Wolfskin by Juliet Marillier

eyes and looked down at his right leg. It did not show much beyond a huge purple mark, which spread all up and down the inner thigh; not much beyond a certain swelling; little enough, for such pain. But Eyvind was a hunter. Through the mist of rising unconsciousness, through the dizzy blurring of his vision and the tremors of chill that began to course through his body despite his best efforts to still them, Eyvind recognized that the leg was broken and bleeding within, where it could not be seen. His mind put the pieces together: himself unable to walk, the cold, the loss of blood, and small, puny Somerled the only aid at hand. He might die. Far worse than that, he might survive and be crippled. A Wolfskin must be whole, and strong.
    â€œSomerled?” he whispered as the darkness came closer.
    â€œShh, don’t try to talk.” Somerled’s voice was strange, coming and going; his sheet-pale face kept blurring as if this were a dream. “I’ll go for help. Where does it hurt? Here?”
    Eyvind did scream then, as Somerled’s careful fingers gingerly made contact with the wounded limb. And when Somerled ripped off his shirt and bound the leg as straight as he could, with strips of stiff bark on either side, Eyvind’s howl of agony echoed through the empty woods until he clenched his teeth hard to still the sound, for he could see the fear in the other boy’s eyes. The splinting done, Somerled rose to his feet, slung his small pack on his back and looked down at the shivering Eyvind, frowning.
    â€œCold,” Eyvind managed. “Bleeding. Bonesetter. Karl…”
    â€œI can run all the way,” said Somerled. “There and back. I’ll leave you my cloak.”
    Eyvind looked up at his friend’s small, intense face; it was wavering, blurring, going dark. He tried to tell him; tried to explain that he would die of shock and cold before help could come, but his voice didn’t seem to be working anymore. All that came out was a sort of grating noise.
    â€œNo good?” Somerled asked.
    â€œCold,” Eyvind managed. “Too long…”
    â€œRight,” said Somerled. “You’ll have to help me, then. As far as we cango, walking. Then I suppose I’ll manage somehow. Never thought I’d have reason to thank you for those endless lessons about survival in the wild. Come on.”
    Eyvind could not remember much after that, except the pain, a pain so terrible he put his teeth through his lip, struggling to remain strong. He seemed to have a picture of himself leaning heavily on Somerled, and staggering, hobbling, weaving impossibly down the steep paths through the forest, and Somerled’s voice coaxing, encouraging, sharply ordering him to go on. He thought he could recall collapsing part-way down in the shadow under tall trees, the pungent scent and prickling touch of pine needles under his cheek, and his friend’s dark eyes staring at him from a face ghost-white with exhaustion. He remembered the familiar set of Somerled’s mouth, a look which said that giving up simply wasn’t an option. From what they told him later, he knew that here and there Somerled had stopped to adjust the makeshift splint, to prod him awake and force him onward. When Eyvind had eventually lost consciousness, Somerled had improvised a sort of sled from branches and bark, using the rope they carried, and dragged the other boy down to open ground. The man who doctored Eyvind said that if he’d been left up on the mountain while Somerled had gone for help, he’d surely have died before aid could come.
    There was no more hunting that summer. Eyvind spent the rest of the season flat on his back in bed, the broken leg held up by a strong hempen rope, which the bonesetter had passed over a high beam; from the rope’s other end hung a heavy stone like a roofweight, which dangled in the air beyond the foot of the bed, stretching the limb straight.