Recovery

Cael is slow to recover. 

And even though she makes progress, something is a little off, still. A little different.

She eats and sleeps, plenty of both, considering how malnourished and broken her body is, how great the need for the nutrients and calories afforded her. (Snacks appeared, mysteriously, overnight, with a note that surprised her. Cael made a mental note to thank the strange pandaren about her equally strange, but touching note.) She reads: her book of fairytales, her Treatise. She picks up her quill twice to write and…  can’t; discards it. 

Healers ward her. Drakku, in particular, is very… stalwart in being with her. She appreciates that, understands the need. (Knows she’s damn lucky she didn’t wake up in a cell. The hint of things she may have done…) 

Cael doesn’t really want to be alone. Not now. For the most part, she isn’t, even if it’s just a friendly chair outside her door.

The pink tree grows a blossom, next to her, and she can’t explain why the fragile flower makes her cry. Petal stays, and that makes her want to cry, too.

Finally, per her orders… Cael walks. Not her runs- no armor, no weights, no great distances. Her simple leather and linen tunic and leggings, with wool underthings and scarf and cloak were all she wore. They do her good. She knows that, even when something like a squirrel chittering in the trees makes her freeze with old terror born anew. 

There’s a copse of evergreen just outside the walls enough to relieve the pent-in, trapped feeling. Here, she stops, breathless, hurting. Cael sits on the soft mat of pine needles, soundless. Above her the aurora plays color on an eternal sunset sky. 

In. Out. Breath. 

Pine. Earth. Snow. Sea.

In. Out. Breath…