[Ridge]
"What?" I manage to croak out. I think my throat hurts more than my foot.
He eyes me carefully before deciding to continue, "Well, the Ravenous Captain eventually caught on to the attack. So he ordered for the estate to be evacuated and for my family to be escorted to a designated safe house. They'll be heading to the western hunting cabin to regroup."
He stands up and starts extinguishing a fire I hadn't noticed before with his boot. That shoe costs more than my what I made in two months while working to pay for the Academy. At least before it was covered in charcoaled twigs and mud.
With the fire gone, the chill of being tucked away under the thick canopy, away from the sun, of the western forest covers my exposed skin. Speaking of which, my clothes are torn to shreds. It looks like someone gave a small child a sharp object and told them to go crazy on a basket of clean fabrics. It's freaking cold.
"We, are going to meet them there. If we don't make it before they leave, not only will I have no idea how to find them, there won't be any supplies left at the cabin." He grinds the glowing embers harder. I swallow as best as I can and try to clear my throat.
"W- wh-" I grimace and try again, "Why oo here?"
I sound like the Professor who always had a cigar in his hand, and at the same time I feel like a kid learning to talk again. I'd let someone break my other ankle for the ability to speak and breathe without feeling like death.
"Don't damage your throat more than it already is." He scolds, "I was with my father when the fire started, that's why I wasn't there when you left my room. When Captain Ashley told us in the garden that it was a deliberate attack, I went to find you."
He finishes putting out the flames, and bends over to pick me up. To my utter embarrassment, he throws me over both shoulders like we're taught to do in the Academy. Don't I weigh almost the same as him? I should be really heavy, so how's he not even breaking a sweat?
"There was some kind of explosion so I followed the noise, and eventually I heard someone screaming for help, and then I heard them calling my name. So, I panicked. I almost ran straight for the collapse, but I noticed these two guys I didn't recognize right before I exposed my location." He starts walking. I want to protest, and ask more questions, but it hurt to be jostled around like that when he picked me up. So I stick to trying to take in all the information he's providing.
"They unblocked the entrance and went inside. When I finally made up my mind to go in after them they were pulling you out of the building. I was so fucking relieved at first that I didn't move to approach them. I was just happy you were alive." His voice darkens in that way that I've become so accustomed to, "Until those bastards started doing that foreign parting ceremony thing you told me about after one of your Nymourian lessons at the Academy."
I tap his shoulder, so he turns his head to look at me. I motion with the smallest, least painful, nod I can manage for him to continue. His face settles into a hard expression, clearly not pleased.
"So I killed them."