The next morning, I woke up refreshed.

  Sitting up in bed, I stretched and soaked in the morning light for a while. It was pretty out. Pretty, and unfamiliar. I didn't live on a farm.

  Where was I again?

  After wiping the sleep from my eyes, I reached over to the nightstand to grab my phone. However, instead of a phone, all I found was a glass of water.

  All at once, I saw my car sinking into that giant sinkhole play out in my mind's eye.

  “Fuck…” I'd forgotten. Flopping back into bed, I yawned and did a big stretch and looked at the symbol carved into the far wall. Somehow, that thing always seemed to be softly illuminated by whatever light filtered in through the smallish window set into the stone wall to my right. Looking at it for a time, it slowly dawned on me that it wasn’t so much reflecting light as emitting it.

  Was there really magic in this place?

  Shaking my head, I closed my eyes and listened to the world. Today, everything was pretty quiet: no sheep were bawing in the fields. No children laughing and playing in the distance. No pretty elven angels speaking in melodic accents at my side. There were birds, though. Birds were nice. I opened my eyes and looked out the window, but I couldn’t see them. Still, they chirped somewhere overhead as the sunlight filtered through the window, illuminating some specks of dust floating in the air, along with the thin trail of smoke rising from the incense burner resting atop my small desk.

  As I listened and observed, I continued to stretch and wiggle around in the bed, testing how my body was working this morning.

  My foot felt tight. My head felt okay. The only part of me that still felt awful was my left arm. I could only feel half as well as I should, and my movements took more effort and concentration than I'd like them to. Still, the bandages had come off in the night, revealing large, thick scars that looked like lightning and several burns. Luckily, they were all fading, but they still looked like shit.

  Overall, though, everything still felt pretty stiff and slightly painful, but it felt a hell of a lot better than it had days before.

  For that, I was grateful.

  Once I felt like I was limber enough, I decided it was time to try to stand. I hadn't been out of this bed for who knew how long, so it was as good a time as any to try. Pushing myself to the edge of the bed, I swung my legs off the side and gently set my feet on the cool ground. Feeling at the floor with my toes, I found it rough but clean, like well-swept, unpolished stone.

  Once I worked up some courage, I whispered, "You can do this," to myself. With a grunt, I pushed myself onto my feet... and almost fell flat on my face. Grabbing ahold of the end table, it took everything I had to keep myself upright.

  My legs were wobbling like a newborn deer's!

  "Ughhh," I stayed standing for as long as I could—about twenty seconds—then grunted and fell back onto the bed. "I thought magical healing was supposed to be instant? What is this shit?" Every game and movie was full of shit!

  Resting until my heart stopped racing, I sat back on the edge of the bed and worked up the courage again. “Come on, man. You’ve got this!” Thumping my chest with my fist, I pressed my feet into the ground... and immediately fell back into the bed.

  “Fuck!” Pulling myself upright a third time, I looked down at my uncooperative legs. That's when I realized that they in no way looked like the legs I remembered. “Holy shit...” I grabbed my thighs and felt around. There was no meat on my bones! For the first time since I'd gotten hurt, I inspected my body and quickly came to realize that I had lost weight.

  A lot of weight.

  I looked like a goddamn corpse!

  Before, I'd been in pretty good shape, what with all the labor, and the gym, and the martial arts, and everything else I did. I was an active guy who generally took some pride in his body, even if I'd put on some padding throughout the winter. But this body was not that body. While I wasn't quite skeletal, I had lost quite a bit of muscle mass, and nearly all of my padding was gone. So much so that I could see every ab, and not in a good way. My arms were stick-thin, too.

  How long had I been out?!

  Gathering up the courage for another standing attempt, I held onto the bedpost and teetered up onto my feet. This time, I managed to stand. Counting in my head, I made it to twenty before my legs started wobbling. My body screamed at me to lie back down, to rest, but I wasn't having it. Instead of lying down, I started walking around the bed.

  Step by step, I hobbled up the left side, then used the wall to shuffle across the room. Once I reached the desk, I pulled out the chair and, with a groan, lowered myself onto the wicker seat. Once I was settled, I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and inhaled as much of the incense smoke as I could. It smelled good.

  Once my heart stopped pounding, I opened my eyes and looked around. I'd never seen the room from this vantage point before. It wasn't all that interesting. The only thing I'd missed was the headboard, which had some basic floral designs cut into it. That, and there were some clothes set on a small stool resting in the corner of the room.

  The clothes weren't the ones I'd been wearing the night I'd been struck by lightning. Instead of my black work clothes, I found a tan long-sleeved... tunic? I was pretty sure it was a tunic. It looked like something that would have been right at home at a Renaissance fair. Under the tunic, there was a pair of brown pants. Those looked nice, even if they were a bit simple. The fabric seemed well-made, but it looked rougher than I was used to.

  "Probably wool." I'd slowly come to the realization that I wasn't actually in heaven, but it was still kind of ironic that the clothes here were made of wool.

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  Shaking my head, I looked at the pile of clothes and saw that, under the shirt and pants, a pair of wool socks and a leather belt were just visible. Turning, I saw that there were some brown leather boots in the opposite corner of the room, near the door.

  Why would they do that to me?

  Standing up, I hobbled over to the boots, scooped them up, and returned to my chair. Leaning over, I grabbed the rest of the clothes and started getting dressed. First, I pulled on the pants. Then, the tunic. Socks. Belt. Boots. Well, only one boot. I couldn't for the life of me get the right one on. After a few minutes of struggling, I gave up. When I finished putting on everything but the one boot, I sat back in the chair and took some deep breaths. The clothes were baggy, but they fit well enough.

  After a few minutes, I used the desk to stand up and hobbled over to the little stone window set into the wall. Leaning against the ledge, for the first time in... however long it had been and dressed like a medieval villager, I looked out at the world. Outside the window was an idyllic pasture. It could honestly be a painting. The long grasses swayed in the soft breeze, and some farmers were just making their way out to fields in the distance, scythes in hand.

  "Nice." I couldn't say that this was a life goal of mine, but I'd be lying if I said it didn't look kind of fun.

  A sharp knock at the door pulled me away from the pastoral bliss outside my room.

  Before I could answer, the door swung open, and a stout man, one who was at least two heads shorter than me but nearly as wide as the doorway, marched into my little sanctuary. He had long brown hair that he kept pulled back in a tight ponytail and a long, neatly trimmed beard. The guy was built more like a laborer than a bodybuilder, with the thick frame and massive hands of an experienced tradesman. A metal scepter dangled from his belt, and he had a long, thick walking stick, one that was too tall for him, grasped in one hand.

  "Uh, hi." I waved at the man. "I'm Alex."

  He looked me over for a while, his grey eyes boring into me with more intensity than I was used to. "Bonan matenon." His words were hard and clipped, with another accent I didn't recognize lacing them. His grey eyes scanned the room in an instant before returning to me. Looking down at my unshod foot, he marched up to my desk, snatched my boot up, and marched up to me.

  Before I could even protest, the stout man pushed me onto the bed. "What are you—" In an instant, he had the boot on my foot, tied, and the long walking stick was in my hand.

  Wiping his hands on his white and red robe, he said, "Staru."

  I had no idea what that meant.

  Waiting for a time, he eventually shook his head and muttered, “Vi vere estas voja?anto," clearly talking to himself more than me.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t understa—woah!”

  Grabbing me by the waist, he hoisted me onto my feet.

  Like a child.

  "Damn..." He was strong, stronger than the older woman who healed me the other day. That shocked me. She was ... but he was like a bear.

  "Venu." Pointing toward the door, he marched to it, opened it wide, and walked into the hallway.

  I understood that command well enough. Not wanting to argue with the scary, short man, I took a single step forward. Then another. By the third, I used the stick to assist my movements. Feeling the thing under my fingers as I walked, I noticed that it was stout and thick, made of some dense, dark wood. I didn't know much about wood, but the grains were tight, and it felt strong and heavy enough to punch through the stone floor without breaking, especially since the ends were bound in some yellowish metal, like brass or bronze or something.

  "Malrapide," he said from the doorway, his words more soft and gentle than before. When I tried to step past him, he grabbed my arm and slowed me down, helping me just as my legs were starting to get tired and wobbly.

  "I've got this." I nodded to him and pulled free of his grip.

  "Bone." He stepped backward a few steps, then watched as I stepped forward. When I didn't fall, he matched my pace, walking backward at the same pace, but never moving so far that he couldn't catch me if I fell.

  With each step I took, he nodded. Once, when I nearly fell, he stopped and adjusted my grip on the staff he'd given me. That helped a lot. Before long, I was moving pretty well. Once I was confident in my steps, I pointed at myself and said, "Alex."

  "Renard," he replied, his eyes focusing on my movements. While the man had a stern look, it wasn’t cruel or biting. It was just intense. And, while he wasn't smiling, his eyes shone with limitless empathy.

  As we walked down the hallway, I quickly found that my room was at the end of the hallway, on the right. My room was just one of many. I could hear sounds in some of the rooms: groaning, the shuffling of feet, a stray cough. It was clear that my initial impression was kind of, sort of correct. This place definitely was a hospital of some kind. Or something. Halfway up the hallway was an archway, from which soft, flickering light and the heavy, sweet smell of incense trailed. Renard disappeared into it, so I followed.

  When I entered the next room, I couldn't believe my eyes.

  Beyond the hallway was a massive hall. It looked like a church of some kind, with pews and the stained glass and the dais thing at the front. A massive stone statue stood on that dais, one of a beautiful woman. She was in a sheer, flowing gown, and her long hair cascaded down her shoulders and along her collarbones, reaching well below her breasts. Her right hand was held up to the sky. In it, she was holding the same eight-pointed star that was set into the wall of my room. Her expression was soft, warm, and loving. Shining down on her from the windows above, pure white light shone on her beautiful face, filling the room with soft, golden light.

  The sheer size and beauty of it all took my breath away.

  Leaning on my staff, I gazed up at the statue in awe. I didn't consider myself religious or anything, but there was something about this place, about the statue, that made me stop and think.

  What if?

  What if there was more to the story than we knew?

  I mean, here I was, standing under the statue of some unknown woman, being guided around by a guy who I was juuust starting to realize might be a dwarf, after being healed by magic light hands by a pretty priestess with pointed elf ears.

  Would believing in this, uh, goddess be so weird after all of that?

  Just then, the soft sounds of prayers filled the hall to my left.

  Reluctantly, I tore my eyes away from the statue and found the source of the prayers.

  A woman, little more than a girl really, knelt before the dais, her hands clasped in front of her chest, her eyes lifted in prayer. Behind her, a group of people, maybe a dozen or so, sat on stone benches facing the statue. Each had their hands clasped, and their heads were bowed in prayer. The kneeling girl prayed in front of the statue for several minutes. Then, with a final bow, she stood and returned to one of the pews.

  Replacing her, a man, old and stooped, rose and walked toward the spot where she'd been, knelt, and began praying. After him, an elderly woman. The next was a boy. After him was a middle-aged woman who cradled a baby. One after another, they took turns while Renard and I watched.

  By the fifth person, I turned to the stout man beside me and noticed that his face was as stern as it had been, but his eyes shone with the same compassionate light as they had when he saw me struggling to walk.

  Maybe he was actually a big softy?

  After fifteen or so minutes, the last congregant stood up from the dais, and a woman, the same one who healed me the day I woke up, emerged from behind the statue. Speaking in the language of this place, she said a few words. When she was done, the entire group said a prayer, then stood and, turning to one another, began chatting among themselves. Only then did she look at us.

  “?u li estas preta?” She asked Renard.”

  The maybe-dwarf nodded. “Jes, Matrino.”

  "Sankte," she said as she walked toward me. Grabbing my free hand, she turned and pulled me toward the statue. "Venu, filo."

  Not knowing what else to do, I decided it was as good a time as any to dedicate myself to my new lord and savior, the beautiful statue of a woman holding a giant star that represented who knew what.