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Although, there was a reason for that.
“I haven’t looked at them.” I said as she reached the last layer. She froze in place, the final layer of soft cotton still wrapped around my abdomen.
“Why not? You’ve had wounds before. I wouldn’t think you were squeamish to the sight of healing flesh.” I shook my head and her lips pulled together before she removed the last layer of cotton with a not so friendly yank.
“It’s the words.” She was clearly upset.
“I don’t like them there.” I didn’t even hesitate to answer, just knowing they were there, talking about them, it brought that same rumbling rage right back.
“They are the words of the Goddess, Caspyn,” she snapped. She wasn’t even looking now. “They healed you.”
“You healed me as far as I am concerned.” I tried to place my hand over hers, to stop the harsh motions of her cloth as she moved to clean my skin.
“If that is what you think, then you are a fool. I could not heal you like this.” She gestured to the wound, but I kept my focus on her, purposefully staring into the anger that was sparking there. “For Goddess’s sake, Caspyn. Look at it.”
She shuffled back, damp cloth still in hand as she glared pointedly from me to the wound. She was stubborn, fiery, and I knew she would find a way to force me to look if I didn’t comply. So, for the first time since I saw the marks I looked at them, and looked at the perfectly unmarred skin underneath.
“What in Goddess, name,” I hissed, shuffling back as though I could move away from the perfect skin that was stretched there. I knew what I had seen before, but what I was seeing now, it was as though nothing had happened.
My bones ached as I stared at the skin, my magic rumbling as though it knew exactly what had happened.
“How is this possible?” I didn’t dare touch it, my fingers stretched above the skin as though an invisible barrier was keeping them there.
“I told you. By the power of the blood. You healed yourself, with the help of the magic of Okivo; of the words.” She was smug, if not a little proud of herself, but I didn’t care. I was still staring at the expanse of perfect skin.
Only then did I shift to look at the words, those glittering, golden lines as bright as that first day.
“The marks,” I asked hesitantly, my fingers shifting away as though the lines would infect them, too. “Now that I am healed, will they fade?”
She shook her head, “No, they will always be there. Now they have a different meaning, a different purpose. Instead of healing your wound, they can serve as protection.”
“Protection?” Something about that didn’t make much sense. “They are just words.”
“Yes, but as we have already told you, words have power. These words more than any others.” That soft prayer-like voice I had heard when I first met her came back as she kneeled before me, her touch gentle as she swept the wet rag over the now healed skin, and over the words that covered me front and back. “In time, you will figure out what that power means to you, and how to use them.”
Lyani exhaled, her hands soft as she wiped them down the skin again before replacing my shirt over the tattoo.
“No bandage today?” I asked, shifting as she stood, already moving toward the door.
“Not today.”
“Does this mean you will stop yelling at me to be careful and not tear my scar?” Or even better, does this mean I can have my blades and leave?
My heart clanged at the thought, the sudden sense of joy plummeting down to my toes in a tangle of emotions as Lyani turned to me and smiled in that all knowing way that seemed to be everywhere in this blasted camp. I pushed off the twist of loss that was attempting to rise away, shoving the thoughts that came with it down into the darkest pit I could find.
I should not feel any remorse in leaving these people. None. No matter what they did for me, they were crazy, the lot of them, with their tattoos and stories and crazed ideas.
I jumped up, ready to take off out the door and never look back. Pain lashed through me with the sudden movement and I winced. Lyani froze, swallowing a laugh.
“Not yet. You may not need bandages, but you aren’t out of the woods yet. There is more healing that we cannot see, I think.”
“I’m fine.” I snarled, trying not to hiss at the pain that was still rippling through me. “I am ready to leave this place.”
“You aren’t,” she chuckled, the gold in her eyes flashing as she folded her arms. “But you’re stubborn, and that will help you to heal, too.”
“I am not stubborn,” I hissed, knowing full well that I had the same thought not a second before.
This place, these people, this woman, they were all trying my patience. I folded my hands into fists, willing my power and my fury to calm.
