Awake
Dragonsfall Weyr
Amber Hills Hold
Vintner Hall
Healer Hall
Hidden Meadows
Dolphin Cove Weyr
Dolphin Hall
Emerald Falls Hold
Harper Hall
Printer Hall
Green Valley Hold
Leeward Lagoon Hold
Barrier Lake Weyr
Sunstone Seahold
Citrus Bay Hold
Writers: Len
Date Posted: 23rd March 2017
Characters: L'fael
Description: Lafael comes out of a coma and tries to figure out about his headaches during threadfall and the voices in his head.
Location: Sunstone Seahold
Date: month 11, day 3 of Turn 8
It was always going to happen.
Lafael lay back against the rough pillow of the infirmary room. He blinked up at the ceiling, trying to take in the old nurse's words. Two months.
Two months in this bed, unconscious. Two months of is young life gone. He tried to piece together what he could remember of the day, his last day before today.
It had been threadfall, an early one. But nothing too serious. He hadn't even been assigned the usual horrible duties he always seemed to get. No, this time he had been along the outer hallways, just tending to the ladies of the Hold. There had been that familiar headache he always seemed to get during threadfalls, the headache he had never gotten before coming to this forsaken place.
But yes, now he remembered. This one had been more intense. The last thing he remembered someone saying--a cook by the hearths--was that the fall was going to be directly overhead. Would that have caused the sharpness he had felt? But whoever heard of someone getting headaches due to thread? Unless it was a thread going into your head, that is.
Lafael's thoughts ambled through what a thread score must feel like until he blinked back, forcing himself back on track.
No, this would never do. Think stupid, he growled to himself. Now what had happened? Okay, there had been a direct threadfall and his headache had been particularly intense. It hadn't started out like that, not until...not until the fall had been directly overhead. Not until...until...the voices.
The voices in his head.
Oh Faranth, he was mad! that was it, he was like that old man the trader family he had lived with had come across, deep in the forest. The man who had been babbling to himself and ignored them in favour of is imaginary companions. They had left the old man there, by himself.
Lafael felt a trickle of tears as they flowed along both sides of his face.
How could he hide his madness? What would happen to him? Or did everyone already know? Quickly he moved his hands. They were unchained, nothing was holding them down to the bed. He shuffled his feet and likewise, they too were unfettered by anything. Or perhaps no one knew yet. He took a deep breath, trying to steady his nerves. Maybe this was only tied-in with the threadfall, so as long as he hid away then maybe no one need ever know that he heard voices.
They were always curious voices, he allowed himself to ponder. Always talking about the fall, soft soothing kind voices. Much kinder than any voices he ever heard in real life.
"Ah, awake I see?"
Now that was not a voice in his head. Lafael lifted his head and looked at the elderly woman standing at the foot of his bed. She smiled but it wasn't a gentle smile. Nothing in this place was gentle, not even the nurses, he thought to himself.
"Good, I was wondering if we were going to just have to throw you out to the Fall and give you up as a hopeless case."
"Wh--what happened to me?" Lafael's voice was rusty from disuse.
"Fell down a flight of stairs, banged that silly head of yours," the nurse said. "But you're okay now. Good thing, cos that nursery has lost yet another silly girl. Ran off with a sailor over at the Hall. And we need all the help we can get, so you get on yer feet. We'll need you over there tomorrow babysitting the little ones. Threadfall tomorrow, y'know. Gotta keep an eye on all the children."
"Tomorrow?!" But...but he had only just woken up! And now he must face what had put him in this position already? Why must his life be so cruel?
The old woman ignored the shocked expression on his face. Instead she wrenched him into a sitting position. "Yep, come now, you've been laying there the last two months, it's time to get up and get back to work. You lazy drudes, I wouldn't put it past a single one of you that you all hurt yourselves on purpose just to get out of work."
Lafael bit his lip hard as the room swum and his vision blurred. Only a person from this place would think that getting someone to their feet straight away after waking from a coma was a good idea.
Such was his life.
Last updated on the April 25th 2017