Chapter 5
Atlas
Writhing pain awakened me. I moaned and trembled.
The intensity of feeling overwhelmed all my senses, and I almost missed the footsteps approaching.
I attempted to open my eyes, but heaviness weighed them shut.
I fought against the suffocating darkness, needing to understand why I hurt so badly.
Finally, I glimpsed a ray of light. Blinking with some effort, the images blurred before me.
My confusion grew. What was wrong with my eyes?
A brief memory of my attackers assailed me, followed by a jolt of lightning to my skull and a wave of intense heat.
I wasn’t dead yet, but this might be purgatory.
“Help.” The word scratched from my throat.
“Mr. Long?”
I could barely make out the words spoken to me. It sounded as if my head was under water.
A cold liquid touched my lips and poured down my burning throat. I gulped desperately, choking myself. My coughs and sputtering made my head implode with more pain. Blackness ebbed at my limited vision until I could no longer remember what came next.
I don’t know how much time passed until I awoke again.
I was shivering—cold to my very core. This time, instead of blurriness when I opened my eyes, there was only darkness.
Fear lanced through my chest. I reached for my eyes, one of my arms obeying and the other protesting in pain.
Was I now blind? Would I never see the world again?
My fingers brushed against a strip of linen. I pulled at it, anxious to see again.
A hand clasped over mine. “You mustn’t touch the binding until your eyes heal.” My hand was pulled back down to my side. “It’s wonderful to see you awake. How do you feel?”
My fingers curled over soft flesh, the petiteness in my hand matching the feminine voice. She was warm, and her touch soothed my trembling.
“Mother?” Even as I said it, I knew it was not her. Mother had never been overly affectionate. But nothing about how I felt made any sense. I could not grasp a coherent thought.
“Not your mother, just a friend. The doctor has given you laudanum to help you rest until you are healed, but it can make a person confused too.”
Laudanum . . . no wonder I could not stay awake or concentrate well. I did not recognize this woman’s voice no matter how hard I thought about it. Who was she? “My head . . .” I muttered. It hurt like the devil.
“It took a terrible blow.”
I forced out another question. “And . . . the rest . . . of me?”
“You have a few broken ribs, a fractured leg, and your shoulder had to be set. But you are alive, and that is what matters. A few of your wounds were growing infected. The fever nearly took you, but you fought it like a champion.”
Groaning, I shifted my aching arm into a better position.
“There, now. No more talking. Just rest.”
A flash of memory pierced through the fog. Mr. Timmons. Other desperate faces of men I had won money from. The attack. The men bent on killing me. Were they here now? I could not rest. I had to find my mother and sister. I had to protect them.
I tried to sit, but firm hands pushed me back down. It did not take much for my weak body to collapse beneath them. I caught my breath and tried again.
“You are not ready to get up yet. The doctor insists you stay down.” I was pushed back again. This time before I rallied, a hand went to my head, smoothing my hair. This soft touch melted my resistance more readily than her previous efforts. A lyrical song filled my ears.
“Hó-bha-fn, hó-bha-fn, Hó-bha-fn, mo ghrá, Hó-bha-fn, mo leana, Agus codail go lá.”
The words were in another language, and I could not distinguish them. But the soothing, angelic tones were like a tonic. I was a grown man, unafraid of anything until I had nearly greeted the gates of death. Now guilt tormented me.
I did not deserve a second chance at living.
But this woman—whomever she was—did not seem to care. Her voice . . . it was a gift—a gentle song of serenity. She wanted me to recover. And I clung to her wanting. The fact that someone desired my health and worried for me brought more peace to my soul than any medicine ever could.
My breathing evened as I listened until the entrancing sound and the comforting touch lulled me back to sleep.