Victor Rosevale's Arc

Chapter 3 of 18

Victor hit the shallows on his knees. Sable's face was pale under the smear of river mud. Her leg was the problem. A gash ran from her thigh to her knee, still leaking pink water into the current. He dragged her out of the river by the shoulders and laid her on the bank. She groaned. Alive. Barely. He pulled the wool strips from his shirt and pressed them to the wound. Blood soaked through the first strip before he could tie it. He stacked the second on top and cinched the leather thong above her knee. The wool went dark almost at once. He knew then it would not hold. The gash was too long and too deep, and his coat lining was already a wet rag in his hand. "Victor." Her voice was a scrape. Her brown eyes found him. "You came." "Shhh honey. I’m here. I need clean cloth. I don't have anything clean." She swallowed. Her hand moved to her vest and fumbled at a buckle. "Inside. Left pocket." He opened the flap. A folded square of oiled linen sat against a small tin. The linen was white. Clean. A flight kit, packed the way her father must have taught her. "Salve in the tin," she said. "Pack it. Then wrap." His hands shook. He made them stop. He peeled the soaked wool away and saw bone at the deep end of the cut. He spread the salve along the wound. He folded the linen into a pad and pressed it down. He tore the rest into strips and wrapped her thigh tight, then tighter, until the white stopped turning red. The mossy dragon watched from the treeline. It did not come closer. The falcon settled on a branch above them and folded its wings. Sable's breathing evened. Not safe. Steadier. "Who did this," he said. "Later." Her fingers closed on his wrist. Weak, but sure. "They're still out here. Two of them. They took my pack and left me for the river." Her eyes cut to the ridge above the bend. "They'll come back when they see the falcon circling." Victor looked at the ridge. Then at the spear he had dropped in the mud. Then at Sable, wrapped in the only clean cloth for a day's walk in any direction, unable to stand. "Honey, I move you." He slid an arm under her knees and lifted. She hissed but did not cry out. The dragon turned its head upslope, toward a cleft in the rocks he had not seen from the water. Cover. A place to set her down and wait with a spear pointed at the only path in. He carried her toward it. Behind him, the falcon lifted off the branch and climbed.