[ WP ] Most warriors and mages look down on healers ... . Except this one .

It was n't the generals who claimed Him. It was n't ever the sorcerers who hunted him down. It was the healer. As the broken winners waded through corpses and fallen arrows to dig out their survivors, everyone gave Him a wide berth. He had fallen during the battle, struck by a projectile, his horse throwing him for the sake of its own survival and now he lay in the clearing. 
 
 There were many who would have slit his throat to ensure the deed was done. To make his demise as final as their departed comrades. No one would have batted an eye or fought with feelings of mercy. Their hearts were too poisoned by the sick of war, hating Him for causing it, hating Him for continuing it. And yet no one had done it. They had left Him, lying in a paradox. Dead and alive, untouched and waiting for the one man who had earned the right to know. 
 
 Martin tread solidly towards the breathing corpse. He did n't flinch as his boots snapped twigs and arrow shafts alike. His ankles did n't roll as the enemy's limbs lined his path. He had one goal, and one goal only. 
 
 Martin crouched by His side. He was still breathing. 
 
 `` I need a healer,'' the man gasped. Martin knew by the abnormal crackle in the man's voice, that he had a punctured lung. Not lethal. Not yet. 
 
 `` You're in luck.'' Martin commented. `` I am one.'' 
 
 He had thought long and hard about this. Here He was, Martin's enemy, lying in the muck dying an ordinary man. Martin's vendetta had changed over the years, from revenge to revolution, from personal to national, but the reason had stayed the same. This man was the root of Martin's fury. 
 
 `` Please,'' the man coughed. One hand flew to His side, bracing His ribcage. The other clung to Martin's tattered scarf. `` You must help me.'' 
 
 Martin had thought about it more than once. Mercy could be as terrible as death. But no, that was not the fate for this man lying before him. 
 
 `` I will,'' Martin promised. He squinted his eyes against the watery Autumn light. The air smelled like smoke as his compatriots created funeral pyres. His ears were awash with the sound of silence. 
 
 `` Did you know,'' Martin asked finally, watching as scavenger birds circled the thermals above the plain, `` why I became a healer?'' 
 
 He ignored the fluttering efforts of the man's hand against his leg. 
 
 `` I wanted to help people. I wanted to save the ones you broke, fix the ones you discarded.'' He looked down, shoving the hand off his knee. `` That's what I tell people. They believe me. What wonderful work, so fulfilling and worthwhile.'' 
 
 Martin snorted. 
 
 `` Some of them have guessed. The generals? The sorcerers? They know the truth. They saw it as soon as they met me.'' He smiled bitterly, mouth turned down at the corners, `` I'll tell you the truth too.'' 
 
 `` A healer knows the body. Better than anyone really. We can identify the tiniest of problems, and rectify it. This means years of work. Studying, working, concentrating on tiny veins as the world literally crumbles around us, just to save a patient.'' 
 
 `` I am the best,'' he continued softly, his voice no louder than a breeze through the air. `` You wo n't find a man alive who has n't heard of me and my abilities.'' 
 
 `` Hurry up then,'' the man croaked, his voice small and commanding. Martin looked Him in the face. 
 
 `` It's hard to become the best. You have to sacrifice so many people along the way. So many lives that could n't be saved. And you remember, every single face.'' 
 
 `` So many faces frozen in agony now. All because of one man. It's not going to kill you by the way, your wound I mean.'' Martin nodded at the man's side. All four limbs were slowly retreating back to curl around the pain as the man's chest heaved in effort. 
 
 `` But you know why I became a healer?'' Martin asked again. The man stayed silent. 
 
 `` Because a healer knows pain better than anyone else. You wo n't die from your rib.'' Martin shook his head sorrowfully. `` No, you're going to die, because I killed you.Slowly, painfully, one cell at a time. Until you're nothing more than a rotten carcass. You want to know why?'' 
 
 The silence pounded in Martin's ears, in beat with his heart and that of the man before him. 
 
 `` Because a healer remembers Gerald. And as much as you used to be, you are now a blight on this world. A cancer of men. And as a healer, I must save the nation from you.'' 
 
 Martin stood and beckoned to the footmen waiting to the side. As they loaded the fallen man onto a shabby make-shift stretcher, Martin watched, his mind silent.
