A Promise of Death

• 22 •

First came the noise; a jumble of voices crashed into Desa's ears as she fought to gain consciousness. Next came the pain. It felt like an ocean of it was trying to drown her under strong waves. Her senses were working overtime to catch up to the stimuli crashing into her. Her face was against a hard surface and her leg was making her groan. The only reason she wasn't screaming at the pain was that her vocal cords hadn't fully woken up yet.

She tried to open her eyes but the lids felt like iron weights were holding them down. She tried to move her arms, her legs, any part of her but her whole body felt like lead. She would've went back to sleep if it wasn't for the incessant rumble of foreign voices all around her. It was almost deafening. With great difficulty, Desa blinked open her eyes.

Or more like one eye. Her left eye refused to open, it was swollen shut and it throbbed. Her face was lying down on a hard wooden table on her cheek, she gave out a groan as she lifted her head from it.

Lord of the Fae, every nerve and muscle ending screamed at her to stop moving. As she leaned back to look around, she blinked her right good eye so it would clear the blurry grogginess she felt. She just wanted to stop waking up in pain at this point.

As Desa looked around, she realised why the noise had woken her up, there were a lot of people around. Sitting at tables and booths, on the stools, standing idly by. It took her a minute to realise that she knew this place. She was in Tilly's Tavern.

Bringing up a hand to cover her eyes, and rub her face, she winced as she felt pain radiating from her closed shut left eye and lip. She pulled back her hand to look down. She had a split lip which was also still bleeding a bit.

Closing her eyes, Desa leaned her head back in the booth she was sitting. The last thing she remembered was extreme pain and burning. Freyt and Zekla standing over her as they dealt out her punishment for once again trying to get out of the enchantment Sontarro had placed on her.

Desa looked around the dimly lit tavern with a spinning head. Her punishment must've been over. Freyt usually carried her out of Sontarro's lair. He sometimes deposited her at her house. This time he apparently had chosen the tavern. Maybe he thought she could need a strong drink after the past three days. This was probably the twisted orc's way of saying sorry. Not that he would really be sorry. He enjoyed fighting and the sight of blood to much to feel remorse.

Desa scooted over to the edge of the booth to get out. She turned her legs to the side and stood up. As soon as she put her weight down on her left leg, an immense pain shot up from her spine and she stumbled. She held on to the wooden table to prevent herself from falling down. Looking down at her legs, she saw that her left one was bandaged up from her ankle to thigh.