Freedom of Flight

Chapter 3

©CRGangell aka Whitesabretooth

                Chapter 3

Alanna winced as the forming scars were gently cleansed. They couldn’t be stitched as the wounds then wouldn’t be in complete contact with the numb weed. She was over being unable to move, having been bedridden for four weeks. Granted, Jewel had done her best to keep her occupied with books and music but she couldn’t help it. Her body felt fine… right up until she moved, then she would be in agony. Nothing Gus had ever done to her measured up to the pain she went through just being cleansed... and that says a lot.

“Two more days.” Jewel told her encouragingly.

“Two more days until what?” Alanna asked.

“Until you can leave the bed, one day for every lash so for thirty lashes, thirty days of not moving,” Jewel answered.

Alanna sighed. Two more days and she would finally be able to move. I wonder what it would feel like to move again, she thought wryly.

Sage bounded into the room and knocked over the same door-side table that she seemed to be fated to knock over every time she came into her sister’s room. Dominic glared at his daughter playfully as he entered. Sage blushed bashfully as she corrected the table for the umpteenth time and the heavy brass ornament the table held. There used to be a priceless vase there but it had since been replaced with something that was relatively indestructible. She then walked over to her sister.

Jewel glanced up after she replaced the numb weed pad. “I don’t know why her wounds are taking so long to start healing. Granted, the after-effects haven‘t completely start to wear off but the earlier lashes should have started to knit together a little by now. I don’t know much about Were healing rates but Bianca always healed fast. Then again she never got a lashing, which brings me back to having no idea how a pure Were body reacts to the after-effects.”

“Nathanael… he’s a pack doctor/healer, swears air on wounds helps with the healing. The moment I was freed from the numb weed pad, I went for a fly round a ledge and aired my back. I’ve done it every day since.” Sage volunteered.

“Air?” Jewel asked, incredulous.

Sage nodded. “He swears by it. In fact, he sometimes orders it as a part of the treatment, like go to sleep naked with no blankets. He’s done it to ma often enough if da gets a little overzealous with his bites.”

Jewel frowned. “But she still has two days of treatment. I can’t stop to let the scars air because the moment I do, the effect of the numb weed will stop.”

“And we cannot let the effect of the numb weed stop,” reminded Alanna with a grimace at the remembered pain.

“Then finish it first. The air treatment can wait two more days.” Sage continued to Jewel with a shrug.