{ pfsb } flee from Temple Isle

[jaskoleczka]

One second, she was on her knees, cold stone hard through the leather of her trousers, hearing Dandelion shouting her name and watching an arrow speeding towards her –

The next, she's gasping in cool, misty autumn air, her knees and shins growing wet from the heavy evening dew that has settled on the grass where she kneels. Ciri looks about herself in a near-panic, then buries her face in her hands, trying to keep from sobbing with reaction and fear and pain.

She'd made it. Milliways: the first pleasant, peaceful place that came to mind when she made her jump from one world to another. 

Half-turning, she winces at a sharp complaint from her back, and her eyes grow wide as she studies the arrow buried halfway up its shaft in the ground just behind her. "That was a near miss," she murmurs to herself, and pulls it from the ground as she slowly gets to her feet, aching, her back burning. Once upright, she locates the main building and begins staggering her way towards it, step by determined step, stumbling a slightly drunken path through the wet grass and quiet night.

Comments

[lightamidchaos]

He has come out to check on the lotuses in their little sheltered cove, even though he knows it is too early yet for them to grow. Still, at least he can make sure they have not been disturbed.

The movement in the distance draws his attention, and as he realizes who it is and how she's moving, Lan Wangji goes swiftly to join her.

"Ciri?"

[jaskoleczka]

That voice –

She's so grateful she could nearly cry. "Lan Wangji," she says. She hesitates to touch him, knowing his dislike of physical contact, but with every step the fire in her back grows, as adrenaline ebbs from her system.

"May I – my back – "

[lightamidchaos]

"I can carry you," he assures her, moving to her side. He glances at her back, trying to ascertain her injury.

[jaskoleczka]

"A slash," she explains. "It's nothing – I was slow. Too slow. I let one get behind me."

He can see, as she can not, the rent in her shirt that goes diagonally from shoulder to opposite hip, and the crimson stain slowly soaking along the tear. She puts an arm around his shoulder and winces. "Thank you," she says, and huffs a pained breath of laughter.

"One of these days you won't have to carry me to the inn when I appear, wouldn't that be nice?"

[lightamidchaos]

"It will, when you are not wounded," he says, as he shifts in front of her and bends down to lift her full weight on his back with sheer and absolute ease.

"But as that is not today, hold on to me."

[jaskoleczka]

She puts her arms loosely around his neck, one hand still gripping the arrow that had traveled through the worlds with her, and tries not to laugh – it hurts when she does.

"I'm glad I made it here," she murmurs. "It was the first pleasant place that came to mind. The lake, the forest... my friends."

[lightamidchaos]

"I am glad as well."

He moves as gracefully as he can across the grass toward the inn, trying to avoid jostling her.

"Was it the Hunt?"

[jaskoleczka]

"No," she says, rueful. "I'm afraid it was regular old garden-variety humans. We – I was outnumbered."

Dandelion certainly wasn't of any help. "I let one flank me. Stupid."

[lightamidchaos]

"Outnumbered," he reminds her, as they reach the door. Lan Wangji reaches ahead with his free hand to open it, and carries her into the common room with no sign of self-consciousness, heading straight for the hallway that leads to the healers' clinic.

[jaskoleczka]

"Sloppy," she insists, but makes no argument when he takes her straight through the common room in the direction of the medical quarters.

She wonders if the white-haired doctor, Kim, will be there again, and a wry half-smile tugs at her mouth. This would seem all too familiar if she were.

[lightamidchaos]

This time as they enter there is no one else in the clinic. Lan Wangji eases her down onto one of the beds and turns to face her.

"I can see if Madam Bar knows of a healer who could be summoned. I have only the ability to clean your wound and share spiritual energy."

[jaskoleczka]

"That's fine," Ciri tells him, testing the wound by twisting slightly at the waist and rotating her shoulder. She winces, but nods.

"It's shallow, I think. Shouldn't even need stitches." At least, not if the Temple Guardsman's sword had been properly sharpened. "If you can help me bind it up, I think a little rest will do the trick."

[lightamidchaos]

He gives her a dubious look at that, but nods acquiescence. "Wait," he says, and makes a quick search of the shelves for clean cloths and unguents or any poultice of herbs that he might recognize.

[jaskoleczka]

She casts a slightly amused glance his way, then busies herself with turning around and unlacing her blouse and sliding it down so he has access to her bare back.

"If it makes you feel better," she tells, "I will come back to see one of the doctors tomorrow."

[lightamidchaos]

"I think that would be wise."

He draws some water from the basin into a clean bowl and carries everything over to begin tending her back.

"What happened?"

[jaskoleczka]

"I was double-crossed," she says. "By a man called Whoreson Junior."

She sighs a little and shakes her head. "I knew he couldn't be trusted, but I had no other choice."

[lightamidchaos]

It is quite a name for a man to take, he thinks, and may speak to his character. Lan Wangji gently but thoroughly washes out Ciri’s wound as he listens.

“What were you trying to do?”

[jaskoleczka]

"I went to him to find someone who could fix the phylactery. He couldn't, himself, but he knew someone who could."

She thinks of the blue spark of magic – Chaos – spiritual energy that leapt from Lan Wangji's fingers when he examined the box. "It may be fixed, but I had to leave it behind."

[lightamidchaos]

"He betrayed you." He pats the slash dry; it is clean, at least, and should heal well. He opens a pot of ointment and begins to spread it over the edges of her wound. "Theft, or worse?"

[jaskoleczka]

"Hardly a surprise," she says, dry. "Not a very clever man, Whoreson. He got greedy, took one of my companions captive. Dandelion and I had arrived to rescue him. We were fleeing Whoreson's men when I was injured."

She shakes her head. "I don't know what happened to Dandelion. I hope they didn't hurt him."

[lightamidchaos]

He remembers the name as the person Geralt had advised her to seek out, and hopes so too.

“If you need help when you return,” he murmurs, as he applies bandages over the ointment, “I hope you will tell us.”

[jaskoleczka]

"I may," she admits.

"Weeks have passed for me since I last came here. There is much to tell, and unfortunately not much that is particularly good."

[lightamidchaos]

"Then we will get you settled, with tea and a meal, so that you may tell it."

He draws her shirt back up over her shoulders and moves to her side, holding out his hand. "Give me your wrist."

[jaskoleczka]

She reties her blouse quickly, then offers her wrist without question. She learned long ago that she can trust him, and the expression in her eyes is one merely of mild curiosity.

[lightamidchaos]

This time, she is awake rather than unconscious after falling from the sky, and so will be able to feel it from the start as he takes her wrist in one hand, places the fingers of his other hand just above her meridian point, and begins to channel his own spiritual energy to restore and refresh her reserves from his own strength.