Morning all, I hope you had a splendiferous weekend and stayed out of the heat. Someone turned the dial into the nineties but kept the humidity so it was a bit more like a sauna here than anything else. Summer has officially arrived. But lets start off today’s steaming morning with a cool writing prompt. Cool being relative of course. So timers set and off we go.
Oh so many ideas to jot down before I forget.
Monday, June 23rd: His skin was scraped raw.
His skin was scraped raw. Evan dragged himself out of the river. He collapsed on the edge, not even wincing as his abraded flesh came in contact with the sandy and rocky ground. He was more interested in the air than the land. He sucked in deep breathed, his half starved lungs joyous as they filled with simply air, not having to sputter out the water that came with it.
For a moment all Evan could do was breathe. He drew in air deeply and steadily. He felt as though he had been running. He caught his breath slowly and his lungs stopped aching. Once his body was assured the oxygen would not be ripped from them again, the rest of his body made their complaints known. The worst were the scraps. It felt like every bit of his skin was scraped raw. He could see the red and bleeding patches where he had been scraped along the sandy and sometimes rocky riverbed. He could feel the impact of the various rocks he slammed into as the swift current sped him along. He suspected what wasn’t abraded would end up being bruised by morning.
Now that he could breathe, he felt the rocks and sand against his palms he remembered using them to brace himself and protect his face. They were beaten up badly, stiff and sore as well as scratched raw. He lifted his hands from the ground and realized the sand was getting into the cuts. He laughed as he reached back and dipped his hands into the water, knowing the sand needed to come out before it embedded itself in the cuts. He had that happen before and had to scrub the stuck sand out of healing cuts. It was painful and not something he wanted to contemplate again.
Especially without Myrna’s concoctions to take away the pain,’ he decided.
Sand rinsed off he shook his hands free of droplets, knowing there wasn’t a dry item on him to wipe them off. The sun was high and the day was hot. He expected he would dry soon enough.
He shivered despite the sun. The river’s chill was still on him as though the water wasn’t yet ready to let him go. Evan reminded himself it would pass. He stood, wobbly on his feet. He braced himself as his swimming head settled. It seemed to take a moment to realize he was on dry land as well.
‘Probably lack of food,’ he thought. He knew he would need to eat soon. He hadn’t been eating well before, but now his energy was depleted. Any supplies he had on him were gone now, so he would need to forage for a time and possibly try to find the nearest town.
‘Depending on which town it is,’ he thought as he began to carefully move away from the shore and proceed inland. The river had carved the land down and he needed higher ground to figure out where he was. Once he knew that, he could figure out his next steps. Not everyone would be amenable to his presence. The Duke had alliances with many of his neighbors and being seen to give him shelter or even any form of assistance could be viewed as an attack on the Duke.
As much as he hated it, helping him could be politically disastrous for others. Not for the first time he cursed Aldarace and he decision to push Evan forward. To have him recognized. He had been content as a nobody. He didn’t want to be forward. Aldarace had too firmly held beliefs about bloodlines, duty, honor and of course destiny.
Evan had never met anyone as ties to the concept of destiny as him.
Ten til Midnight 