“You should really try to

  get some rest.”

  My nursemaid had refused to

  leave my side for more than a few moments at a time. She insisted on

  sitting at my bedside and dabbing my face with a wet cloth despite

  the fact that it was effectively doing nothing. I had tried to reason

  with her that she didn’t need to keep refreshing the water and

  moistening my face, but in the end it didn’t hurt me and it seemed

  to make her feel better so I let her do it without a fuss. It was

  somewhat nice to have her doting on me, tucking and re-tucking me in,

  it reminded me of when I was very young and would come down with a

  fever or the sniffles.

  “I feel like all I’ve done

  is sleep,” I groaned.

  “Then it’s what your body

  needs right now,” she said with a sagely nod, “no one gets better

  by sitting up and fretting about their illness. Your body wants you

  to sleep, so it’s best that you do, you will heal much heal faster

  that way.”

  “I don’t know if it’s

  that’s simple,” I sighed. I had a deep, uncomfortable feeling

  that magic was at play and that rest, while it felt like I needed it,

  wasn't going to fix anything in the end.

  “Of course it is.” She

  clicked her tongue and donned a very matronly expression. “You’ve

  been through quite a lot and that nasty woman went too far too many

  times. Once was too many times,” she muttered angrily, “but

  repeated injuries have made it even worse. If we do not choose a time

  to rest and let our body heal, the body will choose it for us.”

  On any other health mater I

  might have conceded to her point, but this didn’t feel like just a

  simple physical issue that would mend with some rest and rich food. I

  had been a fool to mess with using my power to the extent I had, as

  much as I loathed to admit it, the cleric had been correct in her

  warnings not to extend my powers without someone to monitor.

  “When is the healer

  arriving?” I asked as I let my eyes wander up to trace the cracks

  in the ceiling.

  “Soon, I hope,” she

  replied with a long sigh. “I told Martha to send for the one that

  nursed your father through a very bad fever when you were very young.

  It was very touch and go with him that winter, but the doctor was

  able to get him to pull through and have him back on his feet when we

  all thought he was a goner. If anyone in this kingdom will know what

  to do it will be him.” She turned her attention to the basin once

  again and dipped the rag into the bowl, then squeezed the excess

  water from it before placing it on my forehead and applying gentle

  pressure. “It will feel like he will get here much sooner if you

  just close your eyes and rest. Remember how I used to convince you to

  sleep the night before your birthday by telling you it would make it

  come quicker?”

  “Of course and you were

  right, it did make it feel like it came quicker.” I had figured out

  it had been a ploy just to get me to sleep when I was still fairly

  young, but it still worked. I would cover up my head and lay begging

  my body to sleep despite being excited so I could wake up the next

  morning and run downstairs to see what exactly had been bought for me

  that year.

  “Now close your eyes and

  pretend it’s your birthday tomorrow. I won’t move an inch while

  you sleep and be right here for you.” She positioned the cloth to

  comfortably lay over my eyes, then wrapped her hand comfortingly

  around mine. “Nothing is going to happen to you on my watch.” She

  cleared her throat and her voice cracked slightly. "I won't let

  anything happen to you again, I may never forgive myself for not

  fighting for you at the very start of this whole terrible ordeal."

  I was glad for the cloth over

  my eyes, it hid the tears welling up. “Okay, I will try to sleep

  now,” I murmured.

  I didn't know what else to

  say, I didn't feel like I had the strength, physically or emotionally

  to try to comfort her in the moment. While I always just told myself

  she was mostly just a servant who had been tasked with raising me and

  was just kind to me, she had spent more time with me than she had any

  of her actual children. I felt close to her in a way I hadn't my

  parents and it pained me to know that she was so upset.

  Between the cool cloth, the

  comforting hand on mine, and the nursemaid’s soft humming of a

  lullaby I was asleep within a few minutes. My dreams were muddled

  masses of feelings and emotions, the scenes more than just images and

  sounds. It felt like I was free falling endlessly into a dark void

  where I could sense things just beyond my perception but couldn’t

  move or do anything to gain any clarity. There was an itchy tingle in

  the back of my consciousness that told me I was being watched, though

  I didn’t know how or by who. The feeling made me uncomfortable and

  no matter how much I fought to try to focus and make out anything in

  the undulating darkness, I was left ignorant and unable to do

  anything but let what would happen, happen. I had settled into a sort

  of unhappy comfort with the situation when a feeling of impending

  doom griped my chest, like I had suddenly become aware that I was

  rapidly accelerating towards the ground. I tried to thrash and fight

  uselessly and screamed silently into the void around me.

  “Easy, easy,” said an aged

  male voice that cut through the darkness, “I’m here to help you.”

  I couldn’t place the voice.

  It wasn’t someone I had heard before and the sudden presence of a

  voice made me feel even more uneasy.

  “I need you to wake up,”

  they said gently, but sternly.

  Wake up? Right, I had gone to

  sleep, this wasn’t real, I needed to wake up and get out of the

  nightmare I was stuck in. It felt so real though, like it had invaded

  my consciousness and taken me hostage. Maybe I would stay in the

  dream forever, be doomed to fall endlessly in a space where time no

  longer mattered.

  “Florin!”

  A violent shake brought me out

  of my dreams with a great gasp of air. My lungs burned and my neck

  hurt from being violently whipped back and forth.

  “Oh thank goodness,” my

  nursemaid screeched, voice near a hysterical scream. “I thought we

  lost you!”

  “I’m okay,” I managed to

  mutter out. My own voice felt distant and foreign like someone was

  pretending to be me in the same room.

  “Now you are,” the man

  muttered, pulling my shoulders forward and forcing me to sit up. “Get

  the pillows piled up behind him, no more sleeping flat.”

  The nursemaid jumped into

  action, hastily stuffing pillows behind me while I groggily tried to

  stay awake. The allure of giving in and going back to sleep was

  strong, almost like something was beckoning to me, whispering how

  wonderful sleep would be if I would just let it overtake me once

  more. Even though I was still very much out of it, I was conscious

  enough to be terrified that there was obviously something very, very

  wrong with me.

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  “I

  can’t see!” I exclaimed as the realization wafted through me.

  “We’ve got to get him more

  conscious,” the man said.

  I let out a startled yelp as a

  spray of cold water drenched my face and front of my sleeping gown.

  Instantly I began to shiver and my teeth chattered together, it felt

  like I had no body heat of my own left. The shock unfortunately did

  not return my sight.

  “He’ll catch a cold like

  that!”

  “I can cure a cold, but I

  need him to be alive first.”

  My blood ran cold and I

  started to make a concerted force of will to break through the groggy

  haze that was enveloping me. Maybe this is what it felt like to die

  and I wasn’t going to go down without a fight. I started by

  wriggling my fingers and really paying attention to the feeling of

  the fabric beneath them, then I started focusing on the cold water

  soaking my clothes, then the smells of my bedroom, taking every

  avenue I could to try to connect my mind and body back to the real

  world and convince it to leave the dreams behind. Slowly my sight

  returned, the nothingness replaced by blurry splodges of color that

  slowly came into focus. An older man whom I had never met before was

  staring at eye level with me, his lips set into a firm, worried line.

  “Coming back to us?” he

  asked.

  “Uh huh,” I replied

  weakly.

  “Good, your eyes look more

  focused so I think you’re out of the worst part of it.” His voice

  sounded so calm and in charge that I couldn’t help but feel a bit

  safer.

  “Coming out of what?!” The

  nursemaid was still near hysterics.

  “That’s something I’m

  going to be working on figuring out,” the man soothed, “nothing

  to worry about for now, he’s back and with us.”

  Blinking my eyes rapidly a few

  times helped me to further surface and I felt connected enough to

  bring my hands to either side of me and lift myself up enough to

  readjust my position to something a bit more comfortable. Sadly my

  legs still sat as dead weight, they were refusing to wake up with the

  rest of me.

  “Do you think you’re well

  enough now to answer some simple questions for me?” the man

  questioned.

  I nodded to who I was going to

  assume was the healer who had been sent for me. He seemed about the

  right age, old enough for deep set wrinkles to have invaded his

  forehead and all of his hair to be an ashy white. Most healers had to

  be decently advanced in their age before they were truly trusted.

  Poor peasants might have to accept a young apprentice to assist them,

  but only the most elderly and experienced healers would attend to a

  royal.

  “Have you been more tired

  recently?”

  “Of course he has,” the

  nursemaid answered for me, “that nasty woman tortured him and

  broken his body more times than I can count.”

  The healer turned to her and

  smiled gently, but firmly put a hand on her arm. “I need you to let

  him speak for himself right now, it can be dangerous to have words

  accidentally put in his mouth or him not tell me some symptom. The

  best help you can be right now would be to take this bowl.” He

  paused, picked up the now empty water basin and gently placed it into

  her hands. “Take it to the purest water you can find, nothing

  that’s been sitting around the castle for too long, directly from

  the well that you draw yourself most preferable. Fill it up, then

  bring it back. Before you do though, make sure you find the cleanest,

  softest cloth you can, the more pure and soft the cloth the better

  it’s going to help our young lord.”

  She looked to me with concern

  and alarm, clutching the bowl to her stomach, but slowly she turned

  towards the door and left the room to complete her mission. As soon

  as the door closed softly behind her she broke into a quick jog,

  frantically wanting to complete her assigned tasks as quickly as

  possible.

  The healer let out a long sigh

  through his nose, but there was a smile on his face. “Sometimes the

  hardest part of helping someone heal is getting people who mean well

  but are going to get in the way doing something that makes them feel

  helpful in a non-obstructive way. It would be helpful to me if when

  she comes back with the cloth and water that you really seem to

  appreciate the cool water on your face and perk up a bit if you’re

  able to every time she comes back after I have her change it out. I

  know it’s not doing much, you know that too, but she doesn’t need

  to know that. Alright?”

  “I can do that,” I agreed.

  It was an ingenious solution that was an overall positive for

  everyone involved, I could see why he was widely regarded as the best

  there was in the kingdom.

  “Good, now back to my

  question: have you been feeling more tired lately?”

  “Yes,” I answered, “I

  took a very long nap early today, then I fell asleep again in a chair

  while I was working with the royal scribe. Particularly with the

  scribe I found it harder to wake up than what would be normal, he

  seemed concerned about it too.”

  “Concerned?” the man

  raised his eyebrow in a questioning expression. “What was he

  concerned about?”

  I furrowed my brow trying to

  remember his exact words, but found they had melted away from all the

  grogginess and disorientation from the dreams. It frightened me that

  I had so easily forgotten, it was not like me to start forgetting

  things that happened not so long ago.

  “Something about how I was

  sleeping really deeply,” I answered.

  “Having trouble with memory

  as well,” he said to himself, a contemplative look on his face.

  “I guess so, though that

  doesn’t worry me as much as the fact I can’t walk anymore or feel

  my legs at all for that matter.”

  “That will be the second

  problem we tackle,” he said, “you stopping breathing in your

  sleep and having a strong desire to return to sleep is a much more

  pressing issue.”

  “I stopped breathing?” I

  asked in alarm. My heart pounded in my chest, what I had felt was the

  thick, suffocating embrace of death trying to drag me down. Perhaps

  it hadn’t been simply a dream at all.

  “Let’s not panic, no good

  will come of that. It could be because you were laying flat, some

  people simply can’t sleep flat or they risk stopping breathing,

  though it is a bit worrying if you were doing similar while sitting

  up earlier.” He paused and felt around my neck, gingerly working

  his way around from the base of my jaw down to my collar bones. “Any

  congestion or cough recently?”

  “Not at all, I don’t feel

  ill at all really, just groggy and sleepy.”

  He nodded as if he already

  knew the answer, but had to ask anyway to make sure. “What about

  this business your nurse was talking about? Someone has been physical

  with you?”

  I really didn’t know where

  to begin and part of me did not want to air all my dirty laundry to

  someone who I just met, but when faced with the idea that I had

  already almost died and he was trying to stop it from happening

  again, I decided to suck it up and tell everything. The words spilled

  from my lips and it ended up being easier to talk about than I

  thought, I suppose at some level I wanted someone to know everything

  and maybe understand. Part way through I started to wonder if he

  would even believe me, it all sounded ridiculous at some points, but

  his serious expression never wavered and he kept nodding his head to

  indicate that he was listening and processing.

  “That everything?” he

  asked once I had finally run out of things to say.

  “I think so,” I said

  quietly, anxious if he would believe all of it or not. If I was in

  his position I wasn’t sure that I would.

  “Overall this might be a

  touch out of my expertise,” he said, “but I might know someone

  who can help a bit better.”

  “You believe me?” I said

  in shock.

  “What is there not to

  believe? The part about magic being real and such?” he replied with

  a soft smile. “I’m a healer, I’ve seen things happen that I

  can’t even begin to explain with normal logic. I’ve seen people

  I’m sure were possessed, mangled limbs that straightened themselves

  out over night, and blind people who got touched by someone with a

  ‘gift’ who could then see again. I long ago stopped believing

  that reality was so cut and dry to be only the things I can

  personally see and feel. This woman I’m going to send for to come

  advise treatment for you, she spent one day with someone I was sure

  was going to be dead by dawn and by dusk the next night they were up

  and about their normal life like nothing happened. She claimed that

  she could heal them when I couldn’t because she had abilities that

  I do not, I’m inclined to believe her, so let’s have her take a

  look. If there is something like magic at play she’ll be able to

  help you much more than I can.”

  I swallowed hard, but gave my

  permission with a shallow nod. The horror that I was perhaps already

  too far gone for even a very skilled healer rose in my chest.