|
Post by Mael Leblanc on Aug 22, 2011 15:27:43 GMT -5
"Stop squirming!" I snarled as the flesh beneath my fingers spasmed. "Honestly, you soldiers have more bravado than you do actual courage!"
This was not how I had imagined my time with Gil would be spent, surrounded by the moaning and groaning of injured and dying men, and the smell, gods, the smell! Adrien didn't seem bothered by it as much, or if he was, he did not confide in me.
"Adrien, have that bandage ready. I need to remove the shard." He was a lucky bastard, this one, either that or his assailant had had terrible aim. Still, whatever its origin, it had become imbedded in the muscle near his shoulder blade.
He tried not to scream as I grasped it and pulled it free, dropping it immediately to tend to the gaping wound. The bandages we used were already treated with poultices meant to staunch bleeding. It would be adequate for this sort of wound.
"We need to wrap it 'round," I murmured. "So it will not come undone in the night. Courage, Messire, the worst is over." So long as you don't take infection in the night... I added silently, that was always a risk.
We did what we could and I sent the man on his way with strict orders to stay in his cot and rest. I once again took the opportunity to question why I was here in the first place.
"I should be out there," I grumbled, suddenly. "Hunting, this isn't my war!"
"You're a damned D'Angeline," Adrien replied placidly. "Isn't it your war by default?"
"But it isn't my war!" I retorted, feeling my anger surge. "It's hardly my fault that Gillermo can't take his eyes off his lady-friend long enough to realize that he has other commitments!" Yes, it was terribly selfish of me to think that at the time, but perhaps I would have been more level-headed if I had not currently been up to my knees in dirt and blood and gods-knew-what-else.
|
|
|
Post by Gillermo Stregazza on Aug 23, 2011 23:56:00 GMT -5
After fighting as long and as valiantly as we could, we'd eventually had to cut our losses and retreat, but the Skaldi had made undeniable progress, and we'd taken undeniable blows. For the Azzalese, it was a harsh thing – as it was for me.
Praise Asherat, I'd taken a few blows of my own, but none overly disabling, though gashes in my thighs, shoulders and sides, light as they were, were rather numerous. I wasn't bleeding abundantly, and may had greater needs than I, so I'd opted to discreetly find a place in the healer area to clean myself, without overly alerting anyone.
I was cleaning a long but superficial cut to my arm when I heard Mael groan at Adrian not too far, and I sighed tiredly.
“I'm sure the Skaldi will agree, and will send you on your merry way when they make it here, Mael. Keep your sour grapes for later – you knew war was upon us when we rode out. It was a plausible liability.”
My voice was calm, tired. I'd lost a few good men in the last assault, and my heart was heavy.
|
|
|
Post by Mael Leblanc on Aug 24, 2011 0:35:00 GMT -5
When Gillermo spoke, it was not embarrassment or shame that filled me, it was anger.
"Shut up!" I snarled, holding a hand out for a clean cloth and a wash bucket before making my way to him. "And where are my mother's killers while I'm otherwise occupied here? I'd wager thet aren't sticking their necks out on the battlefield for king and country!" I wrung out the cloth. "What did you manage to do to yourself, Gillermo?"
"Looks like a series of shallow cuts, Mael," Adrien helpfully supplied. "There's one long one on his arm." He took my hand, leading it to the injury in question.
"Well, he's still chattering like a jaybird so I did not imagine his wounds were fatal," I remarked, beginning to clean the cut. "The dying ones are the worst. The ones who are felled on the battlefield are the lucky ones, I think."
"At least you cannot see them, Mael," Adrien replied.
"My ears and my nose still work, Adrien," I replied. "Do you have any wounds that are more serious than this one, Gillermo? The healing herbs must be used sparingly, as the head healer keeps telling me."
|
|
|
Post by Gillermo Stregazza on Aug 24, 2011 22:26:38 GMT -5
“Nothing fatal, no, your prissiness,” I replied, chuckling. “The arm's the worst, and if you can help me clean those I can't reach, that will be helpful, but otherwise, save your talent for those who need it more than I do, Mael.”
I shook my head, and let him to his bad mood for now, lest he vent some more.
“How long have you been in this tent?” I asked Adrian – he was calmer, as usual, and so it seemed natural that I would ask it of him.
He reminded me of To-Biko, betimes – that was a sweet and yet sour emotion all at once. Ah, Elua, but I did miss my old friend.
|
|
|
Post by Mael Leblanc on Aug 25, 2011 9:46:55 GMT -5
"All bloody day!" I snarled before Adrien could answer him. I was still bristling over the prissy comment. I wasn't some fat noble content to rest on his laurels while other folk slaved away in his kitchens.
"Let me rephrase that: we have been in here for gods know how many hours cleaning up after the mess you soldiers make with your...weapons!" I felt around for the bucket and dipped the cloth in it.
I spent the next few minutes cleaning the cuts with Adrien's help. "We should bandage the one on your arm, at least," I remarked. "The wounds might not kill you, but the infection might, and conditions in this camp are--"
"--it's a cesspit," Adrien interjected.
I nodded my agreement. "Especially with all the wounded and dying lying about."
|
|
|
Post by Gillermo Stregazza on Aug 28, 2011 10:16:43 GMT -5
“Aye,” I groaned. “Though if you must be angry at someone, Mael, save it for the Skaldis. Our force is a defensive one, you know that – and their attack was almost unexpected.”
I sighed and shook my head a moment, even as my friends tended to my wounded arm. “We lost land today, and Elua knows how many villagers were killed, maimed, taken prisoner. That's what these men are fighting for – to protect their fellow D'Angelines. If you would sooner they stood back while the Skaldi make it all the way here....”
I shuddered, to think of what they would do to my Mirielle, to think, also, of what they would do to my friends, of what they were already doing that I didn't know about, but supposed.
|
|
|
Post by Mael Leblanc on Aug 28, 2011 11:37:08 GMT -5
I drew the bandage tight around his arm. "I could have left at any time!" I snarled. "Do you know how easy it would be to slip out of here in the night?! I could have been halfway to the City of Elua by now, but I stayed."
I tied off the bandage and tore of the excess. "I stayed because I thought I might be able to do some good. I don't have to like the fact that you take the field and I might not ever see you again, just when I thought I'd made a friend. I don't have to like the fact that D'Angeline blood is being spilled on D'Angeline soil, but I--"
"Mael..."
Adrien's voice made me freeze in mid-rant. The tone of it, low and dangerous, the voice he only used when he was on the cusp of anger.
"What is it?" I asked softly. Was he going to yell at me? I couldn't remember the last time he had raised his voice to anyone.
"A green serpent, they just brought one in."
I froze, heard the splash as the rag in my hands fell into the bucket. I forgot about Gil, forgot about what I was supposed to be doing.
A green serpent on a black field...
"Where?" A single word, spoken softly and filled with as much menace as I could muster.
"Here," he took my hand and we began weaving through the tent, moving ever closer to the moans of pain. We might have been alone in a silent tent, for all I cared.
I didn't need Adrien to tell me his wounds were severe to know that they were. I could smell the iron tang of blood.
"He's dying," a simple statement of fact, nothing more. The rest of Adrien's breath was taken up with description: tawny hair, blue eyes, sallow skin. Did I remember him from that night?
I remembered every face from that night, but I could not tell from simple description, I needed to touch his face to know for sure.
"Messire Leblanc, we need to give him syrup of poppies," one of the healers, not a voice I recognized.
"No, I need him lucid!" I snapped, there wasn't much time. Where were his companions? Why was he here?
Where were the men who murdered my mother?
"But he's in pain!" I felt flesh brush against mine and I shoved against it. They would sedate him over my rotting corpse. I needed him to tell me what he knew.
"He's a strong man, he can deal with the pain," I snarled, mocking sweetness in my tone. "Adrien, where's his neck?" My hand was taken again, guided to quivering flesh. He was sweating profusely. There wasn't much time, I would need to be quick.
It was best to start with the basics. "What's your name, Messire?"
"Why...should I...tell you?" His voice was hoarse, it was clear he was labouring to breathe, but even in it's current state I did not recognize it.
"Listen then," I said slowly. "I can make sure you die a slow, painful death, or, assuming you cooperate, I can hasten it along, that all depends on how willing you are to answer my questions."
He choked out a name, not one I recognized. It didn't matter much now, since he was dying anyways, but I committed it to memory all the same.
"The crest you wear on your armor. Which house bears such a seal?"
"That....that's not..."
Then I did something I had sworn I would never do. Something that went against all my instincts as a healer.
I struck a dying man.
He whimpered in protest, but offered no resistance. I ignored the gasps of astonishment from behind me, trusting Adrien to keep the busybodies away until I was finished.
"For. whom. do. you. work?" I asked, feeling like I would grind my teeth down to nothing.
"B-Blackwood Company...m-m-m-mercenaries," I was impressed that he actually took the initiative to provide me with information. No wonder I couldn't find any records of such a seal. It probably was not listed in any official channels.
"Very good, one last question," I fought the rising tide of excitement. At last, a trail to follow!
"Where are your companions?"
"E-Eisande...the fleet....going to...to..."
My hands balled into fists. Eisande! The fleet! Were they planning to join the fleet? Attack it? Either way, that was where I needed to go, assuming our friend wasn't lying.
"Thank you," I said. "You have been most helpful. Good eyes, Adrien." Were it not for his eyes, I would never have known he was there. "Now, I just have to decide what to do with you..."
|
|
|
Post by Gillermo Stregazza on Aug 28, 2011 13:34:11 GMT -5
I was going to embrace Mael and his emotional outbursts when we were interrupted by fate herself – and letting effusions go in favor of information, I followed him and Adrien to the cot where a man lay in agony. Truth be, it was a sorry sight, and I stared in shock as my friend all but tortured the dying man for information. I might have tolerated that he would not be given milk of the poppy – that, I could understand. Backhanding him, though, that was beyond indignity, and so it was seething that I called out, loudly, with authority I'd forgotten I had.
“Mael,” I called, “that will be enough. You,” I ordered a healer, “give this man milk of the poppy. Mael, Adrien, you are relieved of healer duty until further notice. With me.”
I turned to go, then paused to see if they were following. If not, I would push this further.
A healer hesitated, and I gave her a glare that said everythign I thought about the situation.
“Yes my lord,” she murmured, and she prepared the milk, advanced so as to give it to the dying man.
Meanwhile, I glared at Adrien, so as to impress on him how important it was that he (and by extention, Mael), obey my command. I rarely gave orders – when I did, I expected obedience.
|
|
|
Post by Mael Leblanc on Aug 28, 2011 16:50:33 GMT -5
Anger surged within me, flowed through my veins. How dare Gillermo call me away like a servant! This was my chance to claim vengeance, a small vengeance, but still! He had no right! He had no right at all!
Adrien's hand was heavy on my shoulder. "Let's go, Mael. He's dead." Something in his tone seemed to indicate that if he wasn't dead by morning, he wouldn't be alive by the time we broke our fast.
"I know..." I felt as if there were lead weights attached to my shoulders as I shuffled forward, allowing Adrien to lead me after Gillermo.
"We're going to Eisande," I said as soon as the voices within the tent faded away. "Adrien and I, that is--perhaps we can even catch them on route if we hurry."
|
|
|
Post by Gillermo Stregazza on Aug 29, 2011 0:10:06 GMT -5
“And get cut to tiny pieces of ass-hat,” I replied tartly. “Mael, I'm disappointed in you. I told you I was oath-bound, and I am, but if you go sullying my name and my extension the name of many an important folk I am linked to, I won't be able to do much for you.”
I crossed my arms, and took a deep breath.
“You heard me say before that we were going to Eisande. These folk are headed straight into the fire – the Lady of Marsilkos is readying for an assault, and if our experience here is anything to go by, it will be the same there.”
I spat on the ground, for in truth, I was furious. “Ah, I thought you were a man of honor. What honor is there in torturing a dying man?”
|
|
|
Post by Mael Leblanc on Aug 29, 2011 10:33:21 GMT -5
He was furious, I could hear it in his voice. Well, good, so was I! In hindsight, perhaps I should have leashed my temper, as I had often done in the City of Elua, but I was not in the City anymore.
"What honour is there?!" I raged. "What honour did those men possess when they raped and murdered my mother, tore out my eyes, burned my house to the ground!?" I tore my blindfold away, for once hardly caring if anyone noticed. "Look at me, Gillermo! Look at these scars! Will you let the man who gave them to me walk away when we finally hunt him down? If so, you're right, there isn't much you can do for me." I carefully secured my blindfold in place.
"What if we had arrived in Eisande and they had already moved on, what then?" I said softly. "You can hold fast to your moral platitudes, Gillermo. Now I have a name and a destination, and I'm going hunting. Come on, Adrien..."
For a moment, I thought that Adrien was going to side with Gil over me, but then I felt a hand grasp mine.
"I'm sorry, Gillermo," I continued. "This is one oath I cannot avoid breaking."
|
|
|
Post by Gillermo Stregazza on Sept 3, 2011 13:24:03 GMT -5
Mael ranted and raged, and Adrien, quiet though he was, didn't stop him from going onto his path of madness.
“So you will ride off to Eisande,” I replied quietly. “Go on then. Do not seek entrance with the authorities under my name, if you forsake your oath, and do not claim yourself of my household. I took oath, and so did you – and if you break your oath to me, Mael, then why should I keep mine to you? What will you do, then, when you get to Marsilikos? Will you wander from door to door? Go on then. Have your madness. I shall take no part of it, when my duty is here, and so would yours be, had you half the honour I saw in you some time gone.”
I squared my shoulders and crinkled my nose.
“If you ride through the city of Elua, be sure to find Raisa Valois on the way. I will make sure she knows to give you your wages, since it seems our covenant is broken.”
In truth, I was hurt and sad – and it seemed I'd lost a friend, though had I ever had one, I now set myself to wonder. I prided my self on paying my debts – and so I would.
|
|
|
Post by Mael Leblanc on Sept 3, 2011 14:46:15 GMT -5
"At least I would be doing something!" I shouted. "Who knows where they will be by the time you get around to heading in that direction, or are you too smitten with Mirielle to see much else!?" Love, something I did not understand, and imagined that I probably never would understand.
"I can survive!" I spat. "What do you think I've been doing for the past few years? I had no need for a noble's name to coddle me! And you...you can keep your blood money!"
"No, Mael..."
I froze, feeling the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. There it was again, that soft voice Adrien used that always preceded a shouting match.
"Oh, what now?" I snapped. "You're abandoning me as well, Adrien? I didn't hear you speak up when I first proposed we leave!"
"That was before you refused wages you promised the boys," Adrien's words cut to the core. "Are you going to sacrifice all your friends on the altar of your vengeance?"
"But--" I began, trying frantically to come up with an argument that would make it sound as if I wasn't shortchanging my oldest friends, to say nothing of my newest friend. It seemed as if the full magnitude of what I had been about to do suddenly became apparent to me in that moment. They were both right: What in hell had I been thinking?
I came to a full stop and turned around. "Gillermo, I...." It felt like there was a frog in my throat, every step forward felt like an ordeal in itself. For once, I did not balk at the thought of kneeling before anyone, Gil had clearly proven himself the superior man.
"I'm sorry, Gillermo," I whispered, pressing my lips to his hand. "I--It's hard...it's terribly hard..."
|
|
|
Post by Gillermo Stregazza on Sept 7, 2011 8:46:41 GMT -5
Elua knows, I`ve never felt the urge to strike a blind man before, and my fists bawled, my jaw set, for I would tolerate ill being spoken of Mirielle by no-one, not even my own flesh and blood. Ah, I took a step that I didn't even fell, and hissed at Mael, ignoring his self-pitying apology.
“Never,” I hissed as I jerked my hand away from his, “speak ill of my woman again, Mael Leblanc, or you will find that there will be no friendship here. Foolish of me to think that we were beyond a business arrangement. So be it, then. Do as you will. Keep you word and I shall keep mine, but bear in mind that you would be angering a rather relentless foe, if you betray me.”
Having retrieved my hand, I turned, hurt that he would have so easily forgotten and sacrificed his link to me, when I would have gladly given my blood for a friend. At least now, I knew where his priorities lied – that was fair enough, I supposed.
I turned to go, lest I speak more regrettable words. I needed to calm my nerves, ere I lose my temper. I may no longer host Ka'Sho'Rok, I reminded myself, but if the demon was so at ease in my body, it may well have been because I had darknesses of my own. Best not to feed them.
|
|
|
Post by Mael Leblanc on Sept 7, 2011 22:56:51 GMT -5
I sprang to my feet, anger returning anew. "I thought that we had a business arrangement was clear from the start, Gillermo! It was you who thought of it as something more!" Yet I could not in good conscience say that the statement was completely true. Had I not, in my heart of hearts, hoped to make a new friend amidst all the backstabbing that went on in Night's Doorstep?
"I'm going to my tent!" I announced. "To sleep, if that assuages your fear that I will desert in the night."
I paused, then, mid-step, squeezing Adrien's hand. "I hope the company hasn't moved on from Eisande before we arrive, Gillermo..."
I don't know what I'll do, then...
So I headed to my tent, my sleep wracked by night-terrors of chasing my mother in vain through bloody, cobble-stone streets, while her murderer's laughter echoed all around us.
|
|