Piece in Our Time (Chapter Two )

         Groaning and the sounds of stiff bones cracking, the sounds that woke Eva from her sleep like state sounded as if they were coming from miles away. She could hear her blood flowing through her veins and the faint “thump” of a heartbeat; she assumed it was her own. Opening her eyes she winced and quickly shut them.  The sun was brighter than she had thought it could ever be, rays beaming down on her like a thousand fire licks. She sighed and sat up slowly before she heard the heavy breathing that sounded like it was coming from above her, Eva could almost feel the shadow being cast upon her and it was then that she felt the snow between her thin fingers.
                   Faintly Eva heard the chirping of a bird, and slowly she opened her eyes and looked up. A man, he must have been more than seven feet tall stood above her, red hair cascaded down from his chin, strands weaving together, atop his head sat another tuft of thick fiery hair that went magnificently with his silver eyes and pale skin, a scar down this man’s left eye gave the assumption he had been through many battles and hadn’t lost much of them. Head to toe this heavily burly man was covered in iron, stained with what Eva could only guess was blood from the looks of him, though she knew to judge a book by its cover was a poor choice to make. His arms bulged out widely; they rippled with the muscles underneath his thick skin. She slowly let her eyes trail down his body taking in his iron clad form one inch at a time but before she could take in his, she didn’t want to say beauty because this kind of man, the man standing before her wasn’t beautiful he was striking.
                   Eva could hear the man talking, more like bellowing at her, and the rasp in his voice accompanied by the thick brogue only made her shiver to her core more. She knew she was in a dream, only this type of a man could exist in a dream. Not to mention the wondrous terrain around her. Mountains that touched the hands of god, covered in a thick blanket of snow that only continued to cover the ground below them. A stream to the far left of her babbled slowly and her skin took on a case of goose bumps at the thought of how cold the water must be. He was still speaking to her when she averted her gaze back to his, cerulean meeting jade in a fierce battle only one of them was fighting as she misplaced her right mind in the deep loch of his eyes.
                   She could hardly resist, if this was her dream then she would do whatever she pleased in it and while ignoring his bellows and idle chatter she sat up, ignoring the frost bite that was most definitely covering her knees through her still blood stained knickers, she wondered for a moment “If this is my dream why am I still in my stained uniform?” before pushing the thought aside and taking her hand, shaking with the chill of the wind that she now noticed had begun to pick up and placing it on the man’s thigh, running up his leg slowly she stood up one leg at a time. Her fingers thin and red from the cold couldn’t make out what type of cloth he used for his pants but it was smooth and warm to the touch. He wore a pair of heavy boots lined with the fur of the softest she had every touched. The iron his torso was sheltered in was ice cold and she had to pull her hand back quickly, and when she did the man gripped her wrist with the weight of twenty vices, his large hand covering her wrist with ease he pulled it behind her and in seconds her thinly covered back was pressed to his iron clad chest.
                   Gasping Eva took in the vision of her breath leaving her lungs as the man’s free hand clung to her neck. This was not how she had wanted this dream to go.  Eva felt him lean down and she shivered at the feel of his warm almost hot breath against her bare neck, “was he smelling me?” she felt his nose travel the length of her throat into her dark hair and a deep breath was heard above, the fabric of her uniform fluttering in the wind and she clamped her thighs together in an attempt at preventing the creeping chill from reaching under. Picking her up with the ease that a child does with its teddy bear the man threw Eva over his shoulder and hoisted her upon a horse. Still believing herself in a dream Eva allowed the man to climb aboard behind her and in an instant she was surrounded by body heat, she caught herself leaning back and enjoying the ride as it began. Eva could hear the man’s heart beating in her ear through his iron. A calming “thump….thump…thump” Eva closed her eyes and fell back asleep.
                   The violent way with which Eva was pulled from her sleep was terrifying and sitting up instantly she caught her heart in her hand covering her chest. She had been dropped on her bottom into a pile of snow. A scream escaping her lungs as her eyes shot open. “How could I fall asleep and wake back up in a dream?” Eva shook her head, “Maybe I’m dead? Maybe the explosion from the air craft killed me and I’m lying in the lush green grass right now waiting for someone to find my lifeless body?”  “Nay lass you are not dead, and what might an aircraft be?” A rough voice spoke from behind her with a thick accent she could only guess came from somewhere near Scotland; she followed the sound and turned having stood up some moments ago during her speech among herself. Eva laid her eyes on a jolly looking man, he reminded Eva of what she would imagine Santa might look like if he were real. His cheeks were rosy and his white hair braided randomly down his head and chin, he too wore a suit of iron but he did not have the same body as the man before, heavy in the middle but not with muscle, he clearly was not a starving man.
                   “If I’m not dead I’m dreaming then.” Eva replied to the man stepping only a foot closer, he didn’t seem dangerous. “Nay not a dream either. “ The man had started picking at his teeth with a rather intimidating dagger he held in his hand and Eva winced. This was the strangest dream she had ever had; she must have been hit pretty hard. With that in mind Eva felt a fire begin in her back and she bent over with a yell. One hand on her back gripping tightly the other on her knee for balance Eva could feel a burning sensation and a heavy throb in her middle back and decided she needed to sit down right then and there and she fumbled to the ground in pain. A shooting unbearable pain darted up her spine and she cringed before feeling hands on the hem of her dress and in a millisecond she was exposed to a whole camp site of burley rough men and she screamed, her thighs quivered and she anxiously fought to tug her dress back down.  Ignoring the pain she turned on her stomach and came face to face with the man she had tried to fondle earlier and thought this was his payback. Eva felt his eyes bore into her deep, all the way through to the back of her body right through the site of pain and she blushed, a deep shade of red, not much different from the red dots on the foreheads of men who had past that same day and she was suddenly overcome with grief. If this was her death, what was there’s? This whole event was a mental struggle, and just as she felt the man pull her up once again, with amazing simplicity, she blacked out once again.
                   A pillow of warmth and security is what Eva woke up to next. “Oh thank goodness I am not dead, nurse!” She began to speak before opening her eyes, her voice was cracked and she was desperately in need of water. Her breathing was deep but slow as she took in her surroundings and with a sigh of defeat closed them once again. Around her a warm glow from a candle covered the room like the snow blanketed the external landscape. She lay upon a bed of animal skins and furs. Her dress had been removed and by rubbing her legs together she could feel so had her stalking’s, a heavy wrap of some sort of cloth was wrapped around her chest and the pain in her back, while still there had dulled significantly.