Authors: Naomi Baysinger-Ott
Chapter 27
I toss and turn every time they try to help me, not letting them get to me as I drown in pain. I sob out as someone reaches for my face to feel my forehead, and toss so hard dizziness enters me and I have to stop. I pull away my hand and continue to do so for five minutes as someone tries to treat it, all the time thinking of nothing but escape and freedom from my agony.
Then, there is a pinch in my stomach as something squeezes my cut and I drift into a deep darkness and feel nothing.
I awaken to the world as I hear the soft sound of feet thudding over the wood floor and my ears tune in to my surroundings. I listen and wait as I feel a new presence in the room. I know it, but cannot believe it.
I know not how he came here or why, but I feel parched and dead without him and whimper for him to come to me. I am relieved as I feel the weight of two soft warm hands beneath my jaw.
Nadeje.
I relax to his touch and the anguish drains from my soul. I feel something warm hover close to me, and there is a light brush of heat to my lips before it is lifted away. My heart wavers in my chest as I feel the presence of Nadeje at my side, and it is all I want.
Prickles run through my arm as I feel him lift my hand, and soon the pressure and sickening wetness on it is taken away. It stings in the air, but the knowing that he is keeping his promise to restore it is enough to make me remain at peace.
Without meaning to, I drift further away and cannot feel him here anymore as I am blanketed in sleep. All I feel is the connection of his touches to me, and the occasional warmth of his hand in mine. I feel my palm burning. It goes away but it returns as a sting when something rough brushes the sore spots. I feel warmth and cold depending on if he holds it, my hand my gateway to awareness.
I notice a silence, and all I feel around my hand is warmth. I feel sentience slowly come back to me and I slowly move the fingers of my hurt hand. I feel a change in space as there is a shadow above me and I feel something twine with my fingers, gripping me.
Nadeje.
It disappears and I acknowledge him sitting down and waiting for some response. I cannot move or speak it seems, but the little I manage is to curl my fingers with his.
I drift.
I waken to the feeling of the soft pulsation in his hand to find it still in mine. I feel dry inside and yet cold, but the heat of the room seems extreme. I swallow faintly and it burns my throat with the parched feel. My head feels light and toes tingle in their places. I feel exhausted yet want to wake up. My eyes flicker open only to close again, but a breath escapes me as I see a faint form at my side.
“Nadeje,” it is weak and hardly there but his hand tenses around mine.
I feebly try to look again and manage a brief image of a blurred face staring at me from the side of the bed. This time I want help to be wakened if I cannot do it myself.
“Gilch,” it is stronger now, a full breath, taking my entire chest’s worth to drive it from my lips.
There is a clatter and the bed sinks a bit as I feel him tower over me. Darkness shades my lids, and I feel his hand’s pressure on the bed beside me as he leans over me. I wish to reach up and hold him but I cannot even begin to try. I feel his breath beat down and waft to me as he breathes in anticipation of my call for him, but I cannot make sound anymore. Then, his face is against mine. He breathes against me and leans so close our noses brush.
For a second, everything is as it was again.
Then, there are shuffles in the background and I feel that Nadeje is not the one making them. I hear gruff words and sense him moving away. He breathes an incomplete sentence to someone as though trying to make it stop, but they seem not to listen. He is backed off the bed.
I glimpse blurry figures and Nadeje being lead back from me and feel the absence of his hand in mine exist as unaccustomed. I open my eyes again to look and a second passes as they stay open. This time, it is not blurry, and I can see Nadeje clearly as he is guided backwards to the door. I cannot understand it and groan out a sob.
“Nadeje!” it is weak and wanting.
Immediately, I see him jerk forward for me.
My eyes close.
“Let me go to her!” It is begging and seeps into my mind with other words from the people driving him.
I feel my head pound and I swallow dryly, all my strength gone again.
There is a loud clash and something bangs to the floor. I wince in pain at the sound. I let out a pant as I feel something close up in my chest, and I can hardly get breath.
“There is no need for you now, she is healed…” it is soft and low, and not Nadeje.
“Lyra…” I hear him strained and fighting to get away.
Suddenly, I feel awake. I open my eyes and lift up a little but fall back again. I hear him falter as though my movement struck him with worry. I breathe deeply and try to stay, but it is growing hard.
“Leifde!” It is a sob now, not with as much desire as with fear, and is farther off than before.
I weaken as I hear the sound of him clattering near the door. The warmth of his hand lingers in mine and I can’t help but wonder why he was brought to be taken away again so soon.
I am asleep the moment he leaves.
Chapter 28
I hear the soft drone of silence in the room and can’t help but feel abandoned. The weakness in my body is nearly gone but I feel exhausted and still cannot rise. I lay here searching my atmosphere for any fraction of Nadeje’s being. I breathe and every breath sounds out like a rattle into the quiet. Only an occasional murmur around me implies my guarded position. I am tortured as all I can do is wait for someone or something to aid my waking up.
I feel the flood of tingles run through my body and shiver from the sensation. My head is sore in the back and this tells me where I must have hit it. I weakly begin to open my eyes and the dim light from the candles seems too bright after what feels like hours of darkness. I squint a moment then open them all the way and make myself stay with them like this to adjust. I blink and my lashes tickle each other with the stiffness from the perspiration and tears which I had felt dripping from them when I was tossing earlier tonight…or whatever time it was.
I frown a little, but feeling my eyes are stronger, I stop and gaze around me as I turn over in the sheets. The room is nearly empty except for the bed I lie in and a dresser to the far right of me against the wall. A bedside table is to the right and beside it is an empty wooden chair. I feel something plunge inside me but can’t figure out what it tends to. I look for any other sign of life and find two men. One sits dozing in a similar wooden chair beside the dresser, and the other is propped against the wall seated on the floor, also sleeping.
The chair at my side is still, yet I feel like it should contain movement for some odd reason. I move my hands up the bed a little, but stop at a burn which runs through my palm in my right one. I slowly raise it up to see, and my eyes find the wool bandage secured tightly around my hand. I feel my heart waver.
Nadeje.
My eyes catch on the chair past my fingers and I let it fall down onto the blankets above me.
He had sat in that chair.
I close and unclose my hand and feel the absence of his in it return. I close my eyes and clench it tight. I feel the scab on the cut stretch and threaten to break. I almost let it, but remembering all Nadeje has done for it to heal I loosen my fist.
I tersely feel as though I just fell into the bed. My eyes shoot open. I stare at the ceiling above me and no longer feel the weight of my body in the bunk.
Where had they taken him?
I feel something inside stir. I turn, rolling over and balancing myself on my elbow. I look to the men both still resting in their places and swallow. I hesitate a moment at my strength, but given that I am able to hold myself with my arm, I think I am doing pretty well. I slowly prop myself up with my hands, weighing less weight on my injured one than the other. I turn my body so that I can sit up and silently slip out of the bed.
The moment I am on my feet I almost decide to lie back down. Pins and needles are in the bottom of my arches, and I have a feeling being stealthy is not my talent right now. Nausea threatens to overcome me but I breathe five times, counting each breath and waiting until my mind clears from dizziness. I manipulate the easiest way to get through the door for at least a minute before I make myself step forward. The ground feels like it is slanted, and I immediately have to stop in order to not fall. I breathe at least five times again, and when I grow my courage, I once more step forward.
My knee cracks and I whimper at my stiffness as I move, but I manage not to wake the guards. I take another, then another, and another, each time getting faster and more balanced. I am almost to the door. I creep past the guard by the dresser and try not to make the floor boards creak by stepping lightly. I take one step too lightly and realize toes first were not in my favor. I feel my foot lock and my head spins too fast for me to recover. I brace myself and close my eyes tight as I fall. I hit the ground with a thump and I hear one of the guards standing.
“Ms. Orange!”
I turn ready to try to rise, but the man is already kneeling beside me, and his hands reach out to find a way to pick me up. I see the other guard who had been by the door come to the other’s shoulder and my stomach cramps up.
Why had I even thought I could make it?
Before I can protest or tell them I am alright, I am lifted to my feet and they each stable me until the other gets his arm about my shoulders. They begin to carry me to the bunk. I want to tell them to drop me, to leave me here on the ground where I can feel the full-fledged cold and truth of my present circumstance, but I know that this would only be more shameful towards Nadeje than letting this man assist me.
He gently lowers me onto the bed and as soon as I am down turns away and speaks to the other. “Tell Sir Orange she is awake…”
It is in a different Dutch dialect than I am used to using, but I make it out.
His companion leaves with a nod and he turns back to me. “You do not try to get up without us. It hurts you if you are not physically ready.”
It is a command, with the stance of working under my vader. I only half absorb it, not promising to follow it.
He reaches out a hand to feel my temperature and I wince at his touch. He seems dismissive and moves it away. He reaches for a pillow and props me up a bit so that I am not laying the same as before. When finished, he turns and walks off into the room, and waits by the door for his friend to return.
There is the thudding of boots on wood and I hear the echo down the hall as it grows nearer. I am trying to think of an excuse for rising on my own for my vader, but as I see the figure enter through the door, all ideas vanish like they were never there. I feel my pulse skip a beat and stare at the individual standing not even 20 feet from me.
Zenith.
I feel my breath gradually come back to me, and my chest trembles with every rise and fall. He is unchanged, it seems, by the commotion from before, apart from a new red bruise running from his hairline down the side of his face to his jaw. It makes me want to disappear beneath the sheets, the scar of a thin cut also shining in the faint light. The expression on his face is not as deadly as I had thought it would be, but also not kind. It is dull yet seems to know something I don’t, which only makes me want to hide more.
He remains watching me from a distance as though taking a casual visit, but his face shrouds something dark. I see the strength in his shoulders and the healing given by the medics on deck, and his whole demeanor tells me he is ready for another fight.
Seeing me not starting a conversation, he looks to the ground a moment and then steps forward. I tense a little and grow rigid under the sheets, and I unconsciously hold my bandaged hand in the other, protecting it. He stalks to the bed side table where he stops, facing me. My limbs feel like they are made of liquid. My fingers tighten on my hand as he reaches out and fondles a piece of a rag on the table beside me.
“You are healed,” it is not a question, but a gentle statement. He turns and looks into my face. “You were supposedly very sick with blood loss only a few hours ago…it is lightening on me to see you better.”
I do not respond; a third of me senseless, a third of me angered, and a third of me fearful.
He searches my eyes for something and I resent it as he seems curious. “You are to be a great deal of care.” His words are soft and sound close to a smile.
I feel my toes tingle in warning of the mixed message in it.
“Do you understand me?”
I do not answer him.
He gentles. “Lyra, I aim to take what I have been granted. You are my token of reputation. I do not wish to make you tolerate more than courtship before you heal fully. I am aware that you are unhappy, but will do my best to comfort you when there is need…I am willing to take care of our blemishes for us.”
I would have let him comfort me, would have let him love me, but I can’t; not now or ever.
Not after Nadeje.
The thoughts of his words are affectionate and sweet, tempting almost, but I know Nadeje is willing to fight too, and that I am only makes the opposition stronger.
He sets his hand in front of him and fondles the sheets a moment. It does not scare me, but makes me worry that he intends to court me right here and now. It gives me only a second to think of refusal before it is too late. He looks up to me and glances at my profile a moment, as though to keep in check my emotions or sickness.
“I hope you agree with my strategy.” It is questioning but not at the same time.
I swallow. It takes me seconds to respond, but somehow I do. “No,” it is soft and small.
He does not seem angered. “Under what terms?”
I feel my throat tighten. “Such that I cannot agree to any proposition of you becoming anything more…than what you are to me now.”
His face darkens. “That is?”
I hear the sheets crinkle in his fingers as they pinch. It takes all of me to speak it. “Not what you wish it to be.”
He clenches his jaw. “You are not being specific.”
I release my hands and set them on my stomach. “You are being too fast.”
He softens a bit to the come back, and seems to mistake it for something of more meaning. I watch him and wish to scoot away as he carefully sits down on the edge of the bed and faces me. It takes a moment as he watches me, but slowly his hand travels over the comforter. I reach my hand out and grip the top of the sheets, pulling them up a bit and trying not to look frightened, but I know it is no use. His hand coasts over the blanket, and slowly, his palm grazes over to top of my wounded hand. I do not move, unable to think of what to do.
Feeling my stillness as I do not protest, he gently curves his fingers around my hand, and takes it back on the journey to himself. He looks down onto it and turns it palm up and cups it, observing its state and the bandage. He lays his other hand over it and pets it lightly, still not looking to me. I am staring at him, with mixed feelings of horror and confusion at the nervous flutters I feel inside at his actions. He fiddles with the bandage a moment, then stops and slowly his gaze returns to me.
My heart beats twice its normal speed and I can’t calm it. I hate it, curse it, and can only think of how Nadeje would feel if he knew I had not pulled away yet.
Zenith’s eyes are a lighter brown in the dim lighting, and burn softly with secrets. I pause…
secrets…
I remember Nadeje’s tender handling of me not a few hours ago and the moist kisses and soft breathes to me…
the
openness…
I watch Zenith as he does me and I feel the difference…
With Nadeje there had been no secrets.
He turns my hand in his and looks to it. “Someone bandaged it well,” he says it gently, kindly, warmth vibrating in his tone.
I do not tell him who. Nor shall I tell him by whose blade it was that I was hurt firstly.
He looks at me and I feel his pulse through his hands. It is faster, more pronounced and energetic than Nadeje’s. “You are awake, are you not?”
I feel his fingertips hint beneath the ridge of the wool and feel a little exposed and wish to draw back. He feels it and strokes it gently, causing my blood to freeze.
When I still do not answer he looks down to my hand again. “Shall I let you rest?”
I do not recall him ever asking to interrupt my rest in the first place.
Seeing the blankness on my face he begins to move. “I shall.”
Before I can get back my hand though, he bends low and, lifting it, kisses the knuckles. He sets it down carefully and rises.
I feel my cheeks unwantedly flame up and blush at his impropriety. He looks to me and I feel myself make every single bad judgment upon him until I see the willingness to learn in his eyes. He starts to turn away, just as my vader arrives in the door.
I wish to blurt to him that it is not as he might think, but know to hold my tongue after everything that has happened if I wish to learn anything of Nadeje. Sir Orange once more heads forward and Zenith restarts his walk out the room. As they pass each other, I sense the exchange of success in their expression. I intend to eradicate any living flicker of success in the area they communicate in.
He comes close enough to the bed that I can reach him and stops and reaches to the cloth on the bedside table. “Lyra,” it is soft.
I watch him as he lightly trails the cloth in a clean bowl of water in his hand and reaches to wipe it across my forehead. It soothes me and cools my head after my heated interaction with Zenith, and I am grateful. He sets it aside after he seems finished, and to my heart’s further weakening, he takes the hand Zenith had just released.
“You are better?”
I do not need to hide it from him, so I nod.
He searches my eyes for answers and, finding none, speaks his mind. “You fell again, without any warning to the guards you wished to move…do not do this again…you could get hurt worse,” I hear the sincerity in his voice and know he cares.
“I was…just…trying by myself.”
He gives me a look. “I rose from a bed fever myself not long ago. I did not try by myself. Headstrong girl, just like your moeder…and me, I must admit.”
I almost wish to smile, but my mind ventures elsewhere.
“You are still weak then?” His hand is tighter on mine.