Chapter 7

It was getting late and Sorcha had not stirred or shown any sign of life since Bastan ran toward us and only yelled she was hurt and we needed to come immediately. I thought it would be minor or another arrow. I didn't trust Tollam, but he had more reason to hurt me than he did her. I didn't like how he was looking at her, but she could have easily burned him if he tried to touch her, and it could have been explained away because she looked like me.

I wasn't expecting her to fight a bear. Not for Tollam. The man should have been in prison or executed by now, but Folcard was protecting him. The only reason Tollam hadn't been on the receiving end of Guttertown justice was because of Folcard's forces. Sorcha might not understand his looks since she'd never been around men before, but if her nose could tell the rest of the Barons were up to no good, she surely could have sensed that about Tollam and let the bear kill him.

If she died saving Tollam, I'd burn him alive.

Tollam had his rabbits. I knew enough about Kibal to know he was the son of a poor cobbler and joined the military because the Baron whose lands they lived on raised their taxes without my father's permission. Kibal knew what it was like to be hungry and said we shouldn't waste the bear.

We ate rabbit stew while we waited for Sorcha to wake. Everyone was processing this differently. Kibal was processing the bear meat, so we'd have something to eat if we got closer to the coast and game thinned out and Sorcha couldn't forage. I didn't think she'd eat it, but the rest of us could.

Frog and I needed to be touching her to make sure she didn't slip away. Bastan's mother was a healer, so he was treating her wounds. Leodos and the rest of them had formed a circle around her to protect her from Tollam. He was loudly grumbling about how she was an abomination and we should kill her.

Bastan had cleaned most of the blood off of her when he was applying the poultice. There was a thick paste all over her chest and arms and I couldn't tell if her wounds were healing. She still felt cool to the touch and not as warm as she should be. I couldn't lose her.

Even if I was somehow wrong and she wasn't Lisana, she was a member of my family and there were so few left. When the humans won the war and passed the decree that the Tempris had to marry humans, the ruling Tempris were also only allowed to have one child. My father and I were all that were left of my family.

It was finally time for us to sleep and honestly, someone should kill Tollam. I knew one of the soldiers would be standing watch in case we got attacked by an animal or the tribes, but they were also having to stay awake to make sure the idiot didn't do anything to the girl who fought a bear to save him. It seemed like hours had passed and I hadn't been able to fall asleep. I didn't think I would be able to, but I must have slipped into sleep during the night. When my eyes opened, I could smell breakfast being cooked. I immediately checked on Sorcha.

"She still hasn't woken up, but she's a lot warmer than yesterday," Leodos told her. "Bastan is getting more herbs to treat her wounds in case she pulls through."

"Please don't say in case. You watched her heal in front of you."

"From an arrow that only hit her arm and not very deeply. She woke up from that as soon as I got her hair wet. Wounds like this would be fatal to a normal human."

"You know she's not a normal human and it would have killed one of us by now."

"You need to prepare yourself that she might not make it through this."

I wouldn't look at him. Leodos had been there for me my entire life, but he never coddled me. If I needed to hear something, he always told me. That was one of the reasons he was my first love and it eventually rekindled when I realized Rivannus was dead and not coming back. I just didn't want to hear it about this. I didn't know why she had all this magic, but I needed it to save her life.

I sat up and pulled Sorcha's head in my lap again. There was a huge gash on her scalp, but I could feel that her hair was the exact same texture as mine. When Bastan came back, he set to making another poultice. He told me to lay her flat and poured water from the creek on her injuries to clean them. I tried not to cry when her eyes fluttered as the water spilled across her chest.

"I knew you would wake up," I said.

I really just needed to hold her, but she didn't want it and shook my hands off.

Leodos immediately crouched next to them by her side.

"Can you fix this like you fixed the arrow or do we need to stay here and continue with the poultice? We were worried you weren't going to wake up."

"I just needed to sleep off the pain. I need food and something to drink."

Bastan was still by her side and handed her his hip flask. "For the pain," he told her.

She took a huge sip, probably thinking it was water. I doubted Belisarus had given her wine with her meals. He probably did the exact same thing that was done with all Tempris—milk or water until we could handle spirits. They all carried two flasks. One had spirits just in case they couldn't find clean water on their travels. In this instance, I didn't mind anyone giving her spirits because of her wounds.

I guessed right when her face screwed up as she swallowed.

"What the fuck is that? Did you give me piss water?"

Bastan chuckled.

"I didn't give you piss. People pay good money for that."

"There's a lot of shit I don't understand about Nestran, but paying anything for that is probably the weirdest."

"You must be feeling slightly better if you're talking like a Guttertown brat again. Can you heal this? Why did you risk everything and expose yourself for Tollam?" Leodos asked.

"I slept off the worst of the pain. I couldn't feel it while I was asleep. I need food to make it go away."

I didn't know why she avoided answering about Tollam. I think we all wanted to know that.

Mafir told her the stew he was making was almost done, but it had rabbit in it and she wouldn't eat it. I didn't even notice Frog a few feet away with his own stew pot, nor that he had left to gather anything. Frog called over he would be done in a minute and would bring it over to her. Now that she was awake and talking like she usually did, Leodos was furious. I knew she would think he was angry with her, but we were all upset after spending all night thinking she was dying.

"How could you be so careless and stupid to expose yourself like that? You nearly got yourself killed, and no one knew what to do with you. We didn't know if you were dying, and we didn't know how to treat you. I told you before we left to let the guards and myself handle everything."

"You weren't doing a very good job of handling it. Tollam was lying on his sword and none of you had time to get an arrow ready to save him."

"Every single one of these guards is prepared to die in the service of the king. You shouldn't have exposed yourself. That bear could have killed you. How would Esylle get to Idric to get her message with you gone? What do you think it would do to her to lose you?"

"Why should any of you die going back to Idric with me here?"

"The fact that you nearly died doesn't tell you that you can't protect everyone?" Leodos yelled. "How can you be so foolish?"

"I wasn't dying," she whispered. "I just needed to sleep while the pain was the worst and now I need food to get rid of the injuries."

"What if someone else was watching and saw? You can't keep exposing yourself like this!"

"Then tell your men to stop charging face first into bears!"

I could tell Leodos was about to snap at her, but Frog brought her a bowl of food. Sorcha dug into the food and was eating very quickly. She had been very pale all night and since she woke up, but I noticed color coming back into her cheeks the more she ate.

Frog was waiting with a fresh bowl of food as soon as she finished the first one. I watched, amazed, as the more she ate, the deep gashes in her body started to slowly close up. It took three, and a half bowls of the stew Frog made before she was completely healed. I reached out and tried to touch where the claw marks had been because there wasn't even a scar, but Sorcha danced away from me.

Alirak, Mafir, Bastan, and Kibal were all sitting around her asking questions all at once. Tollam just sat away from us glaring at her. Tollam was going to have to have a fatal accident before we got back. It was just a matter of when and who did it. Sorcha asked them to slow down with the questions. Leodos looked at all of them and scowled like he didn't think she should be answering any of their questions.

"This is amazing! How did this not kill you? How did you manage to heal yourself? If I could do what you do, I'd have so much fun with it," Bastan said.

"I don't know. You keep asking me questions and I've already answered them with Leodos. I don't know why I am the way I am and I don't have answers to any of your questions. I was pretty sure when I attacked the bear that whatever happened, I could heal myself if I got hurt."

"And if the bear had killed you? What then?" Leodos snapped. "I specifically told you not to reveal yourself no matter what."

"They don't want to hurt me. Only Tollam wants to hurt me, and he hasn't liked me since we left."

"You just gave him every reason to distrust you!"

"He was never going to like me!"

"I realize you haven't spoken to many people, but did you really not notice the way he was staring at you? Use your nose."

She really hadn't noticed. I was pretty sure she smelled something, but she didn't know what it was.

"I may have thought she was attractive at first, but now that I know what she is, I'm not sticking my dick in that. I think we should just kill her and be done with it."

Based on the look on her face, Belisarus hadn't explained sex to her at all. At nineteen, she should know that by now. Whether she was with me, the tribes, or the humans, she'd either be married or planning her wedding at this age.

"I should have let the bear eat you," she told him.

"I didn't need your help, little girl. I could have handled it myself," Tollam snapped, stalking off.

I pulled Leodos away. "What are we going to do about him? You know he's not going to keep his mouth shut when we get back home. What if he decides to hurt her while we are sleeping?"

"He's going to have an accident on the way, but we need him for now. He's not going to hurt her while we are sleeping. Can't you see how he's looking at her? She petrifies him and he doesn't want to be anywhere near her."

"We need to get going," Sorcha finally said. "The weather around Idric will be changing soon and I don't know what is going on with Belisarus's health."

"Are you okay to travel?" I asked, surprised. She had only woken up about thirty minutes ago.

"I'm fine. I need to bathe in the creek and change clothes and we can leave."