Yet to be named, pt 17

And yet again I've messed up the update schedule. So I post the entirety of my story in English. That is, what I've written so far, the story itself is far from finished.

+ a little change to update layout, now the English story will after that Polish one (so that it greets you once you enter the blog, unlike the previous setup)

With this big of an update the Polish story will be pushed further back, the next update on that will come next week.

(Noooohooo it's Thursday already! Dang it!

‘No!’, she shouted, burying her dagger in the skeleton’s spine just as it ripped the blood-covered axe free. It fell still right next to the injured man.

That was the last one. She didn’t even bother retrieving her weapon. Instead, she fell to her knees, inspecting the wound. It had to be bad, but, maybe....

It was bad. Very bad. She could see the bone, white among the rapidly growing pool of red blood. She ran back to the still unsettled horse, which was looking around scared on the other side
of the river. It was a miracle that it didn’t run away. She fished out clean cloth from her bag and was about to run back to him when a horrible realisation dawned upon her.

It wouldn’t suffice. She needed more. A healing salve or a potion. But nobody would sell her any back in the city. Her eyes fell on his travelling bag, still safely nestled on the back of the saddle. Maybe...

She overcame her reservations about searching other people’s luggage and thoroughly explored t he bag, taking everything out. An apple. Stale chunks of bread. Fresh change of clothes.
An old, tattered book. A little silver talisman. A small red bottle full of liquid.

It had a cross painted on it.

It couldn’t be anything else than a healing potion.

She couldn’t believe it, but there was no time for asking questions. She ran back to him.
He was white as a sheet, his breathing hard and unsteady, and the pool of blood was really big, almost entirely soaking the remains of the last skeleton. She unplugged the bottle, lifted his head and forced it down his mouth. She prayed for it to work.

It did. Flesh mended in her eyes. The bone got covered in muscle and disappeared from sight. Fresh new skin appeared at the sides of the wound, closing it down.

And then it stopped.

She grunted and grabbed her bandages. The potion fixed most damage, but the gash still cut rather deep and – slower, but still – continued to bleed. She applied the cloth and kept putting new layers on the wound until it stopped bleeding through. Then she fixed the bandage in place and finally pulled her dagger out of the skeleton’s spine. He’ll need a stick to walk around, at least for some time, and a fixed support for the injured leg. The bone may have been damaged and a proper chirurgeon should take a look at it, but it’s hard to find one in the middle of a forest, so she had
to rely on her own skills. Even though the birds returned with their merry chirps, she was content not to wander unarmed into another enemy.

She scavenged the nearby area and found two relatively straight branches. Then, she carefully tied the shorter one to the bandage wound. She put the other on a polearm rack at the side of the horse’s saddle. Now, when there was no danger and she had plenty of time to think, this saddle – and probably the rest of his luggage – couldn’t really belong to him. A lone elf like him had no chance of affording such costly equipment.

She didn’t bother. Not much. He proved a decent fellow and an at least tolerable fighter. And he too was an elf, so why not help a kinsman?

She packed his things back inside his bag, put it back on its place, and led his horse to him. Now was the hardest part – installing an unconscious man on a saddle.

With considerable effort she raised him off the ground and slumped him on the horse, then mounted it behind him, raised him higher up, somehow pushed his fit leg to the side with her own while trying to keep her balance, and finally dropped him on the saddle in front of her, mounted almost properly, one leg on each side of the horse.

After the long escape, intense fight – a dagger is not the weapon of dreams against three skeletons -, frantic attempts at tending the wound and then the completely awkward mounting, she was weary to the bone, breathing very heavily. She reached out for the reins and bade the meadow goodbye at a steady trot. The next city was still some distance ahead, and the undead may still
be looking for them, but she didn’t want to risk further damaging the wound.