"There's no way that incident caused this much wound," Dastan muttered, his pacing echoing in the dimly lit room as he shook his head in disbelief. He couldn't fathom that the burn from scalding water could lead to such a significant loss of blood. Despite his skepticism, the physician proceeded to change the bandage, diligently applying necessary medicines to staunch the bleeding and promote clot formation.
As the physician prepared to depart, Dastan couldn't suppress his concern. "Is she going to be okay?" His voice carried a cautious tremor, betraying the worry gnawing at his insides.
The physician spoke with a calm demeanor, his voice carrying the weight of expertise. "Your Highness, I have applied necessary medicines to stop the bleeding and promote clot formation. With proper care, her Highness should recover," he reassured, his tone steady and reassuring. As he finished speaking, he bowed slightly, indicating his departure.
Dastan's gaze remained fixed, his expression blank as he absorbed the physician's words. , and he felt a pang of guilt gnawing at him. "Also," the physician stopped once more and spoke. " I think the delay in the treatment of the wound has caused it to worsen," the physician continued, his tone becoming more serious. "If she had reported about it earlier, this much blood loss could have been avoided."
However, instead of easing Dastan's turmoil, his words only intensified the prince's sense of culpability. The realization that the delay in treating Noori's wound had worsened her condition weighed heavily on him, casting a shadow of guilt over his troubled expression.When left alone Dastan gave out a ragged breath.
"Damn it! I should have listened to her!" Dastan's self-condemnation reverberated through the room, his disappointment etched into the furrow of his brow. He closed his eyes, grappling with the gravity of the situation and the remorse that consumed him.
Dastan felt remorse as he gazed at Noori lying motionless in the bed. Not only the fact that he had scolded her in the morning after she was genuinely hurt by a servant's action, but also the realization that she had helped him get better all along, made him feel very small. Her stillness, like that of a lifeless statue, weighed heavily on him. The room seemed to shrink around him, suffocating him with the guilt of his actions.
Her pallid complexion, drained of its usual warmth, startled him. The loss of blood had transformed her skin to an unnatural shade, as if drained of life itself. With hesitant steps, he approached her bedside, the creak of the floorboards echoing in the heavy silence of the room.
Taking a seat in the chair beside her, Dastan lowered himself slowly, his movements careful and deliberate. He couldn't shake the feeling of insignificance that washed over him, a stark reminder of his own shortcomings.
"I know I've been... terrible to you," he murmured, his voice barely above a whisper. Each word carried the weight of his regret, heavy with the burden of his actions. "I shouldn't have... I should have listened to you, especially after..." His voice faltered, unable to articulate the depths of his remorse.
He swallowed hard, his throat tight with emotion. "I'm sorry," he managed finally, the words a feeble attempt to bridge the chasm between them. "Thank you... for helping me. Again." The gratitude in his voice was tinged with shame, a bitter acknowledgment of his own failings.
As Dastan sat there, his gaze fixed on Noori's bleached pale form, the heaviness of his mistakes bore down on him like a crushing weight. In that moment of introspection, he couldn't help but feel the enormity of his actions, realising just how small he truly was in the grand scheme of things. The room was enveloped in an oppressive silence, each moment stretching out like an eternity, gnawing at his insides and leaving him feeling uncomfortably exposed.
Desperate to break the suffocating silence, Dastan began to speak, his words tumbling out in a disjointed stream of consciousness. "Do you know my brother? I mean, not personally, but you must have heard of him, right? The first son of King Azorius." He chuckled bitterly at the absurdity of his question, acutely aware of how insignificant it seemed in the face of their current situation. "Well, he used to tell me I was selfish. I didn't believe him at first... until I did."
His voice wavered with emotion as he continued, his gaze dropping to his hands, still stained with traces of her blood. "I didn't care about others. If something benefited me, I would just go along with it, regardless of the consequences for others." His admission hung heavy in the air, a stark reminder of his own failings.
"But you see, I was always told from a young age that I might not live past my youth. You probably don't know what that feels like." He glanced up, searching for some sign of understanding in her still form. "Well, you wouldn't know. I thought, if I didn't have long to live, what did it matter if I took what I wanted? It was all going to be left behind anyway when I was gone. So I became selfish."
He paused, the weight of his confession settling heavily upon him. "I am selfish, and I don't know if I can change that about myself... not until I'm sure if I'll live for sure. So don't blame me for the things I usually do. Once I'm completely healed, I'll try to make amends for what I've taken. But until then, I just want things to be like this." With that, he leaned back in the chair, his head resting against the headrest, and closed his eyes, exhaustion and remorse washing over him in waves.
His confession settled upon him, Dastan found himself sinking deeper into the chair, his eyelids growing heavy with exhaustion. He spoke until his words trailed off into silence, his mind drifting on the currents of his own thoughts. Gradually, the room grew darker, the shadows lengthening and merging with the night.
Unaware of the passage of time, Dastan eventually succumbed to sleep, his breathing slow and steady as he slipped into unconsciousness. The room fell into a profound silence once more, broken only by the soft rustle of fabric and the sound of two quiet breaths, intertwined in the quiet of the night.
The hushed silence of the night wrapped around them like a comforting blanket, as Noori gazed up at the tapestry of stars painting the sky. Among them, she spotted a constellation that sparked her imagination, its arrangement resembling the form of a horse. With youthful exuberance, she pointed out the celestial shapes, her voice brimming with delight.
"Look! It's a horse!" she exclaimed, her finger tracing the outline of the imagined creature against the starlit canvas.
The man, lying beside her, turned his head slightly, his brow furrowed in curiosity. "A horse? How do you see that, my lady?" he inquired, genuinely intrigued by her interpretation.
Noori eagerly explained, gesturing to different clusters of stars. "See, that's its head, and there's its body, and those are its legs, and that tiny one is its tail," she elucidated, her eyes sparkling with wonder.
"But couldn't it also be a cow?" the man proposed, his tone gentle and contemplative.
"No, it's a horse because I say it is!" Noori retorted playfully, her cheeks puffing out in mock indignation as she turned away from him.
The man chuckled at her reaction, rolling onto his side and propping himself up on one elbow. "Alright, it's a horse. And you, my dear, are a princess," he remarked teasingly, his affectionate tone infused with a hint of sarcasm.
Noori's eyes widened in surprise at his words, her cheeks flushing with embarrassment. "How did you know?" she stammered, caught off guard by his unexpected declaration.
With a tender smile, the man reached out to gently tuck a stray lock of hair behind her ear. "Because you carry yourself like royalty, my princess," he confessed softly, his voice filled with genuine admiration and affection.
"No! I'm not a princess, because princesses are weak! I'll be the general of the army, and I'll be strong, and everyone will fear me!" Noori declared, her words imbued with the determination of a youthful dreamer with grand aspirations.
"Everyone would fear you? Even me?" the man queried, a hint of concern in his voice.
"Oh, no, silly! I would never hurt you, so there's no need for you to fear me, you know that, right?" Noori reassured him, her tone affectionate and sincere.
"Are you sure you wouldn't hurt me?" the man pressed, his brows furrowing with uncertainty.
Noori paused for a moment, her expression thoughtful as she considered his question. "Well, I would never hurt you intentionally, because that would hurt me too, you know," she replied earnestly, her hand instinctively resting over her heart as she spoke.