For a while I just lay on my back with my eyes open. Nothing hurt and I didn't want to move in case it started again. My breathing was easy and I didn't want to push it lest my ribs leap back into the fire-storm they had been.
The bed was the most uncomfortable imaginable. Basically a thin sack of straw on a stone base. My hands explored it. So did my nose. It stank. So did I. I checked my body, it was fine, the cloth of my shirt was stiff, which I thought was odd but didn't think about. I turned my head. There was light coming from a corridor. Bare stone walls and a thick door. I was in a cell. In a prison. We don't have prisons, but the barbarians do. What would we need prisons for? If you are a commoner and guilty we fine you or we kill you, a noble goes into exile. Foreigners are like commoners. Why would you need a prison? A foreign noble was a guest if held against his will; guarded but still a guest. Civilization is a wonderful thing. Prisons are for barbarians.
With care I moved my legs off the bed and sat up. Glancing down I saw why my clothes were stiff. Blood and mud and… well, other things. No wonder I stank. There was nowhere to go, but still I stood up. Dizzy and weak, I supported myself with one hand on the wall and shuffled slowly to the door. It wasn't far. There was an opening as big as my head. I couldn't resist the temptation. Outside, looking left and right a corridor of similar doors stretched away to end doors of different design. There were lamps attached to the walls, burning oil and casting a fair light.
“Anyone here?” My throat was so dry that the words came out as a croaky whisper. I tried again, mustering some spit and swallowing first.
Movement here and there, then heads began to emerge. It would have been comical. No, I smiled, almost laughed aloud, it was comical. Disembodied heads, poking through holes in doors into a well-lit corridor, blinking away tears from the added light. I looked left and right, counting and recognizing.
“Next time stick to the plan,” Kerral said, trying to make his voice harsh and failing miserably.
I laughed and it hurt my throat, so I stopped. I couldn't think of anything to say. Sheo, Kerral, Yebratt, Larner, Hettar, Lentro, and Gatren. I named them again in my mind, smiling foolishly.
“Have I missed anything?”
They laughed. We all laughed. Well, we were alive against all expectation, and whole and, most importantly, not alone.