The Bald Princess

~Ten~

Do not worry about your scars, Sire, they narrate tales of your bravery. Let me caress them once. Let me fall in love with them once, after all, they are an inseparable part of you. And until you learn to love them, I'll kiss them everyday for you.

Atarah

"Did you had your lunch?" Warrior Duncan asked me and I looked up from my tools, slowly shaking my head as I pulled my mask up. Why?

"Neither did I, healer. We can have something in the nearby diner." He said and I choked on my breath. My fingers accidently pressing on the tweezers, making the blood to dribble down my index finger.

And slowly, like a tsunami rolling inside the ocean, I saw something flashing inside his dark eyes. His skin paled. His jaw clenched as something darker crossed his face. He started shivering badly and something inside me snapped. I walked closer to help him, it was like an uncontrolled action. Like my mind pushed me to help him. But he took two steps back, his eyes clenching shut and his fingers digging in his palms, as if he was trying to control himself but from what.

Warrior Ansel Duncan was a dangerously scary man. But that day, scary was such a small word to explain how he looked. He was the same Warrior, I had known from two months but he still felt different...... like a stranger, in that particular moment. His breathing became shallow and when he opened his eyes, I flinched back, they were dark. As dark as anything could be. It wasn't demonic— no but scary. But he didn't scare me enough to make me run away from him. Like a spell had adhered me to the ground, to stand near him, closer to him. He needed me and yet a saner part told me, I should run. From him. As far as I could. But the irrational part told me to stay and I did.

"Are..... are you okay, Warrior Duncan?" I asked softly and his eyes were staring at me like he was looking into my soul. I could feel his gaze piercing inside me.

"You're bleeding, healer. Dress your wounds." Was all he said. His voice deeper than usual. His tone was so rough that it made my throat dry. I looked down at my bleeding finger and gulped.

Was it the blood? Did it made him lose his control over his demon? Was he..... was he really what Bailey had told me he was?

"Damn it, dress your wound! Think later on what Bailey said to you was true or not!" He growled angrily and I jumped in surprise at his outburst. I didn't even had to question him how he knew what I was thinking as I quickly pressed the cotton on my cut and applied a band-aid on my wound. I grabbed a soaking pad and cleaned a few drops of blood that had fallen down on the floor before I threw it in the trash can and washed my hands.

And slowly, his skin-tone returned to his normal color. His eyes lost its malice and his fists unclenched as he took a deep breath. And he was back to normal. Just like that. Trying not to concentrate on my racing heart, I filled a glass of water with my shaky hands before handing it to him. He took the glass of water, his eyes focused on me, as if he was thinking of something. Slowly, with his eyes on me, he took a long sip of water before he placed the glass down on the table and wiped his mouth with his handkerchief.

"So, healer, shall we head towards the diner?" He asked like he didn't just lose his composure a minute ago and I bit my lips. Like I would go with him after he had just shown me the scariest side of him. Who knows what would next snap this side of him again!

"But won't the diner cost us thrice of the actual food?" I asked and he nodded his head before he shrugged his shoulders, clutching his sabre closer ho him.

"Four times, actually, healer. But the rules says that no-one can deny a warrior of free food. So, I won't have to pay anything for the food but you would have to. Grab your purse, will you?" He asked, no jest, no amusement in his eyes or voice. Not that his voice ever held any kind of emotions. I blinked at him, looking at him deadpanned. This man can't be serious?

"I don't have money either, Sir Duncan. What made you think I can afford a plate of food four times the actual price in this period of famine?" I asked and he looked around the infirmary, at my patients before he looked at me.

"The fact that you own the infirmary and you always have a bunch of patients waiting for you to diagnose them." He said like I was earning in thousands. I shook my head, sighing.

"I don't charge them the money, Warrior Duncan. And this infimary doesn't belong to me. It's an abandoned building, they abandoned it when I walked in it the first time. So, I made it as my hospital to treat the patients for free. Sorry to disappoint you but I don't have the money, Sir Duncan." I said his eyes widened for a spilt second before they narrowed into his scrutinizing gaze.

"You treat people for free? How do you manage the expenses of their treatment then?" He asked and I shrugged, smiling gently at him.

"I make blankets at home, Sir Duncan. And father sells it in the market at quite reasonable price. It helps me with the expenses and some kind gentlemen and ladies also donate money to Bailey for the infimary." I said as I closed the register and nodded my head with a polite smile at my patient who was leaving the infirmary after seven days. She was finally alright. Poor girl, she was suffering from food poisioning.

"I should go to the diner and get myself some food, hm." He said and my heart sunk at the thought of seeing him leave. And only the Lord knew when he would return next.

I saw his lips twitching as he left the infirmary and I clenched my eyes shut, suddenly remembering how he had been able to read my mind all the other time. And I was pretty sure, he ready my thoughts even now. No wonder his lips twitched in amusement. Great! Now he would think, I'm a weirdo too. Not that I wasn't but...... sigh.

~~~~~~

I turned to my patient as I started asking him what was hurting. He had fever. This famine would defined pull our economy down and would make a lot of people ill with no food to eat. Starvation was our major concern.

I was working; treating my patients with Bailey when I heard footsteps behind me. Heavy footsteps, I had grown accustomed to. I didn't even had to turn back to know who had walked in the infirmary. It was Warrior Duncan. But he was here early. He had left the infirmary, not even twenty minutes ago. Bailey stiffened as she turned to look at Warrior Duncan but he payed her no heed. His attention was driven towards me. The way he kept boring his eyes into mine, barely blinking them, made me swallow nervously. Especially when I wasn't good with eye contacts.

"Healer," He called me out, making my insides to twist and curl at his voice. I licked my lips, turning around to face him. I was once, very grateful for the mask on my face, for it hide my blush very well.

"Do you need something, Sir?" I asked and he rose one his brows as he lifted up a parcel in his left hand and held his sabre in his right hand. He slid the empty chair to sit on, like he owned the infirmary.

"I brought lunch for us, healer." He said casually, making the patients around us and Bailey to choke on their breath. My eyes widened when I looked down at the parcel in his hand. Why would he buy me lunch? He never did this before. Nobody did.

"I didn't buy you food, healer. I just asked him to put a bit extra. And they did." He answered my unasked question.

I pressed my lips together, my eyes boring into his dark ones and for once I felt like he teleported me to a different world, a different universe. It was so calm in there, I never realised how much tranquility his eyes held before. My lips parted in surprise when he took a step forward, suddenly his impassive expression was long gone. Something more soft, more gentle and more heart melting was replaced in his dark eyes.

And then something different happened. My eyes looked at a woman in his eyes, dressed in a gown with a scarf wrapped around her scalp. It was quite later when I realised, it was me, that it was my reflection, his eyes held and I flinched back. I was hideous. I couldn't even look at my own reflection without feeling the pain in my chest. It had been years, I had looked at myself in the mirror.

Years, since I threw all the mirrors of my house outside; years, since I had gazed at my own reflection. It pained to look at myself. And no, I didn't pity myself, I hated myself, I hated how I looked. How I was bald and how I wasn't like other women. And when I looked at myself in his eyes, though it was just a hazy glimpse, it made my insides to twist in disgust. I didn't knew how anybody beared to look at me.

I was quick to look away and even quicker to feel the burning of the tears in the back of my eyes. I was miserable. And I was aware about it.

"You're thinking rubbish, healer. The strongest hatred I see for you is yours. Snap out of it." He warned me in his sharp voice, making me blink out of the darkness, I had surrounded myself with. I licked my lips, shaking my head.

"I can't eat right now, Warrior Duncan. I have a lot of patients to attend." I said as my appetite vanished in thin air. He rose his brow as he took another step towards me.

"Miss Bailey, why don't you attend the patients till I have a word with her." He said, not even looking at Bailey. I saw her looking at him in defiance. She opened her mouth, probably to deny him but that's when Warrior Duncan looked at her, his eyes fierce, daring her to deny and she visibly gulped as she turned around to attend the patients.

"And healer, I won't think your father would appreciate you breaking your another promise to him, again. He won't be happy to know that you're missing your meals behind his back, hm." He said in his calm tone and my insides burned at his softly, calmly rolled out threat.

"How do you know about the promises I made to father? What are you hiding from me, Warrior Duncan?" I asked and he smiled. He smiled. His predatory smile which often made me feel like a prey, he would hunt on. His canines flashed dangerously and my heart almost stopped beating for half a second.

"Don't you get tired of asking the same question again and again, healer?" He asked, looking down at his sword and I bit on my tongue as the strings of curses now wished to get released.

"Asking the same question a hundred times doesn't tire me, Sir, as much as not getting any answer does." I said and his smile widened. I felt the hair on my neck raising in alarm.

"Keeping you in the darkness would give me nothing, healer. But I am trying to figure out certain things, myself. And how am I supposed to explain you the things, I, myself am confused about?" He said, making me swallow nervously. What was he confused about? And was it related to me?

"Do not stress yourself much, healer. The food is turning cold." He said and I licked my lips, looking at the number of patients waiting right now in the infimary.

"I can only eat once I attend all these patients, Sir Duncan. Bailey needs to go home early and it's not right to make the patients to wait either." I said and he looked around the infirmary and everyone immediately took their eyes off us— off him.

"It's alright, healer. I can wait until you're done." I blinked at his words. He was willing to wait for me until I was done with my work?

"But aren't you needed on the border?" I asked and he rose his brows, his eyes glowing with amusement as he placed his right leg over his left one.

"Everyday is not a war, healer. My soldiers are trained enough to patrol the boundaries alone, efficiently. And even if any emergency occurs, they'll inform me. And a warrior too can go off duty once in a while." I gulped, my heart soaring inside my chest. It wasn't everyday, people waited for me, leaving their work aside. And today, definitely was not every day.

"But how will they communicate you when you're here. Won't it take a lot of time for them to come here?" I asked again and he shook his head.

"They won't have to come here, healer. I'll just know if any danger arrives, hm. You're not yet aware of my powers. Now, attend your patients, I'll be waiting for you." He said and my eyes widened.

"But.... but the food will turn cold."

"Do not worry, healer, I'm used to the cold food."