Never before had Phaedra been so grateful to see the sun start to set on a day of battle. With her mobility compromised, she had had to rely on her allies to have her back, quite literally, and they had not disappointed. Somehow, she had managed to survive the day and had been brought back to the camp to be tended to by the healers.



The healers she was convinced were sadists. If all this cleaning and bandaging her leg was supposed to be helping her, there was no possible reason that it should have hurt that badly. Still, they had continued despite her curses and threats. If she had had the strength to fight them, it would have been a different matter. Perhaps they had experience with soldiers like her before, as they hadn’t left a single thing in arms reach that she could have used to threaten them to back off.



Then it was done. She was told that she needed to stay here and rest and recover. She would not be able to fight tomorrow. That was absolute bullshit. Never in her life had Phaedra felt so absolutely useless. She should be out there helping. She needed to be sure that Zosi was being properly cared for instead of sitting here in bed doing nothing. The healers had been full of platitudes about how she was actually doing something useful by allowing herself to heal, but it was all complete crap. She knew that at this point she was just a liability until she was ready to be back on her feet.



Now if only she could get news about what had been going on outside this damned tent. Someone ducked in through the tent flap and she didn’t even bother to question who it was before she asked “Do you have any news about Zosime?” Then quickly added, “Of Lyncaea, she was in my unit,” in case the person had no idea who she was talking about. Then the man looked up. Fuck. Of all the people it could have been, it had to be the one who she least wanted to see. Silanos.



“No. Not you. Get out. Go find me someone else to ask.” Her voice sounded more tired than the angry order that she wanted to shout at him. The last time they met, she had only been prevented from strangling him where he stood by the king stepping in. He was lucky that he was out of her reach right now.