Raymond.
and at his feet they'll cast their golden crowns
when the man comes around
"I can wait," the red stallion replied, watching Pavetta wade into the waters with his head tilted. Blood washed from the ugly gash and the ugly dried mats in her coat in whorls of deep maroon, piquing the interest of a host of timid minnows as it diffused into the surrounding water. She needed medical attention far more than he, and word around town was that the swamp was not always hospitable. A few more moments of discomfort were a small price to pay for their safety under his watch.
You seem more of a caveman butcherer to me, she said as she exited the pool, and Raymond's hearty laughter rang through the treetops. Perhaps he should have been offended at her presumptiveness, but frankly by the looks of her side and his relative inexperience with sutures he imagined she would probably look something like a butcher's product by the end of all this.
"I'm not familiar with a whipstitch," Raymond said thoughtfully, his memory of first aid lessons playing like degraded film in his mind as he took the needle delicately under his telepathic control, "but I think I know something that might work."
A surgeon would have stapled a wound like this, in another place, time, and universe. It was long and ugly, no matter how much shallower it was than it could have been. He hummed along to an old soldiering tune as he set to work on a running locking suture that theoretically wouldn't fail the moment she bumped into something. He'd never seen it used on a wound quite this large and his handiwork was far less artful than his swordplay, but it got the job done.
When she spoke again, he fell silent to listen, chuckling softly in his throat. "I try not to murder people when I can help it." The words came with a jocular tone, but darkened just a little at the edges. Somewhere along the timeline of his life he'd paid a price to make that quip possible.
Raymond took up the meticulous process where he left off, though this time the humming did not continue. Slowly, painstakingly, the gash was disappearing behind a scaffold of dark stitches. "I've met soldiers three times your age with half your spirit. What are you doing running around with a medicine pouch?"
You seem more of a caveman butcherer to me, she said as she exited the pool, and Raymond's hearty laughter rang through the treetops. Perhaps he should have been offended at her presumptiveness, but frankly by the looks of her side and his relative inexperience with sutures he imagined she would probably look something like a butcher's product by the end of all this.
"I'm not familiar with a whipstitch," Raymond said thoughtfully, his memory of first aid lessons playing like degraded film in his mind as he took the needle delicately under his telepathic control, "but I think I know something that might work."
A surgeon would have stapled a wound like this, in another place, time, and universe. It was long and ugly, no matter how much shallower it was than it could have been. He hummed along to an old soldiering tune as he set to work on a running locking suture that theoretically wouldn't fail the moment she bumped into something. He'd never seen it used on a wound quite this large and his handiwork was far less artful than his swordplay, but it got the job done.
When she spoke again, he fell silent to listen, chuckling softly in his throat. "I try not to murder people when I can help it." The words came with a jocular tone, but darkened just a little at the edges. Somewhere along the timeline of his life he'd paid a price to make that quip possible.
Raymond took up the meticulous process where he left off, though this time the humming did not continue. Slowly, painstakingly, the gash was disappearing behind a scaffold of dark stitches. "I've met soldiers three times your age with half your spirit. What are you doing running around with a medicine pouch?"
@Pavetta
aut viam inveniam aut faciam
