Swords and Staffs

3. Regaining consciousness

Alistair:

As soon as I gained full consciousness, I jumped up to my feet. I jerked my head around, observing the battlefield.

Masses of torn tents and dismembered wagons occupied the area. Wounded soldiers lay on the floor. Most of them were not fatal but untreated. The rain seemed to have stopped, after flooding our crops and leaving significant streams trickling though the seams of the stone floor. Our main tents had been invaded by waves of water and our weapons shelter lay there in a pile. The storm had played a decent part in the destruction of our camp, not to say the mages didn't have anything to do with it either.

I hadn't been out for too long. The battle must have ended earlier than I had predicted. The mages had retreated and left a mess behind and I saw my mother helping a citizen. I decided to accompany her. She caught my eye.

"Alistair, thank Aaldin that you're okay!!" mother squealed as I approached her. She hugged me tightly and examined the small cut on my forehead.

"My dear son! I told you that you should have stayed inside!" She ran to fetch a wet handkerchief for my wound.

"Mother! It's only a graze! I'm fine! I'm eighteen now, I can take care of myself" I groaned as she pressed the cold material to my head.

"Besides, there are other people out here who are bleeding to death. I have to help!" I scanned my eyes across the bloody landscape. A small woman was lying in the corner of the field, bleeding. Dying. I rushed towards her.

"Miss!" I screamed. No sound.

"Miss are you ok?" she still didn't answer.

I quickly took my Templar breastplate off and scooped her up into my arms. She was fairly light. I quickly checked her pulse; she was barely alive. I ran to my tent and gently placed her almost-lifeless body on my bed. I reached for the bandages to cover up the huge gash across her stomach.

In the time it took to bandage up her wound I came to the realisation of how beautifully familiar she was.

Her thick lips were tinted a deep scarlet red, delicate and tender, her shoulder-length, jet-black hair was soft and elegant. Her body was slender and dainty, so delicate it should be forbidden to touch. She seemed as fragile as glass. As if anyone so much as held her too tight, she would shatter into a million pieces and you would never be able to put her back together. I had never seen anyone as divine as she.

After a few minutes, she began to wake. Her eyelids slowly lifted open to reveal her stunning royal purple eyes. They were beautiful, her most fascinating feature.

Arlene:

I was almost conscious.

"What...?" I started.

"Sssshhh, don't waste your energy, you're okay now," an unrecognisable voice whispered softly into my ear.

Lethal stabbing pains began to occur around a certain area of my stomach. I felt cold although my palms were still sweaty and so was my forehead. The dizziness spun the unfamiliar room around and made me feel nauseous.

Some of the blur washed away from my eyes to expose the shape of a man pressing a wet cloth against a deep cut into my stomach.

Eventually, the fog went away, and my eyes instantly focused on the details of the man's face. He looked somewhat familiar. He had quite a round face. His blond hair was slicked back, and his eyes were a clear ocean blue. He was quite tall and lanky. However, he had small muscles in his arms not at all like that bulky Templar that charged at me in the battlefield. Quite handsome.

He looked confused as to why I was staring at him, I was trying to figure out who he was. However, I wasn't making any progress, so decided to ask him.

"Who are you?" I asked, my injury- which I didn't remember I had- stinging again. He looked at me, now aware that I was fully awake and began to speak.

"Forgive me for startling you miss, I'm Alistair, I found you lying by the fortress, bleeding. They got you pretty bad." Alistair.... the name rang in my head.

"Alistair?"

"Yes... do I know you?"

"Wait a second! Ali? Ali from when I was a kid? That's why you look so familiar! I used to play with you, here in Mournstead, before the feud!"

"We did?" he looked bizarrely baffled.

"You really don't remember me? Princess Arly, Sir Ali the Great? The wooden swords we used to fight with, the paper dragons we used to pretend with?"

"Oh yes! Look how much you have changed! No wonder I didn't recognise you! What happened to the pigtails and the ribbons?" he joked.

"I am pretty sure I out-grew those a long time ago." I stated, still slightly dizzy.

"I didn't realise you were still living here, where's Arcadia and Nicholas? How are they doing?"

"Oh, umm..."

"Arlene?"

"Father is probably at home and mother... well..." Alistair looked at me extremely confused.

I felt there and then like I wanted to die. My muscles tightened up and I clenched my body stiffly. I considered that, after all that had happened, would dying be the easy way out? The end to all my misery. Mother's death, father blaming me for it, me feeling guilty that it may be my fault. I wasn't sure. The hole in my chest began to ache and sting. The build-up of pain physically hurt me as well as mentally. I tried to hold myself together.

"It doesn't matter...." I replied, still in agony from my physical and emotional wounds.

"What do you mean?" he looked puzzled and intrigued at the same time. My eyes began to puff up and before I could stop it, a tear escaped and rolled down my cheek. And then another and another until a whole river had burst its banks and came flooding down, flowing down my face and onto the mattress beneath me.

"Are you crying? Please forgive me! I didn't mean to upset you! What did I say? Whatever I said, I am so sorry! I'll leave if you want. Are you okay Arlene?" his forehead wrinkles in worry and his eyebrows lowered in concern.

"It's fine..." I began, sniffing while I spoke and trying to recover my tears. "It's me, you have been so kind and considerate, and it's something else. And please don't leave! I don't want to lose my childhood friend again." I added the last sentence quickly.

"Do you want to talk about it?" he asked, I knew that he wasn't sure about what to say.

My head began to spin again; my palms started to sweat even more than usual, and I looked at Alistair again, who was waiting patiently for an answer. He had grown up a lot since I last saw him, his golden blond hair glinting shiny and bright. He had a pleasant presence to him, just like before. I had no idea what had come over me, but part of me wanted to start this forgotten friendship from scratch. Part of me wanted to discover what this guy was like and start it the time we had together all over again.

I felt a strange and overpowering sensation in my body and suddenly became drowsy and disoriented. It then became blurry and dizzy again, I didn't understand what had come over me...