He scowled, and pressed a hand down on her shoulder. She winced as her leg screamed momentarily at the sudden extra weight. “Just because you can walk doesn’t mean it’s healed, Lena. The bandit sliced through the muscle a little. You could hurt it worse if you don’t rest.”

She set her hands on her hips stubbornly, and frowned at him. “What’s with you lately, Damien? You’re getting so over protective. I’m fine, but you treat me like a child when I hurt myself even a little. Like just now, with the mending.” He didn’t answer, but looked away suddenly. Her frown deepened. “Is it… am I doing something wrong…?”

“No!” He held up his hands toward her, his expression slightly panicked. He still wasn’t looking at her, she noticed, just at her shoulder. “Lena, I never meant to make you think…”

“Then what, Damien?” She demanded, throwing her hands up. “I can fight almost as well as you can, so it’s not like you needed to immediately panic earlier when I got hurt.”

That had been kind of endearing, actually. As soon he’d heard her cry of pain, he had whirled into such a flurry of motion that before she’d realized what was happening the bandits had all been killed. She hadn’t known he could fight like that. The expression on his face when he had knelt over her, his hands shaking as he tried to get a good look at the cut on her thigh, had been much less one she would have expected on a hardened warrior, and more on that of a frightened child. He’d been more hurt by her wound, she thought, than she had been.

“I’m not weak.” She said insistently when he still didn’t answer her.

“I never said you were.” He said quickly.

“Then stop acting like it!” She snapped. “I am a grown woman, Damien, and I do not need you treating me like a child!”

“I’m not treating you like a child!” He snapped right back at her.

“Oh no? You won’t let me mend my clothes, you won’t let me cook dinner, you only let me fight when there’s so many opponents you don’t notice when I’ve drawn my own sword!” He scowled and looked away, but she was warming to her subject now. “I’m not allowed to leave sight of camp unless I’m bathing or I have to piss! And Goddess forbid I want to wander around a peaceful town on my own! You treat me like I’m a three year old, so how must you think of me?!”