A soldier rushed out of Reya’s room, his face tight with urgency.
"Angus woke up and tried to sit up. His wound might have reopened—the bandage is soaked in blood."
Lara didn’t wait for Agilus or the soldier to react. Without a word, she spun on her heel and strode toward Reya’s room.
Inside, Angus sat at the edge of the bed, shoulders hunched, sweat beading on his forehead. His sunken eyes, dry lips, and the stiff way he held himself spoke of hunger, thirst, and relentless pain.
Lara turned back and swiftly gathered a bowl of porridge that one of the soldiers had prepared earlier and a jug of water, along with another jug containing the last of the medicinal tea she had brewed for Alaric the previous night. When she returned, she handed him the bowl and passed the rest to Agilus.
"Eat a little before I check your wound," she said.
The secret guard grunted a thanks and took the bowl, his hands trembling as he scooped the first spoonful. Each swallow looked painful, but he forced himself through it, his body screaming for nourishment even as the burning in his throat and the deep, gnawing wound in his back made every movement an agony.
Agilus, watching from the side, passed him a few pieces of longan. "Here. They’ll help."
Angus chewed slowly, the juices soothing his parched throat. After he drank the medicinal tea and the water, he felt better.
Lara moved behind him and began unwrapping the bloodied bandage. The moment the last layer peeled away, Agilus sucked in a sharp breath and took an instinctive step back.
He had seen wounded soldiers before, but Angus’ injury — it horrified him.
The wound was brutal—over two feet long, stretching from his left shoulder blade to the back of his right waist. Blood oozed through the sutures, dark and sluggish.
Lara’s brows knit together. How is he even sitting up?
"Do you have someone in your team who knows how to care for wounds? Call them in. I’ll show them how to treat this properly."
The soldier nodded and rushed out. Moments later, he returned with a man in his late twenties, as tall as Lara, with sharp eyes and a relaxed stance.
Lara recognized him immediately—he was always the first to laugh when she and Agilus traded barbs.
"Are you a physician?" she asked.
Felix tilted his head. "I trained under one."
"So, you’re a paramedic?"
Lara sighed. "A medic, then?"
"Alright, a physician’s assistant."
That, at least, got a slight nod.
"What is your name, medic?"
Agilus and the physician’s assistant looked at each other. Who was he calling medic?
"Uhm, it is Felix. My name is Felix, Kane." Felix thought he liked to be called a medic rather than a physician’s assistant.
Lara turned away, retrieving a jar and her medicine kit from the shelf. Her fingers hovered over a clay jar filled with clear liquid. Alcohol.
She was not sure if physicians at the time were already familiar with ethyl alcohol. She knew that people in other parts of the world had been using alcohol as a disinfectant, but AzurVerda was a vast island largely untouched by outside influences. She had studied its history—or rather, the history that existed in her world. This timeline, was nowhere in the books.
Yet, she knew that even in the 21st century, there were remote areas where people still treated wounds with superstition rather than medicine.
"This is alcohol," she explained. "Use it to clean his wound. There is only limited supply, so use it sparingly."
She dipped a cotton swab into the vial and glanced at Angus. "This will sting."
Before he could react, she pressed the swab to the wound.
A sharp inhale. His muscles clenched like iron cords, but he didn’t make a sound.
If Lara could only produce povidone-iodine, the wound would not sting much. However, the disinfectant’s components required chemical processing, which she did not have the capability to do so.
Lara worked quickly, removing dried blood and cleaning the stitches. "Agilus, go ask Alaric for the wound ointment. It worked well on his injury."
The room fell silent.
Agilus, Felix, and Angus all turned to look at her.
The secret guard’s face darkened. He shuddered, shaking his head. "No. That’s Master’s medicine. I won’t take it."
Lara’s hand paused mid-motion.
A strange tension settled in the air.
From the other room, behind the thin, slatted bamboo walls, Alaric had heard everything.
When Lara entered the room, he already had the ointment in his hand.
She barely glanced at him. "I’ll check your wound after I finish treating him. His is worse—I can’t believe he’s still breathing."
Alaric didn’t respond. His dark eyes were fixed on her, unblinking.
This time, she wasn’t wearing a hat.
The morning rays of the sun that seeped through the crack on the walls cast a golden glow on her hair—copper-brown, thick, and knotted neatly at the crown of her head.
His grip on the canister tightened.
Lara reached for it. "Can I use that on him? He saved your life, after all. I’ll be careful, I won’t use too much."
Alaric hesitated for only a moment before handing it over. Their fingers brushed, and though the contact lasted barely a second, a strange heat lingered.
Lara barely noticed. She was already walking away.
"I’ll be back in a moment," she called over her shoulder.
Alaric watched her go, her voice carrying into the other room as she instructed Felix on how to care for the wound properly.
In the other room, Lara thinly spread the ointment on the wound as the guard showed reluctance.
"I don’t deserve this medicine."
Lara scoffed. "If your injury isn’t life-threatening, do you think I’d waste it on you? Get better. How else are you going to protect your master?"
Her words struck something deep within him. The tension in his shoulders eased.
Lara nodded, satisfied. "Felix, after seven days, the wound should be healed enough to remove the sutures."
She demonstrated how to do it, but Felix barely heard her. His mouth was slightly open, staring at the precision of her stitches.
After wrapping Angus’ wound in fresh bandages, she stood and handed him a small wooden pillbox. "There are six pills inside. Give him one each day for three days—it’ll fight infection. The rest, use wisely. Only for those who need it most."
"Come with me, Felix. We need to check on someone else."