Dreams and knives.

The right-hand windows of the barn are closed and in the half darkness you struggle to make out your handiwork. The smell is the worst of it though, a sickening miasma of **** and disease that clings to the air and burns your eyes. It was the flux most likely, better to do this than let it spread to the rest of the herd. You let the axe fall from your hand. The memory is oddly faint but you recall the shrill shrieks they had emitted as your axe set upon them, how the ram had desperately tried to save its flock. Blood and viscera coats your body so you lift the bar across the great door and descend into the pool of warm water waiting outside. Evening is giving way to night and the sun's fading light sends streaks of red across the cloudy sky. Staring up at it, you allow yourself to float across the surface of the water.

You drift for miles, until all the light has drained from the sky, but still that smell fills the air and in the darkness the screaming begins again. Willing yourself deeper, you sink into the water and let its calming pall cut off all that surrounds you. A delirious peace consumes you, but soon you feel your lungs ache and your heart straining within your chest. This is no place for the living you think to yourself as you **** your way to the surface.

You wake with a start.

The cave is warm and for a second you imagine you are back with Sylvia, that it had all been a nightmare, until you notice the others. Inside the small chamber are a handful of wounded from your caravan, most with broken bones or defensive cuts to their arms. Two women move amongst them; one short but muscled like an oxen, a sword hanging from their hand like an open threat, the other is thinner, homely faced and dressed in a rough spun tunic and leather apron. As they drift about, setting bones and sewing cuts you finally become aware of the darkness on the right side of your vision. Cloth has be wound tightly around that side of your face and as your mind focuses on it you begin to feel the sundered flesh beneath. Your hand probes gingerly, eliciting jolts of pain and coming away dark and glistening. The sensations overwhelm you and tears spring unbidden from your eyes.

At last the healer turns their attention to you. "Calm boy, is only pain" she says in a broken mirror of your language. Her voice flows gentle as a stream, in any other situation you would probably find it soothing, but right now your are quite beyond that point. As your bandages peel off, the guard retches and reels away to vomit in the corner, but the healer merely clicks her tongue and tilts her head impassively.

"What... What have they d-done?" You ask through pained sobs.

"Is looking worse than it is being. You will live, but the egg is broken" she clicks her fingers and gestures towards the fire "egg must come out".

Confusion holds you for a second, until realisation creeps across your mind. Perhaps you had just not wanted to realise beforehand, but now you notice that even with the bandage gone your right eye saw nothing. "Eye" you correct, emotionless "it's 'eye' not 'egg'".

The guard pulls a knife from the fire, it's blade white-hot, and hands it to the healer. "Eye, yes. Boy is right. Much you will learn me on journey." A piece of leather is slid between your teeth and the guard kneels atop you, elbows pinning your shoulders whilst her firm hands steady your head. All the while refusing to look at your face. "Brave now, is only pain."

At first you feel nothing, then comes a pain more powerful than anything you had ever felt before. It washes over you in waves, as inescapable and furious as the ocean tides. From your throat bellows an almost inhuman howl that chills even your own blood and you feel your bowls empty into your trousers. Your arms grab at the guard's and grip them so tight that you fear your bones will shatter. After what felt like an eternity the healer steps back from their work, the pain lessened but still monstrous. When the guard lets go it is all you can do to curl up in a ball and let unconsciousness take you.