@emberworn | plotted starter
Pain was a constant in Mercury’s life. He was used to bleeding, trickling from sore nose and busted lip; to bruises encircling his eyes and peppering arms and torso. That sharp pang on inhalation was as an old friend--and though the poignant, persistent agony at his thighs was a newer addition it wore a face familiar enough. The assassin’s son was able to breathe through it all and follow the woman with the burning eyes, father’s corpse cooling in the dirt and childhood home devoured by merciless flame. There was no need to go back for his belongings, no need to pack anything. It all belonged to the fire now.
Strange looks accompanied the trip into lower Mistral. Mercury remained a handful of steps behind his new employer and the shifty-eyed girl at her side, stoic despite the need to periodically wipe blood from his busted lip and the hitch in his step. Whether people thought she’d beat him, or that he was about to try to mug them, he wasn’t sure and in truth he didn’t fucking care. What had begun as tolerable agony in his legs grew in intensity until he could feel it all the way down calves he no longer possessed. It rolled in his stomach, created nausea that he shakily swallowed down. Just a few more blocks and he could address the bandages that had become saturated with red.
When at last Cinder passed through the open door of a questionable, run-down inn Mercury breathed a sigh of relief. The stairs were murder and by the time he reached the landing he trembled visibly. Still he limped along after her, eyes carefully averted from any who glanced his direction. The tinkling of keys heralded the unlocking of the room the two had apparently already acquired and paid for; they must have anticipated that recruiting his father would go well, he thought. His footfalls were heavy as he passed Cinder and the girl he didn’t care to remember, perhaps a bit too hasty to claim the one wooden chair and get off of his feet.
Never speak unless spoken to--a hard lesson to shake, particularly when he feared he might be sick. Dark eyes followed total strangers settling about the room, mannerisms perhaps not pertinent when faced with a new employer. It was difficult to care too much when every breath hurt. Pain may be a constant in his life, but rarely had he ever had to endure this much of it all at once. Breath hissed out between clenched teeth as he adjusted the hasty wrappings around his legs--fingers coming away slicked red. What he really needed was to clean up and rebandage wounds that were so fucking close to healing; that, however, would require rising again, and he just wasn’t sure he had it in him. Not yet.