After sleeping for who knows how long, Aeloria opened her eyes in the small inn room and looked around slowly. She noticed that she was the only one there.
But something felt different. She turned her head carefully and realized it didn't hurt like before. No fire in her spine, no grinding bones. She flexed her fingers, then her toes. She could move her limbs. Just like before, she wore nothing underneath the blanket.
Before she could fully examine her body, the door creaked open.
The man who had treated her earlier walked in, carrying a big bag that smelled of fresh herbs.
His gaze settled on her the moment he entered the room.
"Oh, you finally decided to wake up," he said, relief clear in his voice. "It's been three days since you closed your eyes. I was actually beginning to worry you wouldn't wake up."
He settled the bag in one corner and walked toward Aeloria, but then stopped short.
Aeloria was now rubbing sleep away from her eyes with both hands.
'Wait—she's rubbing her eyes. It means she can move her arms. I need to find out how much of her body she can move and decide how to escape in case she doesn't like the food I brought and wants to eat something else… someone else… me.'
"So, how are your legs?" he asked, trying to sound casual. "I haven't washed in a week, and I suspect I'm rotting from the inside. Truly hilarious, if you think about it. Also, I brought delicious food. Lots of it."
He was babbling, his voice thin with trepidation. He wanted her to think he was "bad meat," a pathetic meal not worth the effort of a Cannibal
Aeloria turned slowly toward the man.
"I won't eat you," she said flatly. "I know bad meat when I see one."
Those were like golden words to the man's ears.
"You mean it?" he asked, his hope rising. "I mean… how are you feeling?"
As a weak and cautious person, even if he didn't fully believe the rumours, he wasn't one to take chances.
Aeloria didn't answer.
She turned to look at the ceiling, her eyes distant.
"Why did you bring me here?" she asked finally turning her gaze towards him in a slow manner. "Why did you help me in the first place if you were afraid of me? And most importantly… who are you?"
The man looked at her expression and knew he had no choice in the matter.
"It was because of the rumors about you," the man answered, for the first time, his expression turned serious.
Aeloria looked at him with a confused expression. "Rumors?"
"I suppose I need to tell you a bit about myself before you can fully understand what I mean."
He then straightened his back and began.
"My mother was bitten by one of the deadliest vipers known when she was pregnant with me. But instead of dying, she miraculously survived. My grandmother, the only herbworker pronounced the venom incurable. So for her to have survived meant she was immune to poison. And in this world, only one set of people are immune to poison, Thornsleepers." He paused, then gauged her reaction before he continued.
"That was when the rumors began to spread. Instead of thanking the rulers of the third sky that my mother survived and gave birth to me successfully, they began to call her a witch. They called her a demon, and a Thornsleeper. We didn't have an easy life. My grandmother, the only Herbworker in the village was even affected by the rumors. I don't know if it was because of the venom, but I was born with a very weak body. That, and the rumors made the other children refuse to play with me."
"I think I understand what you mean, but that still does not explain why you helped me." Aeloria interrupted, pulling the blanket tighter to her chest.
"I won't bore you with details, to make it short. An outbreak of a disease even my grandmother couldn't treat spread throughout the village. That was when the villagers decided to take action. In the end, my mother was burnt at the stake alive. I will never forget her screaming. She confessed that she was a thornsleeper in order to spare me and my grandmother from the wrath of the villagers." Aeloria saw the way his hands trembled at his sides as he spoke about his mother's death.
"My mother was killed because of rumors none of them made the effort to confirm. So seeing you on that ruin field, having bad rumors of your own, how could I leave you there?"
"I'm... sorry about your mother," Aeloria said at last, she had never had to sympathize with someone before, so she didn't know what else to say.
"I'm an awful child, am I not?" He said as tears filled his eyes but never spilled.
"I don't understand what you mean."
"The rumors weren't entirely baseless. There was a thornsleeper in the village, but it wasn't my mother."
He hesitated, then took off his shirt.
"What are you doing?" Aeloria asked with surprise evident in her voice.
He turned his back to her.
Aeloria froze, she was all too familiar with the markings on his back. It was a black tattoo of a big tree, most of its branches withered and dry. On one of its extended branches was a single rose dripping a dark liquid. There were eight vipers on the tree and four human skulls around the root—one of a man, one of a woman, one of a child, and the last of an old person.
That was the distinct symbol of a thornsleeper.
The tree symbolized life sustained by Herbworking. The dried parts symbolized the deterioration of the value and purpose of herbs due to their usage for bad intentions. The rose represented the bad results yielded from the usage of plants. The eight serpents represented the eight pathways of Thornsleepers, each pathway deadlier than the last. Finally, the dreadful skulls—none are safe from a thornsleeper, be it a man, a woman, a child or an old person.
Showing someone this image was the same as trusting them with your life.
"You… you're a thornsleeper?" Aeloria asked in a low tone.
"I watched my mother scream as her flesh was peeled off by the flames. I knew I was the one supposed to be on that stake, yet I couldn't take that step forward. In the end, she never resented me. Yes, the dreadful Thornsleeper wasn't my mother, it was I."