Kael laid Henry down on the small clinic's sickbed, his hands still trembling with panic. The entire way to this remote village, he had done nothing but clutch Henry's unconscious body close, his ears ringing with the frantic pounding of his own heart, his mouth muttering prayer after prayer for a miracle. He watched Emma hurry to the bedside, his eyes unable to hide the utter panic of a friend fearing for someone he held dear.
"Please, healer, save his life!" Kael cried, his voice so urgent it nearly broke.
Emma did not answer right away. She went and sat at the edge of the bed, her eyes sweeping quickly over the pale, unconscious face of Henry before her, the very face she had barely dared to believe was real only moments earlier. Don't dwell on that face anymore. Right now he's only a patient, nothing more. She told herself this, forcing her gaze back into the proper place of a healer, even as her heart hammered in a chaos she couldn't control.
"I need to look at his wound first," she said, her voice calm enough to surprise even herself.
Emma pressed her hand against the mouth of the wound on Henry's chest. A soft blue light flared from her palm, seeping straight into the bleeding wound, spreading a gentle warmth over the torn flesh. Kael and the soldiers standing around them watched the strange light with wide eyes, caught somewhere between fear and hope, none of them daring to speak and break the stillness of the moment. This was the first time any of them had witnessed with their own eyes the power the villagers had always whispered about, and now, with Henry's very life resting in those same two hands, not one of them doubted any longer whether the rumors were true.
Emma withdrew her hand, and the blue light vanished at once, leaving the wound bleeding noticeably less than before.
"His wound is fairly deep, but not life threatening," she said, looking up at Kael. "I'll get him something to stop the bleeding."
Kael let out a breath of relief, but his eyes had not left Henry's pale face, worry still gnawing at him. Amer, who had been standing quietly in the corner of the room for who knew how long, immediately ran to the medicine shelf, his small hands quickly plucking handfuls of familiar herbs into a gray stone bowl, his movements as practiced as though he had done this a hundred times before. This was not the first time the boy had watched his mother save someone in the middle of the night, but never before had he seen her look this strangely tense while looking down at a patient.
Emma gently parted the torn fabric of Henry's shirt, revealing the blood soaked wound on his chest. Her fingers moved over his skin with a healer's practiced skill, trying not to let herself dwell on anything beyond the task at hand, though the warmth of his body still made her fingertips tremble faintly, a sensation strangely foreign and familiar all at once.
Amer ran back and handed the bowl of herbs to his mother. Emma took it, using a large stone to grind the leaves into a thick, dark green paste, then gently spread it over the mouth of Henry's wound. Sweat had soaked his forehead, his face twisted with a persistent, dull pain, but he still did not wake, only soft groans escaping between labored breaths.
❖ ❖ ❖
The simple bedroom lay bathed in midday sunlight slanting through a small window, its walls rough hewn stone, furnished with a bed, a table holding a water jug and cup beside the headboard, a modest bookshelf in the corner, and an old wooden cabinet standing quietly against the wall. The air in the room carried the faint scent of herbs mixed with damp wood, a rustic fragrance utterly foreign to the gilded chambers of the royal palace Henry was used to, yet strangely, it brought him a quiet sense of calm he couldn't quite name. Henry, dressed now in a plain white shirt, a thin blanket over him, slowly opened his eyes.
The first light to hit his eyes made him wince, his mind still heavy as though he had just come out of some long nightmare. Kael sat leaning against the edge of the bed, his head slumped, having dozed off at some point, his breathing even and steady.
Henry raised a hand to his chest, a sharp pain flaring as he tried to sit up. What happened to me? Why does my chest hurt this much... He gritted his teeth, braced his hands against the mattress, and slowly hauled himself upright.
Kael startled awake the instant he heard the sound, springing to his feet to support Henry, tucking a pillow behind his back so he could lean against the headboard.
"You're awake!" Kael exclaimed, his voice bright with unconcealed joy.
Henry looked around the unfamiliar room, everything before him strange, from the rough stone walls to the faint scent of herbs in the air. "Where are we?" he asked, his voice still carrying a note of confusion.
"This is the healer's house," Kael answered quickly. "The villagers here say this healer is remarkably skilled."
At that very moment, the door swung open, and Emma stepped in, carrying a bowl of still steaming rice porridge, the fragrant scent of rice mingled with fresh ginger spreading through the small room. Henry stared at her, something about the sight of her making his heart skip a beat he couldn't explain.
Emma froze in the doorway as well, her eyes sweeping over Henry's face, now awake and looking straight at her, a wave of unease rising inside her. Will he recognize me? she wondered, her heart skipping a beat, her fingers tightening around the handle of the bowl as though it were something to hold onto.
Kael turned, smiling as he made the introduction. "This is the healer who saved you, Your Highness. Her name is Emma."
Emma stepped in cautiously, coming to stand beside Henry's bed, trying to keep her expression as calm as possible despite the storm of thoughts still churning inside her. "How is your wound feeling now?" she asked, her tone carefully probing.
Henry smiled faintly, a tired but sincere smile. "Thank you for saving my life. I feel much better already."
Those words, along with the warmth in the look he gave her, made something in Emma's chest give a small, sharp ache, a feeling both familiar and strange that she quickly smothered before it could grow into anything more dangerous.
Outside the door, the sound of small hurried footsteps approached, and Amer bounded happily into the room, immediately grabbing the hem of his mother's dress out of unchanging habit. "Mama! We need to go find herbs!" the boy said, his voice bright with excitement.
Henry stared at the boy, startled, his gaze lingering a little too long on that young face, as though searching for something familiar he himself couldn't quite name. "Is this your son?" he asked, his tone probing.
Emma faltered slightly, her hand tightening protectively around Amer's shoulder, an instinctive reflex. "Yes, he is. I've brought you some porridge," she answered, steering the conversation elsewhere.
Henry nodded slightly and asked nothing further. "Thank you."
Emma handed the bowl of porridge to Kael, who took it eagerly without hesitation. "I won't disturb the two of you any further," she said, then took Amer's hand and turned to leave the room.
Henry stared after her retreating figure as it disappeared beyond the door, a vague thought creeping through his mind that he couldn't quite name. "I feel like I've met her somewhere before," he murmured, half to Kael, half to himself. "There's something about her that feels very familiar."
Kael laughed, apparently thinking of something else entirely. "If you ask me, that boy looks a bit like you did as a child, Your Highness. Especially those cold eyes!"
Henry's expression hardened, and he turned to stare at Kael with a look so sharp and cold that the guard flinched and stumbled half a step back, hastily thrusting the bowl of porridge in front of Henry like a shield.
"You should eat your porridge first," Kael said, his tone somewhat pointed. "You need to recover quickly so we can return to the palace."
Henry took the bowl and slowly brought spoonful after spoonful to his mouth, but his mind still lingered on the figure of the woman who had just left, along with an unanswered question that kept smoldering quietly in his chest for the rest of that afternoon.
❖ ❖ ❖
The yard in front of Emma's house was bathed in afternoon sunlight, a long table and wooden chairs set out in the middle of it. The soldiers sat gathered together, some sorting through the various herbs, others grinding them with large stones in stone bowls, the steady sound of pestles pounding filling the quiet countryside air.
Kael helped Henry out into the yard, his steps far steadier now than they had been that morning. The soldiers, catching sight of their commander, immediately shot to their feet, bowing their heads in unison.
"Your Highness!" they called out together.
"How are your wounds?" Henry asked, his eyes sweeping over each soldier's face with genuine concern.
Kael answered with a smile. "The healer has treated them all. There's no need to worry, Your Highness."
Emma stepped out of the house and approached the soldiers, her gaze gentle as it swept over them. "You've all worked hard," she said, then handed one soldier a glass jar filled with vivid green herbal pills. "Remember to take one before each meal."
Henry watched the scene, something warm rising in his chest at this woman's devotion. He smiled and held his hand out toward Emma, his eyes expectant, like a child waiting for a reward.
Emma looked at him and gave a small laugh at the gesture. "You don't need to take medicine," she said. "I already put the herbs into your porridge."
Henry drew his hand back, laughing awkwardly, a little embarrassed, quickly turning to look at the soldiers to hide his sudden fluster. "Carry on with your work," he said, his tone trying to hold onto his usual authority.
The soldiers sat back down at the table, returning to their work of grinding herbs. Emma turned to leave, but Henry hurriedly called out to stop her, as though afraid the chance would slip away if he didn't speak up right then.
"May I ask you something?"
Emma turned back, looking at him with a puzzled expression. "Are you hurt somewhere else?" she asked, a flicker of worry in her voice.
Henry laughed sheepishly, scratching the back of his neck. "No," he said, "it's just that I haven't yet met your husband."
The unexpected question caught Emma off guard for a moment, and then a faint smile touched her lips, tinged with a bitterness she had learned to hide for seven years. "You want to meet my husband?" she asked in return, her voice still gentle. "That will be rather difficult for you."
Henry looked at her, puzzled, missing the hidden meaning in her words. "Why would that be so difficult?"
"My husband is dead," Emma answered, her voice as light as though stating a fact long since made familiar to herself, and then she laughed and turned to walk away, leaving Henry standing frozen in the middle of the yard.
Henry stood rooted to the spot, watching her back retreat, a vague sense of guilt rising in him that he couldn't quite explain. I just asked something remarkably tactless.
Kael stood beside him, looking just as puzzled. "Why did you want to meet her husband?" he asked, curious.
Henry glared at Kael, his face flushing without his meaning it to, for a reason he wasn't yet ready to admit to himself. "That's none of your business," he snapped, then turned and strode off irritably toward the far end of the yard.
Kael hurried after him, stealing glances at his commander's still flushed face, privately thinking that perhaps the wound in Henry's chest wasn't the only thing keeping him restless since waking up in this small house. He glanced back toward the wooden house where Emma had just disappeared, then over at Henry striding ahead of him, his expression still not fully settled, and wondered whether he ought to bring this up with his commander again once he had calmed down, or whether it was better to stay silent and let things unfold on their own.
❖ ❖ ❖
Night fell, and the small clinic sank into the pale golden light of the oil lamp on the worktable. Outside the window, the chirr of insects mingled with the wind rustling through the bamboo grove at the edge of the village, a familiar sound that had lulled Emma to sleep for the past seven years, but tonight it could do nothing to calm the tangle of thoughts churning through her mind. Emma sat in silence, both hands wrapped around a cup of water long gone cold, her gaze drifting into the empty air before her, unmistakably troubled. All day, she had forced herself to play the part of a calm, steady handed healer, even as her heart kept clenching every time her eyes accidentally landed on the face of the man lying on that sickbed.
He doesn't recognize me. The thought had circled through her mind all afternoon, both a relief, since her secret remained safe, and a quiet, twisting ache in some corner of her heart, a disappointment she didn't dare name. I should be relieved. For seven years I've prayed he would never find out, and now that it's come true, why does my heart feel this hollow. She turned the cup slowly in her hands, watching the small ripples spreading across the surface of the water, trying to keep the memories of that moonlit night long ago from creeping back, but it was useless, they kept quietly rising from the bottom of her heart like a tide that could not be held back.
Amer came trotting over to his mother's side, his small face lit up with delight. "Mama! Lord Henry has brown eyes just like mine!" the boy exclaimed, utterly unaware of the weight those words carried on his mother's heart.
Emma smiled stiffly, trying to keep her voice as calm as possible. "What a coincidence," she replied, her hand tightening around the cup in her palm.
"Did Father have bright eyes like mine too, Mama?" Amer asked next, his round eyes looking up at her, full of curiosity.
"Of course he did," Emma answered at once, her voice gentle but hiding a dull ache only she could understand. The older you get, the more you ask about your father, and the harder it gets for me to answer.
"If you're such a good healer, why couldn't you cure Father?" the boy asked further, his innocent child's question making Emma's heart clench.
"Your father died before I ever started learning medicine from Master Max," she answered, keeping her voice as gentle as she could, though every word felt like a blade cutting into her own conscience, a lie she had repeated over and over for seven long years to protect her son.
Amer fell silent for a moment, then puffed out his chest, his voice ringing with all the pride of a seven year old boy. "Don't worry, Mama, since Father isn't here, I'll protect you!"
Emma laughed, a warm smile this time, and a real one, no longer forced. She pulled Amer into her arms, holding her son tightly, her nose stinging faintly. My little boy, you have no idea your father is truly still alive, and right here beside you. She closed her eyes, savoring the small warmth pressed against her chest, trying to push away every other tangled thought in her mind, leaving only this rare, peaceful moment amid a day full of upheaval.
Amer nestled his head against his mother's chest a little longer before finally letting go, his eyes shining beneath the lamplight as he looked up to ask a few more small questions, about the new herb he'd learned about that afternoon, about whether he could go with her into the forest to gather leaves tomorrow, about whether the wounded soldier from today would get better in time to play at throwing stones with him in the yard as promised. Emma answered each of her son's questions while stealing glances toward the dark window, somewhere beyond which, in the small bedroom, the man from seven years ago still lay deep in sleep, with no idea at all that the child sitting in her lap was his own flesh and blood. That night, after settling Amer into a deep sleep, Emma lay awake for a long while, straining her ears for the faintest sound drifting from the room on the other side of the stone wall, her heart both longing for and afraid of something she herself did not dare put into words.
❖ ❖ ❖
The next morning, the yard in front of Emma's house was once again bathed in its usual sunlight, the soft early light filtering through the trees, gilding the dewdrops still clinging to the leaves. Distant roosters crowed along with birds chirping on the rooftop, a peaceful morning no different from the thousands of others this small village had quietly passed through over the past seven years. The soldiers, along with Henry and Kael, sat on wooden chairs, continuing the unfinished work of sorting herbs from the day before, the mood considerably more relaxed than the tension of that first day. Some hummed quietly, others took the chance to tease their comrades, cheerful chatter and laughter ringing out across the small yard, none of them aware that this fragile peace was now numbered in moments.
Without warning, a group of assassins in black cloaks, their faces hidden, came charging into the yard from out of nowhere, their shapes flitting through the blazing sunlight like silent dark streaks.
The soldiers shot to their feet at once, drawing their weapons and surrounding Henry protectively. Henry and Kael rose calmly, their sharp, cold eyes sweeping over the masked strangers closing in around them.
"Who sent you here?" Henry demanded, his voice hardening with menace.
One of the assassins let out a soft laugh from behind his mask. "You don't need to know that, Prince Henry."
With that, he swung his sword and lunged straight at Henry. Henry drew the sword at his hip to meet him, the clash of steel ringing out across a yard that had only ever known the peaceful sound of pestles grinding herbs. The soldiers and the assassins quickly clashed with one another, the chaotic ring of swords sounding out everywhere, dust kicking up under scrambling feet, wooden chairs knocked flying, half dried herbs scattering wildly in the wind.
Inside the house, Emma was bent over rearranging the medicine shelf when she heard the clash of metal and shouting echoing in from the yard. Her heart clenched, and she dropped the herbs in her hand at once, rushing for the door. What's happening? Amer, where are you? A mother's instinct let her think of only one thing before she could even make out the chaos unfolding before her.
Henry was locked in swordplay against an assassin in front of him when a black, poison tipped arrow suddenly tore through the air, flying straight for his chest from a hidden angle no one had noticed in time.
In that split second, with everything hanging by a thread, Amer, seemingly from nowhere, suddenly darted out and shoved Henry hard to one side.
The arrow buried itself in the boy's chest instead of Henry's.
Fury exploded inside Henry at the sight, a brilliant golden power suddenly wrapping around the sword in his hand, blazing bright across the yard. Henry poured all of that power into one decisive strike, swinging it straight at the assassin who had loosed that fateful arrow.
The assassin was hurled backward by the force of the strike, crashing to the ground, dead on the spot.
Time seemed to stop in that instant. Amer collapsed onto the ground, his small body shaking in waves, his tiny hands clutching at the black arrow still buried deep in his chest. Emma had just reached the doorstep when she saw it, and in that moment her entire world collapsed, all the chaos around her drowning beneath a thick ringing in her ears. She lunged forward, her legs no longer feeling like her own, a heart wrenching scream tearing out of her as she saw her son collapse, rushing to gather Amer into her arms, tears pouring out uncontrollably.
"Amer! Don't scare me like this, Amer..." she screamed, her voice shattering under the weight of utter panic, her trembling hands clutching his small body as it grew fainter in her arms.
Henry stood frozen, his panicked eyes locked on the scene before him, his heart clenching until he could barely breathe as he realized the boy who had just saved him lay unconscious in the arms of his sobbing mother. Around them, the bodies of the assassins lay scattered across the blood soaked ground, but no one had a thought to spare for them anymore.
Kael and the soldiers stood stunned, none of them daring to speak, only staring at Amer's shallow breathing with eyes full of fear. Some of them had lived and died on battlefields, had witnessed countless scenes of bloodshed and stayed unmoved, but faced with a seven year old lying motionless because he had risked his life to shield their commander, not one of those hardened soldiers could keep his throat from tightening.
Henry hurried over and dropped to one knee beside Amer, all the dignity of a prince gone from his eyes now, replaced by the raw panic of a man who had just watched an innocent child sacrifice himself for his sake. "Amer! Wake up, Amer," he called, his voice shaking with fear.
Emma pulled the arrow from her son's chest with trembling hands, a thick plume of black smoke rising from the wound the instant the arrow was removed, carrying with it the pungent stench of some unfamiliar poison. She touched the wound lightly, and the familiar blue light flared for a moment before dying out, not strong enough to drive away the darkness creeping through Amer's small body. Her face had gone deathly pale, her eyes wide with terror.
"Amer's been poisoned," she cried, her voice so stricken it barely sounded human, her arms clutching her son as though a single moment's slackening would let him slip out of her arms forever.
Henry looked at Emma, stunned by the overwhelming anguish flooding her face, a strangely familiar feeling rising in his chest, as though somewhere deep in a memory long since gone to sleep, he had once witnessed this exact kind of despair on that same face, beneath some moonlight he could not recall. Why does seeing her in this much pain twist something inside me, as though it were my own pain...
Around them, the soldiers hurried to clear away the assassins' bodies, some running for water, others standing guard against a second attack, but every eye kept drifting back to the small body twitching faintly in Emma's arms. Kael knelt down beside her, his voice choked. "Let me carry him inside, healer. It's too sunny out here, it isn't good for the wound." But Emma seemed to hear nothing except the wild pounding of her own heart and her son's breathing, growing weaker by the moment against her ear. She bent down close, pressing her forehead to Amer's, whispering his name over and over, as though stopping even for a moment would sever the fragile thread still tying him to this world forever.
Henry reached out, meaning to help Kael carry Amer inside, but the instant his fingers touched the child's rapidly cooling skin, a strange rush of emotion slammed into his heart, so intense it stole his breath, as though some invisible thread were tightening around his chest, pulling him closer to this unfamiliar child than any reason could explain. This child just saved my life. I owe him a debt of life, and I will not let him die owing it. He slid his arm beneath Amer's back, carefully lifting the boy alongside Emma, and the whole group hurried into the house amid a chaos of shouting voices, leaving behind a yard littered with bodies and streaks of blood slowly drying under the sun, and a question hanging unspoken in the air that none of them dared put into words: whether this seven year old boy could survive the unfamiliar poison gnawing through every vein in his body, and whether this peaceful village, and the sheltered life Emma had spent seven years so carefully building, could remain intact after the terrible calamity that had just struck.