Amaryllis gasped in surprise and fear, immediately backing off from the figure.

This was bad. She was alone in the remote countryside with an enemy soldier in her presence. If he were to harm or kill her, nobody would know, since only Livia knew where she actually was, and it would be days, if not weeks, before Livia realized that something was wrong. 

Then, would Livia blame herself for persuading Amaryllis to take that vacation?

Her only consolation was that the man was injured, which puts her on somewhat equal ground with him if it turned into a violent conflict. Although her knife didn’t have a long reach, she knew where to hit to make it count.

All these thoughts flew through her head in a split second as she continued to maintain eye contact with the man, too scared to break eye contact.

She saw him register her presence, his eyes focusing and realizing that there was a person in front of him. She saw the moment when he realized that he was alive and injured right in front of a girl from the enemy kingdom. She could almost see a similar internal struggle play out in his mind.

How would he react, she wondered. Would he beg her for help? Or would he attack her?

Without warning, the soldier lunged at her with a blade, a dagger that he must have held on to despite being swept away by the mudslide and falling into the river. He was surprisingly fast for someone who was barely half-conscious and probably heavily injured, but his movements were still focused and steady. All Amaryllis saw was a flash of gold in his hand and suddenly, he was right in front of her.

Amaryllis screamed and stumbled backward, letting her skirt slip out of her hand. Despite having some self-defense training, it was already clear to her that his skill outmatched hers, even in his weakened state. On top of that, being calf-deep in the river water makes it hard for her to retreat quickly. All it takes to end her was if the man is willing to throw his dagger at her and has good aim on top of that.

To her surprise, instead of him swiping the dagger at her, he plunged it downward into the river grass to her right. Amaryllis flinched as it strikes its real target—a hidden water snake also hiding within the river grass.

He hadn’t been trying to kill her. 

He was only trying to kill a venomous water snake. She was so focused on him that she didn’t sense the snake approaching her from a blindspot, but he did, and he chose to save her despite the obvious fact that she was someone from the enemy kingdom.

Amaryllis stared in shock, her heart still pounding in fear so loud that it nearly overrode her sense of hearing. Her breathing was ragged from the earlier burst of fear. As she watched, the man then flinched and yanked his hand away, the dagger still impaling the snake. Amaryllis saw with horror that the water snake had bitten his hand when he stabbed it, the puncture wounds made by the snake’s fangs bleeding.

“Oh,” he said blankly when he saw it. “This is a pathetic way to die.” Then he crumbled back into the water with a soft splash.

“Are you crazy?” Against her better judgment, Amaryllis knelt down and grabbed his hand to examine his new wounds. “Why did you do it? I have an antivenom for that! I could have recovered easily, but you’re already injured! Why did you risk yourself to save me?”

But he didn’t answer. Perhaps he had collapsed from the injuries he sustained from yesterday’s battle. Or perhaps the snake venom took effect faster than usual due to his weakened constitution. Either way, he was out cold again.

Amaryllis bit her lips, unsure of how to proceed from here. She should leave him here to die. What kind of princess saves a soldier from the enemy kingdom? And yet, he saved her from the water snake, so she was indebted to him. 

With a sigh, Amaryllis decided to take him back to the cottage and nurse him back to help. 

“I’m only repaying this debt,” she muttered to herself. “A princess must know proper gratitude. And I shouldn’t abandon someone who is injured and in need of help. A princess must know proper compassion too.”

She wasn’t lying about the antivenom. Water snakes weren’t uncommon around the river areas, so all the nurses carry emergency supplies of medicinal plants and drugs, including antivenoms. 

She quickly procured the antivenom from her satchel and administered it to him, praying that she wouldn’t regret helping him. Then, after she made sure he took it properly, she began to start dragging him back to the cottage.

Before long, she was exhausted, despite only dragging the unconscious young man to shore. There was still a distance to the cottage. The main problem was his armor. He was already heavier than her, but with the armor adding additional weight, it was going to be impossible.

So, she decided to take his armor off and leave it at the bank of the river. She knew how to take off someone’s armor, being a war nurse and all. Rolling the man onto his side, she started unbuckling and untying the knots that held his armor together.

It was at that moment that he seemed to revive a little, stirring back to life just in time to see her trying to undress him. He started squirming, as if to stop her.

“Stop resisting. I need to get your armor off.” Amaryllis reprimanded him. 

“Don’t undress me…” he mumbled deliriously. “I am saving my chastity for my future wife.”

Amaryllis’s mouth dropped open in indignation, unsure of whether to laugh at him or scold him. “I don’t like what you are implying!”

Well, at least he seemed like an honorable and chivalrous man. Someone like that was now rare, as most died early in war. Chivalry does not keep men alive. Not for long. 

The thought reassured her now that she was less convinced of the probability of him retaliating and killing her the instant he was fully conscious again.

He was unconscious again, but that made it easier for Amaryllis to finish what she was doing. As soon as his armor was off him, she hoisted him onto her shoulder with a huff and started making her way back to her cottage.

She had to surrender the only bed in the cottage to him as he was the patient. But because he was still soaked from the river, she tried to lay him in front of the fireplace so the heat could help him dry faster. Once he was dry enough, she could change his clothes into something cleaner. It was a good thing Livia had some of her brothers’ clothes in the cottage.

She also checked his body for injuries, but aside from his limbs being pruny from being in the water for over a day, he didn’t have anything serious. Nothing life-threatening or infected, only some major bruising and scrapes from being in the mudslide and the snake bite, all of which she treated. His shoulder was also dislocated, but she reset it and bound it in a cast. However, he could have some kind of internal injury that she couldn’t see, and those were also harder to treat.

He must have been a new recruit, Amaryllis decided. While his hands were calloused, she noted the lack of scars anywhere else on his body. Was he a nobleman? Noblemen are commonly placed in positions where they are less likely to engage in direct combat. That would explain his lack of scars.

She finds herself studying his face again. He must be of a similar age to her, around twenty. He seemed quite young to be fighting in battle. She knew that as war stretched on, recruits became younger and younger.

What she didn’t expect was for him to have a nice face, even haggard and pale as it is. His features were well-formed and symmetrical too. His lashes were long and his skin was surprisingly smooth. 

What was he, a god? He seemed too inhumanely handsome. Is there an actual human out there that is both this good-looking and chivalrous and lucky enough to survive the mudslide that killed thousands of soldiers.

“Who are you?” Amaryllis finally gave in to the temptation and poked his face. “How did you survive the mudslide with such minor injuries?”