Reality's Escape: a collection of short stories

Mother

Another photo / Reedsy prompt. Had a lot of fun with this one again!

Disclaimer: the photo does not belong to me, if you make it full screen, the credit is at the bottom.

Shayne twitched. His body ached all over, and his head was throbbing. His left foot was cold. Where was he? The smell of herbs, the sound of humming, the soft something he was sitting against... this wasn't the camp.

His eyelids were crusty, but he pried them open. He was in a large stone building. The humming was coming from his right. He turned his head carefully, and something wet fell off his forehead. Liquid dripped down through his eyebrows. He raised a hand to wipe it away.

His arm wouldn't move. It was bound. Panic set in. Maybe Broderick hadn't settled for just a beating. Were they going to torture him? It was only a couple of coins!

His legs were free. Shayne clenched his fists and rolled off the cushions. Pain exploded up his left leg and he collapsed to the floor. He was helpless.

The hand that settled on his shoulder was small. "Up you get, lad."

He craned his head upward to see a woman with grey hair and a rounded figure. There was determination mixed with the kindness in her eyes. Kindness? Shayne decided he was dreaming, and allowed her to help him back into bed. The woman calmly picked up the blanket he had dropped.

"Are you too warm?"

He found his voice, but it was raspy. "No, it's a little chilly."

She used a corner of the blanket to dry his face, dabbing the torn skin gently, then arranged it over his lap. "Are you hungry?"

"Yes."

She walked to a fireplace against the stone wall and poured from a kettle into a bowl, then brought it over. "I haven't been out to check my traps today, so there isn't any meat in there; but it's got some ginger, which should help with muscle recovery." She put it down on a little table beside his bed.

Shayne used his free arm to lift the bowl to his mouth. The soup was warm and spicy down his throat. His stomach growled as the liquid entered his body, and he put the bowl down, half-empty. This wasn't a dream. "Who are you, and where am I?"

The woman pushed the blanket off his left foot, then lifted a cloth from a bucket of water and placed it over his ankle, which he could now see was swollen twice its size. The coolness helped ease the pain. "My name is Lila, but most people just call me Mother."

Shayne snorted.

Lila scraped a mush of crushed greens up from the floor, which must have fallen off his face earlier. "I'll forgive you for that, young man. You are under my roof, after all, unless you'd like to leave."

"Listen, I don't have any money on me. You can stop."

Her hands stilled and she looked at him. "It's been paid for."

That gave him pause. Why would Broderick have him beaten only to pay for his care? It didn't make sense.

"Not by whom you think."

"Then who?"

"Whom."

Shayne rolled his eyes, but not before a memory of his mother presented itself. It had been a long time since one of those had surfaced. He replied sarcastically, "Whom."

Lila smiled. "The same one who granted me his pardon."

"Does he have a name?"

"His name is Jesus."