When I woke, the sun was already high. Daylight entered through a window, mixing its warmth with the chilly air that preceded the winter. There was this idyllic sound of birds and wind.

  “How are you feeling?” Ingrid asked. She was at a table cutting vegetables.

  I didn't have any pain, and my breathing was easy. Compared with how I was last night, it was a remarkable improvement.

  “Good day, Mrs. Ingrid. I am feeling well.”

  In fact, I am feeling too well.

  I took a deep breath, hesitantly because I expected a stab of pain at any second… but none came. I did that a few more times with the same result.

  This is strange...

  I touched the bandage over the wound and pressed a little.

  No pain.

  Ok, now this is getting weird.

  I put my fingers below the bandage, but I could not feel the injury.

  I jolted upright in the bed and hastily removed the bandages.

  There was no wound, not even a scar or redness on the skin. It was like it had never happened.

  “Did you give me a healing potion?” I asked Ingrid because that was the only thing I knew that could heal like that.

  “No, child.” Ingrid had come to my side and was inspecting the place where the arrow had hit me. “I tended your wounds, gave you a concoction to lower the fever and cast an antibiotic spell, that was all I could do. My last potion was used six months ago, and I could not buy more. But even if I had given you one, it would not have worked because your injury was too old.”

  I knew that, but I was out of explanations.

  And then things got even stranger. I looked at my left arm, the purple marks and scratches from my fall from the hill were gone. Until yesterday it hurt a little if I bent the elbow, but now it was like new. The accident happened around one week ago.

  I took away the blanket and inspected my naked body. During the journey I suffered scratches and small cuts from falls and bumps, but they were all gone, every single one of them.

  “Did you saw when this happened?” I asked.

  “Sorry. You were in very bad condition in the middle of the night, but there was not much I could do, so I rested a little. I woke up just after daybreak and you had already stabilized. Do you feel anything?”

  “No … well … I am just hungry. I mean, really hungry, like I had not eaten in days.”

  “At least this is something easy to solve, dear” Ingrid smiled. “I am preparing lunch, but if you want, I have some leftovers from yesterday.”

  I wolfed a bow of cold soup and hard bread, and as I ate, my thoughts started nagging at me:

  This is a good thing, right? The reason doesn’t matter, I am healed, I am not dying anymore. Everything is fine. So … why do I feel so unease? Why does this scare me so much?

  Aside from that, I had another, more mundane concern.

  “Do you know where my clothes are?”

  “I put then in a bucket outside, they are too gory to use. I will find something for you to wear.”

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  She gave me an old, worn-down dress, but it was clean and fitted relatively well. We ate lunch – I was still hungry – and after that I asked her:

  “Mrs. Ingrid, there is something I can do to help?”

  “Don’t worry, dear, you should rest.”

  “I am feeling fine … and … to be honest … I am losing my mind here. I am worried about Uther and my recovery… I need something to do, please.”

  “If that is the case, there was some things I could use a little help.”

  In fact, there were a lot of things that needed to be done, so much so that I was surprised an old lady like Mrs. Ingrid could keep up with.

  I helped tend to her herb garden and asked her to explain how to make medicine from some of the plants. I would say half of all I knew about medicine had been acquired by pestering people just like that.

  I fed her chickens, gathered berries from nearby bushes, boiled water, swept the floor and finally went to a nearby stream to do laundry.

  The stream was small – I could cross it with one step – and had crystalline, cold water running over a bed of rocks.

  Washing clothes in a stream was something I had never done, so I don’t think I did a good job. I had taken my clothes to see if I could wash away enough of the blood stains to wear them again, but when I decided to clean them, I got another surprise.

  There was no blood.

  My shirt was dirty from mud and had a hole where the arrow had hit me, but not a single drop of blood.

  A practical part of me was happy that this had been taken care of, but the rest was just freaking out.

  Where did the blood go? The front of my shirt was soaked with it, I am sure. Does this have anything to do with my recovery? Not even healing potions reabsorb blood, so that would not make sense.

  I forced myself to calm down by going back to work, but I didn’t know how much longer I could rely on this trick. I carried back the basket of wet clothes with some difficulty.

  It was almost night, and I was finishing hanging the clothes on a clothesline when I saw Uther returning on a horse.

  ***

  Approaching me was a gaunt figure. Uther had dark circles under his eyes, and his movements were lethargic as he dismounted the horse. His expression was tired and sorrowful.

  He walked absently past me, heading in the direction of Ingrid’s house. It was twilight, and I was wearing the old dress from Ingrid, so it was understandable that he did not recognize me at first glance.

  “Uther …” I called him in a small voice.

  He stopped, turned back in my direction, and carefully looked at me.

  “Gift?” His eyes widened, mouth agape. "Why are you up? You should be resting.” He moved toward me with purpose, intending to offer support.

  I politely refused his assistance and took a step back.

  “About that...” I rubbed my arm uneasily, looking at my feet. “I don’t know how it happened, but I am healed.”

  His head tilted, eyebrows raised.

  It would be easier to show him instead of trying to explain. I turned, unlaced my bodice, and lowered it, crossing my arms in front of me for modesty. I felt Uther’s warm, calloused hands on my back, inspecting the place where the arrow wound should have been. That made me shiver a little.

  “Nothing, not even a scratch … Incredible. Does it hurt?” He asked, still caressing my back.

  I shook my head in a negative, what I was feeling was definitively not pain.

  I dressed back up and gave him a quick rundown of what happened. After finished, I stood silent for a moment, hesitant in formulate the question that had plagued me since I woke up: “Do you think this has to do with what Professor Locan said about artifacts not being able to be destroyed?”

  If that were the case, it would mean that something fundamental about me had changed, and questions about what I was began to creep into my mind. What did it really mean to be an artifact? Was I even human anymore?

  “I don’t know, it is likely...” Uther smiled. “But you know what? I don’t care. I am just glad that you are alive.” He hugged me. “We can leave this mystery for later.”

  We stood like that for a few warm moments. It was one of the most basic forms of human comfort—the feeling of being held and protected—and I needed that so, so much.

  “You know I will still punish you for disobeying me, right?” Uther tightened his hold, gently stroking my hair as he kissed my forehead.

  “I am looking forward to it.” I snug under his embrace.

  After that we talked about Captain Ectar betrayal and Uther explained what he had done since he left me with Ingrid.

  “I went to an army outpost nearby and commandeered a few soldiers to arrest the scouts. I needed to go for them before they came for us, but when I returned to the scouts' camp, I found five of them dead… Someone had poisoned their food. Two were unaccounted for; I tried to find them to no avail.”

  I felt bad about the scouts. I had travelled with them for several days, talked with them and hoped with all my heart that they were not all traitors.

  That added a new layer of complication to an already messy situation, but there was nothing we could do there, so we resumed our goal to get back to the Capital.

  I said my farewell to Ingrid and thanked her for all she had done for me. Uther paid her for my care, with an extra to keep quiet about my miraculous recovery, but she refused that bonus.

  “Nobody wants to hear gossip from an old lady like me, don't worry.” She laughed with a raspy sound, unfazed by what had happened.

  Me and Uther spent the night in an inn at Lakeside Village and the next morning our return trip started.

  And as for my “punishment”, the one I received that night I didn’t mind at all…