AsCast, "Episode 1 - In Which Tumnus Milks a Centaur" is now available! Listen here: http:// narniafanfiction. com/ AsCast/ Ep1. mp3 (Remove the spaces. To save, right click and choose "Save target as..." It's a large file, but it's worth it!)

Chapter Two

Over the next several hours, Zahara managed to get a little bit of water and soup down the young man's throat. He was severely dehydrated from his days drifting on the sea, but trying to force an unconscious man to drink was a rather difficult task. She also carefully cleaned the cut on his forehead, but found several more injuries underneath his shirt that were already infected. As a result of the infection, the man spiked a high fever that Zahara was extremely anxious about. Although she did her best to keep him cool, it was obvious he was suffering even in his sleep: His face contorted every once in a while in a spasm of pain, and soft mutterings escaped his lips.

When Zahara became too tired to sit by his bed any more, Malia relieved her for the night.

Zahara gratefully fell into bed next to her son and slept until the next morning when Aydin startled her out of sleep with his fussing.

She reluctantly rose, scooped Aydin into her arms and went down to the kitchen to feed him breakfast. Both Abbas and Taher were already eating, but neither Malia nor Mahtab were to be seen.

"Good morning. Did the young man survive the night?" Zahara asked anxiously as she deposited Aydin in Taher's lap.

"Yes, Tarkheena. Malia went to sleep a few hours ago and Mahtab is now sitting with him. He still has a fever and hasn't woken up," Abbas informed her.

Zahara sighed and nodded as she gathered a small breakfast together for Aydin before she picked him back up and walked back upstairs to the sickroom. Mahtab had removed the young man's shirt and was gently sponging him down. He looked no better than he had the night before, but if he had survived this long, Zahara was still hopeful he would pull through.

"Good morning, Mahtab. How is he?" Zahara asked as she put Aydin down on a blanket on the floor along with his breakfast of bread, cheese, and fruit, and then walked over to the bed. She gently rested her hand against the man's hot cheek and he stirred, leaning slightly into her cool touch. He didn't feel quite as warm as before, so perhaps there was some improvement. The wounds on his stomach were still red and infected, though.

"He is not out of danger yet by any means, Tarkheena, but I think he is quite strong. He is very young," Mahtab commented quietly.

"Yes, he does look young…perhaps no older than me," Zahara said as she pulled another chair up alongside his bed. "Mahtab, you may go rest now. If we're to keep him alive, we must take shifts."

"What about Aydin, Tarkheena?" Mahtab glanced at the toddler, who was clumsily lifting a grape to his mouth.

Zahara shook her head and made a dismissive gesture. "Don't worry about him. He'll be fine in here with me."

Mahtab nodded and bowed to Zahara before she left the room. Zahara watched Aydin for a few more seconds, then rose and began to dab some more thick ointment onto the man's wounds. Malia, always prepared for Aydin to fall down and scrape his knees, made sure to have the remedy around at all times. Zahara didn't know what it was made of other than some sort of plant extracts, but apparently Malia's grandmother taught her the recipe that was supposed to help with infections. There was a big difference between a child's scraped knee and the kind of injuries this man had, though.

Zahara finished the sponge bath Mahtab had begun and then quickly went back to her own bedroom to fetch some toys to keep Aydin occupied. She settled herself on the floor next to him and began stacking blocks, acting delighted every time Aydin knocked them down, which in turn made him squeal with laughter. Every twenty minutes or so she returned to the bedside and checked the young man's progress, giving him another cooling soak with the sponge to ease his fever down. She even managed to get more water down his throat and was relieved to see him swallow reflexively even in his sleep.

Four hours later, Zahara was sitting at the window as Aydin napped on a soft cushion on the floor when she heard the young man stir. She quickly hurried to his side to find his eyes open, but unfocused. He seemed to be trying to talk, but his voice was rough from disuse and weak from his condition.

"Shhh," Zahara used the same voice she used to soothe Aydin. "Don't try to speak, you're very ill. Here, drink some water." Zahara gently supported his head and tipped some more water into his mouth. She noticed his skin didn't feel nearly as hot as it had only a few hours earlier.

"I think your fever has broken - that's a very good sign," she said quietly.

Zahara noticed the young man staring at the veil covering her face and she smiled, though he couldn't see it. "You're in Calormen, which I think is very far from your home. But we'll talk about that more when you're a bit stronger." She gently pushed the man's dark hair from his face and stroked his head. "Go back to sleep now, it will help you recover faster."

The young man closed his eyes after a moment and he was soon asleep once more. Zahara waited a few more minutes to make sure he wouldn't wake again, then lifted her sleeping son from the floor and deposited him in his own crib in the other room. When she entered the hallway, Malia was already going into the other bedchamber.

"I will sit with him for a few hours, Tarkheena, while you eat something. Mahtab will see to Aydin when he wakes," Malia said.

"Of course, Malia. But I think his fever is broken so he may have come through the worst of it. He just woke, though briefly, and was able to drink some water. When he wakes again, I think we should try and get him to eat some soup. He needs more nourishment. If I am not there when he comes around again, please fetch me."

Zahara peered through the doorway at his sleeping form and then went down the stairs and out of his sight.

***

When Edmund awoke in three hours, a different woman, sans veil, was sitting at his bedside mending a shirt. Edmund’s whole body ached and his throat felt like it was on fire, but he managed to croak out a pathetic, "Water…please."

Startled, the woman dropped her work and looked at him. "Oh, you're awake, sir!" She quickly poured a glass of cool water from the pitcher beside the bed and held it to his lips. He drank slowly and was surprised to find that just the small action of keeping his head lifted from the pillow exhausted him. He must be in truly bad shape.

"One moment, please. I need to fetch the Tarkheena - she will want to see you."

A Tarkheena? Then he really was in Calormen. And if he was honest with himself, he wasn't quite sure how to feel about that. It was true that Narnia had fairly good relations with the country, but all the same, Edmund didn't like being in such a position of weakness and at the mercy of one of the members of nobility. Who knew what connections this woman had, and if she found out she housed a Narnian king in her home, it could potentially land him in deeper trouble than he was in already. He supposed he should just be happy to be alive at the moment, though.

The woman gathered her robes and hurried from the room, and in only a matter of seconds, the veiled woman entered instead. She shut the door quietly behind her and made her way to Edmund's side.

"You really must be doing better if you're awake again," she said as she laid a hand on his forehead. "Your fever is still gone, which is very good. Can you speak at all, or is your throat too sore?"

The woman sat on the edge of the chair next to the bed and looked at him expectantly. Even though Edmund could see only her eyes, they seemed open and honest. All the same, he knew he needed to play things cautiously.

He tentatively cleared his throat.

"I am in Calormen?" All he got out was a whisper.

The woman nodded and reached for the glass of water, helping him to drink a bit once more.

"Yes, in Calormen. The province of Zalindreh to be exact. Do you remember what happened to bring you here, sir?" she asked kindly. Her eyes showed concern.

He nodded slowly and closed his eyes. All of the men he had lost beside him. They had been good men, too.

"Shipwreck. But…" It seemed he wasn't capable of very lengthy answers at the moment, and he simply didn't have the energy to voice his thoughts.

With a nod, the woman stood and began to straighten the blankets around his body.

"Yes, I presumed a shipwreck. I found you washed up on the beach almost two days ago now…" she trailed off and then looked at him sympathetically, or with what Edmund supposed was sympathy since he could only see half of her face. Her voice was sympathetic, though, and her eyes were extremely expressive. "I'm very sorry that your ship was lost, and any other crew. It must have been frightening."

She sighed and shook her head as if to clear it of other thoughts. "You look tired again already, so Mahtab is going to feed you some soup right away. Then you can go back to sleep."

The veiled woman went back to the door and opened it and the other woman entered immediately. At first Edmund didn't think he could manage to get anything down besides water, but as the soup warmed his body, he already imagined he felt a little stronger.

His thoughts from before still bothered him, though, and he couldn't make sense of them at all. If his ship had been heading Northeast towards the Lone Islands when they encountered the storm, how in the world had his little boat drifted all the way down to the province of Zalindreh in Calormen?

Big thanks to my beta, writeonkate, for helping with technical grammar stuff and especially with developing the plot! Also, thanks to Hev and TastyAsItGets for giving me some inital feedback!

Reviews are greatly appreciated! Thank you. :)

AsCast, "Episode 1 - In Which Tumnus Milks a Centaur" is now available! Listen here: http:// narniafanfiction. com/ AsCast/ Ep1. mp3 (Remove the spaces. To save, right click and choose "Save target as..." It's a large file, but it's worth it!)