Second last day of Days of Ancestor. Vencian counted backward while lying still.
Thirteen days... He reached the approximate number of days he must’ve been unconscious.
The bed held clean sheets. A water jug stood half empty and recently set down. The sll was washed linen, not blood or salve.
The physician stepped in where she stopped. Cloth shifted. A chair scraped once before stilling.
"Your ribs were crushed inward," the man said. "Two on the left split clean. Lung flesh beneath them bruised dark, leaking air and blood into the chest. That pooling pressed your breath thin. Cold shock followed. The strain traveled inward and shook the organs loose in their places."
He paused, as if checking a ledger.
"Your shoulder tore at the cords that hold it. Muscle split along the grain. The left hand broke through skin. Bone showed. We cleaned it and closed what we could, but binding had to stay loose. The knee twisted hard enough to stretch its bindings and grind the joint. It swelled fast and locked."
Vencian stared at the ceiling. The words stacked and settled.
"Your mind shut itself down," the physician went on. "Not sleep as rest, but sleep as shelter. Exhaustion and cold pushed it there. If it had not, you would have torn yourself apart trying to breathe."
Another pause. A breath taken carefully.
"Lord Marendil reached you early. He stopped the bleeding where hands could not. He pulled air back into the lung and held it there. He kept the damage from spreading."
Vencian pictured Larion. He healed him back in Coriel too. His Arche, Wretched Garden, is suitable to heal others wounds. Growth forces where rot should finish.
"He chose not to restore you fully," the physician said. "Forcing flesh to hurry back risks warping it for life. So we let ti work where it could."
The man’s voice tightened.
"Apparently dicines were not working on your body as efficiently as they should. Your body pushed them out as if they did not belong. We have no cause for that. It may change now that you are awake."
Vencian drew breath and spoke. "I need ti alone." His voice ca out thin, but it held.
His mother stood a mont longer. Her hand hovered near the bed rail, then lowered. She nodded once. The physician gave brief instructions about water and movent, said what hours he would return, and stepped aside for her. The door shut behind them. Footfalls settled outside. The room held sound the way a closed chest holds air.
A docunt lay on the table beside the bed. Clean paper. An official seal pressed hard into the wax. It was the report he had asked for. He reached with his injured hand. The fingers obeyed late, skin pulling where it had been bound. He lifted the page slowly, the effort plain in the tremor that ran through his wrist.
The first lines ended the excursion. Students recalled under escort. The site sealed by order of the academy and the crown. Language flat, arranged to carry weight without detail. He read on.
Deaths were confird. No count given. Families notified through proper channels. A public statent deferred until after the festival. The phrasing paused him. The page did not change, but the aning did. He held it there longer before continuing.
Cause followed. Determination under review. No classification assigned. Responsibility withheld pending examination of external variables. Each line stepped back from the one before it. He slowed, reading each sentence twice, the delay asured and intentional.
The notice shifted to continuity. Classes resud on a modified schedule. Practical modules suspended. Normal academic function asserted. Moraenor access restricted indefinitely under joint authority. Artifacts and records secured. Evidence retained for review. He folded the lower corner of the page between thumb and forefinger.
The final section listed internal review. Faculty interviews ongoing. No actions finalized. Further notice to follow if required. It ended there. No address. No closing line.
He scanned the page again. One line nad Seris Valemont. Unaccounted for. Missing. Nothing else followed it.
He read that line twice, then a third ti. No escort noted. No recovery attempt listed. No authority attached. The notice treated her as a status mark, not a person. Questions lined up and stopped there. Where she went. Why Larion brought back only him. Why this paper ended her at a word and moved on.
Air shifted near the window.
Quenya appeared without warning, small and solid between the bed and the wall. Vencian turned his head toward her and spoke before she could breathe. "Where were you. Who pulled you away. What blocked you. When did it happen. Did you see them take her."
She answered at once, voice quick and low. "I was pushed out," she said. "Sothing closed around you and forced away. I tried to co back the mont I felt you move. I didn’t choose to leave."
He didn’t pause. "What pushed you. Who."
"I don’t know," she said. "It wasn’t a hand or a voice. It was pressure. Like being told there was no space for . I stayed close. I watched for the mont it loosened."
His breath shortened partway through her reply. The effort of holding himself upright slipped. His questions slowed, then broke apart. He did not finish the last one.
"Don’t disappear on , man," he said.
Quenya stayed where she was.
The knock ca soft but firm. It cut across the room before either of them spoke again.
"What," Vencian said.
His mother answered from the other side. "Soone is here to see you."
"Who."
"Aline."
He drew breath once and let it go. "Let her in," he said. "She shouldn’t be alone either."
The door opened after a pause. Aline stepped in slowly, as if unsure the room would hold her weight. She closed the door behind her with care and stood there, hands folded tight at her waist.
"You’re awake," she said.
"Yes."
They looked at each other without moving. Then she crossed the space in small steps and stopped beside the bed.
"I brought nothing," she said. "They told not to."
"That’s fine."
Another pause settled. She glanced at the chair, then at him.
"May I."
He nodded. She sat, posture stiff, knees together, eyes dropping to the edge of the blanket.
They spoke about small things first. Food at the house. Servants reassigned. Repairs finished in the west wing. The words ca careful, placed where silence might otherwise stretch too long.
"How are the mornings," he asked.
"Cold," she said. "The bells ring earlier. Dawn doesn’t wait as long."
"And Elias."
She lifted her head. "He’s in the capital. He left two days ago with his guard. Court business, they said."
He nodded once. The answer stayed where it was given.
More quiet followed. Aline’s fingers tightened, loosened, tightened again.
"I’m sorry," she said, too fast.
"For what."
She shook her head, breath catching shallow. "For her. For Seris. If I hadn’t— if I hadn’t frozen, if I hadn’t been there at all, they wouldn’t have had leverage. She stayed because of ."
Her voice broke on the last word. Tears followed without warning, dropping onto her hands.
"This is my fault," she said. "They took her because I was weak. If I had run, if I had shouted sooner, if I had been anyone else—"
"Stop," Vencian said.
She tried, but the words kept pushing. "She told to stay back. She told she would handle it. I believed her."
"You were ant to," he said.
She looked up, eyes red and unfocused. "You don’t know that."
"I do," he said. "She made a choice. That choice wasn’t yours to undo."
Aline’s shoulders shook. She pressed her hands to her face, breath stuttering. He reached out with his good hand and rested it over her knuckles. The contact was clumsy but steady.
"You didn’t trade her," he said. "You’re still here because we decided you would be."
She drew a breath that scraped on the way in. Another followed, slower.
"I should have done more," she said.
"You did what you could with what you had," he said. "That’s all anyone gets."
She stayed bent forward for a long mont. When she straightened, her eyes were clearer, though the strain remained.
"There’s sothing else," she said.
He waited.
"Sothing important," she said again.
Reviews
All reviews (0)