( nursed back to health shipping meme. )

[forthemayqueen]

Nursed Back to Health Comment with your character, preferences, preferred role, and any information you'd like to include. Your character has either been injured/sick and had to be taken in (possibly against their will) or has been the one to help somebody like the former. Through the mending process, the two characters in a thread have fallen in love - or at least grown closer and more affectionate. Reply to others. Thread.

Comments

[hlaefdige]

Well, more of an expert than a man would be, at least...

[ It sounds like a sad life, a lonely life, but not that much sadder or lonelier than her own. If the tables were turned, she'd likely be fielding the same questions and giving the same answers. Such is the life of those who ply their trade through violence.

The sterile comment gets a raised eyebrow, but not much more of a surprised reaction than that. ] Some women might prefer that, actually. [ A widow, perhaps, who had taken over her first husband's profession after his death might prefer a man who isn't interested in taking over her life, or adding to her brood of children. Some women, like herself, are not cut out to be mothers at all and find the thought of settling down to be more than a little disquieting. What would she do with children? Once they are old enough to sit astride a horse and not fall off, she feels a little more confident with them, but when she is handed a babe in swaddling clothes all she can think of is what might happen if she drops it. ]

So. [ It's hard to think of a way to word this delicately, so she just blurts it out. ] It all...works? [ Laughing a little, embarrassed but curious nonetheless, she elaborates. ] People tell all sorts of stories about witchers. Some say you have cocks like wolves. Some say you don't have cocks at all.

[wolfdogwitcher]

[That elicits a laugh so sharp and loud that it physically hurts and makes him wheeze. Huh, definitely cracked a rib or three, probably when one of the beasts had thrown him to the ground.] Yeah, it works. And it looks just like any man's, as far as I can tell.

[hlaefdige]

Gods, be careful.

[ At least he laughed, though, which makes Éomer laugh again, even as she reaches up to press her hands to his torso to hold him steady, leaving smeared bloody hand prints on the small clean strips left of his bloodied shirt. ] Don't hurt yourself worse because of my poor jokes.

[ Once she's fairly certain he won't damage himself further, she returns to trying to patch up the mess that is his leg, still chuckling quietly to herself. ]

[wolfdogwitcher]

[He catches his breath, glad at least that she wasn't embarrassed by his answer or her own impertinent question.] Right, I'd hate to burden your conscience if I pop a lung. You've got a soldier's sense of humor as well as a soldier's medical prowess.

[hlaefdige]

[ She spends all her waking moments surrounded by men. If talking about pricks was enough to embarrass her, she'd be in the wrong profession. ]

Are you trying to tell me I'm doing a poor job of it?

[ She's just joking. But, again, keeping him talking means keeping him alive, and that's what she's focusing on right now. ]

[wolfdogwitcher]

Doing better than I was managing, anyway. [He says, ruefully.] Couldn't even get my belt off to tourniquet the thing.

[hlaefdige]

Because you're hurt, I won't even make a joke about your equipment even though you set it up for me.

[ Even without a tourniquet, things seem to be slowing down in the bleeding department, which Éomer is quite grateful for. If he's more or less patched up, she can get him onto her horse and back to the village. If he's still bleeding everywhere, she's going to have to fashion a pallet to drag behind Firefoot with him lying on it and that doesn't look like it's going to go over well with anyone involved. ]

[wolfdogwitcher]

If I get out of this alright, we can revisit jokes about my equipment, eh? [Probably not, it's probably unseemly but it's good for the banter that's keeping him awake.] Melitele, I need a drink. Wherever you're taking me, I hope there's booze.

[hlaefdige]

I'll hold you to that.

[ She probably won't, but if she makes him make a promise, then he's more likely to hold on, right? Right.

She huffs at him, sliding her hands under his thigh to shift his leg in a very intimate way that would be scandalous under any other circumstances. To be fair, it's probably pretty scandalous even now, but there's nobody here to see them, and who's he going to tell? ]

You're going back to Hjaroarholt, so not only will there be alcohol, there will also be a bed. Which you're going to sleep in until you recover more.

[wolfdogwitcher]

[He groans as she shifts his leg, less due to any proximity of feminine hands near anything delicate and more because it really fucking hurts.] Alderman's gonna grumble about having to put me up when I've botched the job.

[hlaefdige]

The alderman will keep his mouth shut and do as he's told if he knows what's good for him.

[ Kneeling over his leg with her hands splashed red in his blood and her hair sticking to her temples messily, Éomer may not look all that intimidating, but she's uncommonly tall for a woman, and a life of hard labor has left her strong and broad, an illusion helped by the armor she wears. Combined with her ability to project her voice across a battlefield to be heard by her men, she can be plenty imposing when she wants to be. Certainly imposing enough to cow one backwater alderman into doing what's asked of him. ]

You'll be fine.

[wolfdogwitcher]

[He chuckles. Not because he thinks she can't order the old alderman around but precisely because he's certain she can and she will, if need be.] I like you. [Said declaratively, if a bit woozily.]

[hlaefdige]

You're going to like me less in a minute.

[ She gets her fingers under his thigh again and lifts, jostling his shin with her knee until she's fairly certain he'll brace his foot and keep his leg up so she can start to wrap some bandages around it. ] Keep your leg there.

[wolfdogwitcher]

[His snarl of pain could give the wargs a run for their money. Torn and abraded by the half-dull candid claws of the wargs (and the dirt he'd dragged himself through, thankfully cleaned away), his leg strongly objects to being moved. But he doesn't jerk or lose his footing, planting his boot to keep it in place while she works. He's a little embarrassed at the visible display of pain, but it's too late now. Hard to look macho when the lady's found you bleeding to death in a pile of dead monsters.]

[hlaefdige]

[ His snarl of pain gets a sympathetic grimace from her but doesn't slow her down at all. Instead, she wraps his leg with quick, economical motions, pulling tight enough to keep things together and to slow any further bleeding but hopefully not so tight that she risks the blood not getting to where it's supposed to.

Once she's tucked the last knot away, she shifts to sit back on her heels a little, her bloody hands resting casually on his legs.

The dead monsters around don't seem to bother her much. ]

Did you get here on foot?

[wolfdogwitcher]

Yeah. Didn't want to risk the horse. Left her behind in town. [He examines the wrapping approvingly.] You smell like fresh horse sweat so I assume you didn't come on foot? [Thank fuck, he wasn't going to have to limp back to town leaning on her. Strong as she was, that would have been exhausting for them both.]

[hlaefdige]

[ Éomer is very strong, yes, but Eskel is a mountain of a man, still wearing most of his armor, and he's badly injured to boot. She probably could haul him all the way back to Hjaroarholt if she had to, but then she'd also be needing a bed to recuperate in, and she's not sure the village would be kind enough to extend that much courtesy to them.

She hums. ]

You really aren't from around here, asking one of the Rohirrim if they got somewhere on foot.

[ To be fair, many peasants don't own horses, or if they do, they're pack horses and not for riding. But yes, Éomer came on horseback. ]

Can you stand?

[wolfdogwitcher]

Dunno, maybe you didn't want to risk your mount either. [He laughs. He braces one hand on the tree, then his back. It's sturdy, for being a scrubby thing poking out of the hilly grasslands. It'll give him something to push against.] Take my hand. Between the two of us, I'll get up.

[hlaefdige]

Firefoot's killed his fair share of wargs.

[ Besides, they weren't hunting wargs any more, they were looking for a witcher. And she found him.

Shifting back up to her feet, she brushes her hands off on her legs and then reaches out to Eskel, bracing herself to accept his weight and to haul him up off the ground. ]

It's not far.

[wolfdogwitcher]

[True to his words, he regains his feet, though his sword- rough hand grips hers tightly.]

Swords are over there somewhere. [He pants, pointing.] Just need to get those and then I'll go wherever you want me to go as long as you promise I can be drunk and horizontal when I get there.

[hlaefdige]

[ Her hands are just as rough as his, and her grip is strong and sure as she helps him regain his footing. She steps in close to him once he's standing, reaching out to try to steady him until he stops swaying dangerously. ]

I'm not sure if you should be hunting for your weapons right now... if you fall down, you might not get up again.

[ Shifting her grip on him, she brings her hand up to her mouth before catching sight of how bloody her fingers are and grimacing. Right. That won't work. Instead, she purses her lips and whistles without her fingers to assist, still managing a piercing shrill note that cuts through the woodland air easily.

It doesn't take long for the sounds of a horse approaching to become clear, and not much longer after that for a massive gray stallion to come cantering into the little clearing she found the witcher in. ]

[wolfdogwitcher]

Can't leave without them. [He insists, leaning on her as he feels and then sees the stallion arrive. He lights up at the sight of such a beautiful beast, as he has a somewhat incongruous soft spot for animals. As the horse comes closer, he extends a hand.] Hey there.

[hlaefdige]

You're not going to, calm down.

[ Watching Eskel soften in the face of her giant charger cements Éomer's opinion of him in a way that little else could. She takes great pride in her horse, in all of her horses, and has raised him from a foal and trained him to be able to carry her in full armor in the midst of a battlefield without hurting himself. He's a magnificent beast, and she's terribly proud of him.

She isn't, however, oblivious to his faults. ]

Careful, he bites.

[wolfdogwitcher]

Alright. [Bypassing the nose then. He pats the stallion's shoulder with the hand he can move enough to do so.] Never seen horses like you have here. If I make a little money, maybe I'll get one to take back home with me come the fall.

[hlaefdige]

[ She feels a little bad that Eskel's attempts at petting were thwarted, so she elaborates. ]

You smell like a warg. [ Considering he's been rolling around with a fair number of them, and is covered in their blood, that's hardly surprising. ] I've trained him to attack them.

[ It explains why Firefoot snorts and dances a little in place, obviously unhappy with this warg-smelling man being led closer to his side, but all it takes is a few terse commands from Éomer to have him stilling, though his ears make his displeasure known. ]

Just give him some time to settle.

[ Eskel isn't the first man to visit the Riddermark and want to take some horseflesh home with him; usually Éomer isn't exactly encouraging of such endeavors, mainly because she's stubborn and a little territorial, but if Eskel makes it through these injuries, and if he isn't heartily sick of anything Rohirrim by the end of his recovery, she'll help him find a colt or a filly to take with him. ]