Mistress of Helena

Chapter 22

The air was saturated with the pungent stench of blood, charred flesh, and sweat. Soldiers unscathed by wounds bustled through the labyrinthine catacombs, their arms laden with soiled bandages, their uniforms stained with the blood of comrades. Carrack trailed behind Crow, the maelstrom swirling around them punctuated by Alaina’s sharp, commanding echoes. At the thought of encountering her, he straightened his walk.

Small, partially excavated rooms were pockets of solace along the hallway, each a fragment of its intended size, crammed with makeshift tables and beds nursing the wounded. Crow inspected a few before signaling Carrack to follow him inside one of them.

There, Carrack found Foeham, sprawled on his back, eyes closed, his uniform half-burned off by fire, exposing charred fragments of his flesh. The right side of his body, from his chest down to his hip, was a canvas of agony. His wounds simmered, formed blisters, and festooned with pustules, the seared skin crackling with every laborious breath. The inferno had also kissed the lower side of his right jawline, leaving second-degree burns visible to Carrack’s trained eyes. The sight was grim.

A pit formed in Carrack’s stomach, a feeling of draining horror washing over him as his eyes scanned Foeham’s mutilated form.

“Good lord,” Carrack whispered unbelievingly to himself as he shook his head, “he hasn’t a chance.”

“It’s not good, no,” Crow said. “But it’s not hopeless.”

“Look at him, Crow,” Carrack retorted. “You’ve witnessed plenty. What makes you believe he can survive this?”

“I’ve watched men perish from mere cuts in the blink of an eye, seen men linger, conversing normally, even with half their bodies gone. I’ve seen sturdy men meet their end after a mere head bump, and a man survive an engine explosion with all his limbs blown off. Death is … unpredictable,” Crow elucidated. “Under normal circumstances, I would consider him done for, but I’ve never been accompanied by a mage before. And she believes there’s a glimmer of hope.”

“Alaina is gifted, but I don’t know how she plans to pull this off.” Carrack sighed.

“You can ask her yourself,” a voice interrupted, revealing Alaina’s entrance through the doorway. She appeared to have weathered a storm. Her hair was a frayed mess, despite being restrained in a bun, her face wore a gaze that seemed to cut through stone, and she was smeared with dried blood. In her grasp was a small vial, containing a luminous blue liquid. “There remains a flicker of hope for your captain, albeit a precarious one.”

“What have you got there for him?” Carrack questioned.

Alaina hesitated, her gaze lingering on the liquid before she approached Foeham’s side. “It’s the potion I mentioned previously. The Dreamings.”

Carrack’s eyebrows lifted in surprise. “You’re administering that? But isn’t that—”

“Very risky,” she interjected. “The chances of him surviving are slim, but they’re nonexistent without it.”

“I hadn’t imagined its use for something like this,” Carrack mused. “And the hallucinations? If he experiences nightmares, won’t he react violently?”

“That would indeed be bad,” Alaina concurred, elevating the potion to scrutinize its consistency against the light. “But this concoction has been altered slightly. It will almost entirely immobilize his body, sparing only the essential functions—heart, brain, lungs, the like. He will be plunged into a comatose state, which is imperative to halt his body from succumbing to panic.

“How long,” Carrack’s voice faltered as he gestured toward Foeham, “will this entire process take?”

“To heal?” Alaina exhaled deeply, her gaze unwavering. “It’s uncertain. A considerable amount of time, at the very least. There’s a possibility he may remain in this state indefinitely. Unfortunately, I just don’t know.”

“Do you need our help with anything?” queried Carrack.

“N—” Her voice halted, and a frown creased her forehead as she assessed Carrack. “You can go sit down in my room and wait for me to look at the damn leg.”

Accepting her direction with a resigned inhale, Carrack turned to Crow, directing him to fortify the stronghold, maintain vigilance for any arrivals from the city, and assume command until his return to the surface. With a nod, Crow departed, his voice reverberating through the hall as he issued orders to any lingering idle figures.

Carrack’s gaze returned to Alaina, who was meticulously administering the potion to Foeham. Her eyes, meeting his, silently reiterated her previous directive. With another sigh, he withdrew, limping towards her quarters.

In that room, he perched on the very bed he’d been relegated to after his previous brush with calamity. Though only partially seated, as if poised for a hasty escape, he yearned to resume his duties beyond these walls. Yet, there was a distinct shift in his emotions—a sense of disappointment he couldn’t quite articulate. Every inch of his body throbbed, and it wasn’t just the pain from the wound. Am I truly getting old? The question lingered in his thoughts. His tenure on the island hadn’t been extensive enough to mark significant years gone by. But he felt the undeniable weight of age; a sense of fragility he hadn’t carried upon his initial arrival. Moreover, the apparitions, the dreams, the mental disturbances that now plagued him were new, foreign, despite the myriad challenges he’d faced throughout his life on the mainland.

The waiting seemed endless, every echo of footsteps heightening his anticipation, hoping it would be her, but it never was. Carrack’s frustration swelled, impatience seizing him as he rose, intending to depart.

As though summoned by his movement, Alaina entered, bearing bandages, and wearing the same look of disapproval he’d seen before. Carrack repositioned himself on the bed as she approached, the stern gaze lingering as she addressed his wound.

“Aggravated,” Alaina noted.

“Understandable, you’ve had a long day,” Carrack ventured in agreement.

“No,” she corrected sharply. “Your wound. It’s aggravated. You’ve torn through the stitches.”

“Well … It’s been a fairly eventful last few hours,” Carrack offered in explanation.

“Mm hm, Sergeant Crow filled me in, although there’s a certain level of ambiguity in the account,” Alaina responded.

Taking a deep breath, Carrack began recounting every detail: the initial rescue, the standoff, the ship, his blurred recollections of a brush with death, and the visions of Adcock in the flames. At first, his words rushed, skipping seemingly unimportant details only to double back to explain them. It was an endeavor, but eventually, he wove a coherent narrative, particularly clarifying the supernatural elements. When he finished, Alaina sat, her eyes seemingly delving into his thoughts, probing for unspoken details, before she reverted her attention to tending his leg.

After a thoughtful silence, she spoke again, her voice measured, almost analytical: “That’s …” She paused, hands on hips, gaze fixed on the ground. “A lot.”

“Anything else to add to your boundless wisdom?” Carrack’s chuckle came out nervously and involuntarily.

“Your near-death experience …”

“That’s the point, Alaina. I think I did die. Dammit, the memories are slipping away, but I distinctly recall a shadow and a sensation of being pulled from some abyss. It’s all so hazy now,” Carrack endeavored to clarify, frustrated by his eroding recollection. “Your thoughts?”

“Thoughts?” Alaina’s voice held a note of incredulity. “I wish I could offer some explanation. The shadow between life and death is not easily comprehensible, particularly when I’ve not experienced such a state. Our minds are capable of conjuring so many illusions in life, I can’t imagine how amplified that is as death encroaches; it’s a puzzle intertwined with our perceptions of life, soul, and perceived realms beyond our own. It could have been your mind crafting illusions while you were submerged in the water.”

“I can’t just dismiss it as mere illusion. It still lingers like a bad taste,” Carrack contended.

“Regardless of your unwillingness to accept it as a hallucination, what about your vision of Adcock? How would you categorize that?” Alaina asked.

Carrack exhaled forcefully, frustrated by her logical correlation. “I … just can’t.”

“You may need to discuss it with someone. There’s likely only one person on this island skilled enough to assist you, but …” Alaina’s words were chosen with precision, and Carrack discerned her implication immediately.

“I did promise her I would return for another session,” Carrack acknowledged.

“You omitted that particular tidbit earlier,” Alaina remarked, her eyebrows arching in surprise.

“I did,” Carrack confessed, nodding. “It slipped my mind, apparently.”

“Nonetheless, stepping into the right now seems like a bad idea,” Alaina said.

“You have a point,” Carrack agreed, his tone somber. “Given our current predicament, my needs must be secondary. The fires, food, the people—it’s all unraveling.”

“No, they absolutely must not!” Alaina retorted vehemently. “Now, more than ever, you need rest, food, and moderation. I swear if you aggravate this wound again—”

“There’s a limit to restraint—look at your clothes and tell me to relax right now!” Carrack said, gesturing to the blood stains marring her attire. “This entire fortress will be submerged in blood if we don’t act swiftly!”

Alaina’s gaze lingered on her blood-soaked attire, then shifted to her hands, stained with Carrack’s fresh blood. The silence stretched, her thoughts seemingly lost in contemplation. A deep breath accompanied her soft click of the tongue. “I’ll address our food situation, explore some alternatives, can you give me a couple days?”

“I’ll try. Do what you can, and I’ll be grateful, but don’t turn yourself into a tumor over it,” Carrack said.

“I’ll make a note of it,” Alaina’s laugh bore no mirth. “Managed to catch a glimpse of our newfound guest—the shipwreck survivor?”

“Haven’t found the moment yet; what’s his story?” queried Carrack.

“Well, it’s hard to say. He hasn’t awakened yet. He’s on the older side, lean, with salt-and-pepper hair. But his countenance … It tells a story of its own. It’s etched with so much weariness. Whatever ordeal he faced out on those waves, it’s marked him deeply,” Alaina said. “Do you want to see him?”

“He’s no good to me unconscious. I want him to tell me why … why that blasted ship crashed, why it exploded … I want answers for why all these people had to die.” Carrack’s voice was a rumble of restrained fury.

“I’m afraid you’ll find no solace from him right now, hard to think you’ll find all the answers you want if he ever awakens.” Alaina said, shaking her head. “But I’ll keep tabs on him and see if there is anything I can do to rouse him from his slumber.”