Elendor
Sick Puppy
Keldean clings to life while the elves figure out what to do.
Sort Date: no date set
Location: On the Moors
Description: Keldean isn't looking any better after a couple of days. He's still coughing, weak, and running a mild fever, but perhaps the fact that he's still alive at all is a testament to the healing attention of the elves. He wouldn't have survived at all if left to his own devices and no matter what the situation.. tent or otherwise the youth is looking at a long recovery.
He's barely been conscious enough to interact, always in that state of light sleep that's broken by his coughing and saturated lungs.
[Aruir(#22123)] Aruir makes her way up that same path, her steps less light and her expression less bright than it was two nights previous. In her arms is a medium sized bundle of something soft and a bag of herbs is slung over one shoulder. She comes prepared this night. As she approaches the tent, the sound of coughing brings an added element of sadness to her face, something she is careful to hide before entering the makeshift sickroom.
And of course it's raining outside of his tent. Two more figures approach, one in a green cloak lined thickly in fur, the other taller yet somehow difficult to make out in the dark night. The ends of Caelwen's hair is wetly plastered to the cloak of green, which bulges out over some burden she carries. She is whispering to the taller elf in bell-like elven. "Perhaps you might give it to him. I do not know if I can." She sounds nervous, somehow, or embarrassed.
Keldean opens his eyes when Aruir enters the tent. There's recognition as the teen remembers seeing this new elf, but he doesn't know her name. He tries to speak in Sindarin, but his pronunciation is horrid and he can't sing the words as they're supposed to be spoken. " Are you a healer?"
[Aruir(#22123)] Aruir smiles down softly on the boy, kneeling on the ground to set down her burden gently before pulling back the hood of her cloak and answering him in a lilting Westron, heavy accented towards her own native tongue. "I am a healer, young one, if that is what you wish to know." Her voice is quiet and her smile is kind. Her sleeve is pulled up and she rests the underside of her wrist lightly on his forehead, frowning at the still hot feel to the skin. "How are you feeling?"
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath smiles, the dampness hardly doing more than slicking his hair and making it shine more blackly. And he nods, taking the package from Caelwen, and slipping inside the tent a little after the healer. But Aruir is busy with the boy, and so he waits.
You say, "Tired.." Keldean answers, giving up on Sindarin when he realizes that she speaks Westron. His exhaustion is weighing on him more than anything else, but his voice is still raw. "Chest hurts." He moves his hand to press against the area just below his throat. When Giliath steps in the teen brightens a bit, actually managing a smile for the vinter when he looks past Aruir."
Caelwen, alone outside of the tent, anxiously watches Giliath enter. She closes the cloak around herself again and stands there, somehow poised and fidgeting all at the same time. After a moment, she slips a bit closer and opens the edge of the tent just a little to peep in.
[Aruir(#22123)] "Is it an ache or a burn, Keldean?" Aruir asks of him gently. "The fatigue is normal. All of your energy goes to fight the infection, child." She turns to dig in her leather bag and pulls out a soft cloth which she uses to dab at his face and neck gently before setting it off to one side. Giliath's arrival catches her attention and she turns to him with a brief smile before her focus is stolen once more by the sick human.
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath smiles back at the boy, and looks over his shoulder. His face eases as Caelwen is there. Then he turns and comes over to Aruir, saying quietly in Sindarin, "My wife has brought a warm blanket, and some honeycakes. Can he eat them?"
"Ache.. " The Bree teen answers in weak complaint, looking back at Aruir. "I can't sleep." Not entirely true. He has slept, but likely he doesn't feel that he has. He coughs, not bothering to cover his mouth anymore. His brown eyes look to Giliath again, but he doesn't hear the words clearly over the rain, crackling fire, and wind.
Caelwen blushes suddenly as Giliath speaks, her chin dropping down. "I will wait for you," she whispers through the rain, the melody of the elvish woven through the night. She closes the tent flap and backs away into the shadows.
[Aruir(#22123)] There's a barely noticable slump of relief to the elleth's shoulders at this news. "That is normal for this type of illness, child." The not sleeping is worrisome though... She begins to untie the bundle at her knees, answering the ellon as she works. "Excellent. I've brought furs with me for heat, but the blanket will do best against his skin while he sweats." Her soft Sindarin comes much more naturally than the Westron. "But the cakes will have to wait a while. I've medicine that must coat his throat." That said, a small oilcloth is removed from the big bundle and laid out flat, soon filled with leaves, roots and grounds from her leather bag, spread out side by side.
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath nods, a watchful look sent after his wife. Then his attention returns to Aruir and he nods again, unwrapping the things he carries: A blanket, warmed and soft. This he lays over the boy. In the curve of his arm, he holds yet a clay pot.
Keldean accepts the basic explanation from Aruir and looks to Giliath again. His eyes settle on the pot with that endless curiosity his people seem to hold. "Is that Caelwen's?" He shifts to sit up more, struggling against the weight of the blankets. "Did she go? I .. saw her.." The youth doesn't sound entirely sure of himself.
[Aruir(#22123)] "Shhh, hush child. Speech will only aggravate your throat. Try and rest while I prepare your medicine." After the blanket is spread, she reaches up her own set of furs to Giliath. "Spread those over him while I grind this set, please?"
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath unfolds the furs, spreading them over Keldean. "Lie down," he tells the boy. "Do not speak. Yes, it is Caelwen's making. She has brought it to you, with honeycakes within. But you cannot eat them now, Aruir says." All the while he is talking, he is busy - making sure the blankets lie easily on the human's form, settling the pot down where Keldean can touch it. There is something oddly comforting about the fat smooth roundness of it, something that draws the eye and the touch and perhaps brings a soothing to the mind.
Keldean's brow creases at Aruir's words, as if he might protest, but Giliath is quick to echo her instruction and the boy lays back, defeated. "Honeycakes?" His eyes open wider with sharp interest. He works a hand free from the pile of blankets and reaches for the pot, attempting to pull it closer for examination. He looks to the entrance of the tent again, searching for Caelwen.. but she is not there.
[<#22123>] As the boy is told to lie down, Aruir has to object, lifting her head to the ellon before she speaks. " **** ******* ** ** ******* ** ** ***** ****, ** ** *** the **** ** *** *******." A set of leaves are ground into a gooey paste, which she scoops up in one hand while the other reaches to open Keldean's shirt. Little globs at a time she spreads it onto the skin of his chest, rubbing it in. The paste gives off a cold, minty scent and will feel cool against the skin, perhaps with a mild tingling if the flesh is sensitive. " Giliath," she begins quietly. " **** ** **** ** has ****." Her voice is quiet and calm, nothing in the tone to provoke worry from her patient as she works.
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath glances over, then nods slightly. "She will give you something to drink," he tells Keldean, in his strangely-accented westron. "You must sit up a little to drink it. Are you strong enough?" Then a sidelong glance at the healer, and quietly, swiftly, in a fluid run of elven that the boy could not hope to follow, even were he well, he says, "He has come here to apologize to one who rested within the haven of the valley. That one is no longer there. And while waiting, he has become cold and gotten ill." The words are an answer - but possibly it is not the question Aruir has wanted answers to.
The Sindarin flows over Keldean and he can't focus enough to try and understand any of it. He keeps his hand pressed against the clay pot with almost rapt attention as Aruir rubs the strange ointment against his skin. When Giliath addresses him, the youth looks away from Caelwen's earthware. "Yes.." He answers, wrinkling his nose and coughing again as the strong smell of the medicine invades his senses.
[Aruir(#22123)] "Here." With just the tips of her fingers, Aruir hands the ellon a small bowl. "Fill this with rainwater, please, and take care not to touch the rim." She turns then towards Keldean again, switching to Westron for the moment. "Peace, child, peace. That herb will help to loosen what has taken root in your lungs." The remainder is wiped off on a square of towel--again from her bag. "I'll have you drink water first, to quench your thirst and clean your throat before the herbs that must coat it." She drops her attention then to the rest of the herbs spread on the rough side of the oilcloth, crushing some and cutting others, mixing the final products in a tiny clay bowl. As she works, she speaks, her words once again the music of her native tongue. "For what was he to apologize?"
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath gets up, moving to the tent flap and holding the small bowl out into the rain. A breath of cool damp air circulates through the tent. A few minutes later, he returns, letting the flap fall again behind him, and holds the bowl out to Aruir, looking at her with grave eyes. Then he squats on his heels and says to Keldean, "She wishes to know of your past, and of your ... dealings with the one named Rhifaroth. You are not to speak. Shall I tell her, or do you wish to do so yourself when you are well?"
Keldean lets his eyes drift closed for a moment, the weird sensation of the medicine on his chest proving to distract him as easily as the earthware did. Giliath's words pull his focus, and he listens, laying quiet for a long time with rasping breaths. He looks at Aruir with guarded eyes for a moment, a natural defensive urge, but he speaks softly. "You can tell her."
[Aruir(#22123)] For a moment, it looks like Aruir will protest Giliath's phrasing, unsure of just how much time this child of the Edain will have left--not to mention recovery--if he remains out here. But, his answer stays her tongue and she says nothing, merely taking the bowl from the ellon and holding it in one hand while the other arm works to help the boy sit up. "Drink," she murmurs to him softly, forgetting to use Westron as her attention is divided between her patient and the soon-to-be storyteller.
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath nods. But he is silent still for some time, his eyes looking into a faraway place. Finally, he begins to speak, and he does so in Westron that Keldean might listen.
"The man, Rhifaroth, was living in the town called Bree. One, an evil man, wished knowledge of him, and ... the boy, Keldean, was persuaded to bring Rhifaroth to where he could be taken. When he had done so, he was made to go also. Terrible things were done to Rhifaroth before he was rescued. Keldean wishes to make amends now for the part he played in allowing this to happen."
Keldean is sharp enough to understand what's required when she helps him up and holds the bowl to his lips. He takes a slow sip, fighting the urge to cough as the liquid cools his sore throat. He drinks slowly, very thirsty, and listens to what Giliath says.
[Aruir(#22123)] "And he has been checked for..." How did Sidhel put it? "Wicked tricks to read his mind?" There is the barest breath of derision in her otherwise warm voice. Once the bowl is empty, she will set it to one side and use her free arm to pack the roll of her cloak under the boy's back, as well as other packs and items from the tent, just as before. Only then will she lower him slowly, satisfied to see him still elevated. "It may be less than comfortable, child, but until you breathe easier, this /will/ help." Her assertion is soft, repeating a message from her first night in this tent. After all it is unclear just how much he is recalling. "I ask, Giliath, because if we do not get him somewhere warm, dry and off the damp ground, I fear he will not last another week." Again, spoken swiftly, softly, fluidly in her native tongue.
"My mind? .. What do you mean?" Keldean asks, frowning and studying Aruir's face. "Is that what Mirinthel says?" He forces the words out even though they've both told him to stay silent. "Asht is dead. Rhifaroth killed him.. I saw it. You saw, Gil-" The cough returns and he lays back, spending the next several moments clearing his throat of choking mucus.
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath has opened his mouth to reply, when Keldean's hoarse voice forestalls him. "Yes," he confirms. "That one is now dead." But he gives Aruir a concerned look. "We should wait." He rises fluidly, and goes to the tent door, stooping and looking out.
[Aruir(#22123)] "We should wait?" the elleth questions him, still in Sindarin. Carefully she adds just a small amount of a clear liquid to the mix of herbs, stirring it slowly as she rises to stand nearer the ellon. "Wait for what? He must be brought to shelter soon, Giliath, or there will be nothing I can do to save him." She pauses to check the consistency of her mixture. "The damp from the earth and snow seeps into his lungs. And fevers like this need to be starved, not fed, but here we have no choice, lest the icy air steal his very life. What is so important as to risk him?" All this while, her voice is calm and soft, no anger or rising passions to inspire ire or agitation, but sweet, soothing tones that present no threat.
Keldean lays quietly once he can breath again, limp. He reaches to touch Caelwen's earthen pot again, drawing comfort from the inanimate object.
[Giliath(#9838)] But Giliath has not heard. Or if he has heard, he has chosen not to answer. For he is no longer in the tent, but striding swiftly along the path after his wife.
Keldean starts violently coughing, the medicine she worked into his skin starting to break up the clinging congestion in his lungs. The youth curls up, hacking badly into one of the blankets, blood staining the cloth.
[Aruir(#22123)] Watching the ellon leave the tent in late pursuit of his wife, Aruir heaves a soft sigh, just as the fit of coughing catches her attention. Moving quicker than she has in days, the elleth drops to her knees at his bedside, using the cloth she'd had before for his face to wipe away the traces of red from his skin. "Easy child, peace, you must drink this." She rubs his back in slow, soothing circles while her empty hand reaches for the small bowl. "Sit up, uncurl and sit up. This will help." Her voice--even in the rougher Westron--is warm and pleasant to listen to.
Keldean pushes to sit up again, his frame shaking from the near-suffocation reflex. As the stress of the spasm eases, the boy relaxes again, staring at Aruir now with an almost blank expression. "I'm not getting better.." He says, the words cracking from swollen vocal chords. "Why.. why are you helping?"
[Aruir(#22123)] "No, you aren't." Lying to her patients outright is not something Aruir does often at all, or very well. Shifting to a better angle, she holds the small bowl up to his lips. "After you drink this, you mustn't speak for five moments." The mixture is of the consistency of rich honey, and the taste is sickeningly sweet, though the aftertaste is quite bitter. "You are ill." That seems to be all the explanation there is.
Keldean does as he's told, taking a breath and then slowly swallowing the thick liquid. His face crinkles at the heavy sweetness of it, more than he's used to from growing up in a place where candies and such are a rare treat. He lifts his hand to rub his throat, the strange coating sensation making him uneasy, but he remembers not to say anything and lays back in silence.
[Aruir(#22123)] The rain slows, a moment of respite in the chill winter's pour. A hopeful sparrow starts to sing, only to have his song snuffed out when the pause turns out to be no more than that--a caesura. Aruir turns towards the tentflap at his song, a soft smile lighting her face as she picks up where he left off, humming the tune with her own sweet voice for a moment before turning to Keldean. "That will coat your throat and ease the soreness from your coughing. Once it passes into your blood, the medicine should help with the fever and with the loosening of the sickness from your lungs." She reaches out to brush hair from his forehead. "I dare not give you anything to suppress the cough, since it is what's helping you to stay alive right now."
The aftertaste is unpleasant at best. Keldean swallows painfully a few times, trying to rid his mouth of it even as it brings moisture to his eyes. Finally he speaks, a plaintive request, "Water.." The last fit of coughs sapped his energy to the point where he makes no effort to move about now.
[Aruir(#22123)] "Not just yet, tithen emlin. Let it have a few moments more..." Aruir speaks in Westron, the elven endearment slipping through her lips before she realizes what she's said. But it is accurate, Keldean as frail and helpless as a fallen sparrow. She smiles and sets to putting her pack to rights, folding each square of fabric around its herb and tucking the ends before placing it back where it belongs. Only when that is finished does she take the two bowls to the entrance, one to clean and the other to fill with water.
Keldean sighs in defeat, closing his eyes. He doesn't ask for the water again and looks to have dozed off. The sleep won't last long, the medicine will eventually begin to work and he'll be awake coughing again. But for the moment his body grabs what little bit of rest that it can. If Aruir remains by his side, she may have the satisfaction of seeing the fever begin to recede a few hours later. Small progress, but enough to show that she's on the right track with her treatment.
[Aruir(#22123)] Once the smaller bowl is clean, Aruir will return to her patient to offer water, only to find him resting. Rather than disturb his sleep, she places the bowl on the floor nearby and sits leaning against her pack watching, waiting. With no one left to guard him, she will stay, leaving only when her time in the Halls of Healing calls her down, sometime after first light. With him though, she'll leave the two bowls full of water and those honeycakes. He'll need what strength they can offer him.
He's barely been conscious enough to interact, always in that state of light sleep that's broken by his coughing and saturated lungs.
[Aruir(#22123)] Aruir makes her way up that same path, her steps less light and her expression less bright than it was two nights previous. In her arms is a medium sized bundle of something soft and a bag of herbs is slung over one shoulder. She comes prepared this night. As she approaches the tent, the sound of coughing brings an added element of sadness to her face, something she is careful to hide before entering the makeshift sickroom.
And of course it's raining outside of his tent. Two more figures approach, one in a green cloak lined thickly in fur, the other taller yet somehow difficult to make out in the dark night. The ends of Caelwen's hair is wetly plastered to the cloak of green, which bulges out over some burden she carries. She is whispering to the taller elf in bell-like elven. "Perhaps you might give it to him. I do not know if I can." She sounds nervous, somehow, or embarrassed.
Keldean opens his eyes when Aruir enters the tent. There's recognition as the teen remembers seeing this new elf, but he doesn't know her name. He tries to speak in Sindarin, but his pronunciation is horrid and he can't sing the words as they're supposed to be spoken. "
[Aruir(#22123)] Aruir smiles down softly on the boy, kneeling on the ground to set down her burden gently before pulling back the hood of her cloak and answering him in a lilting Westron, heavy accented towards her own native tongue. "I am a healer, young one, if that is what you wish to know." Her voice is quiet and her smile is kind. Her sleeve is pulled up and she rests the underside of her wrist lightly on his forehead, frowning at the still hot feel to the skin. "How are you feeling?"
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath smiles, the dampness hardly doing more than slicking his hair and making it shine more blackly. And he nods, taking the package from Caelwen, and slipping inside the tent a little after the healer. But Aruir is busy with the boy, and so he waits.
You say, "Tired.." Keldean answers, giving up on Sindarin when he realizes that she speaks Westron. His exhaustion is weighing on him more than anything else, but his voice is still raw. "Chest hurts." He moves his hand to press against the area just below his throat. When Giliath steps in the teen brightens a bit, actually managing a smile for the vinter when he looks past Aruir."
Caelwen, alone outside of the tent, anxiously watches Giliath enter. She closes the cloak around herself again and stands there, somehow poised and fidgeting all at the same time. After a moment, she slips a bit closer and opens the edge of the tent just a little to peep in.
[Aruir(#22123)] "Is it an ache or a burn, Keldean?" Aruir asks of him gently. "The fatigue is normal. All of your energy goes to fight the infection, child." She turns to dig in her leather bag and pulls out a soft cloth which she uses to dab at his face and neck gently before setting it off to one side. Giliath's arrival catches her attention and she turns to him with a brief smile before her focus is stolen once more by the sick human.
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath smiles back at the boy, and looks over his shoulder. His face eases as Caelwen is there. Then he turns and comes over to Aruir, saying quietly in Sindarin, "My wife has brought a warm blanket, and some honeycakes. Can he eat them?"
"Ache.. " The Bree teen answers in weak complaint, looking back at Aruir. "I can't sleep." Not entirely true. He has slept, but likely he doesn't feel that he has. He coughs, not bothering to cover his mouth anymore. His brown eyes look to Giliath again, but he doesn't hear the words clearly over the rain, crackling fire, and wind.
Caelwen blushes suddenly as Giliath speaks, her chin dropping down. "I will wait for you," she whispers through the rain, the melody of the elvish woven through the night. She closes the tent flap and backs away into the shadows.
[Aruir(#22123)] There's a barely noticable slump of relief to the elleth's shoulders at this news. "That is normal for this type of illness, child." The not sleeping is worrisome though... She begins to untie the bundle at her knees, answering the ellon as she works. "Excellent. I've brought furs with me for heat, but the blanket will do best against his skin while he sweats." Her soft Sindarin comes much more naturally than the Westron. "But the cakes will have to wait a while. I've medicine that must coat his throat." That said, a small oilcloth is removed from the big bundle and laid out flat, soon filled with leaves, roots and grounds from her leather bag, spread out side by side.
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath nods, a watchful look sent after his wife. Then his attention returns to Aruir and he nods again, unwrapping the things he carries: A blanket, warmed and soft. This he lays over the boy. In the curve of his arm, he holds yet a clay pot.
Keldean accepts the basic explanation from Aruir and looks to Giliath again. His eyes settle on the pot with that endless curiosity his people seem to hold. "Is that Caelwen's?" He shifts to sit up more, struggling against the weight of the blankets. "Did she go? I .. saw her.." The youth doesn't sound entirely sure of himself.
[Aruir(#22123)] "Shhh, hush child. Speech will only aggravate your throat. Try and rest while I prepare your medicine." After the blanket is spread, she reaches up her own set of furs to Giliath. "Spread those over him while I grind this set, please?"
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath unfolds the furs, spreading them over Keldean. "Lie down," he tells the boy. "Do not speak. Yes, it is Caelwen's making. She has brought it to you, with honeycakes within. But you cannot eat them now, Aruir says." All the while he is talking, he is busy - making sure the blankets lie easily on the human's form, settling the pot down where Keldean can touch it. There is something oddly comforting about the fat smooth roundness of it, something that draws the eye and the touch and perhaps brings a soothing to the mind.
Keldean's brow creases at Aruir's words, as if he might protest, but Giliath is quick to echo her instruction and the boy lays back, defeated. "Honeycakes?" His eyes open wider with sharp interest. He works a hand free from the pile of blankets and reaches for the pot, attempting to pull it closer for examination. He looks to the entrance of the tent again, searching for Caelwen.. but she is not there.
[<#22123>] As the boy is told to lie down, Aruir has to object, lifting her head to the ellon before she speaks. "
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath glances over, then nods slightly. "She will give you something to drink," he tells Keldean, in his strangely-accented westron. "You must sit up a little to drink it. Are you strong enough?" Then a sidelong glance at the healer, and quietly, swiftly, in a fluid run of elven that the boy could not hope to follow, even were he well, he says, "He has come here to apologize to one who rested within the haven of the valley. That one is no longer there. And while waiting, he has become cold and gotten ill." The words are an answer - but possibly it is not the question Aruir has wanted answers to.
The Sindarin flows over Keldean and he can't focus enough to try and understand any of it. He keeps his hand pressed against the clay pot with almost rapt attention as Aruir rubs the strange ointment against his skin. When Giliath addresses him, the youth looks away from Caelwen's earthware. "Yes.." He answers, wrinkling his nose and coughing again as the strong smell of the medicine invades his senses.
[Aruir(#22123)] "Here." With just the tips of her fingers, Aruir hands the ellon a small bowl. "Fill this with rainwater, please, and take care not to touch the rim." She turns then towards Keldean again, switching to Westron for the moment. "Peace, child, peace. That herb will help to loosen what has taken root in your lungs." The remainder is wiped off on a square of towel--again from her bag. "I'll have you drink water first, to quench your thirst and clean your throat before the herbs that must coat it." She drops her attention then to the rest of the herbs spread on the rough side of the oilcloth, crushing some and cutting others, mixing the final products in a tiny clay bowl. As she works, she speaks, her words once again the music of her native tongue. "For what was he to apologize?"
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath gets up, moving to the tent flap and holding the small bowl out into the rain. A breath of cool damp air circulates through the tent. A few minutes later, he returns, letting the flap fall again behind him, and holds the bowl out to Aruir, looking at her with grave eyes. Then he squats on his heels and says to Keldean, "She wishes to know of your past, and of your ... dealings with the one named Rhifaroth. You are not to speak. Shall I tell her, or do you wish to do so yourself when you are well?"
Keldean lets his eyes drift closed for a moment, the weird sensation of the medicine on his chest proving to distract him as easily as the earthware did. Giliath's words pull his focus, and he listens, laying quiet for a long time with rasping breaths. He looks at Aruir with guarded eyes for a moment, a natural defensive urge, but he speaks softly. "You can tell her."
[Aruir(#22123)] For a moment, it looks like Aruir will protest Giliath's phrasing, unsure of just how much time this child of the Edain will have left--not to mention recovery--if he remains out here. But, his answer stays her tongue and she says nothing, merely taking the bowl from the ellon and holding it in one hand while the other arm works to help the boy sit up. "Drink," she murmurs to him softly, forgetting to use Westron as her attention is divided between her patient and the soon-to-be storyteller.
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath nods. But he is silent still for some time, his eyes looking into a faraway place. Finally, he begins to speak, and he does so in Westron that Keldean might listen.
"The man, Rhifaroth, was living in the town called Bree. One, an evil man, wished knowledge of him, and ... the boy, Keldean, was persuaded to bring Rhifaroth to where he could be taken. When he had done so, he was made to go also. Terrible things were done to Rhifaroth before he was rescued. Keldean wishes to make amends now for the part he played in allowing this to happen."
Keldean is sharp enough to understand what's required when she helps him up and holds the bowl to his lips. He takes a slow sip, fighting the urge to cough as the liquid cools his sore throat. He drinks slowly, very thirsty, and listens to what Giliath says.
[Aruir(#22123)] "And he has been checked for..." How did Sidhel put it? "Wicked tricks to read his mind?" There is the barest breath of derision in her otherwise warm voice. Once the bowl is empty, she will set it to one side and use her free arm to pack the roll of her cloak under the boy's back, as well as other packs and items from the tent, just as before. Only then will she lower him slowly, satisfied to see him still elevated. "It may be less than comfortable, child, but until you breathe easier, this /will/ help." Her assertion is soft, repeating a message from her first night in this tent. After all it is unclear just how much he is recalling. "I ask, Giliath, because if we do not get him somewhere warm, dry and off the damp ground, I fear he will not last another week." Again, spoken swiftly, softly, fluidly in her native tongue.
"My mind? .. What do you mean?" Keldean asks, frowning and studying Aruir's face. "Is that what Mirinthel says?" He forces the words out even though they've both told him to stay silent. "Asht is dead. Rhifaroth killed him.. I saw it. You saw, Gil-" The cough returns and he lays back, spending the next several moments clearing his throat of choking mucus.
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath has opened his mouth to reply, when Keldean's hoarse voice forestalls him. "Yes," he confirms. "That one is now dead." But he gives Aruir a concerned look. "We should wait." He rises fluidly, and goes to the tent door, stooping and looking out.
[Aruir(#22123)] "We should wait?" the elleth questions him, still in Sindarin. Carefully she adds just a small amount of a clear liquid to the mix of herbs, stirring it slowly as she rises to stand nearer the ellon. "Wait for what? He must be brought to shelter soon, Giliath, or there will be nothing I can do to save him." She pauses to check the consistency of her mixture. "The damp from the earth and snow seeps into his lungs. And fevers like this need to be starved, not fed, but here we have no choice, lest the icy air steal his very life. What is so important as to risk him?" All this while, her voice is calm and soft, no anger or rising passions to inspire ire or agitation, but sweet, soothing tones that present no threat.
Keldean lays quietly once he can breath again, limp. He reaches to touch Caelwen's earthen pot again, drawing comfort from the inanimate object.
[Giliath(#9838)] But Giliath has not heard. Or if he has heard, he has chosen not to answer. For he is no longer in the tent, but striding swiftly along the path after his wife.
Keldean starts violently coughing, the medicine she worked into his skin starting to break up the clinging congestion in his lungs. The youth curls up, hacking badly into one of the blankets, blood staining the cloth.
[Aruir(#22123)] Watching the ellon leave the tent in late pursuit of his wife, Aruir heaves a soft sigh, just as the fit of coughing catches her attention. Moving quicker than she has in days, the elleth drops to her knees at his bedside, using the cloth she'd had before for his face to wipe away the traces of red from his skin. "Easy child, peace, you must drink this." She rubs his back in slow, soothing circles while her empty hand reaches for the small bowl. "Sit up, uncurl and sit up. This will help." Her voice--even in the rougher Westron--is warm and pleasant to listen to.
Keldean pushes to sit up again, his frame shaking from the near-suffocation reflex. As the stress of the spasm eases, the boy relaxes again, staring at Aruir now with an almost blank expression. "I'm not getting better.." He says, the words cracking from swollen vocal chords. "Why.. why are you helping?"
[Aruir(#22123)] "No, you aren't." Lying to her patients outright is not something Aruir does often at all, or very well. Shifting to a better angle, she holds the small bowl up to his lips. "After you drink this, you mustn't speak for five moments." The mixture is of the consistency of rich honey, and the taste is sickeningly sweet, though the aftertaste is quite bitter. "You are ill." That seems to be all the explanation there is.
Keldean does as he's told, taking a breath and then slowly swallowing the thick liquid. His face crinkles at the heavy sweetness of it, more than he's used to from growing up in a place where candies and such are a rare treat. He lifts his hand to rub his throat, the strange coating sensation making him uneasy, but he remembers not to say anything and lays back in silence.
[Aruir(#22123)] The rain slows, a moment of respite in the chill winter's pour. A hopeful sparrow starts to sing, only to have his song snuffed out when the pause turns out to be no more than that--a caesura. Aruir turns towards the tentflap at his song, a soft smile lighting her face as she picks up where he left off, humming the tune with her own sweet voice for a moment before turning to Keldean. "That will coat your throat and ease the soreness from your coughing. Once it passes into your blood, the medicine should help with the fever and with the loosening of the sickness from your lungs." She reaches out to brush hair from his forehead. "I dare not give you anything to suppress the cough, since it is what's helping you to stay alive right now."
The aftertaste is unpleasant at best. Keldean swallows painfully a few times, trying to rid his mouth of it even as it brings moisture to his eyes. Finally he speaks, a plaintive request, "Water.." The last fit of coughs sapped his energy to the point where he makes no effort to move about now.
[Aruir(#22123)] "Not just yet, tithen emlin. Let it have a few moments more..." Aruir speaks in Westron, the elven endearment slipping through her lips before she realizes what she's said. But it is accurate, Keldean as frail and helpless as a fallen sparrow. She smiles and sets to putting her pack to rights, folding each square of fabric around its herb and tucking the ends before placing it back where it belongs. Only when that is finished does she take the two bowls to the entrance, one to clean and the other to fill with water.
Keldean sighs in defeat, closing his eyes. He doesn't ask for the water again and looks to have dozed off. The sleep won't last long, the medicine will eventually begin to work and he'll be awake coughing again. But for the moment his body grabs what little bit of rest that it can. If Aruir remains by his side, she may have the satisfaction of seeing the fever begin to recede a few hours later. Small progress, but enough to show that she's on the right track with her treatment.
[Aruir(#22123)] Once the smaller bowl is clean, Aruir will return to her patient to offer water, only to find him resting. Rather than disturb his sleep, she places the bowl on the floor nearby and sits leaning against her pack watching, waiting. With no one left to guard him, she will stay, leaving only when her time in the Halls of Healing calls her down, sometime after first light. With him though, she'll leave the two bowls full of water and those honeycakes. He'll need what strength they can offer him.
Players: Aruir, Keldean, Giliath, Caelwen
