Chapter : 741

“I already did,” she interrupted, her voice gentle but firm. “While you were sleeping. I changed the dressing. The green salve you carry is a remarkable thing. The bleeding has stopped completely, and the flesh is already beginning to knit itself back together. You heal as unnaturally fast as you fight.”

He had forgotten, in his feverish state, about his body’s enhanced regenerative abilities, another detail that did not fit the ‘simple doctor’ persona. He made a weary, mental note to be more careful, if he survived this.

“A benefit of a healthy, mountain constitution,” he said, the lie feeling thin, worn, and utterly transparent.

She didn't challenge him. She simply finished cleaning his face and sat back on her heels, her expression now one of deep, thoughtful contemplation. “This journey is my fault,” she said, her voice heavy with a new, and completely unwarranted, wave of guilt. “I dragged you into this. I insisted on coming. And now you are hurt, you are feverish, because of me.”

“You did not hold a blade to my throat, Sumaiya,” he countered, his voice firmer now as a surge of his own stubborn pride cut through the fog of his fever. “I made a choice. The weaver’s son’s life is worth the risk. My injuries are an acceptable, and calculated, cost of doing business. Do not claim a responsibility that is not yours. It is an insult to my own agency.”

His words, meant to be a logical, almost harsh, absolution, seemed to have the exact opposite effect. A single, crystalline tear, shimmering like a tiny, captured star in the faint, bioluminescent light, welled up in her eye and traced a slow, silent path down her cheek.

“Why?” she whispered, the question raw, emotional, and utterly, completely illogical. “Why would you do that? Risk everything for a child you do not know, for a woman who has brought you nothing but trouble and danger? What kind of man are you?”

Lloyd looked at her, at this strong, mysterious, and now openly weeping woman. The Major General had no answer for her. The Lord of Ferrum had no answer. But the doctor, the Saint of the Coil, the mask that was, with every passing moment, becoming more and more real, he did.

He reached out with his uninjured, and surprisingly steady, hand. And, for the second time in his long, and very strange, second life, he gave in to a foolish, illogical, and profoundly human impulse. He gently, with the tip of his thumb, wiped the single, perfect tear from her cheek.

“The kind of man,” he said softly, his voice his own for the first time in a very long time, raw, tired, and completely, finally, honest, “who believes that some things are still worth fighting for.”

The moment hung between them, fragile, profound, and utterly, completely, and irrevocably real. The admiration in her eyes was no longer just for a warrior, or for a hero. It was for the man himself, the beautiful, terrible, and magnificent paradox of divine strength and aching, human vulnerability. The seeds that had been sown in blood and fire had now, in the shared, quiet intimacy of the jungle night, blossomed into something complex, dangerous, and undeniably beautiful.

The journey back from the green hell of the Dahaka Jungle was a strange, dreamlike procession. The oppressive, cloying humidity gave way to the clean, dry air of the open hills, and the gloomy emerald twilight was replaced by the brilliant, golden light of the sun. Yet, the jungle’s shadow lingered, not in the landscape, but within them. They were different. The ordeal had taken something from them, but it had also forged something new in its place.

The silence that accompanied them now was not the hostile, wary quiet of their initial days together, but a deep, comfortable understanding that transcended the need for words. They moved with a practiced, easy synergy, two parts of a single, efficient machine. Lloyd, still favoring his wounded shoulder, would point out a potential danger—a loose rock on the path, a rustle in the undergrowth that sounded wrong—and Sumaiya would react instantly, her hand dropping to her knife, her body tensing, ready to fight. She, in turn, would spot a source of clean water or a patch of edible berries he had overlooked, and he would follow her lead without question.

Chapter : 742

He no longer saw her as a liability, an unwanted complication to his mission. He saw a partner whose instincts were as sharp as his own, whose resilience was a thing of quiet, steely beauty. She, in turn, no longer saw the quiet, sad-eyed doctor or the terrifying demon of fire. She saw Zayn, the man, a complex and contradictory being of immense power and profound gentleness, a protector who had shielded her with his own body. The masks had fallen away in the crucible of the jungle, leaving behind a raw, unvarnished truth.

They arrived back in the city of Rizvan under the cover of a moonless night, two weary ghosts slipping through the sleeping streets. The raw, chaotic energy of the city, which had once felt so overwhelming, now seemed almost tame, its dangers petty and mundane compared to the primal malevolence of the Dahaka.

They went straight to the weavers’ hovel in the Lower Coil. The single oil lamp was still burning, a lonely star in a sea of darkness. As they climbed the creaking stairs, they could hear the soft, despairing sound of a mother’s weeping. They were just in time.

When Lloyd pushed open the door, the sight that greeted them was one of utter desolation. The boy, Harun and Aliza’s son, was paler, frailer than before. His breathing was a barely perceptible flutter in his chest. The faint, sweetish scent of death was beginning to cling to the air. The parents looked up, their eyes hollow, and when they saw Lloyd and Sumaiya, a flicker of something—not quite hope, but a shocked disbelief that they had returned at all—crossed their faces.

“You came back,” the weaver, Harun, whispered, his voice a dry rasp.

“I made a promise,” Lloyd said simply. He didn't waste a moment. He knelt beside the boy, his exhaustion forgotten, his focus absolute. The doctor was back on duty.

He opened his pack and carefully laid out the treasures they had won. The Sun-Kissed Fern, its leaves glowing with a faint, golden inner light, and the Moonpetal Orchid, its delicate, crescent-shaped petals shimmering with a soft, silvery luminescence. They seemed to pulse with a gentle, latent power, two pieces of a living, vibrant magic in the grimy, dying room.

“Sumaiya,” he said, his voice a low, calm command. “I need a small, clean bowl and a grinding stone. And boil some of the clean water we brought.”

She moved instantly, her exhaustion vanishing as she took on the role of his assistant. She found the requested items—the family’s last remaining bowl—and began to prepare the herbs with the focused intensity of an alchemist.

Lloyd turned his attention to the boy. Under the guise of checking his pulse, he activated his [All-Seeing Eye]. The internal scan confirmed his fears. The infection had spread, the boy’s lungs were almost completely filled with fluid, and his spiritual energy, his life-force, was a guttering, sputtering flame on the verge of being extinguished. He had hours, at most.

The preparation of the cure was a quiet, sacred ritual. Sumaiya crushed the glowing leaves of the fern into a fine, golden powder. She then did the same with the shimmering orchid, its petals dissolving into a silvery dust. Lloyd himself took a piece of the common willow bark and ground it into a coarse, brown powder.

He mixed the three reagents in the bowl, the gold, silver, and brown swirling together. He then added a few drops of the boiled, still-warm water, and a miracle occurred. The moment the water touched the powders, they effervesced, releasing a soft, hissing sound and a cloud of fragrant, sweet-smelling steam. The mixture in the bowl began to glow, a soft, warm, golden light that pushed back the shadows in the room.

The weavers stared, their hands clasped over their mouths, their eyes wide with awe. This was not medicine; this was alchemy, a divine magic they could not comprehend.

“Hold him,” Lloyd instructed the parents. “Gently. We need to get this into him.”

With infinite care, they lifted their son’s head. Lloyd dipped his finger into the glowing, warm paste and gently touched it to the boy’s lips. At first, there was no response. The boy was too weak, too far gone.

“Come on, son,” Harun whispered, his voice thick with tears. “Just a little. For your father.”

As if hearing the plea from across a vast, dark ocean, the boy’s lips parted slightly. Lloyd carefully, patiently, administered the medicine, a small amount at a time, until the glowing paste was gone.

Then, they waited.