The One

TWENTYSEVEN

The same bed.
He had to think about it for a minute, had it been a weird dream?
Surely it had to be, he had definitely died.

He wanted to sit up, no! Nope nope! Definitely not a dream.
He grabbed at his stomach, just under his ribs.
He was wrapped there, but he could feel the hard edges of stitching.

" So, I hear you have a new habit of getting stabbed? "

Morten looked around at the voice, wincing loudly.
His Brother was sitting there, smiling.

"Osmin?" Morten said, his voice was weirdly quiet.

"Ah, lost your voice? Nice and quiet!" His brother jested,
but stood up all the same and grabbed his hand.

"Josan is with me, but she couldn't stand to see you laying here looking like a piece of beat up beef."

"Is it that bad?" Morten managed to press out of his throat.

His brother shrugged, "Remember when you fell out of that pine when You were 12?
You looked worse then."

Morten snorted, he had hit every single branch down, that tree a broken his arm, wrist and bruised every inch of him.

"You hit your head really hard, they said.
So they told me to tell you to try and stay awake ones you woke up." He smiled.

"Kenan!" Morten blurted out, suddenly remembering the hammer flying into him.

"Ah, he's the ash? He's okay.
Broken all his lower ribs if I heard right. He was in that bed but his father took him home."
His brother said.
That made sense, thought Morten,
carefully looking at the bed next to his that his brother had indicated.

"What, how? What happened to the invader?" Osmir sighed and turned,
pulling a chair close to the bed and sat down.

"From what I understand, most of them got boiled? You should remember that?"

Morten Nodded.

"You, that Ash and a big fellow named Agnus? Took out a lot of remaining guys."

Morten nodded, made sense.

"Agnus take out the big guy?" Morten asked.

"No! One of the five did." Osmir said, sounding like he didn't exactly believe it.
"Don't worry!" he said, seeing Morten's shocked expression, "That guy, Agnus, is still alive."

His brother smiled, "It seems.. well, three man couldn't take him down. But a woman managed.
Apparently stabbed him in =the neck and severed his spinal cord."
He shook his head, smiling wide, "Shit, I have seen three of the five and the one that took him out is easily the most innocent and fragile looking one!"

Aya, though Morten.

He could see it though, he had heard Agnus's voice before his brain had fully checked out.
He could imagine Agnus fighting the hell out of the big man and Aya actually saving his ass instead of the other way around.

Typical.

"How did you get here so fast? " Aske Morten.

Osmin sat back in his chair an looked at him for a moment,
"We were already on our way."

Morten looked at him for a moment, "why?"

"It seems, you were picked to be married. Whether you knew it or not. " He said, grinning.

Morten frowned at him for a moment, " I was? "

Osim nodded.

" Well I did catch a dagger to the lung. " Morten shrugged.

" No, it was apparently before that. I didn't hear that until later." His brother shrugged.

Morten frowned, "When did you leave?"

Osmir shook his head, "I got a letter to be in the city by this morning, two weeks ago?"

Morten blinked.

Well shit, that meant Four already knew she was going to be stuck with him.
Or maybe the council had decided.
Either way...

Roran had died.
He was the only remaining option anyway.
He looked at his brother for a while, chewing this.

Osmir looked concerned.

" Are they still going through with this? " Morten asked.

Osmir took in a breath and held it there looking thoughtful, " I asked the same when we arrived to... this?"
He gestured around the room, " Not just you, here, looking like overused stuffed animal. It's an abandoned war zone outside of these doors. They are still dragging massive boiled and blistered bodies out of the walls. "

Morten laughed at this, Osmir looked at him in surprise.
" By the lords, you must have been so confused! Thinking I had been living in a murder dungeon!" He grinned.

Osmir laughed back, "Well, Josan was really upset.
She basically told me to grab you and run home! "
He sighed, " But, seriously, there's death in abundance here right now"

Morten looked blankly ahead of him.
He had been sure he would be one of them, the dead.
How did he get here, how did he survive?

" You got incredibly lucky. " Said Agnus simply.

Morten looked at him, pulling on a tunic and stuffing it in his pants.

" I got to you, Kenan was half conscious. Yowling like a cat, saying you were still breathing.
As if I was going to dismiss your lifeless body. " Agnus shook his head.
"I did understand. I saw your injury, thought there was no way you were breathing but realized you weren't lying in a puddle of blood either." 

" Is that a good thing? " Morten asked.

Agnus shrugged, " you still had the knife stuck up your gut. So that could have been why.
blades sometimes block the vessels and bleeding.
But nope, the knife was extremely blunt so it just hurt the shit out of you and pushed all your important bits away."

Morten rubbed the spot, it had indeed been one of his more painful impaling's.

"Don't touch it... " growled Agnus.
" You will get it infected."

"Yes dad!" Growled Morten back.

There was a meeting of some kind and Morten had been dragged out of bed to participate.
But they were faced with the issue that sitting wasn't a good position for him, he'd rip his stitches.
So now all the pretty beat up young men were preparing for a standing meeting.

Morten was actually sporting some furs.
His brother had found the mozer, he had launched just before he left, on it's sled in a ditch.
And taken it's brand new soft fur.

Morten was cold now, all the time, even here.
He had lost a lot of blood even if that last gut stab hadn't caused major bleeding.
He had ate very little due to his days of being knocked out followed by another day of obtaining more injuries.

So he looked like a Frozen today.

Agnus, petting the tunic to lay nicely, looked like a changed man.
He would have looked like a cutting board. But his freckles hid his injuries quite well.
His hair was nothing like it had been when he first met him, it lay in thick curl on his chest.
He seemed less red, probably because he hadn't been exposed to the sun as much or because he too had lost most of it in the recent struggles.
He had eaten better and was less dry and veiny.

Agnus simply seemed well cared for.

He plucked on his shirt, sighed and looked at Morten.
"You think what I'm thinking?"

"They are... cancelling." Said Morten.

Agnus nodded, "The death of several participants. Hell, all of us got nearly killed.
It be in bad taste to continue."

Morten nodded.

Agnus sighed.

Morten wanted to say something, how Aya would probably still wanted to be around him.
But actually, he wasn't sure so he didn't dare suggest it.

"Let's go." Morten nodded back.