It would be a very long time before he opened them again.
Bloodraven was thirsty. His mouth was dry as brittle bones, with much the same taste lingering on his tongue. That discomfort drove him out of slumber and he lay for a moment, instantly awake once sleep had withdrawn, and no little disoriented by the state of his surroundings. The walls were of stone blocks, not hewn out of the rock itself. There were four walls and a stout door instead of three and a daunting wall of rusting bars. A pallet that was well stuffed with goose feathers, and pillows and blankets instead of hard stone floor and a spattering of moldy straw. There were no stifling chains.
Ah, he remembered now. The climb up those narrow stairs under a ceiling so low he’d had to bend to avoid scraping his head. A miserable climb, with his legs so weak they’d threatened to give out under him, and only his pride in the face of human observation had kept him from giving into the weakness. The pain in his side had been excruciating. Strange, now, that it wasn’t. Strange that it plagued him not at all. He sat up, warily scanning the room for enemies and found none at all. He found only the sprawled form of Yhalen at the edge of the pallet, limbs twisted, and his frayed braid snaking across the stone floor.
Bloodraven frowned, leaning forward cautiously, expecting a pulling stitch at his side. Again, no pain assaulted him, merely a twinge of what seemed healing flesh and muscle. His hand hesitated in its path towards his human, curiosity over the state of his own wounds overcoming him. The bandage at his side was stained with blood, but it was well dried and old. He pulled it off gingerly, recalling well the ugly gaping wound that Yhalen had painstakingly cleaned and stuffed with healing herbs before he’d stitched. The stitches were still there, fresh and blood crusted, but the flesh they pierced looked weeks healed, the mouth of the wound sealed together and pink with healthy flesh.
Bloodraven stared, fingers trembling just a little, a hair’s breadth from the miraculously healed wound. Had he wasted away in fever sleep so long that weeks had passed without him knowing it?
No. No, he’d have sensed it. Would have felt it in the stiffness of a body gone too long without activity.
He’d suffered injury before that had kept him off his feet for many days, and he remembered the time well. Remembered only too acutely the weakness of recovery. A body didn’t wake up refreshed and vital after such an ordeal. There was pain and weakness and suffering to be endured and hidden from the speculative eyes of one’s brethren.
Warily he pulled the bandage from his shoulder, only to find that wound also well on its way to becoming a forgotten scar. Even the annoying little throbbing points of discomfort in his ears where rings had been torn out, either in the fight that had ended in his capture or by his captors stealing the gold loops from his ears, seemed to have dissipated.
Magic had been worked upon him, there was no question in his mind and it sent a thrill of fear through him that an army of human men with arrows and spears could not. The ogre shamans who wandered the mountains, seeking refuge and food from each tribe they passed, practiced no such magic. Ogre magicks consisted of ranting chants and wild-eyed predictions, herbs thrown into fires to
make clouds of stinking smoke and dire claims of curses and condemnation from the warlike gods who dwelled deep within the most inhospitable parts of the northern ranges, if their representatives on the mortal plane were not treated with due respect.
Bloodraven had never held much treaty with the gods, much less their wild-eyed shamans. Their magic was nothing so much as herb lore and a canny knowledge of how to spook the volatile members of the mountain clans. He’d never seen a shaman steal a body’s youth and vitality with a touch—though he imagined it would be a much coveted skill. Certainly no ogre shaman would waste his time or energy with a magic that could heal a body of grievous wounds. That spoke of things arcane and treacherous and not to be trusted. That spoke of things voiced of around fires at night, things meant to frighten children and amuse wary adults.
That magic had been aimed at him was appalling, and though his body was a great deal stronger than it had been last he’d been awake, he still entertained the superstitious notion that the shroud of the black arts had tainted him. Of untrustworthy human magicks. He felt like a child again, beguiled by the tales of the clan elders, shivering in his spot around the fire, seeing things in the darkness around the ring of light that in all good reason were not there and never had been there.
He stared at Yhalen, at this small boned human so easily broken, and found it difficult to equate him with the childhood fears of the poison of dark magicks. To harbor fear of him would be humiliating at best. Ridiculous, considering that he’d cast no dark spell onto Bloodraven yet, and had good reason and many an opportunity. He’d chosen instead to heal. And he’d done a rather good job of it, considering he claimed to be ignorant of the magic he obviously used with appalling frequency.
Baffling.
Bloodraven touched the healing wound at his side again, fingertips catching at the knots in the stitches. Those would have to come out, or they would drive him to distraction. Without a knife, he doubted his large fingers would be much good at picking loose the tiny knots. Yhalen’s smaller hands could do it...if he dared let the human touch him again. He frowned at that brief moment of superstition, annoyed that the wariness lingered. He reached for Yhalen in the face of it, determined to prove his own courage, and was vastly relieved when he felt nothing but slack human limbs and smooth human skin when he pulled the young man fully onto the comfort of the pallet.
Yhalen was all dead weight, head lolling and body entirely tractable in Bloodraven’s hands. His skin was cool to the touch, as if he’d just come in from a cold winter’s day. Colder than death. This gave Bloodraven momentary pause and a small thrill of worry, until he saw the slow rise and fall of Yhalen’s chest. Alive then, but very deeply enthralled in the grip of unconsciousness. He pulled Yhalen into the warmth of the spot he’d himself just vacated, dragging a soft, human-spun blanket up to cover his slight body.
“Wake up,” he demanded, gently patting Yhalen’s cheek. No response at all. He ran a hand down the length of Yhalen’s braid, fingering the soft silkiness of its weight, considering as he did so what had thrust Yhalen into this demanding sleep. Pondering things Yhalen had said to him in that cell, of his magicks that borrowed from the forest and the things that lived within it to heal. There was no forest here. Nothing but stone and stone, and yet more stone. What miscalculation had his human made to heal his wounds? More curious yet, why had he bothered?
He stroked down the length of the braid again, then back up to the tousled mass of hair that framed Yhalen’s face. Yhalen moaned, eyes moving behind the shield of his lids and body contorting suddenly in some bout of pain, his hands curling under the blanket to clutch at his side. Had he taken a wound that Bloodraven was unaware of since the cell? If that narrow-faced little lordling had dared to lay a hand on him, Bloodraven would pull him limb from limb.
He pushed the blanket aside, catching Yhalen’s wrists and easily drawing them up to his chest so that he could lift the tunic and see what damage there was. But there was none, only smooth, perfect flesh. Bloodraven passed fingertips across it, shivering as he realized it was the exact spot of his own wound, which pained him not at all. Had Yhalen taken that pain, along with the infection and weakness?
The unconscious bout of ghost pain had left Yhalen shivering, his cool skin gone goosepimply.
Bloodraven pulled him up, holding him close against his chest and sharing his own generous warmth.
He leaned back against the wall and cradled his human in his lap, as he imagined a human mother might do for her child. Gods knew ogre mothers had no such tenderness.
He dragged the blanket up, arranging it, and sat there afterwards, with his eyes flickering around the environs of this new prison. He recalled very little of arriving here, the journey up the stairs having
consumed the majority of his awareness. He thought that the human woman, the one with the eyes of a hunting hawk, had brought them here.
Eventually, when Yhalen’s shivering ceased and he lay quiet and still, Bloodraven’s restlessness got the better of him and he shifted the human aside, arranging the blankets back over him before rising to examine the contents of the room.
He stretched, working the cricks out of back and shoulders and rotating his head to relieve the stiffness of his neck. He’d been too long inactive and his body rebelled as joints and muscles cried out, aching and stiff regardless of the arcanely healed wounds.
He shifted through the contents of the table. There was clothing and various herbs, as well as tools for grooming, which held some interest for him. There was water and rags and human soap, which he made use of. There wasn’t enough of the dirty water left to cleanse his hair, so he gathered it back and pulled it into a warriors knot at his nape, binding it with a strip of frayed leather from his trousers.
Might as well find some use for them, torn and bloody as they were. He stared thoughtfully at the pile of clothing on the table, wondering how much face he might lose if he accepted their offerings and clad himself in human-made garments. Hardly as much face as he might lose if he faced them in stinking bloodstained leathers.
He convinced himself to shed the trousers with little effort, tossing them to a corner and scrubbing his lower body with the dirty water before toweling dry with a swath of linen no doubt meant to dress wounds. The trousers were of a fine, stout material, soft and pliable and thick enough to protect against the elements. There was fine, subtle stitching along the waist, the delicacy beyond large ogre fingers.
He fingered the cloth, marveling at the tightness of the weave. The things that the men of the lowlands were capable of never ceased to amaze him. Those few stolen items that trickled up to the northern tribes were bartered at high prices, for even the mountain humans who worked in fear of their lives for the tribes, did not create such clever things. But then again, perhaps they were capable, but chose not to share with the race that had hunted and oppressed them for generations. Understandable.
If he were in the same position he’d have offered nothing more than the simplest tasks demanded of him. Not for the first time he considered the tribal chieftains of old, fools for choosing to make war with the humans rather than ally with them.
There was the rattle of the locks on the outside of the door. Bloodraven stiffened, battle instincts coming into play unbidden. He had to force himself to relax, recalling that a mindless bid for escape did not, at the moment, lie in his best interests. He took a step backwards, resting his shoulders against the wall and forcing his body into an unthreatening stance. Still, when the guards stepped into the doorway and saw him, their weapons came up as their faces both paled and tightened. The serving man behind them flinched visibly, the stench of sudden fear pouring off him like he’d bathed in it.
Bloodraven made no move and no sound, lowering his lashes enough so that his watchful stare wasn’t so obviously challenging.
The guards waved in the serving man impatiently, and he reluctantly moved forward, dropping the bucket of water and sloshing a great deal of it on the floor in the process. He practically tossing the wrapped bundle into the room in his efforts to deposit his offerings and be gone. The guards backed out just as hastily and slammed the door shut behind them.
Bloodraven waited until the sound of the locks being secured had finished before moving to retrieve the wrapped bundle. More herbs, from the smell of it. The fresh water was inviting, though, and he dipped out a handful to drink, then another, realizing only as the water hit his belly how hungry he was. He vaguely recalled picking at the first meal they had brought to this cell, but his appetite had been muted due to the infection and fever, and he’d not taken full advantage of human cooking. He rather hoped they’d send another one soon.
He tossed the bundle on the table, uninterested in herbs, and set about more thoroughly working the stiffness out of his body. He was still sore in places, the muscles in his side and shoulder taut and sensitive as newly healed flesh was wont to be.
He quenched his thirst with more water when he’d finished and retreated to the pallet where Yhalen still slept. He resisted the urge to touch him, to push the blankets aside and uncover the finely healed brand on the small of his human’s back. It had been placed advantageously, with thoughts of enjoying the view of it while he enjoyed the body of his little human slave. Pity he’d gotten little enjoyment out of Yhalen since it had been placed. If it had not been wounds preventing, then it had been circumstance, and if not circumstance, then he had to reluctantly admit to conscience getting in the way. And now
that Yhalen had healed him—perhaps even saved his life in the doing and at great risk to himself—there was debt to be considered.
He shut his eyes, resting his head against the wall, pondering the indignity of owing debt to a human, and a human slave of his to boot. Not that this particular human considered himself as such, regardless of capture and brand and collar. Well, the collar was gone and he was only in Bloodraven’s company by the dubious grace of this keep’s lords, but the brand was still there.