When he first emerged, eyes slightly open in the darkness, he thought he was back in that cavern, the lair of the wyvern.
His mind could almost conjure the bones and the smell.
But this was another place and this was night time. Half of the wooden ceiling in this circular room was still missing and the moonlight bathed that side with abandon. Wall and floor alike of heavy stones surrounded him with their dark shapes.
He moaned.
Immediately a kobel woke up at his side, stood up and approached, saw his open eyes. He in turn could barely make that silhouette, so blurry was his sight.
"He is awake!" The young, fuzzy voice yelled. "He is awake!"
And that kobel ran outside.
It was not to last. Already slumber fell back on the scaled lizard.
Before he could wake up again the rumors of voices surrounded him along with the first warmth of daylight. He could feel it know, his whole body ache, burning from wounds long closed. The voices grew closer, still indistinct.
They were forcing some liquid down his throat.
He coughed. Immediately the fit lit all the pain that lingered in his every limbs. Around him hands were struggling to keep him down. Voices turning to clamors.
When Tunu finally emerged, the haze of a realm suggested three kobels around him.
The closest he finally recognized. It was the shaman talking to him, snapping his fingers over the warrior's muzzle.
"You hear me?!" He finally discerned. "He can hear me. He is healed!"
And with that the shaman turned away to leave.
Tunu's hand grabbed his arm, holding him firm. It had been more of a reflex than a conscious thought. The headache, the nausea, had him incapable of giving more than moans.
The other kobel he could recognize was Elua. She was crying against his hand, pressing it on her cheek and rubbing it.
He could not tell if this was real.
But ever more quickly the realm was taking shape, his senses sharpening, the bed harder against his back. He lay on a mattress of fresh grass, quite high above the ground.
"Let go of me!" The shaman protested.
"W... wait..."
"No! I am done here, let me be! Ah!"
The old kobel winced when Tunu tightened his grip, not even realizing his own strength. He let go, afraid of breaking the shaman's arm.
"Please, stay!" Elua pleaded. "He needs you right now!"
"He needs no one! You least of all! Don't you have chores waiting, woman?!"
Her eyes, flashing anger, lowered to the ground and she only held the warrior's scaled hand more firmly against her.
He muttered: "Stay... Lutuk... I have questions..."
"When you are in a state to ask them, maybe!" And he flailed his arms, staff in hand. "Oh fine! Hurry then! Ask what you must and make it quick!"
It was true, his weakness was fading away by the second. His whole body regaining strength, so much so that he could almost force his back to rise slightly from the grass.
The shaman sat back on the cut trunk that served as a stool.
She had not waited on any of them to say all she had on the heart herself.
"You saved us, Tunu! You saved the whole tribe! You killed all the minotaurs by yourself!"
And while those words felt too unreal, too detached from his own memories, she added:
"You saved me."
Which was enough to lit his heart. This time he realized what feat had happened and he was ready to believe in it fully. Yet his attention returned to the shaman, almost stubbornly.
"Lutuk... are you the one who... healed me?"
"Me and that youngling, who else?! You think she could do it?"
"Then," he continued with a half-hope, almost deaf to his words, "then that means you... that means you trust me? You finally believe..."
The shaman's tone sank.
"Your heart is evil and will doom us all. This is no belief, it's written in the stars! Tell him, you!" He called on Elua. "Tell him what you saw!"
"Shut up old male!" She shot back.
"You fed the heart! You fed it, that's how you won! All the wounds you received closed in seconds and that's not a thing wyverns do!"
"You don't know that! You don't know anything, you are just jealous and bitter!"
Her tears only fell harder, cries she thought had run dry after so many nights waiting for her love to wake up. The shaman's words were torturing her.
Yet Tunu, kept calm by the pain, only asked:
"Then why? Why did you heal me?"
For a moment the shaman answered nothing, but offered him a scornful look.
"I can still brew some poison if you want." He grumbled. "I can make it quite potent. We would see then if that heart of yours can still be stopped. Why did I heal you?!" He suddenly got up, his voice booming again. "Because the tribe demanded it!"
The tribe.
Tunu, like all kobels, liked to believe he was loyal. The tribe was the only family he could ever conceive. Yet a shaman took it to the extreme.
Shamans only advised, served as arbiters and then, no matter what, just followed the will of their peers. From the day they had decided to feed, this one had accepted the fate that awaited them all, or so it seemed.
That he did it kicking and screaming hardly made him less impacting for the scaled lizard.
"For the tribe..." He whispered almost for himself.
He could feel how much those words had inspired him, how much comfort they brought him. Already his thoughts had relinquished all angst and finally, finally he could turn back to his love. Elua stood there, waiting for his glance and drowning in his yellow eyes.
Soon they were alone, soon she realized that his body still hurt. There was no way for him to stand, so she went instead to get food for him.
Captives came back with her, carrying plates, buckets and sponges.
"Here! Drink!" She offered him a cup of wine.
He tasted it, realized just how thirsty he was, emptied the cup and then the jar. She simply ordered for another and turned back to serve him dry fruits.
"Rest, don't strain yourself. You have done so much already and your body has suffered so much!"
"Where are we? What is this house? It's so vast..."
"Oh, there is so much to tell you!" She got excited. "You have been asleep for days and the camp was getting noisy and sick, so we moved you here."
"Here?"
She was going to say more but another kobel interrupted them.
The chief had passed the entrance, staggered a bit and rested against the wall. He was panting, he was feverish. He had dragged himself all the way here. To the tip of the hill, its highest spot. To what was to become Tunu's new home.
"Tunu!" He exclaimed.
The chief was holding his belly. No matter how sick, he could not hide his joy. And Tunu in turn felt so relieved to see everyone, each after the other, come up alive and well.
"Chief!" He called, then winced. "Are you okay?"
"Who cares about me! You are awake. That's good. Take good care of him, Elua. We need him back soon. We need you, Tunu. There are so many preys waiting for you now."