Cold.
The first thing she was aware of was being very, very cold. And after the cold, came pain. It washed over her, wave after wave of it, blurring the few thoughts she was able to muster. The cold and pain combined held her prisoner in a space of emptiness and immobility. Her body felt stiff, swollen, and frozen. Her mind was sluggish and confused, none of the thoughts quite connecting with the ones that came before. But as she began the long journey from unconsciousness and her sense began to re-awaken, she began to be aware of the things around her.

She could smell earth directly underneath her. The rich smell of soil, overlapped by the slightly sharper scent of grass. She could feel the earth as well, under her fingertips and under her cheek. The grass prickled against her neck, adding small and insignificant specks of discomfort into the sea of pain that enveloped her. She began to be aware of sounds around her. There was apparently a slight breeze; even though her abused and unresponsive body couldn't feel it, a sound that she could vaguely label as leaves rustling pervaded the area around her. She could even hear birds singing, an ironic and oblivious contrast to her plight.

As her mind slowly cleared, more details of her situation gradually unveiled themselves to her. A slight movement of her foot told her that she still had her fighting knife tucked away in her boot. She couldn't feel her scimitar at her waist, but she could feel her cloak, caught half over and half under her body. It had wrapped itself around her when she had fallen to the ground. It was pulled tight against her neck, the clasp biting into her skin, and it made the effort of breathing that much more difficult. Her fingers scratched futilely against the earth underneath her, barely making a mark in the soil.
Help me.
It had been intended as an articulated thought, but her lips couldn't seem to form the words, and her parched throat refused to emit any sound whatsoever. But it was the first clear word she had been able to think of, and this single word unleashed a whole stream of thoughts and memories.

The march. She had been hired as a forward scout for a hunting party. They had supposedly been hunting after some sort of dangerous criminal. Eclipse hadn't really understood the nature of this criminal, or why he was so dangerous at the time she had been hired. In retrospect, that should have been her first hint. In fact, it had been a decent hint of what she had been getting herself into, but she had deliberately chosen to ignore it. It was safe to say that she had not been herself when she had taken the job. She had been frustrated and bored, half re-thinking her decision to give up her life of criminality. It was an occurrence that seemed to happen far too often. Whatever the reason for it, she had knowingly accepted a job which had a lot of gray, unexplained area to it, and not asked her usual amount of questions.
Well she was certainly paying for it now.

She had surprised the group in a discussion about their real intentions for the journey. Whatever each of them carried in their travel packs was probably illicit, because it had sounded like a smuggling ring of some sort. Her position as a forward scout was probably intended more to discover any law-abiders that might get in their way more than anything else. Whatever their reasoning for hiring her, they certainly hadn't been happy when she stumbled upon their true designs.
Her first instinct had been to run. Some would call that a cowardly response, but in Eclipse's mind, it was nothing more than a survival response. By discovering what they had meant to keep hidden from the group, she had made herself an undesirable. And in circles such as that one, undesirables were often killed without a second thought. But just as her survival instinct had been to run, theirs had been to chase after her. After all, they wouldn't want her spreading their story to the authorities in the nearest town now, would they?

In retrospect, she was probably very lucky that they had left her alive at all. The ringleader had been possessed of a skewed sense of honour which had caused him to stop his men before they went as far as to kill Eclipse. They had caught her and beaten her soundly, and would have done so until she was dead, if it hadn't been for the fact that their leader had called a halt to it.
"Remember this, girly" he had said to her, holding Eclipse's chin to make her eyes meet his as she lay bleeding and beaten on the ground. "We could have killed you. But that would be murder, wouldn't it? We'll leave you alive. We'll even leave your gear with you, as proof of our good will. But just in case you do make it to another town or city, keep in mind that one good turn deserves another. You wouldn't want to betray those that kept you alive now, would you?"
Barely conscious and unable to move, Eclipse hadn't been capable of making any reply.
"That's what I thought," said the man. He patted her cheek. "Good girl." Then he had gotten to his feet and turned to his compatriots. "Let's move out!" he had barked.
It was the last thing Eclipse remembered before now. She must have lost consciousness either as they were leaving or shortly after they had gone. It didn't really make a difference now.

Eclipse opened her eyes, or came as close to opening them as she could with one eye swollen so that it was almost shut and the other half screened by blood from a cut on her forehead. Just like her other senses, her sight was slow in becoming clear to her. Initially, she could see her surroundings but couldn't make the connections in her mind to remember her location, or even name what she saw around her from her prone position on the ground. Slowly, it all began to come to her.

It was bright out; painfully so, at least in Eclipse's mind. She could see trees not far off. She was at the border of some sort of forest. She probably knew the name of it, but she couldn't think of it at that precise moment in time. The leaves were fluttering gently in the breeze, and the occasional dart in the branches gave her an idea of where the songbirds she had heard were perched.

They had been traveling towards the coast, hadn't they? Something to do with going towards a ship - that had been part of the reason she had joined. Any job on a ship usually seemed like a good idea to her. They had been chasing a criminal, except there wasn't one. Or maybe there was, in a sense. Maybe it had been a person, a runner, who defected from the group. Someone who had part of whatever they were smuggling. It was plausible, after all. Smugglers generally couldn't afford to lose any of their merchandise, or at least that's how they behaved. But where was she?
Traveling towards the coast. Which coast? Were they headed for Lomedor? It didn't seem likely. The port city was usually used as a landing-point for black market rings, not a starting point. Lake Aelin? Probably not. There wasn't enough of a market there for any smuggler to justify the risk they ran by selling their goods. Where, then?

Eclipse tried to picture a map of the continent in her mind. It was a map she had perused enough times to know fairly well without actually consulting it. The only maps she knew better were sea charts for major trade routes. She mentally made her way along the coasts of the continent, trying to think of where she might be. A coast, a forest, a city. Had they been planning to visit the city in the forest? Eclipse wasn't entirely sure that they had. Somehow it had seemed like a bad idea to all of them...

The name of the forest-city they had been marching around but taking great precautions to avoid suddenly burst into her mind as Eclipse finally remembered where she was.
Yomeniampa. The elven forest-city. Almost everybody knew about the city, of course. But very few had gone in there. It all made sense now. She and the smugglers had been in sight of the trees when she had accidentally discovered their plot. It was entirely likely that they were being watched by elves, guarding the borders of their lands; they hadn't given the elves any trouble at all, taking great care to demonstrate that they had no intentions whatsoever of trying to penetrate the forest.
Perhaps the smugglers hadn't killed Eclipse because they didn't want any of those elves after them. Would the elves chase after a gang of murderers, even if the victim wasn't of elven descent? She had no idea, and it was likely that the leader had no idea either. In that case, leaving her alive had been the safer route for him.

But being alive certainly wasn't doing much for her now. She was barely able to move, and had probably lost a lot of blood while she'd been unconscious. She was also incredibly thirsty. But she was also completely helpless. Would the elves bother themselves with helping a human if that human was injured and in need of aid just outside their borders? That was another thing Eclipse had no idea about. She had never really known any elves, so she'd never gotten to learn about their mentality. It didn't help that most elves she had known had been rogues, and not at all representative of their race.

Eclipse tried to lift her head and get a clearer view of what was around her. It was afternoon now. She had to get herself moving before it got too late in the day. Although it was almost spring and the weather had been warming up remarkably of late, it still became cold when night fell over the world. If Eclipse couldn't get herself moving and shelter herself from the night before dark fell, she might very well freeze to death before the sun rose again.

Eclipse spotted her scimitar barely a foot beyond her hand, where she had likely dropped it during the fight. She crawled towards it and grasped it in her hand. Beyond it, she could see the tree at the bottom of which she had dropped her travel pack. So she still had her travel supplies, which may or may not be of any use to her, depending on whether or not she could get herself moving again. With what seemed to be far too much an effort for such a simple movement, Eclipse tried to lift herself off the ground with her arms to get her legs back under her again. She got her left leg underneath her easily enough, aside from the pained protest her body gave every time she moved. But her right leg was a different story. As soon as she tried to move it, a sharp pain that was much more focused and intense shot through the area under the knee. Eclipse wasn't even sure if she could get her right leg to bear any weight. It felt like something might be fractured, or severely sprained, at the very least.
Gritting her teeth against the pain, Eclipse crawled over to her backpack, using her arms to move herself. She probably wouldn't have been able to carry the cursed thing very far anyway. Not in this condition. It was heavy with the chain mail that she'd stored in there, thinking that it would be better to leave off wearing it until they got closer to civilization. She could have kicked herself for that thought now, but she supposed she couldn't entirely be blamed for it. After all, she'd only just recently bought the chain mail, and its weight took some getting used to.

Reaching her backpack, Eclipse fumbled for the flask of water that she knew was strapped to the side of it. It took awhile for her numbed and shaking fingers to undo the clasp, but once she did, she shakily raised it to her lips and greedily drank down half the contents, a great deal of it pouring over her chin and neck as well as into her mouth.
Her thirst somewhat sated, she put the cap back onto the flask and collapsed onto her backpack, using it as a pillow as she turned the aspects of her situation around in her mind. She was defenseless and injured to the point she could hardly move, with a possibly fractured leg. She was nowhere near any friendly territory she knew, and couldn't be sure to expect help from the nearest city, which ironically, was right in front of her, concealed in the forest. Some of her wounds would probably become infected if she didn't get them cleaned soon. She needed shelter from the cold, and she needed food and a source of water.
In short, it was highly likely that she could die out here.

"What am I going to do?" she murmured against the cloth of her backpack. She couldn't seem to find an answer for the question. She considered calling for help, but she had had trouble just to produce the murmured question she'd just asked herself. Even if she could shout, was anyone even within earshot? Elves, maybe, but there was a chance they couldn't even be bothered to help her.

Her vision was starting to grow dim again. She had a pounding headache, and her thoughts began to blur once more.
"No," she whispered. "No." She had to stay awake. If she fell asleep, or if she lapsed into unconsciousness, she might not wake up again.
"Somebody help me," she whispered. If there was any help coming, it would have to be soon. She wasn't entirely sure she would be able to keep herself awake for long, and once she fell unconscious again, it was likely that any help would end up being too little, too late.

Up the spiraling staircase and in his room, Gen. Ancalë Varnoi of the guards of Yomenïampa, contemplated the desicion that he was to make. He poured himself onto the parchment as he sat in his desk, brown eyes flitting over each word, taking in all that the parchment had to offer. All of a sudden there was a knock at his door.
"Yes?" he said, not taking his eyes off of the parchment. His voice had a rich and resonant timbre that was in it's own way, captivating. The door opened and a messenger walked in and saluted smartly. Ancalë returned the salute.
"General. We have just been informed that there was a struggle of some kind just outside the border. We were told to ask your advice on the situation, should we go and investigate or should we ignore it?" the Elf asked. The General thought about it for a few seconds.
"I don't think it concerns us very much Larcamacil." he replied.
"We don't take part in the petty dealings or skirmishes of random brigands."
"Sir, there may have been innocent casualties."
That put a whole new light on the situation.
"Round up some archers and station them throughout the trees, standard formation." said Ancalë.
"And you Sir?"
"I'm going to investigate. You're coming with me."

After he had belted on his heavy sword, thrown on his cloak and strapped his spear to his back, Ancalë pulled his sturdy boots on and set out, down the winding staircase and to the soft forest floor below. At his insistance, the messenger Larcamacil came with him, a slim sabre of some sort with him despite Ancalë's protesting statement that he would not need it. The duo jogged over to the border of the forest and peered out. There was definately a body of some sort out there. Ancalë bolted, sprinting out of the woods and towards the figure that lay on it's back with Larcamacil in tow. Once they got close enough, Ancalë could see that it was a woman, the faint chest movements indicated that she was breathing, but beaten to the point of near death. He briefly shouted orders to the messenger, telling him to go and gather some men to make a litter and bring it out here. They had to get her to safety and physician.
"You're safe now." he said quietly to her, despite the fact that she might not hear him.
His eyes stormed as he contemplated the hunting of the ones responsible. Nobody left something like this on the doorsteps of Yomenïampa, and Ancalë was going to make sure that nobody ever would again.

Although she struggled to keep herself awake for as long as possible, Eclipse's eyelids felt leaden and it proved to be impossible for her to keep them open for any significant amount of time. Her mind began to drift back and forth between the realm of unconsciousness and the world of the waking. She knew it wouldn't be long now. Soon, her mind would turn to dark, and while she would live awhile longer, it wouldn't be long enough for her to wake up again.
Not like this, she pleaded internally. I'm not afraid of dying, but why does it have to be like this?
This felt entirely too much like the way her mother had died.

Her mind felt almost feverish from the combined effects of pain, exhaustion, and the fear of what would happen if she allowed herself to fall asleep, so when she first sensed movement nearby, she credited it too her imagination, or to the wind. There had been nobody anywhere nearby earlier. Why on earth would someone be there now?
Then she heard a voice.
It seemed to come to her from far away; it sounded almost surreal. Her tired mind couldn't piece together the meaning of the words that she heard, although she was sure that the owner of the voice was speaking the same language that she would. It didn't matter what the voice was saying. All Eclipse knew was that it meant that she wasn't alone anymore, and that meant that she might still live to see another day.

Whoever it was was very near her now. She heard their voice again, this time saying something very quiet, in a more soothing sort of tone. Once again, she couldn't piece together the meaning of the words spoken to her, but it hardly mattered. The tone suggested to her that help was coming. Whoever it was that had stumbled onto where she lay now, they didn't sound like they were going to leave her to die here during the night.

With what seemed like an incredible effort, Eclipse opened her eyes again to see who was nearby. Her sight was incredibly limited from the blood of her head wounds and the swollen skin around her eyes, but she could see enough to determine who was there.
She saw an unfamiliar face, with brown hair and brown eyes. His features were those that Eclipse had associated with belonging to those of elven descent.
So the elves did sometimes help strangers outside of their borders. It was a reassuring thought for Eclipse.
Thank you.
She had meant to say it to the one that had come to help her, but she couldn't obtain the response she needed from her voice. Her lips moved slightly, and the beginning of a whisper escaped them, but that was as close as she could come to actually speaking. Nevertheless, she felt that she had probably gotten her point across to this unexpected benefactor.
Although she was still in pain, Eclipse felt calmer and felt some of her old assurance returning to her. She could still win this fight.
She turned her eyes towards the elf again and the barest hint of a small, tired smile formed on her lips before the effort became too much and her eyes fell shut again.

As the General stood guarding her body, his eyes blazing, his thoughts wandered over the questions of who, why, when and how. While his thoughts were collecting, the messenger returned with four Elves. Not a one of them wore any armor, and they carried the litter with which they would use to carry her back to the sick bay. But they needed some more signs of life from her so they knew what to expect. They could not pick her up and carry her in for fear of damaging any fractures or things like that. Ancalë was not a physician, and his arcane skills were rudimentary at best, but even he knew it was best not to interfere with this sort of thing. His keen eyes scanned the horizon for any signs of the attackers. There were some tracks leading of in the general irection of the west, but for all Ancalë knew, they were from different people. He sighed once as he and his men waited to see her move some more. Gazing down at her frame, he couldn't help but notice that she was mildly good looking for somebody without Elven blood. The notion fled as soon as it had come, and Ancalë returned to his state of immense concentration. What sort of punishment awaited the men that had done this? What would fit the crime of leaving such a hideous gift on the doorway of the Elves? They would simply have to wait for her return to an okay state of health in order to get some decent answers around here. She would probably want to take revenge, Ancalë assumed, judging by the fact that she had weapons on her, deeming her more than a common traveler. But then the General had an idea. Crouching down low by her head, he gently whispered out to her.
"Can you hear me? Are you alright?" he asked in a tone of voice that was soft, yet didn't lack in volume.

The slight breeze brought forth a small chill across his face, as he wandered alone across the elven border. He placed his arms one over the other, a sign of slight discomfort and a ward against friendly travelers to leave him be. This was not his intention, but it is these old habits that kept him alive. These somewhat distant actions of his was always a boon for him, keeping others safe while not getting involved in his affairs. Though the company of strangers brought a certain relief of warmth, his morals just couldn't tolerate such risks. So alone he ventures, away from the roads and along the borders of the great elven city.

The great forest dawned before him, trees that reached into the heavens just a few feet away. Mixed impressions of awe and wonder filled his head, his eyes giving him away to the majesty of nature. His hands quivered as he attempted to reach into the hard wood, the soft earth embracing him warmly. The sounds and voices that could be heard within were nothing but of thep purest tones, not one trace of disorder or trouble. Even the traces of great beasts that wandered the lands showed great harmony, their footsteps showing little disturbance or none at all. It was a haven for all those aligned with nature, as well as those who respect peace and solace above all. The figure simply warmed himself, caressing his shoulders firmly to shrug off the clean feeling. He should not get used to this he thought, as the old flashes came back again. The smile that was starting to form turned into a straight face once again, and back to his sober state.

His reflections were interrupted abruptly again, sounds of footsteps nearby. His eyesight was not as keen as before, but something was amiss. His footstepts became cautious and silent, as he approached the noise. Keeping a firm grip on his glaive, he placed himself quite a distance from the scene, but in a place where the visual aids could reveal to him everything. In the distance he witnessed a group of men, garbs and armor showing a good fighting prowess. One man stood out from the group, and was kneeling down. He approached another figure gently, a prone one. The figure was almost stagnant, save for the unusual movements of breath. The prone figure seemed helpless and weak, a sign of physical pain brought about by something. The figure gathered his courage, and in one quick motion, dashed at the figure close to the lying one. He would get the answers that he sought, and save the prone figure from the harsh treatment brought about by neatly outfitted individuals.

Being fully immersed in the girl, awaited signs of consciousness, Ancalë payed little heed to the things going on around him. If he had, he would have noted how bleak the day outside the Forest was. The gray clouds cast overhead veiled the sun well and their was a definate chill on the breeze. Bleak, quite realy, did not quite cut it. In his concentration, Ancalë also failed to notice the figure that was running in his direction, and so he did not take any steps to find out if it were a hostile or not.
"General! Incoming!" was the shout that brought him back to the real world, and he picked himself off of his kneesand swept his spear from his back. The spear was ornate, elaborate steel designs wrought the reinforced shaft, and the tip was broad, and razor sharp, with small serated wings at the base of the head. The base itself had a blunt metal implement that was ready for non-lethal attacks. It was a powerful looking weapon. Gripping it in one hand, Ancalë stood low feet spread for balance as he looked at the oncoming possible threat. While he had a nearly mortally wounded girl in his company, it was best to not take any risks, and there was no way of knowing whether or not the individual had taken part in the savagery or not until communication. With his weapon ready, Ancalë ordered the others back and looked the man square in his face. He was of medium build and height, and a shock of medium gray hair fell across his eyes, but in no way concealing how black they were. He had a certain ominous look about him, but then again, as did most people to the General. The look his eyes gave off was a relatively competant, albeit curious one, and the weapon he had, or at least the only one that caught Ancalë's eyes, a dual bladed Glaive, yet another sinister looking thing.
"Halt! State your business here!" Ancalë called out to him.
"We have wounded here so come slowly!" The General's keen, brown eyes were scanning the advancing gentleman, hoping that he was wrong about him. He was not up for a fight right now, and he needed to get this girl to safety. Not to mention that his men would probably fall to that Glaive, and the General hated casualties.

"Can you hear me? Are you alright?"
This time the words being spoken penetrated into Eclipse's consciousness, and she understood what they meant. Her eyes opened again and her lips formed a weak version of her usual, sarcastic smirk. Was she alright? Well, that really depended, didn't it? If it wasn't so painful to move, she would have shook her head at such a nonsensical question.

She was about to try to speak to the one that had come so unexpectedly to her aid when she became aware of a flurry of movement off to the side. Somebody was shouting.
"General! Incoming!"
The one at her side leaped to his feet, and Eclipse could see the mighty spear he wielded, holding it in front of him in a defensive posture. With some effort, she managed to turn her head to see the other who had so suddenly entered upon the scene.

The newcomer held a double-bladed glaive in his hands, and seemed for all the world like he was ready to attack the one standing over Eclipse.
Great, she thought to herself. This was exactly what she didn't need: a foolish misunderstanding on the part of the two strangers, both of whom probably believed the other was responsible for Eclipse's injuries.
"Halt! State your business here!" called the elf. "We have wounded here so come slowly!"

Eclipse hoped fervently that the glaive-wielding newcomer would understand this message, and that he would put away his weapon. The last thing she needed was to have any of the well-intentioned strangers that had come to help her injured, or worse, killed, on her account.

"Don't fight!" It was the first truly audible sentence she had been able to produce since she had woken up. It had been intended as a cry for them to put away their weapons, but it had come out as little more than a murmur. She wondered if the men standing above her could even hear it.
"Don't fight," she murmured again, softer this time. She wished she could communicate to them that a battle right now would be pointless. She hoped that they would understand that before it came to blows and somebody else got hurt.

His footsteps as silent as ever, the figure approached the man with increasing speed. His skills of stealth were not of peak level, however, as his approach was easily detected.One of the men standing around before the kneeling figure took note of his prescence, shouting words of alarm. "General! incoming!" were the words that seemed most audible to him, and it brought a certain uncertainty to his frame. Though he was purely confident in his skills as a combatant, his rash decisions seemed to provoke one of high military standards. A general? Why would such a high ranking figure want to do with a meager girl? he wondered, as her features became more distinctive as he came closer. Her body was lying on the ground, and only the slightest of movements could be observed from the distance.

Now he was only several feet away, a good distance to prepare for an engagement. The general figure had risen up to his feet already, spear in hand as he addressed the newcomer. "Halt! State your business here!" were his words, a sure sign of suspicious activity. "We have wounded here so come slowly!" The succeeding statement brought quite the confusion in him, but his motivations did not waver. Gripping his glaive with both hands now, he kept the larger blade pointed at the general, his stance solidly planted on the ground. The odds were not clearly in his favor, but if a fight was to ensure he would be confident that it would be long enough to take as many of them with him as he can.

He was about to reply in the most apprehensive of tones, when a small murmur emanated from the prone female. From the distance he was in, her words were inaudible and unsound. He could not tell what she was saying, but the expressions she was giving off were those that appeared to be from concern, or that is how he interpreted it. Maybe she thinks I may not be able to save her from them he thought, as he prepared his weapon. Looking at the general squarely in the eyes, he replied with a well-modulated voice, "My business? What is your business? I came here to stop you marauders from beating on a senseless girl, and I would care less for your wounded."Gripping his weapon tightly, he continued. "You have but a few seconds to explain yourselves, or I'll be serving the beasts here a fine meal tonight."His words were those of pride mixed with a bit of determination, as the odds were clearly against him. He would be in for a fight, but hopefully not as difficult as he had anticipated.

It seemed to Ancalë that the girl might have said something, but he did not hear what, and his attention was now fixed upon more pressing matters, such as dealing with the rash young fellow.
"My business?" the gray haired one called out.
"What is your business? I came here to stop you marauders from beating on a senseless girl, and I would care less for your wounded. You have but a few seconds to explain yourselves, or I'll be serving the beasts here a fine meal tonight."
That last remark set Ancalë's teeth on edge, but he stifled his rage and narrowed his eyes.
"I do not think you are comprehending the situation my good fellow." said the General. Pointing to the girl he continued,
"This is what I meant by our wounded, and let it be known right at the outset that if you pose even a slight threat to me or my men, my people will have you executed quick as falcons can fly, so please do not start issuing ultimatums." he twitched his ears as he said the word 'People' as if in a gesture.
"Our intel told us that there was a scuffle out near our border and that casualties may have occured, so I decided to get some men and come and investigate. This is what we found." Ancalë gestured at the beaten body by his feet. His eyes met the gray haired one's and he continued.
"Allow me to introduce myself." he said, "General Ancalë Varnoi of the guards of Yomenïampa; and let me hasten to assure you that I would sooner cut off my hand than let it strike a lady of my own will." If the fellow wanted to be belligerent, then Ancalë would happily trade words and/or blows with him at a later date, right now he needed to get her to safety. Ancalë looked down at her body; it was not in the same position as it was before. His eyes wide, he dropped his spear behind him and knelt before her.
"Hey! Can you hear me?" he said to her.

The two men didn't seem to be fighting yet, but Eclipse was aware of tension around her. The elven warriors still all held their weapons at ready, and the newcomer showed no signs of putting away his. If something in this situation didn't change soon, the scene would become bloodier than Eclipse's battered body.

The exchange of words continued, but Eclipse found it more or less beyond her abilities to decipher the meaning of what either of the speakers said. The line between consciousness and unconsciousness was becoming too thin for her, and she found that she was continually wavering between the two realms. Every second that passed made it harder for her to remain in the realm of the waking, and darkness continually threatened to invade her mind.
She wished they would sort things out quickly. It was almost like the thought of a selfish child, who wanted the adults to finish what they were saying simply so that she could make her own demands and see that her own, personal needs were met. But at the same time, Eclipse was fairly confident that she had every right to put her own needs over those of these strangers at the moment. After all, she was the one that couldn't be sure of living through the rest of the day, never mind the night. As for the people around her, they were all in perfect health.
Providing they don't all slay each other like perfect idiots, she noted inwardly.

Whatever they were all planning on doing, Eclipse hoped they did it soon. She was fairly sure that the elves had good intentions towards her. As for the stranger, she couldn't be sure, but he didn't look like any of the smugglers she had gotten herself entangled with. She didn't really think he was of the dishonorable sort. She hoped that he wasn't.

Suddenly, the scene changed as the elf standing over her suddenly dropped to his knees beside Eclipse.
"Hey! Can you hear me?"
The words pierced through to her consciousness, bringing her closer to the realm of the waking once more. Her eyes barely open, she met the gaze of the elf who was looking down at her with concern in his stare. She managed a bit of a smirk.
"I'm still here," she said. It came out more like a whisper than anything else, but it would still be audible to the one she was speaking to. He probably wouldn't know the connotations of the statement. It was something that she and the other pirates had often said to each other when they were seriously injured, and unable to seek a healer's help because of their position outside the law. It was the sort of statement that meant that although not doing well, they were still alive...whether or not still being alive was a blessing in their condition.

Not without some effort, Eclipse managed to shift her hand so that her fingers fell over the back of the elf's hand. It was a weak mimicry of patting the back of his hand, sort of like a mother reassuring a young one, but the message was there. Eclipse did it more for the benefit of the newcomer than for that of the elf addressing her. She needed the newcomer to realize that the elves weren't her enemies. Perhaps once he realized that, he would put away his weapon.

Her situation didn't seem as hopeless now as it had at first.
There was still time for her.

As the general looked down at the weak frame below him, trying to determine her status, he saw the bruised eyes open weakly and a sort of smirk crossed the rest of her face. Ancalë breathed a sigh of relief at her concsiousness, and he relaxed more when she whispered something to him.
"I'm still here," her low whisper told him so quietly, but his keen ears caught every word. Ancalë gathered that it meant she thought she might be dying soon, and that would not bode well with him. To emphasize what she had just said, she lightly brushed his hand with hers.
"She's still got some fight in her." Ancalë called to his men,
"Bring that litter down here, now." he ordered. His men complied hastily, laying the litter down by her left side. All the while, Ancalë had been rummaging through his cloak. When his hands emerged, they had in them a small bottle of a dark red liquid and a golden-brown wafer of some sort. The food and drink looked minorly pitiful, but the strength that they could renew was incredible. After working the stopper out of the decanter, Ancalë set the bottle on the grass and broke the wafer into small parts. He took off his cloak and laid it upon the ground, setting the broken bits of wafer on something other than dirt.
"Excuse me ma'am, but let's see if we can get any of this into you." he said to her calmly, yet in a quiet voice.
"The wafers are called Lembas, and the drink is a cherry cordial called Miruvor, each one is very nourishing to the body and will help to restore your vitality to a degree." He held a piece of the Lembas out barely half an inch in front of her mouth. It seemed that the General had totally forgotten about the man with the Glaive. He hadn't however, but right now he had slightly more important things things to take care of.

The words spoken by the figure seems to have struck a nerve in him, as in a mere instant he loosened his grip a little, as if taken by surprise. The general addressed him in a somewhat clear manner, clarifying the gray areas of which where they were. It was surprising that he mentioned wounded, when in fact it was the prone figure he was referring to. He even introduced himself as General Ancalë Varnoi, a leading authority of the elven city. The name particularly eluded his memory, as it was also his first time visiting the great haven of his lost heritage. In an effort to show his own honesty and clean intentions, he pointed his weapon downwards, and was about to speak.

Just as words of apology were about to go forth from his lips, the general quickly turned his attention to the girl. His eyes following the scene, he noticed that the prone figure was now getting weaker. The general quickly laid down next to her, and prepared a bottle of liquid and another small packet which appeared to be a bread of sorts. The items he presented he tried to offer to the girl, which hopefully she would accept, and try to take in. They must be medicinal herbs he thought, as they looked too small for rations, and somewhat 'felt' different. He could not tell what exactly was going on, but it appears that he completely misjudged the situation. Perhaps he would be able to clarify himself later, after the general addressed to the needs of the girl on the ground.

Putting his weapon to his side, he took cautious steps backward, eyes still watching the actions of the other men. They had also taken a few steps to the rear, giving the general some distance to help the girl. Sanzen knew a few abilities himself, but perhaps it would be best to leave the healing to the more experienced individual. He may just complicate things, so he decided to take a step back. His backtracking finally came to a halt, as his back slowly felt the trunk of one of the great trees. Using his glaive as support, he placed one knee to the ground, and sat on the soft earth. Though it was not intended at anyone, he addressed the group in a demanding sort of voice, "I'll be here, maybe we can pick up where we left off after you tend to your wounded." It was always his way to pick fair fights, if ever they were needed. Whatever will happen next he would have to see, from the place he was.