Chapter 56: I got taken on a stroll, met a super hot noble lady who is awfully pale but definitely not a vampire despite fitting all the tropes and also my eyes are permanently fucked, probably.

-Sephie-

A dull, throbbing pain pulsed through every part of my body, long before I could even hope to open my eyes. At least I was lying somewhere soft and warm. A bed.

I heard dull, muffled voices sounding out from around me. Muted, as if I was under water. One of them was very agitated, the other calm and collected. I couldn’t make out what they were saying, but at least I knew my ears were still working - albeit badly. What wasn’t working, however, were my legs. Or my arms for that matter. I could still feel them, which I think was a good sign - it meant whatever it was, it would probably get better - but it was still worrying. The downside, of course, was that what little I could feel was almost entirely pain. 

I tried once more to move, to no avail, and finally decided to dedicate my attention to the only thing that didn’t seem broken: My brain.

First, I needed to figure out where I was, but to do that I had to figure out the second most important thing: What the fuck even happened?!

I tried to organise my memories from before.

We were having dinner at the magistrate’s place. We were tense at first, but it got better. He seemed like a good guy. Then… something bad happened. Did he betray us after all? No, that wasn’t it… He was worried, too. He sent his right hand man away to deal with it. 

That’s when we realised something was wrong. There was a… a fire. And a strange rider. We fought him and we won. I think.

But he wasn’t alone, he was with that demon girl Cassie likes so much. Or did they hate each other? It was hard to tell, really. My headache didn’t help it, either. Whatever they had going on, we still fought with her. And then… then what? Nothing. Darkness. Pain. And all of my friends were gone.

But before that there was light, brighter than anything I’d ever seen. A spell.

Did… did I cast that? I was preparing… something throughout the entire fight.

But… I couldn’t possibly cast such a powerful spell. Thinking about all the spells I’d ever put in my spellbook, there was not a single one that came to mind that could do so much.

But what did it look like? Well… a very strong light spell. A blinding spell? But why would I cast a spell that’d hurt not only our enemy, but my friends and I as well? That didn’t make any sense at all…

And even then, I didn’t know any blinding spells, only a simple light spell.

Well… there were also the spells from the elven spellbook. I didn’t really remember most of them but… maybe there was something in there to help? 

Maybe-

I was promptly shaken, literally, out of my thoughts. The muted voice came back. Soft, but agitated. She said a few things I couldn’t understand and something about… being sorry? Sorry what for?

I didn’t get the chance to ask, mostly because I couldn’t even find the strength to open my lips, but also because I was suddenly lifted up by a pair of very strong arms. Shyleen?!

So I was with Shyleen. That was good. That meant we won, right?

So why did I feel so… lost and empty?

I felt us moving outside, the warm, cosy air was quickly replaced by a cool breeze. The smell of smoke and rain filled my nostrils. There were more voices now, anxious ones, angry ones, sad ones. Something knocked Shyleen off-balance, but she caught herself. 

Then we stopped. Shyleen exchanged some words with someone. She was angry, she screamed something at the other person. Then I was put down onto… a bench? Something wooden. It wasn’t comfortable and I found myself wishing back the time I was lying on the bed earlier. My wish wasn’t answered, of course.

Instead, the bench lurched forward and started moving. Not a bench then. A coach? 

Where would we be going that required a coach? And without most of my friends. Shyleen was still there. I could… feel her, somehow. A reassuring presence opposite me. Her hand reached out and squeezed mine. It hurt, but even if I could, I wouldn’t have told her to stop.

Rocking down the road, I slowly drifted off to sleep.

*****

I awoke somewhere soft again. The pain was gone and I felt I could move my arms and legs again. Slowly, I let my eyes drift open and the world filled with shapes and colour once more.

I was in a large bed, larger than any I’d been in before. A blood-red blanket was stretched out underneath me and a canopy of the same colour hung up above. The walls were dark grey, almost black stone bricks. Small candles stuck in iron wall-mounts spent what little light there was in this room, allowing me to catch a glimpse of the rows and rows of portraits and landscapes hung up on the walls throughout this room.

There were even armours, standing like in the castles and palaces back home, but they looked different. The armour was more segmented, like horizontal plates layered on top of one another. These plates were then mounted on a larger leather harness that then filled in the gaps of the armour. The helmet was also very different. I was wider than the ones I knew. Flared out, with a wide, short visor and a face mask that rovered up where the visor didn’t reach. The whole thing was also colourful. Reds, blacks, yellows and blues shone brightly in the candlelight.

I slowly sat up and climbed out of the bed, my feet touching the cold stone floor. I hissed for a moment, but quickly acclimated to the temperature. It wasn’t pleasant, but still much more comfortable than the way I felt beforehand, so I decided I’d be fine.

I grabbed one of the candles off the wall and made my way around the room. The paintings intrigued me, as did the armour. Maybe they could help me figure out where I was. And give Shyleen time to get back to me, wherever she went off to. 

The landscapes were… somewhat familiar. Large mountainscapes, farmlands, woods. Not familiar like home, but familiar like the land we’d sailed through when we first came to this faraway realm. The portraits were… less familiar. 

Nearly every one of them showed a different person, all of which were relatively young-looking, wearing regal clothes, adorned with gold and silver accents. Nearly all of them were relatively pale. They reminded me a lot of Xuè Yun, now that I was looking closely. 

Was this his family’s home? The magistrate had said something about bringing us to the capital and Xuè Yun mentioned growing up there alongside the magistrate.

I glanced at the next portrait in the row. Two people, standing next to one another. A man and a woman. They were objectively pretty. Unfairly so, really. This effortless type of pretty. And while it might be seen as a faux-pas to call a man pretty, rather than handsome, it definitely was the more apt word in this case.

In fact, were it not for the type of dress, I would have taken him for a woman. The two figures were nearly identical looking: Long, straight black hair. A smooth, porcelain-looking, sharp face with a pointed chin. They both had the same little dint right in the middle of their chins, as well as the same dimple on their upper lips. 

They also shared the same blood-red, heart shaped lips, deep red eyes and the same inviting, tantalizingly wicked smile. They even had the same chest - which, I hoped, didn’t bother the girl so much. Not that flat chests weren’t pretty. I liked them just fine, at least. Though if I myself were any more flatter, I’d probably feel bad about it.

The only thing separating the two, really, were the clothes and the hairstyle. The man wore tight black pants and a loose-fitting white shirt that exposed a large portion of his chest. Over his shoulder hung a short black and red cape. His hair was slicked back behind his pointed ears, where it simply fell down to his back.

On the other side, the girl let her hair fall down naturally, only holding it off from falling into her face with a detailed silver diadem. She wore a snug fitting deep red dress, with a tight-looking back corset that tried - and failed - to make her chest look anything less than flat. The dress fell into a slit skirt that exposed her left leg entirely. 

The look certainly didn’t do anything for me at all, which is why it was also totally normal to stare at her exposed leg for longer than was socially acceptable.

At least I was alone.

”Like what you see?” A sultry voice whispered into my ear, sending me flying across the room, smashing into one of the armours and watching in horror as the whole thing tipped over and on top of me.

The last thing I saw was the large helmet falling down towards me faster than I was comfortable with, before darkness took me and the pain from earlier was back in full swing.

*****

The coach was still rocking down wherever we were at. My body still felt shattered, but I was starting to slowly regain control of some of my muscles. I could twitch my fingers, which made me giggle, despite the pain. Which in turn made me realise my mouth was also working again.

I felt Shyleen’s hand squeeze my hand in hers once more - it still hurt, but I didn’t complain. Was she holding my hand all this time? I must’ve been asleep for quite a while…

“Heya, sleepyhead,” her soft voice purred at me and I felt her other hand ruffle through my hair.

Fighting away the blush I felt coming on, I mumbled: “Mm, hey Shyleen. Where are we?”

Her hand in my hair came to a rest on my cheek and her thumb brushed across my cheekbone lightly. “We’re in a carriage, eastbound. The magistrate has ordered that we need to head to the capital. Xuè Yun is takin’ us. I… argued with him. You were still pretty banged up this morning, I didn’t think you were ready for travel, but he wouldn’t change his mind.”

I nodded, as little a nod as I could summon through the pain. “I think I heard you two this moning.”

“Right… You seemed… awake. But you didn’t respond when I talked to you, so I thought you were still unconscious.”

“I think I-”

The wagon hit a hard bump, sending the two of us flying down to the hard ground. I felt Shyleen holding me close. Did she break my fall? If she did, it didn’t help the pain much, as grateful as I was.

“You should’ve just beat Yun up, when you had the chance this morning,” I chuckled.

“Oh believe me, I would’ve. I’m just…” I felt her body tense up against mine, “I’m not really in… uh… fighting form. Right now.”

“Are you hurt?!”

“Barely,” Shyleen lied. I knew she lied, because she twisted away from me when she said it.

“You should rest as well, then. No point in wasting all your energy on me. I’ll be fine, Shyleen.”

“You ain’t f-”

“I’m fine,” I insisted. “Just… help me back up the bench and get me my bag.”

Shyleen sighed, then heaved me up and sat me down on the bench. “You ain’t fine at all…” she mumbled, before ruffling around some things on her side of the coach. A moment later I felt the familiar fabric of my bag gently placed into my hands.

I felt around the bag, searching for a few components. Strawberry leaves and mandrake roots, to be precise. It took me a while, without the aid of my eyesight, but eventually I found what I needed.

“Where are your wounds?” I asked.

Shyleen sighed once more. “It really ain’t that bad.”

“Show me.”

Grunting and mumbling something incomprehensible, Shyleen shifted around. I heard cloth being pushed aside. “Here. Not like you can see any of it anyways…”

I reached out with my hand and quickly found Shyleen in front of me. “Guide me,” I ordered.

She actually huffed, which was very cute, but she grabbed my hand anyway and gently placed it near her… waist? Yes, waist. There were bandages there, I noted.

“What happened?” I asked, voice almost a whisper.

“I… uh… I got… kind of… stabbed.”

“How deep?”

“Um. Like… maybe… uh. All the way… through.”

“That is not “barely hurt” at all!” I protested. “Take off the bandages.”

I felt her body tense up underneath my hand. It was different from before, though. It wasn't an uncomfortable tensing up, more… like back when we were sharing a bed and she… oh gods… I made her blush didn’t I? 

I carefully retreated my hand, trying my hardest not to tease her for it. Not the time for that. Instead, I took the herbs into my mouth and began chewing them into a paste. It wasn’t hard to do this part of it blind. I’d used this spell a few times before and although I usually like having the page open in my spellbook, just to be safe, I was confident I could do it without. 

I took the herb-paste out of my mouth and focused back on Shyleen. “Did you get them off?”

“Y-yeah,” she stammered.

“Good. Guide me again, please.” 

Like before, she grasped my hand and slowly led it to her waist. Without the bandages, I could feel the familiar stickiness of half-dried blood. The smell of iron quickly filled the air. There was a slit there, unstitched, some fresh blood poured out and onto my fingers. Shyleen hissed.

“Sorry,” I whispered. “This is going to hurt a bit more than that, though.”

I guided half the paste into the slit I’d found and Shyleen hissed once more. Was that a whimper? Oh sweety… But this had to be done. Not like she was properly taking care of the wound by herself - noting the severe lack of stitches - and if noone was going to take care of it, the wound would definitely fester.

I muttered the familiar arcane words, intoning every single syllable of the ancient elvish incantation as precisely as I possibly could. It was a long and winding one, which made the whole thing worse, but it worked just fine on Cassie back at the beginning of my little adventure.

As I spoke, the paste seeped into her wound, the slit slowly but surely pulling close underneath my hand. Then, with a slick squelch, this side of her wound closed fully. 

I heard as Shyleen let out a deep breath.

“I’m sorry,” I repeated. “But we’re not done. Need to get the other side as well.”

“Right… yea. Fuck,” Shyleen cursed and turned around. Her hand found mine once more and guided it to the wound. It was a bit harder this time, the wound being on her back, but she found it all the same.

I pressed the other half of the paste into the wound and repeated the incantation. She was taking it much better this time. She was a tough girl, after all. I was surprised she was being this vulnerable in the first place, but then again, I’d never witnessed her in a state this badly wounded.

“There, all done,” I exclaimed as the wound slicked shut. “Any more wounds I should look at?”

“Can’t look at any wounds at all, with your eyes closed like that all the time,” Shyleen mumbled. “Maybe take care of those next.”

“Healing magic works differently on oneself,” I explained. “It’s too dangerous, right now. I’d need a few hours of preparation, a spell circle, the works. It’s fine. I’m pretty sure it’s just my muscles all being a bit wrecked. Can’t move my legs either, right? I’ll be fine once I got some more rest.”

Shyleen hmpfed and her hands cupped my face. “It’s weird, though. Can you see shadows at all?”

“What do you mean?”

“You said it’s just the muscles. So you should still be able to see. It’s just that the eyelids are in the way.”

“It’s… just dark.”

“Can you open your eyelids?”

“I told you the muscles don’t-”

“Just try it,” Shyleen hissed.

I took a deep breath. I didn’t want to argue and she let me fuss over her wounds mostly without talking back. Mentally preparing myself for the immediate onset of even more pain, I concentrated on my eyes and tried to open my eyelids.

I felt something move, but my vision remained dark. The was also barely any pain. Just a dull… ache.

“Holy fuck…” Shyleen whispered.

“What is it? I still can’t see anything, you know.”

The fox girl pulled back from me, her hands ruffling through something. Her hair? 

“Yeah no shit,” she cursed, pacing around the coach. “Your eyes… they’re… like… black.”

“That’s weird. They’re usually blue.”

“No, like. All black. Charred, like coal. Hard.”

Oh. “Fuck.”

“Yea.”

Muffin_Maeve

Wooowie what a chapter.

We're back with Sephie and things are bad!
At least she got to fondle Shyleen a little, so it's not all bad.

Just... a little... lot... bad.
I know how words work, shut up.

Anyways, I really hope you liked this chapter!
I sure liked writing it. Especially the encounter with the very hot strangely pale lady. 
For no reason whatsover.

Vampirefetishistsayswhat.
What?
Uh.

Ignore that. Love y'all <3
-Maeve <3

P.S.: Smol real life update: My PC is probably very fucked, currently sitting in the IT-hospital that is my best friend's place.
Which means I'm writing this from my dad's old macbook pro 2011.
It is... very slow.
But I can write! HAHA!
Small victories, I guess :3