VINCENT CARRIED ELDRA back to the shack that he had built in the shadow of the mountains. She had started to violently shake from the cold of the icy river, her lips tinged with blue.
He tore her wet shift away from her body, then laid her gently onto the bed, tucking the wolf's fur tightly around her trembling body.
Vincent moved swiftly to start a roaring fire in the hearth.
He glanced back at her with a worried look that darkened his silver-blue eyes to thundercloud black.
Eldra shivered uncontrollably beneath the fur, and Vincent retrieved the Bear skin from the floor where he had left it when he had risen in the predawn hour to hunt.
He placed it over the wolfs fur tucking it tightly around her shivering frame as well.
Vincent was at a loss as to what to do to help her.
Quietly he knelt down beside her, caressing her cheek with his cold fingers.
Eldra half opened her eyes looking into Vincent's face, so close to her own. She smiled weakly with her deep blue lips.
"Tell me what to do?" Vincent pleaded desperately.
Eldra closed her eyes for a moment, searching back in her memory for what her mother had taught her to do when she had been brought a half frozen boy, who had fallen through the ice on the lake near their village, one winter when she was a child.
Her mind struggled to reach back to that day, she could not quite grasp the memory in her current state.
Then her mother's voice spoke so clearly in her mind that it was as if she were beside her.
Her eyes flashed open as she half whispered:
"Hot, sweet tea, and mounds of blankets," she breathed.
Eldra silently thanked her mother, before her eyes slipped closed once more.
* * *
Vincent rushed instantly from her bedside and hurriedly searched the room for a pot to heat water in. Spying an old battered pot that he had cast into the corner of the room in a rage on one of his more melancholy days.
He retrieved it quickly from where it had been discarded, and hastily dipped it into the water from the full barrel in the corner. Then he carried it to the hearth, carefully balancing it on the glowing embers that he had pulled from the fire, to allow it to boil.
He took down a chipped cup from the shelf, blowing away the dust from inside it, before carefully placing it on the table.
Here he stopped.
Tea?
He had none, since he drank none. His mind raced.
Then he paused, he stepped outside in to the chill autumn nigh making haste back towards the forest.
He remembered seeing some dried wild mint growing only a few feet into the trees. He quickly gathered some in his hands, stuffing it into his hand.
Vincent then recalled the beehive he had discovered in a hollow tree before the end of the past summer.
He moved in a flash to the tree, where he had lounged on the long grass one overcast day, watching the industrious creatures comings, and goings as they buzzed happily about their work.
Though he was immune to the pain of their sting he approached the tree cautiously, not wishing to disturb the bees within.
When he was but a mortal child, Vincent remembered overhearing the whispered story of a cousin who had met a terrible end.
The boy had been shooting arrows at a bee's nest, striking it again and again until the enraged insects poured forth in a furious swarm.
They had descended upon him, stinging him relentlessly until his screams had faded, and his short life ended in agony.
It had been a horrifying tale at the time.
Yet, even as a child, Vincent had found it difficult to summon much sympathy for his cousin, and as far as he could remember, the boy had always been a cruel little bastard, who took pleasure in tormenting small animals.
Delighting in their suffering simply because he could.
To a younger Vincent, it had seemed that the boy had finally suffered the same fate he had so willingly inflicted upon others.
Perhaps the fates had simply given him what he deserved.
Vincent gingerly reached into the hollow of the tree, breaking off a small piece of the honeycomb, before withdrawing his hand. The thick, sweet liquid beginning to run slowly down his hand as he made his way back to the ramshackle shelter.
Arriving just as the water on the heart began to boil.
Vincent removed the pot from the fire, crushing some of the leaves held in his fist, with his fingers.
Spilling some of the leaves onto the table as he did so, before placing them into the cup.
Next he gently poured some of the hot liquid from the pan over the crushed mint, adding some of the honey.
Letting it drip from his finger tips, before wiping the sticky residue onto his worn trouser leg.
Vincent carried the hot liquid over to where Eldra lay, still shivering violently on the mattress despite the two layers of furs tucked around her. He placed the cup onto the table that stood beside the bed, then carefully slipped his hands beneath Eldra's shoulders, lifting her, tenderly as he slid onto the mattress behind her, close to the head of the bed so that she could rest against him while she drank her tea.
As he moved her into position Eldra's eyes fluttered open at his movements, she looked into his face offering him a weak smiling.
He smiled down at her, before retrieved the chipped cup from the table, and handing the warming liquid to her.
She cautiously cupped her trembling hands around the cup, blowing on the steaming liquid before carefully taking a small sip.
She first tasted the sweetness of the honey, then it mixed with the slightly bitter taste of the mint on her tongue.
She sighed softly, thinking to herself that this was the best cup of tea she had ever tasted, despite the clumsily crushed pieces of mint that now coated the inside of her mouth.
She resolved that when she was recovered, she would have to introduce Vincent to a proper use of a teapot, and a strainer.
She sipped more of the hot liquid feeling the heat from what lay in the cup beginning too slowly course through her body, warming it.
She sighed again, this time nestling closer to Vincent, who she had forgotten, in her contentment, was still sitting behind her lending the support of his strong body to help her sit up in the bed.
Feeling a bit giddy for reasons that she could not understand, Eldra turned her head slightly to the side, looking at Vincent's strong, bare shoulders, and his angular face looming above her.
And those striking mesmerizing silver-blue eyes.
"That's the second time in as many days you have saved my life." She giggled. Grinning like a drunkard deep in his cups.
She raised the half empty cup to her lips, this time she took a long draft, draining the cup in one long gulp, with a slight look of mischief upon her face.
Vincent shifted uneasily behind her on the bed.
"Are you feeling... alright?" he asked Eldra, with a note of unease, tinged with concern.
"I feel so warm and cozy now." Eldra slurred, before shifting her position under the covers so that she could see Vincent more clearly.
"You know my mother told me of another way to warm someone who has fallen into a cold lake," she continued, swinging the cup around wildly, as an impish grin played at the corners of her mouth.
"To bring the warmth back to their body more effectively, she had told me," she said, quoting her mother, while mimicking an older woman's voice.
"Someone should lay unclothed closely next them. Sharing their body heat." She giggled drunkenly.
"So what do you think of that handsome? Care to crawl under these furs for a little sharing of body heat?" Eldra said, with a lascivious lilt to her voice.
Her slurring becoming more pronounced.
Eldra made a gesture with her hands, indicating her intentions, before attempting to pull back the furs that remained firmly tucked around her, to Vincent great relief, in her present state she could not quite manage the task.
Vincent slipped quickly from the bed, retreating crossing the room in two great strides.
When he turned back towards her, Eldra had thankfully once more slipped into a deep slumber.
The cup lying in shattered ruins beside the bed, having been knocked from Eldra's hand when Vincent had fled his position behind her.
* * *
Vincent stood near the table, visibly shaken, his gaze fixed upon Eldra's sleeping form.
The desire he had felt when she had unexpectedly offered herself to him still burned within his loins.
The intensity of it had taken him by surprise.
Not because of the desire itself, but because of how easily it had awakened the creature he had spent so many years trying to suppress.
It had taken every ounce of his willpower to step away. To remind himself that she was vulnerable.
That she trusted him.
That he was not the monster he had once been.
"Dear Gods," he whispered, his voice heavy with disbelief. "What have I gotten myself into?"
The empty room offered no answer.
Only the sound of his own labored breathing as he fought against the desire for her still coursing through him.
Vincent turned to the table, looking at the remains of the mint that he had brought back from the forest.
Or had it been mint he asked himself?
He picked up some of the remnants of the herb between his fingers, bringing them close to his nose, and inhaling deeply.
It certainly smelled like mint, but as he was no expert he began to have his doubts, especially after witnessing its strange effect on Eldra.
Then a terrible thought raced through his brain.
What if he had accidentally given her some poisonous plant to drink in error?
A lump formed in his throat at the idea that he may had accidentally poisoned the only woman he believed he could truly love.
Terror tore at his heart as he flew to Eldra's side searching for any sign that she was in distress.
He brought his ear close to her chest, hearing the strong beating of her heart, and her steady breathing through the thick layers of animal fur.
Relief washed over him making him collapse onto the floor beside the her.
He ran the fingers of both hands through his mass of thick dark curls, letting them meet at the base of his skull.
Relieved exhaustion suddenly washed over him.
He stretched out on the cool floor locking his fingers together behind his neck.
He could feel the remnants of the broken cup digging into the bare skin of his back, but was too exhausted to care.
He had slept on worse.
He closed his eyes slipping into a death like slumber as the rhythmic sound of Eldra's soft breathing sang to him, like some long forgotten lullaby.