Chapter 1942: Awakening to Failure

Erling woke, reluctantly, to the greatest pain he’d ever felt. His whole body ached in a way he hadn’t felt since the year he insisted on picking grapes alongside the commoners in his vineyards.

At the time, he thought that it was important to understand the labor that sustained Fayle barony, so he spent several days filling basket after basket with bunches of grapes and carrying them back to be crushed into juice.

He worked from sun up to sun down with the hot sun burning overhead and few moments to rest. By the end of it, he’d gained a profound respect for the men who worked in the vineyards. He also found muscles he didn’t know he’d possessed when those muscles started to cramp and complain at the abuse he’d put them through.

That was how he felt now. Like every muscle and sinew had been stretched to the limit again and again, right up to the point they should snap.

Beyond the bone-deep ache, fire burned in his thigh and forearm. Sharp, piercing pain that froze him where he lay, not daring to move lest he make it worse.

"Mmmmrrrr..." Erling groaned as he struggled to open his eyes.

"Erling," a ragged, familiar voice said. "You’re awake," his mother cried, rushing forward to gently smooth back the hair that clung to his brow. "Thank the Light, you’re awake."

"Where...?" Erling asked in confusion as he tried to look around. There was only a single lamp burning in what looked like a small stone room. Aside from his mother, the only person in the room was Lady Heila, who looked as exhausted as he felt.

"Still at the arena," Ragna said gently. "You were so badly hurt, we didn’t dare to take you far."

"You’re very lucky, Lord Erling," Heila said, pushing herself off the wall she’d been leaning against as she came over to inspect her patient. "If Khorijin hadn’t carried you out of the forest, things might have been much worse by the time we reached you to heal you."

"She carried me out," Erling said with a deep sigh. "I lost."

"You lived," Ragna emphasized. "Despite that woman’s attempts to kill you."

"That’s not fair, Mother," Erling protested. "I’m the one who got caught in his own trap. But she escaped it. It seems like I owe her a debt," he said, slumping on the blanket beneath him. "And Reynold too..."

"All of that can wait," Ragna said, doing her best to contain the storm of feelings that her son’s words summoned. How was it that he could be so friendly towards the woman who had all but claimed his life? Had they truly forged some kind of bond in the middle of the contest?

"Right now, you just need to rest and recover," she said, putting aside her worries about her son and his relationship with the Eldritch woman. She very deliberately didn’t mention Khorijin’s comments about marrying him, and she pressed her finger to her lips when she shot a look at Lady Heila, indicating to the petite witch that she shouldn’t mention it either.

"I’ll have Emmie call for a carriage," Heila said, moving to leave the mother and son in peace. "Don’t exert yourself, Lord Erling. Once you feel up to it, you should eat a large meal, and then you should sleep."

"I’ll check on you again tomorrow," she promised. "Or Mother Ashlynn will," she added. "We may need to take you to a forest for more healing if your body doesn’t mend on its own quickly enough. I’ve done as much as I can here, but there are limits even for me, so don’t ruin my hard work by doing foolish things," she said as she turned to leave.

"Wait," Erling said, stretching out a hand and trying to sit up. It was a thoughtless, automatic gesture, and the pain that flared from his hip to his shoulder and along his arm taught him very quickly the price of moving carelessly.

Still, there were things he needed to know, and he bit back a cry of pain in order to ask them.

"Has Reynold fought? Or Commander Aspakos?" Erling asked. "Where does the score stand after my... my failure?"

"We need to reshape the arena," Heila said. "The forest is in the way for the next match between Lord Reynold and Taghai. Lord Reynold insisted that he go next for the chance to preserve his father’s life."

"So the rest is still to come," Erling said, slumping back down. "I should stay here then. I should watch until the end. I... I owe Reynold that much, and his family too."

"You owe it to yourself to recover," Ragna said sharply. "You’ve given enough in someone else’s fight..."

"I don’t see it that way," Erling insisted. "Besides, I doubt that Khorijin went slinking back to her chambers after the contest ended," he said with a wry smile. "She’s probably sipping warm wine in the Imperial Box right now and celebrating her victory. I should at least thank her for carrying me out."

"You should," Heila said before Ragna could protest. For a moment, she gave Erling a long, measuring look before speaking again, this time choosing her words with exceptional care. "You surprised me tonight, Lord Erling. In a good way. You have a talent for sorcery and a heart that cares for others."

"I won’t forget these things when I speak to Mother Ashlynn about you," Heila promised. "If you keep pushing yourself like this to care for others, including your Eldritch neighbors like Khorijin, and if you can respect their ways... Mother Ashlynn may yet ask more of you than leading a single protectorate."

"I don’t know that I’m up to doing more than watching over my people," Erling said with a light chuckle. "As for my ’talent’ with sorcery... It didn’t seem like enough to win the night."

"You did more after two days of lessons than Mother Ashlynn did after her first week of lessons," Heila said, surprising both Fayles. "I was there. I remember. Of course, she didn’t wear herself out as you did. She was careful, and she was learning to master other powers at the same time. But still, believe me when I say that you are talented and Mother Ashlynn has been looking for people with good hearts and the right talents."

"Take it as your victory tonight, Lord Erling," Heila said. "You have impressed me and impressed Mother Ashlynn. Whatever anyone else says about your loss to Khorijin, you still have that."

"I would think you’d be more impressed with the victor than the vanquished," Erling said with a self-deprecating laugh.

"She had her whole life to prepare for a contest like this," Heila said, shaking her head. "You had a few days. That you pushed her so far and that you risked so much... Trust me, Lord Erling, we know which is more impressive, even if outsiders won’t understand."

"You can go back to the Imperial Box," Heila said, opening a simple wooden door and waving her squire over. "I’ll leave Emmie to care for you for now. But when this is all over, remember that you need rest," she said before leaving the wounded young lord and his mother behind.

Outside, the sound of breaking, shattering ice filled the air as Hauke the Frozen Forest. Snow and tiny shards of ice drifted on the wind as dozens of trees’ worth of ice fruits exploded at once, shattering the trees that held them in a wave of destruction that swept from one end of the field to the other.

Hauke’s horn blazed with icy blue light as he regathered the energy of the forest, preserving much of the energy it had taken to construct it so it could be reshaped for the competition to come.

"Welcome back, Heila," Ashlynn said, smiling as the first witch in her coven returned to her side. "How is Erling?"

"Stubborn, like you," Heila said in a tone that few would dare to use with the Evergreen Empress. "He wants to watch the rest from the Imperial Box. He says he owes it to Reynold. He insisted on giving his thanks to Khorijin for rescuing him too," she added. "He’s a good man."

"I see," Ashlynn said with a nod. "Virve will be there in case anything happens, and Ollie too. He should be fine even if his wounds trouble him again." 𝒻𝑟ℯℯ

"For now, it’s time to set the stage for the joust," Ashlynn said. "Are you up to helping, Heila, or did healing Erling take too much from you?"

"Healing him was painful," Heila said, shuddering as she recalled the intensity of the pain she felt when she tended to his wounds. "But I left him with most of his bruises and only healed the deep cuts. The rest will have to rely on potions and salves," Heila said.

"Smart," Ashlynn said with a light laugh. "Smarter than I’d have been. I’d have tried to heal it all."

"You could have done it," Heila said. "But I’m glad you didn’t. If you did, he might not learn his limits. I think this will be good for him in the long run."

"Oh?" Ashlynn said, raising a brow at the Willow Witch. "You sound like you have something in mind."

"Just a small thought," Heila said. "I was thinking about the story you told the other night, about the Mother of Forests and Witches of the Fruit and Nut," Heila said. "It’s too soon to say, but... Maybe Erling would be good at being a different kind of witch than Virve and Ollie and I," she said.

"You’re right, it’s too soon to say," Ashlynn said, glancing back towards the Imperial Box and the litter being carried there under Emmie and Lady Ragna’s watchful eyes. "But I’ll think about it. For now, we have work to do. It’s time for Reynold to face his foe..."