Dragon & Dreamer | ONC 2023 honourable mention

4 - Bruised

Dánirah pressed the wet cloth against her swollen eye and studied the young man's face out of the other. He might be her age, perhaps a year or two younger. A nasty bruise marred his forehead, the blood clotting his brown curls. His swollen and split upper lip revealed a row of flawless teeth.

"Do you think he will be fine?"

Naiin stepped closer and dabbed at the blood smeared across the stranger's face. "His breathing has evened, so I'm sure he'll recover. Let's get his shirt off to check for more injuries."

Dánirah placed the cloth on a chair beside the narrow bed and helped to peel the torn shirt from him. The bruises on his pale skin turned black and purple. Naiin ran her probing fingers over his torso.

"I think the ribs are fine, nothing broken, and the cut on his arm is clean. The two of you were lucky."

"I know. I don't understand why the boy tried to help me and risked getting himself killed." She didn't add that he distracted her attackers long enough to allow her to flee. And she didn't dare imagine what would have happened if Naiin and her friends hadn't interfered.

Naiin rummaged in a drawer and returned with a thread and a fine needle. "Perhaps he's just a decent lad. Best to sew him up while he's unconscious. Can you hold him down, Dánirah?"

She swallowed and nodded. The man had helped her, so the least she could do was support Naiin's efforts to patch him up. She pressed down on his right shoulder and elbow while her host closed the gaping wound with deft stitches in the mellow light filtering through the single attic window.

"So, this should heal just fine if he takes care for a few days." She stood up to fetch an earthen jug. When she unplugged it, the pungent fumes of potent alcohol tickled Dánirah's nose. Naiin soaked the wound with it. "It's meant to help relax my customers. But it will sterilise the wound."

"Are you a healer?" Dánirah hadn't found the time to learn much about her mother's friend and now her benefactor.

Naiin shook her red curls in laughter while she stoppered the jug and placed it on a shelf by the small stove. "No, but I travelled with the king's army long enough to have seen my share of injuries. Often, the doctors are overburdened with fixing up the warriors after a battle, and shadow mages prefer to stay away from war. Killing is against their beliefs. So, it fell to us to help where we could."

Dánirah, once more cooling her eye, stared at the older woman torn between disbelief and admiration. Did her mother's old friend really fight in the army?

Naiin seemed to read her thoughts. "It's not what you think, Dánirah. I'm just a wench, a harlot, whatever name suits you. As every general worth his pay knows, soldiers on the way to their potential death need love and diversion. So they encourage a train of women to follow the host. It's a hard life, but not worse than many others."

"I... ack." The women turned towards the young man who fought to clear his throat. Naiin slipped an arm under his back and propped him up on a cushion while Dánirah filled a cup with tea and pressed it into his shaking hands.

He gulped the liquid and rubbed his lips, pulling a face when he touched the injury. "Thank you." He let the gaze of his grey eyes wander around the dim attic. "What happened?"

Dánirah exchanged a glance with Naiin before she shrugged. "Street urchins attacked me, and you dashed in to help. But they pushed you down the stairs, and you hit your head. Naiin here and her neighbours came at the right time to chase them away."

The man dropped his head against the cushion while he studied the stitches on his arm. "I made a fool of myself."

"No, you didn't. You bought me the time to run. But if Naiin hadn't appeared when she did, we would've been in serious trouble." She smiled and reached out a hand. "I'm Dánirah. Thanks for standing up for me."