was beautiful yet it was just a river. I couldn’t believe the things this world held. It had its dangers and many of them were after me but I couldn’t help but admire how it made up for it by containing all these natural wonders on it. I looked around in the area of the river. The wind started to blow softly blowing my hair into my face. I cupped some of the water in my hands and let it fall on the grass. I gasped as it started to move together slowly. As it formed a metallic puddle it moved over to a small sprout and surrounded it. The sprout started to grow at an alarming rate. I beautiful white flower grew from it followed by two similar ones. I reached my hand out to pluck one but hesitated. A voice in my head told me that I needed to pick them and I didn’t know why. I decided to return to the camp. This time I rushed back not wanting Daren to disappear again. I knew I was being too paranoid. How could he have walked away with all those wounds?