Prompt: “Things are going south.”
“Camilla, stay with me.” Val’s voice breaks through the darkness, followed by immense pain from the wound in my thigh. “Stay awake.”
With a groan, I struggle to sit up. My elbow slides out from under me, and I let my back hit the ground again.
Another round of pain provokes a cry, and I realize Val removed knife. It’s not the worst pain I’ve endured, but it comes with a fog. My vision blurs, and my head feels heavier by the second.
“What’s…happening to me?”
“Poison. That bastard used poison-laced throwing knives.” Val rummages in his bag. Behind him, his tail twitches in what I’ve come to recognize as anxiety. The twitching only stops when he finds something in the bag – an unlabeled jar. A second later he’s lathering my wound in a weird goop he scoops from it. “This will draw the poison out, but you need to stay awake until it’s out of your system.”
“Why?”
“You might not wake up.” He wipes his hands, bandages the wound, and pulls me up into a sitting position. I try to help him sit me up. But I can’t.
“I can’t move.”
“It causes paralysis.”
“Of course it does.” Val adjusts me so I’m sitting against his chest, my head resting back on his shoulder. “Things are going south so quickly.” With a sigh, I let my eyes close.
“Don’t.” He speaks in my ear, voice triggering a shiver of goosebumps. I’m suddenly glad I can’t actually move.
Be sure to check out the rest of the responses at the prompt.
As always, think happy thoughts 🙂
Fiction Trials 