Chapter Thirteen

Memories of a Phoenix– Part Four.

The sound of scraping filled the cave. The girl named Violet, a girl with purple hair and orange eyes, was carving a single line into the back wall. The line was but a single addition to hundreds.

Each day was a tally, and the most recent signalled that of nine months.

Past the crackling fire, she heard the soft crunching of footsteps in the snow. The footsteps prompted her to turn to them, wearing a beaming smile.

Aelius entered the cave before dumping the deer from his shoulder onto their makeshift stone cutting board.

“I’m back,” he nodded to her with narrowed serious eyes, having fulfilled his daily hunting duty with sheer grit.

“Welcome back~!” Violet came bounding across, her eyes lighting up as Aelius up took his sword. “Wowwwwww!!! Skillful,” she remarked as Aelius started skinning the carcass.

“I got you the meat, so it’s time for your end of the deal. How long until my poison is cured?” he asked.

“Ten months.”

He briefly stopped. “Ten? Months? That long?”

“Hey, how fast did you think it’d be? The only herbs I have on hand are the ones I can find on the mountain. Do you know how long it’d take to blend an antidote, and how long I’d have to feed it to your Core?”

Aelius clenched his fists. “Right… what if I can go South to the nearest Kingdom and get you some better herbs?” he asked.

“It’d only slightly speed up the process. But even so, you can’t. Once you start the treatment, you have to stay with me and continue receiving it. If the steady stream of antidote stops for whatever reason, the poison being suppressed would bite back even harder and you’d feel excruciating pain,” she warned him.

“No way… I can’t even travel at all?” he sat down with a grimace, silently thinking something through as he glared at the ground.

She continued gazing at him with conflicted emotions, until she pushed him down and pulled aside his wolf pelt, revealing his bleeding wound.

“Your wound opened up again. Thankfully, I’ve gone out and gotten some more plants.”

Aelius sighed as he sat back to allow her to work. Skillfully, she applied some sort of herbal paste up his torn skin, and then covered it with small petals one by one.

“Now, eat this.” She fed him a handful of combined herbs.

“How’d you survive for nine months out here anyways?”

“Well, you know. Day to day, eating plants. It wasn’t really much of an issue. It was the loneliness that was really hard, actually. That’s why I’m really glad you’re here,” she clasped her hands together in a sweet smile and Aelius narrowed his eyes at her doubtfully.

“You’re not purposefully dragging out the treatment to ten months just to keep me around, are you?”

“Excuse you! I’m an ethical and professional doctor. You better watch your tone boy,” she playfully answered as she jumped to her feet and crossed back over to her herbal desk.

This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.

“Ugh.” He laid down.

“What were you doing, before I found you collapsed in the snow with half your upper body missing?” Violet suddenly asked.

“Hunting a monster. Little bastard dragged me all the way out here to try and throw me off.”

“And in the process, you used Magic, when your Core couldn’t handle it?”

“I was forced into a corner. It was the strongest monster I’ve had to fight till now.” Aelius recalled how strong that skal was. It was to the point that Stecia’s Divine Power had little effect on it.

“A monster?” For some reason, Violet lingered on that word.

“I couldn’t use Magic to block that bastard’s attacks, but I could use it to speed myself up and dodge faster. Anyways, there’s more of those monsters out there. I can’t afford ten months at the edge of the world while they’re rampaging out there! How about you come with me while I travel?”

To his suggestion, Violet frantically shook her head. “I am not leaving these snowy mountains.”

“Then maybe I can just go for a short period of time. I’ll come back fast.”

“You don’t seem to get it. You need a dose every two weeks, and if you go over, you will experience excruciating pain. Pain worse than anyone has ever experienced. This poison in your Core, it has festered in your body for close to fifteen years– it has nestled into every crevice where your blood reaches.”

Aelius raised a brow. Fifteen years? he wondered.

“If you miss treatment, you’ll be dead within two weeks. For the first few days, you’ll start vomiting blood and losing strength. Next, your body will start to eat itself from the inside-out. After a week, you won’t be able to move at all. A few days after that, you’ll fall into a coma and never wake up again. Until you hit the coma, every moment will be accompanied by unimaginable pain. Do you get it?” She was adamant about the dire consequences, but it didn’t strike fear into Aelius at all.

Compared to that, the mortal perils he had overcome until now were far more arduous.

“For two weeks, I can travel and then come back to get a dose then, can’t I?”

“Wow, you’re stubborn.” She rose to her feet. “I’m off to take a bath,” she said as she left toward the exit.

“Oh, okay.” Aelius watched her leave. “Wait though. It’s snowing!” he shouted as she stepped out.

“No peeking!” she shouted back.

“No peeking? It’s freezing cold,” Aelius shouted in response.

*

The deer meat had been all cooked and ready to be served by the time Violet returned.

Aelius watched her reenter the cave with bare feet treading through the snow, twirling her soaked hair with one finger. Aside from how revealing her dress was, which caused his face to heat up, Aelius was observing with intrigue at how she’d just taken a bath in the ice.

Before he could think about it further, he was interrupted by Violet’s violent pounce onto the deer meat, having spotted it from the entrance.

“Ohhhh yesss! It’s been too long!” She immediately dug in.

“Wait, it’s a little hot–” Aelius tried to warn her but she was too fast.

“What?” she asked, her mouth stuffed full. “It’s not hot at all.”

“Okay?” Aelius raised a brow as he tried a bite of one. It burnt the tip of his tongue so bad he almost dropped it. “Ow!”

“Careful, it’s a little hot,” Violet answered as she casually ate away, and he gave her an unimpressed glare.

“Really? Is it?”

“More importantly, I’m going to need you to come out with me tomorrow into the winterlands. Gotta stock up on some herbs.”

“Alright,” Aelius sighed, blowing in the crudely roasted venison.

“It’s sho gud,” Violet cried with tears in her eyes.

Aelius raised her brow at her for a moment, but after recalling how long she’d been stuck out here without meat, gave her a fair nod. “Well, glad I’ve done my job, then.”