The Dress - Part 1

"Ugggh"

A sound most notably associated with pain was the first sound out of Octavia's mouth as she woke up. A noise which did not truly represent the full-body pain she was experiencing, but she was not alone in this, as many others around her were making the same noise.

She had no clue where she was or how she got there, but all she knew was every movement caused some sort of pain. She managed to tilt her head slightly and saw more people laying in other beds around the room, groaning in pain as they did.

"Is this… an infirmary." She wondered. She had yet to see someone resembling a doctor, but with all the people moaning and groaning in the separated beds, it was the best guess she could think of.

Octavia then spent the next few minutes trying to remember how she ended up here. It took a while, but she managed to remember the fight with one of the combat trainers. She also remembered how she didn't do too well, not that she needed the memory as the pain and bruises told that part of the story all too well.

But this sorrow was short-lived, being replaced with a grin as she recalled how she ended the fight, biting her instructor. Her paralytic venom did its job, paralysing the smug woman in her place before she toppled and hit the ground hard.

She was very happy about that outcome, but all too quickly a horrifying thought came to her.

"Wouldn't she be in the infirmary too?"

Bearing the pain, she looked around for any sign of the woman from the angle she was facing, and believe it or not, she found her.

She found her standing up and donning her armour that is.

"Oh damn." A wave of panic rolled through her as she saw the woman.

While it had been during and fight, it was a bit of a cheap shot what she, not that anything prohibited it. When she was laying on the floor no one said the fight had ended, all her instructor did was just gloat about beating her, so what was to stop her from attacking again? In some films that's when they make a comeback. The problem was whether she would see it that way. As well as how vindictive she was.

She watched her get ready to leave and Octavia decided she had to do the only thing she could think of.

Pretend to sleep.

"I'm not awake. I could be dead for all you know. Just leave and forget about me." She mused to herself as she lay there as still as can be.

It was cowardly, but since she was under covers, pretending to be like the rest of the patients around her might make it hard for her to be found. It would not be until later that she would realise her being green and having a massive tail for the bottom half of her body made her stand out so much that pretending to be asleep did nothing.

After waiting a few minutes, she opened her eyes and as luck would have it, it worked. That or her instructor did see her but left anyway. With her eyes being closed at the time, there was no way to tell.

As she wiped away the invisible sweat from her brow, she felt something shift halfway down her body. Pushing through the pain again, she shifted her head to the other side and looked down, finding a mass of dark hair with streaks of purple covering a good section of her bed. The mass of hair then shifted revealing the sleeping girl underneath who was none other than Sylvia.

"She stayed with me. That's so nice of her." She mused to herself as she watched her laying there. "I won't wake her, and I think I better get some more sleep as well to let these heal. I've never had to actually rely on my healing ability so we shall have to see how long it takes to fully heal."

And with that thought, she decided to place her hand over Sylvia's to let her know she had woken at some point, and then close her eyes for another well-needed rest.

…

"This healing ability is amazing."

It was the afternoon of the next day and she no longer groaned with every movement. As she looked down at her body the bruising had formed very quickly and in some cases, they were almost gone. She no longer felt pain everywhere across her body, so the bruises were the only thing to show she had been hurt.

"It's good to know it does its job and all. Not sure how long it would take if I lost my tail though." A quick thought came to her about trying it out to see how long it would take, but she very quickly shot that down.

Looking around the room, some of the faces had changed, but others were still there. Thankfully it wasn't like this was wartime, so the only injuries were from sparing, accidents and the occasional attack from either bandits, monsters or animals. This meant that so far, she had not seen anyone die during her stay in the infirmary, which was a good thing to see.

At some point, Sylvia had left her bed, likely to sleep on her own. A part of her felt annoyed that she did that and wanted to be selfish by having her stay with her, but the more reasonable side knew that she couldn't stay here all day. She was an important person, and it was likely someone from the Lord's family probably forced the issue to get her to rest properly.

While this was the case, it did not keep Sylvia from her for long, as evident by her turning up now that she was awake.

"You're awake. I'm so glad you're ok." These were the first words from Sylvia, which put a smile on Octavia's face. The next set of words though removed it very quickly.

"How could you be so stupid and reckless!"

"Err, I-I. What." Octavia didn't quite understand where this annoyance and blunt accusation had come from. What did she do that was wrong?

"Why didn't you call the match to stop the spar? You just kept getting hurt till you ended up on the floor unable to move. How stupid can you be? I even tried to stop it myself, but one of the soldiers nearby told me not to interfere and that only the combatants or named judges can stop a spar. Did you not hear me shouting to you to end the match?"

The dumbfounded expression on Octavia's face pretty much told Sylvia that she had no idea what she was talking about. First of all, Octavia had no idea what the rules for a spar were, something that she probably should have learnt before getting into one. She wondered what a named judge was and decided to add learning these rules to her to-do list.

Then there was the fact that she did not hear or see anything outside of her opponent during that match. She didn't think Sylvia was lying or anything, it was just that she had been so focused on the battle that she blocked everything out. The constant pain and hits to her body further increased this effect as well.

Octavia quickly told Sylvia all of this, who retained a very unamused frown throughout, not happy with her explanation.

"Fine" was all she replied with once she had finished, stating it in a stern voice. It was clear that while she had gotten an answer to why things went the way they did, it did not help the situation.

"I'm, I'm glad you're ok… and you're almost completely healed. How is that possible?" Sylvia said as her eyes roamed over her arms to see the diminished bruises.

"Oh, it's one of the perks of being a Lamia I guess. I heal much faster than say…a human."

"Well, that's good and works out well for later."

"Wait, what's happening later?"

"How have you forgotten already? It's not too long now, but we shall be attending the ball."

"…"

It was again very easy to see what Octavia was thinking, and that was that she had completely forgotten this. Whether this information was knocked out of her during the fight, or she just pushed it to the back of her mind was anyone's guess.

"Are you ready to get out of this place and back to the outside world? We will need to visit the seamstress in order to fit your dress."

"Yeah, I think I should be fine now. Oh wait, have you seen Knight Commander Althea yet? Does she hate me after what I did?"

"Oh yeah, how you ended the match. I thought that was brilliant what you did. Granted at the time I was stressed out when I saw you fall to the floor and struggled against the guards to reach you, but once that passed I was able to appreciate how funny it was."

Octavia's face stayed as it was, but she had a worried grimace on the inside as Sylvia said that. "I definitely need to make it up to her after worrying her so much."

"But yeah, I spoke to her. She isn't angry at all. If anything, she was really impressed by you, both during the fight and what you did at the end. She said not many people can get one over on her, but what you did really surprised her. She kept calling you interesting and that she was looking forward to more sessions with you."

"Well, that's good, I was afraid she would want to get revenge on me for what I did."

"Why. It happened during a spar. Neither of you called the match when you were on the floor. It only ends when one of the combatants calls to end it, when one of them is unable to do so themselves which means the fight is stopped automatically or if a named judge calls it. None of these happened, so what you did was fine. Now, let's get out of here and get you a dress for the ball."

"Ugggh" was the only noise Octavia made as she was dragged out by Sylvia. Whether this was from having to get a dress and go to this ball, or due to the diminishing yet still present pain she was feeling, we will never know.