Helen returned with her daughter-in-law only moments later. Dahlia had, while they were gone, changed into a simple blue-gray dress - nothing that looked like she was trying to impress him, but at least so she’d be properly dressed! - but when she saw the situation outside of the house, she wish she’d left on her work clothes. Her gray eyes went from Lilly to Edward, silently trying to assess the situation. “Dear lord…” she breathed.
Dahlia shook herself from her surprise and she moved quickly over to the horse. “Alright, Lilly, down you come,” she instructed, reaching up to help her daughter off the horse. Once she was on the ground, Dahlia gave Lilly a once-over to make sure she was okay. Edward might have said she was, but as a mother she had to check for herself once she’d heard there was an accident. But Lilly looked shaken more than anything else. Scraped knees and elbows were certainly nothing new for her semi-wild daughter.
“Mom, I…” Lilly croaked, looking like she was about to cry. The truth was, however much she didn’t like Edward, listening to him try to hide his pain the whole way home had her feeling very, very badly.
But Dahlia put a finger to her daughter’s lips to silence her and kissed her quickly on the head. “It’s okay, Lil. Just a moment, okay?”
“Come on,” Helen said, more collected now, “I think together we can help him down.” While Dahlia was inspecting Lilly, she had left and come back with a wooden step stool which she placed now by the horse. Working together and employing the step stool, the two women, small though they were, managed to get Edward off the horse and onto the ground. It was clear from his pain dismounting the horse that Edward shouldn’t - and probably couldn’t - stand on his own, so Dahlia held tightly to him to keep support his weight.
“Lilly, are you okay to take Abigail around to the stables?” Dahlia asked her daughter gently, though strain was evident in her voice. Lilly nodded then, after a moment of staring at the injured Edward, hurried to the horse and took her reins and led the horse guiltily around to the stables. Then Dahlia and Helen, supporting Edward between them, managed to get him in the house and - finally, onto the sofa in the sitting room.
“I’ll go get the doctor,” Helen said, a little breathless from the effort of supporting the man for so long. Dahlia nodded, and Helen gave Edward’s shoulder an encouraging squeeze. “I’ll be back as soon as I can,” she said with a smile, then left the house, leaving Dahlia alone with the battered and bruised Edward.
For several moments, she just stared at him, as though she didn’t believe any of it. Then, snapping out of it, she put a hand to his forehead. She didn’t know why; he was injured, not sick. She moved it down to his shoulder, and knelt down next to him. “Are you… Can I get you something? What- what happened?”