100prompts | [Table #4/Prompt 009: Heartbeat] Title: Bruised

Title: Bruised
Fandom: Hetalia
Prompt: #009: Heartbeat
Character/Pairing: France, Scotland
Rating: T
Word Count: 718
Summary: Circa 950: Alba anxiously awaits Francia's recovery from his wounds.
Authors Notes/Disclaimer: Takes place immediately after the events of this fic. Other fics written for this prompt table are collected in chronological order on AO3.

Circa 950, Kingdom of Dál Riata

When Alba had carried Francia from the practice field, he had been nothing but a dead weight in his arms, limp and cold, and the only sign that he continued to live was the pained wheeze of his breathing, which rattled bloody at the back of his throat and grew ever more shallow with every step Alba took.

By the time Alba laid him out on his own bed, nestled warm and snug amongst the thick furs piled there, even that faint sound had stopped entirely. In a voice worn raw by sobbing, Alba called out for his people to gather herbs and poultices, to fetch the apothecary, a priest, everything and everyone that might be able bring Francia some succour.

His servants had looked on Francia's torn belly, corpse-pale face, and unmoving breast and likely judged Alba a madman for thinking there could be anything left to save. Still they had complied, and now every morning they bring fresh reports of Francia's returning health, of his knitting flesh and lifting pallor, all delivered in tones of stunned, almost worshipful, wonder.

A miracle, they name it, a sign of God's grace, but Alba shakes his head to that.

"It's just the way of our kind," he tells them. "We do not die easily, and certainly not by the sword."

He speaks the words firmly, with surety and confidence, as though he has never and could never doubt them. As though his heart hadn't stopped cold in his chest when Francia collapsed to the ground at his feet and for an agonising instant he'd believed that he might truly have killed him.

He's slain countless men on countless battlefields in the service of his king, and thought himself long-inured to viscera and spilt blood, but the sight of Francia's had still sickened him, driven him to his knees beside him, and he'd vomited until he was bringing up nothing but bile and coppery spittle.

The memory lingers, as bright and vivid and dreadful as the moment that birthed it, and a sennight passes before he dares to visit and look upon Francia again, and only then after the apothecary assures him that the worst is over and Francia is close to awakening once more.

The room given over to Francia's convalescence – Alba's own room – is but dimly lit by a handful of guttered candles and the glowing embers of the fire banked in the grate. The air so hot and thick with smoke, sharp and acrid from the burning of the apothecary's wares, that it robs the breath from Alba's chest as soon as he steps foot across the threshold and raises a sweat to his brow.

Francia's brow is unsullied thus, and though he is wrapped tight around with blankets and furs from foot to shoulder, his complexion is pale and his lips are tinged blue as if chilled. His skin, too, is cold when Alba reaches out to reassure himself that his heart beats still and presses the tips of two fingers against Francia's throat, just beneath the hinge of his jaw.

His pulse is slow but regular, and his eyelids twitch a little, pale lashes fluttering against his ashen cheeks. Alba snatches his hand away guiltily, ashamed to have disturbed Francia's rest.

"I'm sorry," he says, his voice pitched low and as soothing as he is capable of. "For everything. I never should have let you goad me into striking you."

But Francia's words had made him prideful, eager to prove himself the great warrior Francia had heard tell of. He'd pushed too hard, though, grown careless in his arrogance, and likely proved only that hateful lie of Roma's: that he was no better than a wild beast. Savage. Dangerous.

"It won't happen again," he promises Francia, just as he has promised himself every long, dragging hour of these past seven days. "As long as we both live, I will never harm you."

It's a rash pledge, untenable, because though they may yet be allies, there is no telling what their future may hold. If Alba's king ever commands him to take up arms against Francia, he must and will obey, but, here and now, standing vigil beside Francia's sickbed, Alba means it with all his heart.