Check up

Everything went about as I expected it to. A little better if anything. Catherine had said she needed to break and reset my arm, but after seeing me we concluded that the magic spring fixed that too. She double-checked my ribs, my organs, and my feet, and after all that she helped adjust my shoulder, and wrapped it in a temporary brace to help it stay in place while the ligaments healed, as it turned out, my father had pulled on it harder than I thought...

"And lastly, let me see your eyes."

My eyes darted back and forth between her and Mara. "My eyes, what's wrong with my eyes?" I felt my heart rate and my breathing slowly escalate, as my eyes started to sting from the strain.

"Relax. This is just an exam, I need to make sure you heal up right and stay healthy, so I can send you off with a smile."

I swallowed, nervously leaning forward again. "Ok… Just… no bright lights, please. It feels like I can't get used to the daytime after being in the dark for so long."

They paused and looked at each other, Catherine snickering for a moment.

"W-what…" I muttered, still nervously waiting.

"Let's just take a look…"

She looked straight into my eyes, and her own started to glow a bright gold. After a moment she stepped back. Complete silence filled the room as she narrowed her brow, lost in thought. "It's almost like they were burned from the inside… They should recover with time, and maybe a bit of magic. That's why you're sensitive to light. Try to avoid anything that hurts, and if it gets worse I want you to come find me right away alright?"

"Oh… Ok… Is that all?"

"Almost." She sighed. "Speaking of your eyes, how are they feeling since the medicine? Remember they were watering a lot. "You're tear ducts are inflamed again."

I glanced over to the side. "Oh… Right… They're a lot better for sure, I just strained my eyes a lot in the dungeon… Because of… The dark…"

"And."

"And I cried my eyes out once or twice… But I had no trouble holding my tears back when I tried to…"

She sighed. "How do you're heart and lungs feel?" A gold swirl slowly began to attach itself to her ears, wafting around in the air before sliding over my chest to check my heartbeat.

"The last fight I had, it spiked and my chest hurt a lot, but it's felt fine since then."

"Sounds normal, probably just stress, you've had enough of it lately."

'I feel like I'm getting more of it right now…'

"And your lungs?" The gold thread moved slightly. "Deep breath in."

I did as she asked.

"Airways are clear."

'Magic stethoscope…' "I'm surprised you can tell if anything's wrong just by that."

She shrugged. "Well, normally I'd send my thread inside your body, you know, like down you're throat, into your veins, check everything out from the inside."

I felt myself starting to squirm in my seat just imagining it.

"Yeah, that's why I didn't." She said, pointing at my reaction.

With that, the checkup was over. It was a big relief to get it done with. I didn't know why, but I had this nagging feeling that she was going to tell me I was cursed again, but this time it would make me go blind, or that I had permanently scarred my body because I used dark magic, something along those lines.

My eyes being damaged wasn't much of a surprise, given everything that happened, but they weren't hurt that bad either, so it was fine. As I walked out the door of the barracks and felt the cold air on my skin, I felt free. I expected the sensation to overwhelm me in one giant wave, but instead, it felt like it just kept creeping over me again and again. I raised my hand out in front of my face scanning the tendons and muscles, flipping it over to see the calouses. It felt like even the smallest movements of my fingers were a miracle.

I wasn't heading out to the academy for another three weeks, so until then, I could do whatever I wanted. 'It's not just that I feel free, for the first time, I actually am free, aren't I…'

My body may have been hurting, but my head was clear, and what I wanted was to celebrate. 'Maybe I could play a game of cards with the guys?' I went back inside, and ran over to Nillous's room, knocking on it. "Hey Nillous!" I yelled.

He let out a deep angry groan, but it wasn't scary like my father's. It just sounded like he was tired. "What…" He grumbled as he opened the door. The moment he saw me though he stood up straight and soluted. "If it isn't Lady Siya."

I just rolled my eyes at him. "Are the guys around? I wanna play some Eswo– Esowa… That weird card game you guys bet money on." I slowly rubbed my face. 'My head might be clear, but my body is so fatigued I still can't even talk properly…'

He leaned against the door frame with a smirk. "Alright, I can round up a few boys. One condition though, first game we play teams, and you're on mine."

"That's two…"

"Whatever." He groaned, smacking me on the shoulder. "Deal right?"

I felt a bit nauseous from the impact for a moment, but the pain quickly vanished. Although it must have shown, judging by his quick change of expression. "Plesure doing business with you." I smiled back, shaking his hand to ease his worries. After that, it only took a few minutes for us to have a full table.

Eswosten was a game that was Allegedly popular among adventurers. It featured a strange mesh of rules that combined deck building with board pieces. It was played as either 1 on 1 or team vs team, although occasionally there would be battle royal matches as well, some of the rules were even subject to change… Basically, it was the kind of game you'd expect from adventurers…

Being the way they were they tended to add cards and bend the rules until they liked them more. The official rules though, broken down into the simplest terms were as follows. 

Every turn you draw a card, and every card represents an action, each player was given 1 "party" of 3 pieces, support, warrior, and scout, and could use one action for each piece as well as an action from themselves called a strategic decision. When a Player used a card as an action on themselves they would place it face down in front of them and would not have to reveal what it was until it became relevant. These cards would be things like sneak attacks, ambushes, and other such tactics. Unlike in other games though, you didn't have to shuffle your deck, you got to choose the order you could draw the cards in.

All of the rules and nuances of the game were mind-numbing, but after I finally learned them I found that the game very closely resembled proper battle tactics. Well… As much as any card game could. Needless to say, after I picked it up I got hooked, and after that, I started to win… A lot…

Nillous sat next to me, our other partner being Zu… Who was a bit close for comfort. Leaning in to look at my cards after they were dealt.

"After how you acted in the dungeon I would have thought you would be a bit more reserved…" I mumbled.

Of course, those were the only words it took to get him to back away, sitting up straight like a pencil. "Sorry."

I rolled my eyes. Most people I could get a read on pretty fast, those that I couldn't I felt like I could still figure out after a while, but even after all the time we spent with each other, Zu still just seemed strange. "You don't have to be that far away, just don't be breathing down my neck ok?" He started turning red, and I could only imagine his horns and eyes were starting to glow too. 'Maybe… I should have chosen my words better…' Suddenly I was starting to almost feel embarrassed myself. "It's… An expression… It just means, being overly close to someone…" I explained.

To get my mind off… All that… I pulled up my cards as Nillous rested his arm on the table and leaned in. "So, what are you thinking, an ambush?"

Lowering the cards slightly I looked across the table to Cole, one of our opponents. 'An ambush?' It wasn't necessarily a bad idea, but Cole was deceptively perceptive and could read Nillous like a book. 'Ironically, my plan is to make sure you don't know the plan, so you don't give it away… "Let's just see what cards they are playing with. We won't use it for a while though, so don't put it too close to the top of the deck. Otherwise, just run what you normally would and we'll see what happens."

"Ah right, good thinking," he said

We all organized our cards and set the board. 'I wouldn't call it good thinking as much as common sense, but the bigger problem, if any, is going to be—'

"Ok, I move my here, and I take a shot at your warrior." Without discussing it with us at all Zu had already taken his entire turn, and just like in chess once you let go of a piece that was it…

I slowly lowered my face to my palm. "Nillous… Hit him with a stick or something."

"Ow, hey, hey! What did I do?"

I turned back to him. "You just wasted your turn. The move was bad too. You need to move based on what our team is trying to do as a whole. It would have been more ideal for you to outfit your character with something else too." I handed him a set of dice so he could roll to figure out whether he hit. "You need to get a perfect six to even do damage though from this far away."

Sure enough, he rolled a perfect six, critically wounding one of the other team's warriors. "Haha, Yes!" He pumped his fist. "See, I know what I'm doing."

I lowered my head even more pushing my hair back with both hands. 'Were doomed…'