Only A Northern Song ~ Game of Thrones / Willas Tyrell ~

Chapter Forty Eight: The North Remembers

No one came to the tent for quite a while. Other than the guards who stood loyally outside and the healer who came to tend to her injuries, Eddmina was completely alone. In fact, it was the healer who brought Uther to her, not her mother like Willas promised.

Uther hadn't stopped crying the entire time they had been back in the tent, and though the healer had checked him over and said everything seemed fine, Eddmina thought that perhaps the whole ordeal had scared him. There wasn't really anything she could do to comfort him either, other than hold him close and rock him, not while she had to sit still and let the healer tend to her injuries. Her arm was not broken but was badly sprained and needed bandaging, while the cut on her cheek required stitches. With no one else around, Eddmina had to simply grit her teeth together and breathe through the stress and pain of it, all while trying to calm her crying child. The cut would most likely scar too, a thought that infuriated her, but luckily the rest of her injuries were minor. Her throat and neck were bruised from the choking, but so was her jaw and her eye, as well as her back and knees. The back of her head was pounding from when she'd head-butted him, and that on top of the adrenaline rush fading, with the cries from Uther, had resulted in a splitting headache. She tried to shut her eyes to see if it would help, but was unsurprised when it did nothing for her.

"Do you have any idea how the battle is going?" She asked after a while, watching as the healer prepared a rag soaked in alcohol. She pressed it to her cheek and Eddmina swore. The healer shook her head. "I'll go back out there and wait with the others, as soon as you're done."

"I wouldn't recommend it, my lady," the healer commented, offering her an apologetic smile when she pressed the rag to her cheek closer. "You should spend the rest of the day resting. Your body won't thank you if you climb straight back onto a horse or stand for hours."

"Right," Eddmina answered with a nod, clenching her jaw. Uther distracted her from any annoyances with his crying and so she stroked his hair softly, knowing only hours before she was willing to put herself and her life into harms way to protect him. "Please don't cry, little one. Please, it's alright now, I promise."

The longer he cried, the more Eddmina felt like breaking down into tears too, but she refused to cry in front of the healer who was nothing more than a stranger, not to mention she was convinced her mother or Willas could walk into the tent at any moment. If they saw her tears, or even suspected her of crying, that would make her feel weak, and they would surely pity her; Eddmina didn't have the stomach for their pity.

After one final check over, the healer left Eddmina alone with no one but her own thoughts and Uther's screams for company. Eddmina hadn't really believed the healer when she'd said she would need rest, but the events of the day had caught up with her as she wanted nothing more than to lie down and sleep, even though she knew sleep would bring her nothing but nightmares. Except she couldn't just rest, and so she found herself pacing up and down the tent, rocking Uther as she hummed, closing her eyes every now and again to hide from her reality.

Willas had told her he wouldn't be long. He'd told her that her mother would meet her. Willas' word was often as good as a promise, so Eddmina couldn't help but feel betrayed in her solitude. She couldn't help but feel as though she had been sent to the tent not for her protection but to keep her out of the way, so that Willas and the other guards could take charge of the situation. She hadn't realised how much she wanted him, how much she needed him, until the betrayal of his absence twisted into anger, and her humming slowly turned to quiet swears. She'd let that man attempt to kidnap her to protect her son, she'd fought brutally for her survival, only to end up sent away, hidden in camp so the men could swoop in and act like they'd saved her.

Only Honour had saved her. Honour, and herself. She'd never stabbed someone like that before, she'd never truly meant to hurt someone like that before. She'd never seen someone bleed like that, knowing it was caused by her. If he died... That man was the first person she had killed. He deserved it, and she had no regrets over her actions, but Eddmina simply hadn't expected it, and she hadn't expected herself to be capable of such behaviour.