Pressing an ice-pack to his already-bruising chest, Ruban sat beside an unconscious Simani in the ambulance taking them back to Ragah. Half her face was obscured by an oxygen mask, but he could already see colour flooding back into her formerly pale cheeks. Her breast rose and fell rhythmically with unobstructed breaths. She was recovering.

Ruban closed his eyes, leaning back slowly into his seat, trying to find a position that didn’t further distress his tortured muscles. “How did you do it?” he asked the young man sitting across from him in the back of the ambulance.

“Do what?” asked Ashwin, his eyes wide and guileless, as if torn out of some private reverie by Ruban’s question.

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“Beat that Aeriel. How did you know how to fight it?”

“I didn’t beat him,” said Ashwin, looking genuinely surprised. “You did. I couldn’t have done shit without the blade you threw at him.”

“Him?” repeated Ruban, raising an eyebrow.

Ashwin shrugged. “Dunno. It looked like a ‘him’ to me. I could be wrong.”

“Don’t play games with me, my lord,” Ruban snapped. He was too tired for this right now. “Where did you learn to fight like that?”

“Ah,” said Ashwin, with a slight smile. “That’s a tale for another time.”

Before he could ask what the hell that was supposed to mean, Ruban felt himself being dragged under by the blissful oblivion of sleep.