#deviantchronicles

Evelyn

Sometimes a day hike was just what the doctor ordered, especially when the realities of Evelyn’s life pressed too tightly around her. Even her home was a place of potential chaos and colossal responsibility that never quite faded to the background. There was always a world-shattering crisis at hand, always some debacle that she and Arabella got through by the skin of their teeth.

The forest always seemed to hold a paradoxical energy to Evelyn, simultaneously quiet and yet fully, deeply alive with sounds of all kinds. Birds flapping and chirping in the trees. Some sort of animal moving in the underbrush. A deer freezing and staring wide-eyed for a few seconds before bounding away. Evelyn paused in her easy pace, shifting the backpack straps on her shoulders, and closed her eyes, breathing deeply and letting her senses, usually coiled tightly around her, unfurl and thread their way through the forest. Tree and earth, water and wind reached back to meet her.

And a taint of violence, of unnatural predation, of blood and pain and fear also touched her outstretched senses. Her eyes flew open. “Oh, for Heaven’s sake.”

Her hand found the hilt of the large knife she had strapped to her thigh as a precaution, and she drew it as she lurched into a sprint in the direction the discordant sensation had come from. She kept her senses open and honed in on the disturbance as she ran. “One day,” she panted. “That’s all I ask. One nice, peaceful day without any insanity whatsoever.”

She broke through a clearing five minutes later and saw the lake, its water glittering and sloshing in the sunlight. Her eyes swept back and forth as she slowed her pace and approached more cautiously, and the man near the shore caught her attention. She moved towards him, alert for what may have attacked him, but she could see nothing. Whatever it was must have gone.

Dropping the knife and her bag to the ground, she waded into the water, caught the man by the arm, and helped him get to shore. After seeing the wound in his leg, she urged him to go to a doctor, and his wordless reply made her raise an eyebrow. Only then did she notice the scarring on his throat. She dropped into a crouch as he made a sign with his hands, and nodded with understanding, her gaze following the direction he was pointing. Through the tangle of leaves, she could see the dark, rigid structure of a cabin in the near distance.

“Okay,” she told him, reaching for her backpack and pulling it next to her. “But let’s get this packed and bound up so you don’t lose more blood on the way. Then we can talk about your particular brand of hardheadedness.” Maybe she could talk some sense into him later, but for now, she just needed to do a little damage control before he bled out. Furthermore, whatever had attacked him was probably still nearby, and getting them both to some sort of shelter seemed like a practical plan.

She had learned long ago to come prepared, and had packed a little first aid kit in her bag before leaving. After widening the bloodied rip in his pants to give her better access, she removed the canister of drinking water that she had tucked into a netting on the outside of her bag and unscrewed the lid. Then she carefully cleaned the wound with some of the water and pressed a bundle of gauze against it, following with a few loops of medical tape wrapped around his leg to hold it in place.

“What attacked you anyway?” she asked, before remembering that he probably couldn’t talk. “Um, sorry. I guess that can wait until we get you taken care of.” Rising to her feet, she offered a hand to help him up.

Vidar

The accusation of ‘hardheadedness’ was answered with a curl of his lips that may or may not have been a pout, but Vidar let her bend down to work on his leg. He watched her, craning his neck to keep both of her hands in view, but made no attempt to stop her.

He may be hardheaded, but not stupid.

Past experiences showed where the refusal of help led and honestly, he’d had enough of Nadav’s Talks to last him a lifetime.

The water stung and the pressure of the gauze she was stuffing into the wound dragged another low, uncomfortable noise from him, but Vidar kept still until her hands tied off the makeshift bandage, his only movements to assist her or to prescribe a snakelike motion in the air and then make snapping motions with his hand, mouthing ‘snake’ followed by a shrug.

Whatever had decided to try him on for a snack, it had been long, as thick around as his thigh and slippery. From the wound in his leg, he’d call it a lamprey if it hadn’t been bigger than any of those suckers had a right to be. Not that he had a way to communicate that right now, but he didn’t think that was necessary.

His would be rescuer didn’t exactly seem keen on going into the water and if it was something more of the supernatural variety, he didn’t think that she would have much of an idea either.

Which was why he was rather insistent in pushing himself to his feet and getting back to the cabin, more specifically the old, robust mobile phone that waited on the counter in the mud room.

His leg ached as he tried to get it under him, but when he carefully rested his weight on it, the feeling of pins and needles  spread like a tidal wave from the wound and took away all feeling from the hip down. In a reflex, Vidar threw out his hand, grasping her by the shoulder to keep himself from collapsing back to the ground.

Definitely something more than just a bite.

Teeth gritted painfully tight, he jerked his head towards the cabin. He really, really needed to send a message or he’d be in trouble.

The walk was slow with the painful numbness spreading into his groin and making it harder and harder to move his leg, but they managed and Vidar pushed open the unlocked door, immediately gesturing towards the mobile phone.

‘Here!’, he rasped tonelessly, hands fluttering and once the device was in his hand, he typed out a message.

“Need help. Got hurt. -V”

The phone confirmed the sending of the message with a cheerful little tune and Vidar looked up at his would be rescuer.

'Thank you.’, he mouthed and tapped three bloodied finger against his chest. 'Vidar.’, he pressed out, again in a painful sounding, toneless voice.

Evelyn

“A… snake did this?” Evelyn glanced doubtfully down at the man’s bandaged leg as she did her best to support him. She wasn’t exactly an expert, but shouldn’t a snakebite look like a pair of puncture marks, rather than the circular, gaping hole she had seen marring his leg?

Maybe it was just something snake-like, which opened up a whole host of other possibilities that she most certainly did not like, especially considering how big the thing must have been to take a bite that size out of the man. It made her all the more relieved that they were retreating to some semblance of shelter.

Evelyn wasn’t exactly what one might call tall, so she swayed a little under the man’s weight when he grabbed at her to keep from falling. She clutched at his clothing, braced her legs, and gritted her teeth, then hauled him towards the cabin. She didn’t like the way his wounded leg was dragging, as though he had lost all feeling in it. That couldn’t be good.

Entering the cabin, she helped him to the phone as he requested, noting that he was capable of some speech, though his voice was a tattered rasp that seemed to pain him when he used it. At least there seemed to be mobile service out here, which made her feel a little bit better about being out here alone with a strange man, even an injured one. Her own phone was resting in its little pocket sewn into the inner lining of her bag. Wiping her bloodied hands on her jeans– her clothes were ruined anyway, so she might as well– she watched him send out the text to whatever mysterious contact he had on there, and nodded in response to his thanks and introduction.

“Don’t mention it. I’m Evelyn.” She reached for Vidar’s arm again and guided him towards a nearby chair. “Here, let’s at least get you sitting. Do you think the wound is poisoned? Because if it is, we need to do something about that right now or you’re going to have bigger problems than you’ve already got.” A thought occurred to her, and she snatched her backpack from where she had let it slide to the floor a moment ago, retrieving a small sketchbook and a pencil from inside. Sometimes she liked to sketch the flora and fauna she saw on her meanders, and the little book was about half full of such drawings. She handed the sketchbook and pencil to Vidar. “For easier communication.”

Vidar

Poisoned.

Vidar had been thinking about it, but that didn’t make hearing it any more comfortable. He could feel his own skin getting cold and clammy and even sitting down, with no weight on his leg, the feeling of icy pins and needles hadn’t gone away.

Definitely poisoned.

And he had to agree, he was in trouble. He could only hope that Nadav had any kind of idea what was going on and how to fix it. So far, the big idiot had been pretty good about saving the day every time Vidar or Vali had needed him to.

The offered sketchbook startled a huffed laugh out of Vidar and he nodded. His own notebook, which had been given to him a long while ago and which was mostly neglected, was somewhere in a cupboard in the kitchen, but he was in no condition to go and find it. So he took the neat little volume from her, flipped it to an empty page and began to write in uneven letters:

‘Was something big. No idea what. Probably poisoned. Have a friend coming. He’ll help.’

His writing was that of someone who had learned to write late in life and wasn’t overly used to it. The almost childlike quality of his penmanship wasn’t exactly helped by the fact that his hands had started shaking.

He really hoped that Nadav would hurry up and make his way there with whatever strange ways he had.

And thinking of that, Vidar considered if it was a good idea to have a stranger there when the half giant arrived.

'Don’t need to stay. I’ll be fine.’

Vidar added to the sketchbook before holding it out to Evelyn.

Evelyn

Evelyn accepted the sketchbook back from him and read over the awkward scrawl, then arched an eyebrow at him. There was something undeniably sketchy about this man, between his insistent avoidance of hospitals and attempt to send her away.

But then again, she always avoided hospitals herself, for very good reason. For the first time, she wondered if Vidar’s aversion to hospitals had less to do with what he may have done, and more to do with what he was.

That could make things extremely complicated, and her life was already complicated enough as it was, thank you very much. It would probably be smart to do as he asked, to leave and wash her hands of this whole thing. If he wanted to take stupid risks to his own life, it was his to risk.

And if he died because she left him to fend for himself while waiting for his friend to arrive, then his blood would be on her hands. She had the ability to help him, to at least stabilize him until help arrived. She wasn’t a skilled healer, but she had some other, seemingly unrelated abilities that would most certainly slow down the spread of the poison in his body for a period of time. It would expose what she was to this man, but maybe it would be worth the risk if she could save his life.

“Dammit,” she mumbled, then tossed the sketchbook and pencil to the floor. She was going to need them for what she was about to do. “Nope, forget it. Not happening.” She took a step closer to him. “Listen, Vidar, I can slow the spread of the poison in your body, at least long enough for your friend to get here. It… isn’t exactly conventional, what I do. But it’ll be effective.” She motioned to the floor. “You’ll need to lie down for this.”

Vidar

Getting poisoned was a funny thing, Vidar found out. Not ‘haha’ funny but more 'this hurts and I don’t have full control of my body’ funny.

His hand that was clamped tight on his leg again felt like it was grabbing onto a cold, wet piece of meat under the remnants of his jeans. Even his hand itself didn’t quite feel like it was attached to him.

His usually sensitive ears felt plugged up, hearing dulled by a rush of blood and his sense of smell was overwhelmed by the sharp, metallic scent of blood. The air stung his nasal passages on every inhale, as if he was in sub zero temperatures and he was shaking all over.

So, Vidar thought that he had a good excuse for gaping up at her, blinking numbly while his brain was trying to make sense of what she was saying.

When it finally sunk in, he cast a glance towards the still open door, green eyes searching the woods outside.

He hadn’t warned Nadav.

He should have.

Quickly, he shook his head at her and jerked his chin towards the door.

The movement made him feel drunk. The unpleasant kind of drunk where it feels like your brain is lagging half a second behind and any movement will stir something nasty in your stomach. Spots started dancing in front of his eyes.

When he looked down at his leg, his head sagged bonelessly and the effort of keeping his chin from hitting his chest with a painful clang of teeth sent sharp, nauseating pain up the back of his head.

He was in real trouble.

The kind of trouble he still remembered when he could feel his life seep out of his ruined neck.

The one sharp snap of his head turned into a laboured nod then. A hard earned lifting of his head and another quick, jerky downward motion, as if he was falling asleep.

Vidar tried lowering himself off of the chair, down to the wooden floor, but the world tipped on it’s axis and for a second, he felt like he was falling.

Then he was on the ground, his body aching.

He wasn’t entirely sure if she had caught him and helped him down or if he had just not noticed the impact with everything else going on, but he glanced up at her.

Reality seemed to distort around her, like a hand brushing a sheer curtain … like hot air over asphalt.

He’d seen this before.

When he was still delirious with pain, his body weak from blood loss and he had looked up at the large, hulking figure of Nadav.