Now I didn't have to use the spear at all, well, that's probably for the better, thought Mikal as he carefully climbed down from the palisade in the dark.

  In the end he had simply put the spear down and started throwing stuff that had been passed to him.

  He had hardly paid any attention to his makeshift ammunition during the attack, but unless the moonlight had played tricks on him, there had been a few really strange things in there

  Most of them were cutlery, plates, knives, forks and cups. Everyone in Schlucht would probably have to eat straight from the table and with their hands for a while. Stockings filled with stones had been more creative, as had a few wooden toys, may they make someone happy, he mused to himself as he looked for Albert.

  He wanted to ask him what would happen now that they had repelled the bandits.

  Assuming he already had a plan, after all he himself could hardly believe what had happened.

  A small, insignificant village had successfully defended itself against a horde of evil bandits, just like in one of those stories bards would sing about.

  Although they never mention the sweat and fear that comes with such things. Well, it would sound stupid if some bard sang about how Sir Balmung faced the undead, sweating like a pig and wetting his pants as he was attacked. True, in such stories the hero always fought against some monster, undead, demon or dragon. And no one sings about how the monsters die. No, there is nothing musical or heroic about such sounds and we were spared the dragon, so Albert was probably right, he thought.

  While he was searching the square for Albert, he was already thinking about how he would tell the story at home but found that this would not be an easy undertaking.

  He had no intention of telling his younger siblings exactly what had happened, especially the thing with the water.

  When Albert had suggested it, he hadn't yet been quite sure what it would achieve.

  He hadn't even thought about how hot water could get. He would have to think about that the next time they cooked at home.

  Home, the word flashed through his mind.

  This morning, he had left home for the village, it had been a few hours ago, but it seemed like an eternity to him, as if he had been on an incredibly long journey, and he was still wondering how he could tell his family at home about that journey.

  How he could make them understand what had happened, even though he didn't really understand it himself.

  No, my siblings are all too young for that, well, me too, oh Rüdiger's balls, my grandpa is too young for that, or he's just not prepared, he thought, shaking his head.

  The more he thought about it, the harder it was for him to remember the details of the fight that had raged just a few moments ago.

  He had simply thrown everything that was handed to him down without thinking about what it was and without really aiming. He had no idea how long it had lasted, it was dark when it started and it was still dark now.

  The first thing he had actively noticed of the fight was the thing with the water and shortly afterwards the dragon's men had retreated.

  Which he could understand very well. When he saw, heard and smelled what was happening to the people below him, he had vomited over the palisade uncontrollably.

  It was as if the inhumanly shrill screams had broken him out of a kind of trance and his first clear thought was to run away from what was happening in front of him.

  And he wasn't even in danger at that point.

  A large shape was just walking past him when the cloud released the moon again, whereupon he saw a familiar face.

  "Excuse me Boris, do you know where Albert is?" he asked when he recognized the innkeeper.

  "Albert? I saw him on the way to the stables, Theodora, set up a small hospital there," the innkeeper answered after thinking for a while and continued on his way to the palisade.

  He thanked him and continued on his way.

  As he did so, he wondered what they might need a hospital for, after all, they had all been pretty safe on the palisade.

  No, we had to duck a few times because they had shot arrows up at us, but those who were hit there can't be helped. Like poor Horst , he thought, feeling guilty now for momentarily forgetting that.

  He remembered that Horst was the first person they hit with their arrows and that it was only afterwards that they knew they had to take cover.

  Horst was just unlucky that he had been hit before they had realized that the bandits had pretty good bows with them.

  Now that he thought about it, a few others had been hit after Horst.

  They were also just unlucky, got up at the wrong time or got hit by a lucky shot from the bandits.

  Luckily not many of them died in the attack, but the thought that it could have been any of them made him more than uncomfortable.

  Thankfully this madness is over now. No matter what Ivar says, they can't attack again, not after seeing what the water did to their comrades. Ivar is just a bit cynical, probably because of his job, he thought and finally reached the stable.

  He stepped through the open door and saw Albert and Theodora standing silently in the middle of the corridor.

  He raised his hand in greeting and approached them, the big eyes of several horses following him as he walked past their rooms.

  It’s hard to believe that the horses hadn't all gone crazy during the fight, he thought as he approached the mayor and the healer.

  "Since you can still walk, you're probably not here because of me, are you?" Theodora asked him hopefully.

  "Uh, hello Theodora, no, I'm fine, I just wanted to ask Albert what's going on now," he answered, a little confused by her greeting, and looked expectantly at Albert.

  The latter seemed to have barely noticed Mikal coming, and instead looked at the floor with a frown.

  He was about to repeat his question when Theodora lightly elbowed Albert in the side, which seemed to get the mayor out of his trance.

  "Oh, hello Mikal, I'm glad you're okay. Sorry about that just now, I was trying to remember something, but it's not that important. What did you say again?" Albert finally answered, still sounding slightly absent.

  No wonder he looks a bit lost. I'm already done and he's mayor, he thought sympathetically as he saw the pale and sweaty figure of the old man in front of him.

  "Everything's fine, I just wanted to know what's going on now and when do you think I can go back to our farm now that we've beaten them back," he asked again.

  The mayor of Schlucht looked at him for a moment with what he thought was a slightly pained expression on his face before he answered.

  "Er, well, I'm afraid I'm at a loss. If it were up to me, you could go home immediately, but if it were up to me, none of this would have happened in the first place. Unfortunately, I'm afraid it's not up to any of us how things continue, but rather up to those who started all this madness in the first place, and that doesn't really inspire hope," Albert explained, pausing, as if the talking caused him physical agony.

  "But…but you can't be serious, after everything that's happened, it would be complete madness to attack again," he replied incredulously.

  "Yes, you're right, it would be insane," Albert sighed, seemingly talking more to himself than to Mikal.

  "Anyway, thanks again for your work, Theodora, and don't worry, Mikal, everything will be fine. I'll go back to the palisade and wait and see what happens now," Albert finally announced in an increasingly flat voice and left the stable, leaving an incredulous Mikal behind.

  “He... he must be mistaken, right?” he asked after Albert had left the stable and turned to Theodora for help.

  “Maybe I'm a pessimist, but I'm afraid Albert is right,” she sighed exhaustedly.

  “What's wrong with all of you? We won. The stranger told the truth, no dragon came and we beat back the bandits. At least half of them are either dead or completely incapacitated and yet you all act as if the next attack is imminent,” he shouted and threw his arms in the air in indignation.

  Theodora just looked at him in silence for a moment, which became increasingly uncomfortable for him.

  “I'm sorry for getting so worked up, but I really don't understand why you're all so gloomy, I mean we won,” he apologized and took a deep breath.

  “It's OK, it's clear that we're all a bit tense. Could you help me with a patient right now?” she replied shrugging.

  "Uh, sure, what is it about?" he asked, slightly uncertain about her sudden request.

  "It's best if I show you, just follow me," she explained and started moving.

  Mikal followed her after a moment of hesitation and the two went to the back of the stable.

  "Tell me, how come the horses didn't completely freak out?" asked Mikal, as he noticed the strange silence in the stable again as his footsteps echoed.

  "I gave them some sedatives, I couldn't concentrate with all their neighing," she answered shortly without turning to him.

  Wait, what?, thought Mikal, and stopped.

  "You drugged the horses? Don't you think that's a bit bad?" he asked incredulously.

  Theodora, who had noticed that he was no longer following her, finally turned to him before answering.

  "Boris drugs people every day and nobody complains, and I didn't do it without a reason. Don't worry, I know the right dose for horses, nothing will happen to them and now come, we have to move on," she explained to him in a slightly annoyed tone and continued on her way.

  "How exactly did you drug them? I mean did you mix something into their hay or give them some strange herbs to chew?" he asked, still a little disturbed, as he caught up with her.

  "No, I make the medicine myself at home. I just rubbed it on a cloth and held it to their nostrils, that's enough. And it wasn't such a strong dose, you've seen that they're not just lying around unconscious in their stables," she continued.

  “Strange herbs? would do they teach kids these days?”, he thought he heard her mutter in an annoyed tone but decided to ignore it.

  "Did you drug the guy we're going to see like that too?" he asked now, suddenly a little happier than before that he wasn't one of the injured.

  "I tried. I actually wanted him to be unconscious, but unfortunately it wasn't enough, and I didn't want to try an even higher dose. So, he's a little shaken by the drug, but still a little too agile for what I'm planning, so you have to help me keep him still," she told him in a professional tone and finally stopped in front of one of the closed wooden doors that led into the individual stable rooms.

  "So, will you finally tell me who it is and what kind of injury it is?" asked Mikal, who was now filled with a slightly morbid curiosity after her explanation.

  "It's about our shoemaker Gustav and, well, you'll see now," she said after some hesitation and opened the door, whereupon he looked curiously into the room.

  His eyes slid over the man's body, which looked uninjured except for a few traces of blood.

  Finally, however, he looked at the man’s face.

  His brain needed a few moments to realize what he saw there, or rather, to process what was missing.

  The shoemaker from Schlucht, Gustav Breidt, was missing his lower jaw.

  Instead, all that could be seen was a dark red, pulpy mass, from which several bloody threads of flesh fell down onto his chin.

  He could feel all the blood flowing from his face in one fell swoop and his knees going weak.

  "What the hell?" he breathed in disbelief, staggered back a few steps and began to tremble involuntarily.

  You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

  He tried desperately to ignore what he had seen and, above all, not to look again into the room in front of him, where, as he knew, Gustav's jawless figure was still lying on the ceiling, moaning and whimpering in pain and shock.

  But he could not help himself and, as if possessed by a demon of morbid curiosity, raised his head and looked again into the bloody ruin that had once been the man's face.

  Gustav shaking too and raised his head briefly before laying it back down on the blanket, exhausted, the fleshy threads dangling from the remains of his lower jaw dancing back and forth like spider webs in the wind

  No! That's not possible, he thought to himself before he fell to his knees and started vomiting into a bucket that, he was sure, hadn't been there a few moments ago.

  After a while he was just sitting on the floor, coughing dryly and staring, trembling, at the pale yellowish broth in the bucket in front of him.

  "Don't worry, I puked too. So, you're finished? The sooner we get this over with the better," said Theodora, apparently trying to seem somehow motivating.

  He carefully wiped a bit of spit from his jaw before reaching for a water hose that Theodora was holding out to him with trembling hands.

  He let the first big gulp circulate in his mouth for a moment before spitting it into the bucket to get the rest of the vomit out of his mouth.

  The smaller gulps that followed he carefully let run down his throat, which was a real relief given the roughness of his throat.

  "H-How did that happen?" he finally managed to say haltingly.

  "I don't know. I don't think that happened due to a fall, maybe an unlucky arrow or rather a bolt hit him and well, you can see it. Must have been a pretty good crossbow to do that with an upward shot. Maybe there was even some form of magic involved with the weapon," Theodora mused out loud, seeming to be talking to herself instead of answering his question.

  Since he neither fully understood what she was saying nor felt the desire to do so, he continued with his questions instead.

  “How c-can he still be alive?” he stammered.

  "Oh, you'd be surprised what you can survive with enough luck. When I was still studying in the capital, we were once shown a man who had been living with an arrow in his head for two years and had no other problems. On the other hand, there are also plenty of people who die because they simply stumble and fall on their heads in an unfortunate way. As I said, I was able to calm him down a bit with the drugs, but unfortunately it wasn't enough for him to lose consciousness. That's why you have to hold him while I work. Don't worry, he won't be able to muster much strength, the best thing to do is talk to him a bit and try to calm him down," she explained to him in a businesslike manner, rolling up her sleeves.

  "Um, he has every reason to be agitated, I mean, I'm very agitated right now," he said, becoming increasingly hysterical, looking at his still shaking hands.

  " Really? I mean you still have your lower Jaw, I'm sorry, a couple of patients ago I would have tried a motivational speech, but now I'm too tired for that. So, can you handle it now or not? If not, please go and get someone who you think can stay calm," Theodora sighed exhaustedly and looked at him expectantly.

  He instinctively wanted to refuse immediately and was already about to turn around when his gaze again caught sight of Gustav's mutilated figure.

  This time, however, he did not look away; instead, he remained lost in thought looking at the man's destroyed face.

  He had been so lucky. It could easily have been him, lying there in the hay, groaning in pain, with a missing eye, jaw or whatever.

  He had been so undeservedly lucky to be able to stand here at all.

  And when Theodora asked if he could help someone who simply hadn't been so lucky, his first thought had been to run away and burden someone else with it.

  No, that was not the person he wanted to be. That would be a person who would be ashamed to face his family, and so he made his decision.

  "What should I do?" he asked, concentrating on Gustav's ruined jaw and his eyes, which were a little cloudy but still twitching in fear.

  Theodora looked at him briefly in surprise before answering.

  "I need your help to keep him calm while I tend to the wound. The best thing to do is to sit behind him, cross his arms, sit on them, and then immobilize his shoulders if necessary, so that I can work properly. Don't worry, he doesn't have much strength left," she explained to him and entered the box, Mikal close behind her.

  While Theodora stopped in front of Gustav and began to dig something out of a small leather bag, he carefully walked around the injured shoemaker and stood there doubtfully for a moment.

  Unsure of exactly how he should proceed now, while the man in front of him continued to whimper in pain. Now just grab hold and do it, his mother's words echoed in his head.

  He couldn't remember exactly when she had said that, but he was pretty sure it was about the birth of a calf on their farm.

  She's right anyway, don't think about it too much, just do it now , it flashed through his mind as he bent down and grabbed Gustav's arms.

  Suppressing his trembling, he grabbed Gustav's wrist and guided his arms over each other so that they crossed, just as Theodora had instructed him.

  It was easier than he had first thought.

  It wasn't as if Gustav was willing to let his arms be guided, but he managed to get them into the desired position without too much effort

  In fact, he didn't know if Gustav was resisting at all, or if his muscles were just too tense.

  Now that he thought about it, he wasn’t even sure if someone in Gustavs condition was even aware of his surroundings.

  For the shoemaker’s sake he hoped he wasn’t.

  After laying down on the man's crossed arms, he gently pushed his shoulders down, but didn't feel much movement under his hands.

  He avoided looking over his head and at Gustav's face and instead stared at the ground to the side.

  This isn't as bad as I thought. Gustav hardly fights against me. Now I just have to sit here until Theodora is finished, he thought calmly.

  "Okay, I'll start now, get ready for him to start fighting back any moment now," he heard Theodora say and in fact he quickly realized that his work was only just beginning.

  "Hold on tight, Mikal, I'm going to clean the wound now, it will probably sting a bit for him," she said and began to carefully dab the wound.

  As expected, Gustav immediately started to moan loudly and tried to rear up.

  He quickly pushed the injured man's shoulders down and began to shift his weight frantically to be able to press Gustav's arms down better.

  I should have called Boris or Ivar, it flashed trhough his mind as he started wrestling with Gustav

  Had the situation not been so serious, she would have almost smiled when she saw Mikal struggling to keep his balance, which she thought had something of a rodeo ride about it.

  That's right, last year at the summer festival I saw Mikal mount a bull. He actually held out much longer than I would have thought. Let's just hope he can outdo himself now, she thought involuntarily.

  She decided that the best thing to do was to work as quickly as she could without making any mistakes, which admittedly would still be painfully slow with an injury like this.

  Damn, I can hardly get to the wound with all these stitches. Hold on tight, Mikal, she thought, sighing and reaching into her bag and pulling out a small pair of scissors.

  With them, she carefully began to free Gustav's lower face of the loose threads of blood and flesh that covered most of his actual wound.

  Each cut elicited a pain-filled whimper from the wounded shoemaker, followed by a brief struggle, which became weaker each time.

  Whether this was because he had accepted his situation or because he simply no longer had the strength for any form of resistance, she could not say.

  If he was lucky, he would soon simply lose consciousness. Either way, the man's quiet whimpering was soon the only thing that broke the tense silence in the box while she worked.

  Mikal had loosened his grip a little when he noticed that Gustav's resistance was getting weaker and weaker and was now trying to look anywhere but Gustavs Face.

  She could understand that the sight was too much for him; the metallic smell of blood coupled with the sweet smell of saliva probably did the rest.

  To distract herself from the smell, she wondered whether she had ever treated a wound like this before.

  Classic colds of all kinds, fractures when accidents occurred or someone got in the way of one of our self-appointed tax collectors, and the occasional case of food poisoning were actually her usual fare.

  The butcher's son had accidentally chopped off one of his finger with a cleaver once, but that was a one-off. No, there hasn't been anything worse in my time here, she thought, tossing another fleshy thread beside her.

  She remembered that Albert had told her that before she came to Schlucht, and before Aodhan showed up, there had been some pretty dangerous animals living in the woods.

  Beowolves, grain spirits, and wolpertingers had occasionally caused some serious wounds and, in rare cases, even deaths, according to Albert, but that was all before her time.

  By the time she arrived, Aodhan had probably already eaten or chased away every animal in the region that was dangerous to humans, which was probably the only good thing he had ever done for the region, albeit for probably entirely selfish reasons.

  Still, that should not be underestimated.

  If things hadn't changed massively since she left, then the sewers in the capital would still be home to a bestiary that would send shivers down the spine of even the most hardened fighter.

  If she remembered correctly, there was a proven family of basilisks, a pack of ghouls, and according to rumors even a small Sea Serpent. Gods only knew how that beast ended up down there.

  In retrospect, it had probably been a stupid decision to move to a place that had a dragon as a neighbor. But she simply preferred working in the country and taking care of farmer's ailments rather than feeling like she was in a war zone every weekend in the capital because of some gang fights.

  If she weren't so busy and in more or less immediate danger to her life, she would probably laugh at the irony of her current situation.

  Another reason for her coming here specifically even was the Dragon.

  After all, not everyone could claim to have encountered such a creature and be able to talk about it, but that hadn't worked out quite as she had thought.

  She sighed briefly, which resulted in a frightened look from Mikal. However, he quickly looked away again when he saw her work.

  In all that time, I've only seen Aodhan a few times at best as a silhouette in the distance, and I never saw him breath fire. The only thing that is noticeable about his presence are these lunatics he sends to collect money, she thought contemptuously.

  To her disappointment, she quickly realized that Aodhan was little different from the Lords of the capital .

  You didn't see or hear much of either of them.

  They regularly collected taxes and were not above taking everything that wasn't nailed down. To Aodhans credit though he at least cleared the surrounding forest of beasts.

  During her currently thankfully easy task she led her thoughts wander for a bit and remembered that she had actually dealt with exactly this type of injury before, at least theoretically.

  She had read about it during her apprenticeship, although at that moment she was quite grateful that she didn't remember exactly the chances of survival or the long-term consequences for those who made it.

  Unfortunately, it was all too easy for her to imagine what would happen if Gustav miraculously survived.

  Who am I kidding here? I can't heal him here anyway, if that's even possible. At best, I can stop the bleeding, clean and bandage the wound, hopefully prevent infection, and that's pretty much it. For a prosthesis or whatever, he would have to go to the academy in the capital and I'm not even sure if the healers there can pull that off and even if they could no chance in hell Gustav and his family could afford that. It's not like a demon is just going to come around the corner and just put a new lower jaw on him for some favor, she mused to herself, her mood getting increasingly gloomy.

  A mood that didn't improve when she finally managed to free Gustav's wound from the stitches and dabbed away the remaining blood, so that she now had a better view of her patient's injury.

  As she did so, a sweet, metallic smell reached her nose, a disgusting mixture of blood and saliva. The lower half of his face was gone. Due to the missing jaw joint, blood and saliva ran out of his mouth and dripped onto his chest and what was left of his chin.

  She leaned a little closer and noticed that only a small fleshy lump was left of his tongue as well.

  Involuntarily she looked at Gustav's chest again, then checked his pulse and indeed, his heart was still beating very weakly, but it was beating.

  The shoemaker of her village was somehow still alive.

  First stop the bleeding, she thought and got to work.

  With a hand gesture similar to that of a puppeteer, she carefully held her right hand over the man's destroyed face, almost touching the flesh in his wound and even though this was not the case, she could still feel the unpleasant sensation of damp flesh under her fingers.

  Since such injuries were beyond anything that could be treated with normal medicine, she immediately began to cast healing magic.

  She felt a sudden warmth in her fingers as gossamer threads of light formed from her fingertips and traveled the short distance between her hand and Gustav's injuries.

  There they slid through the exposed flesh without resistance and began to repair his injured veins, the flesh in the affected areas appearing to glow slightly due to the threads working there.

  That way he would at least not bleed to death any time soon.

  After that she would increase the blood clotting, absorb the remaining blood, disinfect the wound and apply the bandage.

  At least that was her plan.

  Meanwhile Gustav started to moan and whimper again. The treatment caused an intense burning sensation in the wound, even if it had nothing to do with heat.

  Gustav tried to rear up and twist a little but had hardly any strength left in his movements and was well held back by Mikal after he had shifted his weight a few more times on Gustav's arms.

  Apparently, I overestimated how much strength he still had left... a bad sign, she thought as she let the small threads wander over his wounds.

  The last time I treated a wound like that, I must have been in the capital. Yes, that was one of the mercenaries they had hired to clean up the sewers. There was even less left of him back then, than of Gustav now, she suddenly thought.

  She remembered that she had managed to save the man that time, even if he hadn't been particularly happy about it.

  He poisoned himself a week later. With both legs gone, a missing arm and a missing eye, I can hardly blame him. After all, I can't imagine a simple mercenary having enough money left to afford proper treatment from the djinn, she remembered.

  In comparison, a missing lower jaw is harmless... no, not really! Maybe Mikal is right and I'm just being too pessimistic. Now stop this nonsense and concentrate on your patient, she thought, angry with herself, and followed her own instructions.

  As time went by, Gustav's movements became slower and his groans quieter until he finally lay motionless in front of her.

  Apart from a slight whirring sound that the threads of her magic made when they came into contact with his flesh, silence now filled the room.

  Shit, she cursed bitterly in her mind and stopped her treatment.

  The magical threads went out, leaving only a stinging cold feeling in her fingertips.

  She suppressed a sigh and took some thin cloths out of her bag to carefully dab the sticky blood from the wound.

  "He's stopped moving, is everything good?" Mikal finally asked worriedly.

  "More or less. He's probably lost consciousness. I'm just sucking the blood out of the wound, then I'll clean it and bandage it. But I don't need you for that anymore. I doubt he'll wake up again any time soon," she explained to him hastily.

  "Oh, good. Is there anything else I can help you with?" Mikal asked with audible relief in his voice and a certain fear as he offered his help again.

  Brave boy, she thought and replied: "No, you can go. Thanks again for sitting on his arms," she said with a smile that hurt her face as she reached for a new cloth.

  "Rüdiger, be... er, I mean thank you. I'll go back to the palisade and see how it goes," he answered her, now looking slightly absent-minded.

  "Do that and take care of yourself. If I have to treat you, I'll ask Boris if he'll sit on you," she told him as he left the stable.

  "That won't be necessary. You and Albert will see that we may be dealing with complete assholes here, but not with any crazy monsters. Surely they wont attack again," Mikal shouted as he left the stable.

  When the dull sound of Mikal's footsteps faded away and she was alone with the motionless form of Gustav, she threw the soaked cloth aside and looked thoughtfully at the body of the recently deceased shoemaker from Schlucht. The air in the stable room suddenly seemed much heavier than before.

  He's a father. Yes, his son is that brat Tim who always steals apples, it suddenly shot through her like a painful arrow.

  "I really hope you're right, Mikal, and that we're wrong...for what it's worth, I really hope you're right," she sighed as she stood up to check on her other patients.