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The last thing Jill remembers is steel falling from her hand, and deep, despairing darkness overtaking her. She'd felt relief, as though the end might have almost near. Please, she’d thought desperately, please let it be over.
When she eventually comes to, she knows that her thirteen-year long nightmare has not come to the end she so desires but continues on. If she wanted to, she could open her eyes. But then she’d be back in Ironholm, and it would only be a matter of time until she was forced back onto the battlefield, set to carry out more atrocities, all in the name of her ‘master’.
The thought makes her feel sick, and is all the motivation she needs to feign unconsciousness a little while longer. Eventually, she'll be roused round, whether she's awake or not. But as long as she has a choice in only this small a thing, right now, her eyes will remain closed.
There's some activity around her bed, which is not unusual. Marleigh's probably insisted she be allowed to tend to her wounds alongside some of the other women. Sometimes the Patriarch allows it, and other times they receive the fiercest of beatings for even asking. The conquest of Dhalmekia must have been more successful than it'd appeared, to have the man she hates to call 'master' relent.
Jill feels somewhat relieved about that, at least. With her eyes still closed, she finds her focus turning to the dream she’d been having just before she'd regained some semblance of consciousness, and her cruel reality reared its ugly head.
She’d been on the battlefield, sword in hand and surrounded by Branded men. Who their master was, she had no idea. All she really knew was that their goal would be to either capture or destroy her. Two of the men were complete strangers, but the other-
Clive.
Clive had been there.
It was no exaggeration to say she’d thought about him everyday since the Night of Flames. On the rare occasions when Metia would bless her with sweet dreams, instead of the worst nightmares, they'd be about a childhood spent in her homeland, then in Rosaria. Clive would always make an appearance. Sometimes it would be with Torgal and Joshua too; other times they'd be back on Mann's Hill surrounded by snow daises.
But this dream was different.
It had felt so real.
Jill lets out an involuntary sigh at the thought of something so ridiculous. Clive was dead. He'd perished with Torgal and Joshua and his father, during the siege on Phoenix’s Gate.
“You awake yet?”
This voice was different; new. A woman, yes, but not one that Jill recognised straightaway. Definitely not Marleigh, in any case.
Perhaps they’d been on more raids, more conquests, while Jill had been fighting Titan and the Dhalmekian Army. Maybe this was a new addition to their – for lack of a better word, and Jill loathed to use it – home.
Jill immediately feels sorry for the poor girl. Before she can open her eyes, and respond, she speaks again.
“Must’ve been imagining it.”
She sounds so…unbothered. So unlike someone whose whole life had just been upended, and destroyed.
Jill finally opens her eyes.
The room she's lying in is dim. Firelight casts shadows; she never knows exactly what time of day it is down here.
There's an awful crick in her neck, but Jill strains anyway, to take a glance of the mysterious woman. By now, she'd turned away, so Jill could only catch her profile. She was average height, with a slim figure and short red hair. She wore a white tunic, paired with trousers, and stood with arms crossed, as though she was worried.
Certainly, Jill had never seen her before. So she must be new to Ironholm.
Before Jill can question it, her attention is caught by something else. The faint sound of laughter in the distance. A child hollering. It's so unlike anything she's ever heard before.
And if it's so unlike Ironholm then...
It couldn’t be Ironholm.
A strange type of fear grips Jill, and she looks for the door. She can't decide whether she should be relieved or even more afraid. And as soon as the other woman turns around, and Jill sees the brand on her face, her panic only serves to increase.
An empire healer?
“Ahh,” the woman says, in that unfamiliar lilt, “so you were awake.”
The woman’s name is Tarja, and while Jill had been correct about one fact - she is a healer - it is not the Empire she serves.
Once the initial uneasiness had subsided, Jill eased herself up, propped up on the pillows. Tarja introduced herself and provided a glass of water - which, she insisted, she wanted finished by the end of their conversation. Jill had taken tiny sips as the other woman told her story, and explained where they were.
She works not for, but with a man named Cid, who runs The Hideaway; a safe haven for Bearers, where they were free from the shackles of a master and could forge their own lives and futures. Tarja was the resident medic, and she - and countless others - worked together to see their dream achieved.
It was this Cid, Tarja explained, who rescued Jill from the Nysa Defile. Jill was unsure whether this was because she was a Dominant or because she’d been passed out. Had he been tracking her in the midst of the battle? Was he working with the Branded men she'd fought?
In any case, it was a miracle, that she was, it appeared, so far from the Patriarch and Ironholm.
In fact, it sounded far too good to be true, but Tarja offers her a small reassuring smile, and because she has nothing else to lose, Jill decides to believe her.
“Wasn’t just you, mind,” Tarja continues, as she busies herself at the small workstation just across from the bed.
Jill, who had only spoken to express her initial distrust of Tarja, clears her throat.
“There were others?”
Perhaps the other women and children; maybe some of them had been liberated too.
“He says he's an old friend of yours,” Tarja replies. “And he's been awfully worried about you. Been hanging about like a bloodfly waiting for you to wake up.”
Jill’s deflation, at the thought of those left behind in Ironholm, makes way for the faintest of hope. So faint, in fact, that her first instinct is to crush it where it threatens to bloom.
An old friend?
Surely-
“Clive Rosfield, believe it or not.”
Jill’s heart soars in a way it hasn't dared to for thirteen long years. His face, which she has ensured time never forgot, fills her vision, and without even realising her eyes well up, at the thought. Quickly, Jill bows her head, to ensure Tarja doesn't see.
The other woman has been kind enough, if a little terse to the few people who have briefly poked their head around the infirmary’s door. But that doesn't mean Jill could afford to be complacent and allow herself to show this weakness.
“Clive? Clive’s here?”
When she finally speaks, she feels the full weight of her words. She's worried that, by saying them out loud, it might suddenly become untrue. That Tarja might roll her eyes, shake her head and tell her to not be so ridiculous.
Finally, when Jill feels ready, she lifts her head. Tarja’s expression is soft, almost fond.
“You’ve been sleeping for a while, so he’s been helping Cid with missions and the like,” she explains. “They’re out now, right enough, but they’ll be back soon.”
Tarja’s expression shifts slightly, as if there's something she wants to say, but can't. Jill doesn't understand it, and so doesn't dwell on it, either. She can't, when all she could think was-
“Clive is here?”
She repeats the words, suddenly swinging her legs round the bed, determined, despite what Tarja has just told her, to see him.
She has to know if it's true.
She doesn't know if her heart can take it if it isn't.
Tarja steps forwards, her hands up as if to stop her. To Tarja's relief, Jill feels herself become lightheaded after the movement anyway, and knows she won't be rising for at least a little while longer.
Still, Tarja looks stern, with her hands on her hips.
“You’ll have to wait-“
More laughter erupts from below the infirmary. There's a knock on the door, and a man with a Branded's tattoo opens it without being told.
"Cid and Gav are back with the new guy," he says, oblivious, it appears, to Jill's presence.
Cid. The man who saved her.
Who had saved her and Clive, apparently.
Founder, Clive was alive.
“Scratch that,” Tarja amends, making for the infirmary's door after the man who'd given her the message. She holds up a hand, though Jill feels so overwhelmed with emotion and exhausation that, as much as she wants to, she won't attempt to follow Tarja.
“I’ll be right back. You,” she says, with a sharpness that Jill's not really heard yet, but which tells her all she has to know about how strict Tarja is with her patients, “wait here.”
Jill remains seated on the bed, in the same position she was in when Tarja left. She's scared to move; worried if she does that she'll wake up, and this will have been the dream, all along. Tarja's footsteps retreated down the staircase fairly quickly, and then it was silent. Even the sounds of laughter, and children, that had wafted up earlier, are muted now.
In this moment, all Jill can do is clasp her hands together and close her eyes. She can't remember the last time she felt such hope, and it is dangerous.
If Metia can hear her, she has just one wish. That what Tarja's said is true and that the person who Tarja says is Clive truly is him. That there hasn't been a misunderstanding or a case of mistaken identity.
That he will walk through that door in a moment’s time, and her world, which has been so dark for thirteen years, will have the faintest flicker of light again.
Please, she prays, almost as reverently as she wished for the end on the battlefield, please let it be true.
Heavy footsteps make their way up the steps. There's a moment of silence, a breath, and then the door opens.
Jill knows it is now or never, as she turns around.
If her heart soared before, she's sure it might burst out of her chest now.
The man at the door is taller than she remembers. His hair has grown out too. Jill realises he's marked - Branded - and it makes her heart ache to think what horrors he has endured since his cursed mother betrayed them all.
By all accounts he should be a perfect stranger. After all, thirteen years stand between them, and it always will. There can be no erasing it, no matter how much she wishes she could.
But he's not a stranger, and she knew this as soon as she set her eyes upon him.
She's floored by the warmth in his eyes, as he bounds towards her, as though his feet can't move fast enough. As he places his sword against the wall, and his face is like a mirror for how Jill feels inside. Relief, and joy, and love, and too many emotions she doesn't think she'd ever be able to express, even if she were to be given all the time in the world.
“It’s true, then," is all she can manage, "it really is you."
It isn't a dream, after all.