Chapter 58: A Broken Man
Simon woke up slowly, and feeling the lumpy bed beneath him, he sighed. Despite all that, he’d been returned to his cabin, which meant that he was dead again. Only, if that was true, why was he still in so much pain?
His eyelids shot open at the thought, and he stared up at the ceiling. It was not his ceiling, though. This one was thatched instead of shingled. It took him a moment to notice that he was only seeing it through one eye, though. For a moment, he worried he’d been maimed, which would have been a first for him.
Up until now, he’d always been fine or dead after an encounter. It had been a binary thing. To be terribly wounded but alive, though… he wasn’t sure how he’d be able to deal with that.
Fortunately, he didn’t have to. The blindness was merely due to the way someone had wrapped his head in thick bandages, which was a huge relief.
Simon tried to sit up and felt the whole world spin as he did so. He flopped back down after that, but even that soft blow sent a shiver of pain through his body. He groaned softly, catching the interest of someone because they were on their feet and walking toward him almost immediately.
Hard-soled shoes clicked across the wooden floor, and moments later, a cute young woman was leaning over his bed. With her baby face and big doe eyes, it would have been impossible for Simon to guess her age, and he was in no state to try. She was adorable in that Disney princess sort of way that he’d long since outgrown when he hit puberty.
“No - please don’t move. You mustn’t try to get up,” she said nervously. “You’ve been hurt very badly.”
She opened her mouth, but when she heard someone else moaning, she looked away and said, “I’ll be right back.”
Simon turned his head to watch her go and discovered that he was in a makeshift hospital of sorts. Counting him, he could see at least five wounded men in here, which was about right for an orc attack. He’d never had a chance to see just how many wounded he’d left in Crowvar before…