Chapter 449: Chapter 446: A Forgetful Conversation

Chapter 446: A Forgetful Conversation

 

  Aurelia walked around the unconscious patient lying on top of the stone table. Elayne of the Storm Howler tribe was the daughter of their chieftain, Lykos, who also happened to be the Warrior Elect.

  Her son had clearly already worked on Elayne’s body. The skin across her chest and abdomen was a bright fresh green, the telltale sign of recently healed flesh. Still, even if he had knitted the flesh back together, the dark splotches forming over most of her body hinted at the sign of internal bleeding. Judging by the faint bumps and indents across her ribcage Aurelia noted 9 broken ribs and 8 fractures. It was a miracle she was still breathing. And she hadn’t even begun to examine the extent of damage that had been to her four limbs, all of which were bent at odd angles.

  “God dammit…” Aurelia muttered. “Stryg, you didn’t have to beat her half to death.”

  “M-Ma’am?” an acolyte squeaked with uncertainty.

  Aurelia glanced at the young woman in the corner of the room, standing at the ready.

  “Bring me fresh towels and two basins filled with water, one hot, the other warm. And tell the Silver Mother to send over the herbs in the red jar with the green lid, she’ll know the one. Now go.”

  “Yes, Ma’am!” the acolyte nodded and hurried out of the room.

  Aurelia poured white mana into Elayne’s chest and let it seep throughout the rest of her body. Even with her skills, it would take quite some time to heal the damage, but at the very least she could cover the patient’s internal organs in a protective healing spell.

  Elayne’s chest suddenly rose and she gasped, then fell into a coughing fit.

  Aurelia quickly wrote sigils of a grey curse in the air and placed it on Elayne’s chest. Her body stiffened for a moment as the curse wrapped around her skin, then her muscles went slack.

  Elayne groaned weakly and opened her bleary eyes. “W-Where… where am I…?” she grumbled.

  “In the Celestial Shrine. You’re safe now. Try not to move. I’ve placed a curse on you to keep your body still during the healing session; struggling will only cause you more harm.”

  “It hurts!” Elayne said between gritted teeth.

  “As it should. Your injuries are extensive and I am knitting your internal organs and flesh back together. I can either focus on trying to numb the pain or make sure I don’t poke a broken rib through your lung. Which do you prefer?”

  “Ugh! …The former,” she mumbled.

  “Yes, I thought so.”

  Elayne grimaced and slowly looked up at Aurelia. Her yellow eyes widened in recognition. “Y-You’re…!”

  “Yes, I’m your healer, don’t get used to it.”

  “Right… I’m sorry.” The anger in the young woman’s voice drained away and all that was left was a tone of misery.

  Aurelia bit her lip. The young woman was clearly in more than just physical pain. A small pang of empathy struck Aurelia’s chest, but she quickly smothered it out. She was already in enough pain with her son’s rejection, the last thing she needed was to deal with the suffering of others.

  And yet, even so, Aurelia forced herself to smile, albeit faintly. “You apologized, that already makes you a more well-behaved Sylvan than Stryg.”

  “Really?” Elayne mumbled, surprised.

  “Oh, yes. That boy never listened to anyone’s orders, let alone mine. He was always getting into trouble and he almost never owned up to any of his shenanigans. Even when he admitted he was in the wrong, he rarely apologized. Obstinate little bastard.”

  “I… I didn’t know…” 

  “Well, what did you think he was like?”

  “I… I thought he was like you.”

  Aurelia blinked. “Huh?”

  Elayne blushed and looked away, whether out of pain or embarrassment Aurelia wasn’t sure. Probably both.

  “I thought he was strong, quiet maybe… but he always seemed to know what to do…” She shrugged weakly, “He was the Moon’s Chosen.”

  “Well, you’re right on all accounts,” Aurelia said wryly. “He is the Moon’s Chosen, since the night he was born I suspect. And while he is often mistaken, he does not waver in his decisions, he acts without hesitation, a rare trait among our people’s mageborns.”

  Aurelia smiled in reminiscence. “Stryg has always been quiet. Ever since he was a child he rarely spoke a word to anyone. The other tribe members found it unnerving. And you’re right, he is strong… but that wasn’t always the case.”

  “He was weak?” Elayne whispered in disbelief.

  “Oof, the weakest of the tribe. Yet what he lacked in his muscles, he made up for in his heart. That child could fall and fail, but he would get back up every time. When the other younglings would run away at the growl of a predator lurking in the trees, Stryg wouldn’t hesitate to stand in between the beast and the others. That’s just who he is.”

  “He sounds brave…” Elayne said in admiration.

  “Oh, quite the contrary. Stryg is a coward.”

  “What?”

  “He’s afraid. He doesn’t act out of bravery, he acts because he’s scared. Scared to seem weak, scared to not live up to his tribe’s expectations… And now he’s afraid to lose that which he holds most dear, the family he’s found. He’ll do anything to keep them safe. I worry that fear rules him and it will lead him to do something rash one day.” Aurelia smiled weakly, “I suppose he must have gotten that from me…”

  “I— don’t understand,” Elwayne furrowed her brow.

  “You don’t need to.”

  The door opened and the acolyte walked back inside. Without a word, she carefully placed both the water basins and the towels at the edge of the stone table.

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  “And the jar?” Aurelia asked.

  “Ah, right!” The acolyte nodded and hurriedly pulled out a red jar from her satchel and handed it to her.

  “You may go,” Aurelia said without bothering to glance at her.

  “At once, First Mother.” The acolyte bowed and left.

  Aurelia popped off the green lid and pulled out several thick pale roots. 

  “What is that?” Elayne asked warily.

  “Chew, do not swallow. It’ll help with the pain.” Aurelia stuffed the white roots into her mouth without hesitation.

  Elayne gagged for a moment but began to munch on the roots.

  “See, you even listen. Stryg would have spat it out without a second thought,” Aurelia shook her head.

  “Thanksh,” she mumbled through her chewing.

  “As I was saying earlier, you need not understand any of what I say. That root is a very powerful anesthetic cultivated by the Green mage acolytes of the temple. One of its side effects happens to be short-term amnesia. By the time you wake up, you’ll forget this conversation ever happened.”

  Elayne froze at her words.

  Aurelia glanced at her expectantly, “Keep chewing.”

  Elayne swallowed her spit and reluctantly continued crunching the roots. She could feel the juices being released from within the plant, the liquid numbing her throat.

  “I think in many ways Stryg takes after me,” Aurelia continued. “Stubborn to a fault and unyielding with his goals. It’ll make him a powerful mage, but not a good leader. He needs people to temper his anger and willfulness.”

  Aurelia sighed heavily, “I don’t think I can help him with that, not anymore. I don’t know if my son will ever trust me again… I’m afraid. I’m afraid I’ve lost him.”

  Elayne spit the roots out of her mouth and shook her head as best she could. “You haven’t.”

  “What?”

  “My father and I fight all the time… He even put me into the shamans’ squadrons instead of leaving me in the warrior battalions. He thinks he knows what’s best for me, even though it's my life, and I’m the one who has to live it. I resent him for that,” she admitted quietly. “But at the end of the day, I love him and I know no matter all the terrible things I’ve told him, he loves me. Maybe you said some things that hurt Stryg, but if he really is your son, then you should apologize and tell him how you feel.”

  “Is that what you did? With your father?”

  “No…” Elayne smiled wryly, “I’m not that strong. But I think you are.”

  “My, you might just be wiser than you look,” Aurelia noted dryly and stuffed fresh roots into Elayne’s mouth. “Now chew.”

  She frowned but did as she was told.

 

~~~

 

  Stryg strolled through the wolf pens, glancing at the wolves and their riders. He heard that ever since last spring the wild wolves of the forest had begun choosing goblins from among the Sylvan tribes. The craftsmen in Evenfall had built the pens to house the wolves, though they were free to come and go as they wished. Many of the riders had even grown accustomed to sleeping in the pens with their wolves whenever they were here.

  Stryg found the whole thing worthy of admiration; a bond that neither beast nor man would ever break, a bond of trust. Trust…

  He felt like he was running low on that these days. Everyone in the city was expecting so much of him as the Moon’s Chosen and now War Master. And the only ones he could talk to about it with were Plum and Tauri, the only two outsiders. Neither of them could truly grasp the vast scope, subtle details, and the pressure that his culture put on him. Nor did he have the time to sit down and explain it all to them.

  Lykos had called him here for some sort of a meeting, one which Stryg suspected concerned his daughter’s injuries.

  A sudden scream broke him out of his contemplations. Stryg looked up at the sound of wood shattering behind him. A giant wolf with jet-black fur and larger than any centaur, crashed through the pens, his fangs bare. The smaller wolves scrambled away in high-pitched howls.

  “Frost wolf!” one of the hunters shouted in a panic.

  Why was a frost wolf here? They rarely visited the pens and preferred to stay in the city’s outskirts, amidst the mountain forest.

  Stryg unconsciously reached out for Krikolm in alarm, but it wasn’t at his waist, he had left it back at the temple.

  The frost wolf abruptly stopped its rampage of destruction and turned to him. Stryg glanced around and realized he was the only goblin who hadn’t run away.

  Shit…

  The frost wolf growled in a deep rumble.

  Stryg stared at the beast’s pale blue eyes as it stalked towards him. He furrowed his brow and cocked his head to the side, “...Blueberry?”

 

 

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