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Chapter 10 - Color in the snow

Asperd Isle - winter, The Flood Village, Elisa’s POV

Day nine away from home.

Ill and with child, the words are stuck in my head resounding.

“Dear, please go grab my cloak. We need to make haste.”

I turn and run up the stairs to our room grabbing my bag with my herbs and remedies in. Running out the room and down to the waiting men and the single barmaid. Raval is waiting with my cloak and he has his own on, ready to leave. The young man is likewise ready. Raval holds out the cloak for me to get into. I turn to look at the young man.

“Show the way”

“Yes! Follow me please.”

His voice hold a nervousness to it, his body language screams worry and fear. He runs headlong into the snowstorm and soon only his shadow is visible in the night.

The heavy snowfall has made it hard to move, reaching waist high. All we can do is follow the track he as made on his way to the inn and even that trail is covered up to knee height by the short time he has spent inside the inn waiting for me.

Half an hour that is the time it takes us to make the trip back to his house. Inside we are greeted by an old pair.

“Greetings and good evenings to you sir and ma'am, we thank you for taking the time of the night to travel here.”

The older man's voice calls out as to overthrow the sound of the storm.

“Evening, please show me to the patient.”

Raval stays back with the other two men as the old women shows me to the back room.

It is lid with a small firepot burning to keep the room warm. A single bed in the corner is all the room has. The window is covered with thick wool blankets to keep the warm in the room. On the bed lies a young woman in her teens, she is shaking and sweating, mumbling words that none can hear.

“How long has she been like this?”

“She fell with the cold a week ago and then it kept strengthening its hold of her. She always had an easy time getting sick in the winter, so we just kept an eye on it as we normally do -”

The older women is staring at the girl. Tears form in her eyes.

“I mean she always got better, always!”

Her voice begged me to understand.

“Please ma'am! Please help my daughter!”

I smile to her and grab her hand in mine. “Of course I will help her, ma'am. I shall do all that I can for her so don't blame this on yourself, you have done nothing wrong.”

Riin’s POV

Asperd Isle - winter, Herbalist’s Hut.

Twelfth day alone.

The storm let up during the night, now only light snow is falling. The days have been slowly passing by, the only company I have had was the sound of the wolves howling in the night and scratching on the door to the shed. How they got to the house in this storm is a wild guess. - but I did not dare to open the door since for all I knew there was more than one behind it. So for now we have settled at a staring match, with me looking at them from my window in my room and them looking back at me from the cover of the forest. I have gone to eat the stored food from the cellar, and to keep myself from going hungry during the cold nights where we are staring at eachother I have my smoked meat, I must say it give me a smile on my face to eat the smoked wolf meat in front of them, a simple pleasure in the annoying storm.

Form all the workout I have been doing the past few days, I have gained + 4 to my [Strength] and + 6 [Dexterity], so I'm making progress in that part of my plan at least, well spending eight days time on only training is bound to give some sort of effect. It seems that all my stretching exercises works great for increasing my [Dexterity], that and I have added some knife work into my program. I still need to get my hand on some good swords, I would feel much more safe with dual wielding blades, the two swords style always felt right with me, compared to any other sword style that is - not saying that I'm no good with a dagger or another small knife type of weapon I just like to have one in each hand if I have to go into melee combat with anyone or anything.

The wolves did not show up last night they are moving east by the sounds of their howling last I heard them, they must have gotten the scent of more easy prey then me.

Elisa’s POV

Asperd Isle - winter, 3 Miles East of The Flood Outpost.

Twelfth day away from home.

Wolves.

We were woken last night by their howling, they are moving closer to us. A pack of them is not something we can take on two people, if they track us down we will be in a lot of trouble with only Raval’s sword and my walking stick, we have very little way to defend against them should they attack.

Luck is not with us it seems. We are now staring at a pack of ten timber wolves and I have no doubt that this will end in their victory.

Riin’s POV

Asperd Isle - winter, Herbalist’s Hut.

Thirteenth day alone.

My morning start out with the lack of wolves circling around the house, there where an eerie silence in the air.

The early morning hours was spent looking around the edge of the garden, no sign of them, they had defintely left last night and not returned to this area yet.

Midday I spotter mother and father on the little trail leading west towards The Flood Outpost and out the forest.

Blood covered father's chest and his right arm hang to the side loosely, blood slowly dripping down into the snow.

Mother too was not looking good her skin and slick and pale like she too had lost blood but I could not see any wounds from the way she was walking towards the house.