Guro Challenge #33: Beaten Up/Bruising
#10 of 33 Day Guro Challenge
When he was a pup, Martin one day complained of a terrible headache. His friend Timbal nodded sympathetically, and then kicked him in the shins. Martin used several words his grandmother would have clipped his ears for saying, and asked Timbal why he did that. Timbal responded "Well, now you don't care about your head hurting, do you?"
He thinks of that now, as he shields his head beneath paws with bloody knuckles and broken claws, his tail broken beneath the boots of the hulking rat. He kicks, and catches the rat's knees, knocking her off-balance. Her lanky mate clutches his broken snout in one paw and rains down blows on Martin with the stick in the other. Martin grabs the stick and pulls, the rat goes down, and they tussle on the ground.
Martin could draw his father's sword and stop this in seconds, but he doesn't want to. The rats were indeed robbing the farm, their ill-gotten gains spilling from the sack the male had hit him with and dropped mid-fight, but all they were taking was a few vegetables, nothing irreplaceable. He had found them skulking around the edge of the field, at the far side from the cabin in which the owners still slept obliviously; from their conversation he had decided they meant no direct harm to the family, merely to get the food and get out. He will not risk slaying them.
Eventually, the rats flee, bruised and battered, not bothering to pick up the sack of stolen vegetables. Martin ties the sack closed to protect the food inside from elements and insects, painfully and slowly stands up with the help of the discarded stick, and leaves without bothering to alert the owners. The rats will likely not be back for at least a while, and a hero needs no thanks.
Martin binds his wounds himself, trying not to think about a soft voice and slender paws which helped him before. He ties the bandage too tightly around his broken tail, and his memories and his heart hurt a little less.