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Sweat drips in off her brow, body aching and hurting, a slight ringing in her ears. She can’t tell if she’s freezing or burning or some hellish mix of the two, her nose rubbed raw from constant tissue blowing.
Niveia hates being sick (hates being useless, hates not being in control of her own damn body.)
Zolzaya is out, finishing some business they were in the middle of before her body betrayed her, promising to return soon with better, stronger medicine (and Zolzaya never lies, never breaks her promises, even if there’s now blood on both of their hands because of her). So she waits, laying in an inn bed, feeling gross and tired but unable to fall asleep, time starting to blur together.
At some point, her eyes slid shut but she didn’t even realize it until a hand brushes through her hair, pushing back her bangs. Blinking her eyes open, Niveia squints at the blurry shadow figure above her, tension in her shoulders bleeding out as the figure comes into focus. “Urianger,” she croaks out, hoping her smile didn’t look deranged. The Elezen man smiles softly, nodding his head in agreement.
“Lady Zolzaya informed me of thine illness, and I presumed you yearned for company.”
“Always if it’s yours,” Niveia flirts weakly, unable to tell of her eyebrow wiggle was successful or not (though, going by the faint pink that suddenly dusts itself across the Scholar’s nose and cheeks, she chooses to believe it was charming enough).
Pulling up a nearby chair as he coughs into his fist, Urianger reaches into something down on the floor, straightening his back with a thick ancient tome in his hand. “May I,” he asks and Niveia nods, wiggling herself deeper into the soft bedding.
Flipping to a bookmarked page, Urianger begins reading, voice low and smooth as lines about aether attuning wash over Niveia like a soft wave. Her eyes grow heavier and heavier, humming softly every so often, not at all paying attention to the specific words but to the safety in Urianger’s voice, until her eyes close, finally falling into a dreamless sleep.