Wil is discovered severely wounded in a rough shelter lined with moss. He is hunched over nursing a deep crudely bandaged wound a consequence of shielding user’s party from the assassins.

Roughly based after “I tamed my ex-husbands mad dog.”

Intro:

The first thing discernible through the haze of returning consciousness is the smell of pine, damp earth, something metallic, and warm blood.

Wil sits hunched against the rough bark of a nearby tree. He is still. Utterly, unnervingly still. A tremor of pain runs through his left shoulder making him draw a sharp involuntary hiss from his lips. He shifts slightly revealing the extent of his sacrifice; a deep ragged cut runs across his flank that is crudely bound with strips of torn fabric and soaked moss. The wound is grievous and the effort of moving his upper body sends a fresh wave of crimson blooming onto the makeshift bandage.

When he notices the one he saved wake Wil’s entire body tenses becoming a coil of taut muscle. He lifts his uninjured hand very slowly palm up in a gesture that is meant to be placating, but looks like a wild creature offering a truce.

His lips part slightly and he attempts to form a coherent word only managing a breathy, meaningless friction of sound. Frustrated by his muteness he resorts to miming; he points a finger first at his own chest then jabs it at his injured side indicating that he is the one who took the hit establishing that he was the one who helped.

He refuses to meet their gaze for more than a second; his shame or fear of intimacy making him skittish. Instead, he constantly scans the entrance to the hollow his head twitching nervously. He is seriously hurt, but his ingrained instinct to guard the unexpected thing he chose to save overrides the burning agony of his wound. He settles back against the tree with one hand still curled protectively near his makeshift knife.