>>6052657You try to protest. The part of you that’s a bit too proud for your own good, the part of you that feels a bit too vulnerable and embarrassed at having Salicera tend to your wounds, would have her reach out to Rubida. For some reason, you’d feel better treated with her, and you need to know she’s safe. She has to. if she kept the ray of light focused on her armour, and it has not strayed…
“You cannot fight like this,” Salicera reminds you. “Ah, I spilled it again,” she groans as she proceeds to dab at your chest with the dry hem of her sleeve, reforming the circle once again.
<span class="mu-i">I cannot fight like this</span>, you think as well, and you let it go. At least for now.
Besides, this feels… nice. A bit embarrassing. You feel so vulnerable, like you are once again a thirteen-years-old girl running through the vineyards.
You are so very selfish.
“I thought you were dead,” you mutter, your voice broken. “I thought the Sister had shattered you. What did she— how…”
Salicera shakes her head.
“It was just like with that other cursed tree. Folding space, illusions… visions.” She points at the head laying on the floor. “In the end it did not make any difference.”
She managed to kill one of the Seven Sisters while she was incarnating. Sure, it had just been at the very start, and it’s always easier to snuff a candle flame than to deal with a raging bonfire.
“So you killed it,” you let out a long-held sigh. “It’s over. The mission is over… we can come back.”
“Yes. As soon as you learn how to walk on your own legs again.”
“Master… ah— Master always said I am a fast learner.” You try to sit on your elbows, and with a strain you manage to do so, looking down on your chest where Salicera is applying a further line of ointment, glistening slightly at the fading light of the flower. The reek of the burning corpses is still thick and heavy in the air, but so close to the ointment you can mostly smell their sweet scent, as well as Salicera’s sweat.
“We ought to go check on Rubida after this.”
“And we will. Can’t you focus a little bit on yourself, Argia?” Salicera sighs. “You have almost died yourself. How did you—”
[cont.]
