Teo recites the verses of the wind-walk; the party moves at high speed through the burnt fields around Valerin’s mainland city, out of the city limits, and slowing at the edge of the woods by an empty farmhouse. Adan carries Leah, having taken Teo’s spot to free the student up for her casting. Barely aware of her body, Leah leans against the woman’s shoulder gratefully, head lolling, all her energy focused on keeping her feet moving – putting distance between her and Eschen.

The building is small and dark, two bedrooms and a kitchen area with a loft. Adan lays Leah down on the table while the others set themselves up on watch-duty. Seffon focuses on the walls, drawing runes on the wood with ash and chalk, reciting over each one.

Sewheil removes Leah’s armour piece by piece, checking for further injuries. The nick on her ear she notes and ignores. The burn marks from the quicklime she treats with magic, pulling water from a canteen to rinse them, then doing something that turns the water green and repairs a few layers of skin. Leah watches this through the film of water with a distant sort of curiosity, barely recognised through the pain.

Sewheil lays a glowing blue hand over Leah’s forearm and abdomen, and the pain recedes slightly, but only slightly. The drunk feeling, however, hits full-force, and Leah’s jaw goes a little slack.

“I cannau hyl thes uethou mi supplis,” Sewheil says, gesturing to the spot on Leah’s back where Eschen’s metal-clad foot had kicked her.

“Ƃau bi d gaus de sy surviv?” Adan says, looking at the patchwork of bruises forming over Leah’s torso. Her hand reaches out to the glowing red scar of the stab-wound; the light is strong enough to tinge her hand red, slightly.

“Sy nys res,” Seffon says, finishing with the spells. “She’ll last until we can get her back to the Hold.” He lays a hand over Sewheil’s, reassuringly, and she nods, face taught, golden eyes lit by the red glow.

“I’m not tired,” Leah protests, lying back on the table. “I hurt like a sonofabitch, but I’m not tired.”

“You need rest,” Seffon says strictly, pulling off his jacket and folding it, sliding the pad under her head.

“No really, I used the Afram charm like an hour ago; I can’t sleep.”

“Oh,” Seffon says, and holds a hand over her forehead, muttering a quick word. The wakefulness fades from her body, and Leah is out like a light.

*

She wakes up a few hours later in intense pain, incapable of moving. She barely manages to open her eyes, and sees Adan and Sewheil standing guard. She takes a deep breath to try to talk, but can’t quite manage to fill her lungs

Sewheil notices the change in her breathing and is at her side in an instant, hands lit blue. The painkiller effect they are supposed to have is still not working as strongly as it did the last time she used it, after the anchors incident, and Leah can barely focus on her surroundings. Sewheil notices and gives up, instead placing a hand on Leah’s forehead and drawing it down, closing her eyelids like those of a dead person.

Leah has just enough time to be insulted at the parallel before passing out again.

*

The sun has risen when she wakes up next. Adan and the ranger are on guard duty, Teo and the student ­– Lem? Wasn’t he the guy whose exam I fucked up with my battery tests? – are passed out in the loft, and Sewheil is asleep in one of the bedrooms. Seffon is in the spare room, poring over a book, mouthing words, a hand frozen mid-tousle of his hair and apparently forgotten there for some time.

The pain is not as extreme, though still quite strong. Leah can’t move her ribs to breathe properly, and moving anything other than her feet, right hand, and mouth seems to increase the pain everywhere. Looking down, she sees she has been covered with a thick wool blanket and a sheep’s hide. Odd. I ought to feel warm, under this, but I don’t feel very warm at all. I don’t feel cold either, for that matter.

The ranger notices Leah’s eyes moving about; he goes to the table and takes out a vial of something from his chest pocket, flipping it to just moisten his finger, then traces a rune over the pile of blankets on her torso.

Ohhhh… Leah sinks into the warmth like a hug from a long-missed friend. The pain subsides, though she still cannot breathe right. She closes her eyes, just for a moment.

*

Seffon’s voice pulls her from sleep; opening one eye, she sees him talking into his wrist in Olues, in a very formal tone. He does not notice she is awake, even though one hand rests on the table near her head.

Sewheil comes up to her, bleary-eyed, and lays a blue-glowing hand over Leah’s stomach. The pile of blankets has been removed, but the midday air is warm.

“Wha’v’I missed?” Leah slurs, blinking.

Seffon moves his hand to pat her arm and finishes taking into the charm. He turns to her and takes a seat in one of the wicker chairs by the table. “The force is here, but we can’t reach the keep without any bridges to cross the river. There are four warships in harbour, two each from Cheden and Devad, and the current plan is to try and commandeer one.”

“Baroness?”

“Hm? The Baroness, yes. The captain has put up wards around her, we believe. No-one can get a fix on her location.”

“The keep?”

“Still standing. The horns blew this morning; the all-clear.”

“Air-raid over?” Leah asks, frowning.

“What? No, the call for the end of hostilities.” Seffon sighs deeply. “What exactly it means is unclear.”

“Why?”

“The keep es still flying Valerin’s colours,” Teo says, sitting across the table. Leah turns her head painstakingly to look at her. “Our scrys show that Lord Valerid is still alive, and apparently not imprisoned. His guards are still walking the walls. However, there are also Cheden soldiers in the keep and the courtyard, and a Devadiss naval captain was in the dining hall thes morning.”

Leah leans back against the cloth pillowed under her head, shifting to avoid a button digging into her skull. “How do you know all this?”

“We’ve been busy while you slept,” Teo says, poking her shoulder – so gently Leah doesn’t even feel it, yet it still causes a small surge in soreness.

Seffon waves her hand away with a cross expression. “Go call Lem ba en; hy an Soren uell ny teu stay hỹ ue Leah.”

“She speaks Volsti, you know,” Leah says, a little groggily.

“Yes, and has improved her pronunciation greatly since your arrival.”

Leah smirks. “Same could be said of you.”

Seffon shoots her a sour look that melts almost immediately to fondness. “I was taken from the middle of my supper to interrogate a prisoner in a language I hadn’t spoken aloud for almost a year, and you’re going to hold my accent that night against my utterly perfect accent every day since?”

Leah tries to move an arm to punch his shoulder, and barely manages to twitch a finger. “Remember when I was a prisoner? Those were simpler times…”

Seffon pats her hand gently and stands to leave, pausing at the door to talk. Leah can’t quite see who else is there, and the empty house echoes strangely, distorting the source of words and footsteps.

Eventually he seems to leave, and the other person at the door enters. Lem sits down in the chair beside Leah, and the ranger takes up a post by the window, watching carefully. Everyone else seems to be gone, or at least being quiet in another room.

“What’s going on?” Leah asks, and Lem turns a curious but blank face towards her. “Oh. Right. Wrong audience.”

Lem and the ranger keep watch for a long while, Leah lying on the table and drifting in and out of consciousness though always in pain. Her ribs in particular ache horribly. Neither of her two guards speak at all during the wait.

Early afternoon or thereabouts, judging by the sunlight outside the windows, footsteps approach the cottage. Leah opens her eyes grudgingly, and tilts her head toward the door at her feet. Lem sits a little straighter, and the ranger takes up position beside the front window, peeking out cautiously.

“E’s them.”

He opens the door, and the rest of the group returns, all speaking Olues amongst themselves in low, worried voices. Sewheil stops alongside Leah’s head and holds out a blue-glowing hand, frowning in concern.

“Uy ny teu ge hẽ ba teu th Ƃol,” she says, cutting short the general conversation. “Thẽ esnau anytheng I can deu fõ hẽ hỹ.”

“What’s happening?” Leah asks.

“Can sy by meuv’? Hẽ spin…” Seffon looks her over with worry.

“What’s happening?” she asks again.

“Esen uell come lookeng fõ hẽ,” Teo says, already packing her things. “I can tae hẽ ba.”

Leah raises a palm and slaps it down on the table; the jolt makes her gasp, her whole midsection tensing and burning with sudden pain.

“Leah?” Seffon asks, eyes wide with concern.

“What’s happening?” She stares him down. “Where did you go? What’s the situation at the keep? Is the Baroness alright? Are the five still alive? Are – ”

Sewheil reaches out a hand and covers her mouth, gently. Leah rankles but can’t physically move to shake it off.

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“We spoke to the Devadiss contingent,” Seffon says, looking grim. “They assumed we were here as back-up, and gave us the information we asked for. Lord Valerid has agreed to a peaceful occupation of both city and keep; Devad will withdraw to patrol the shore against incoming vessels from Volst, and Cheden will move to secure the city against rebellion. We should be able to take one of the ships and reach the island, with enough people to oust the occupying soldiers and re-establish the Baron. Doing so may endanger the life of the Baroness, however.”

“Why?” Leah asks from behind the hand. Sewheil removes it.

“She es being held by Cheden, to ensure the Lord’s complacency,” Teo says, coming back into the room with her bags already packed. “He agreed to the terms to keep her safe, an ef we do anytheng to help Valrin, they may decide to kill her.”

“We will still try,” Seffon says quickly, before Leah can say anything. “But the priority is to get the Baroness back safely, so they have no leverage. In the meantime, we need to get you away; Eschen wants you dead at any cost.”

“Medicine,” Leah says, wincing a bit as the pain starts to creep back.

“And to get you treated, yes,” Seffon nods, reaching out a hand to help her up, Sewheil on her other side.

Leah shakes her head, ignoring the twinges it causes down her spine. “No. In the keep. They have so many wounded…if you can’t free them, can you get them medicine? Food, bandages, painkillers.”

Seffon looks pensive, and shares a glance with Sewheil; Sewheil nods and gestures for the ranger. They have a quick conversation in Olues, then the ranger grabs his bag and leaves the cottage.

“Soren is a fair war surgeon; he’ll do what he can,” Seffon says to Leah. “We’ll send supplies as we are able, until we find a way to overturn the occupation.”

Leah nods, still feeling like she is abandoning the keep. “What about the – ”

“Enough,” Seffon says, laying a finger over her lips. He and Sewheil lift her carefully, and Leah bites back a yelp unsuccessfully. Together they support her walking, taking most of the weight, and they leave the cottage.

Teo draws a complicated rune over Lem, Seffon, and Sewheil, tracing it in the air in front of each of them and invoking a charm. The runes seem to link up, and when Teo takes Adan’s arm and begins reciting the wind-walk charm, everyone is swept into the same spell, their steps floating above the forest floor.

Six hours of motion-sickness walking is too much for Leah; she stumbles through as best she can, ignoring the pain in her…everything. Seffon notices her struggling, and traces a familiar rune over her heart, muttering “Noi.” Walking immediately becomes easier, though the pain is still causing her vision to black out.

“Thanks,” she mumbles, picking up the pace a fraction.

Even Teo begins showing signs of exhaustion towards the end of it, breathing heavily though they move only at an easy walk. She starts singing the charm to leave the wind-walk before they are in sight of the Hold.

“Ua’s wrong?” Seffon asks her gently, and she simply shakes her head, finishing the spell and leaving them standing on a path, about four-fifths of the way there.

“I couldn’t keep et up with that many people,” Teo says, panting and collapsing to sit against a tree trunk, legs sprawled. “Not two days en a row.”

“Then take Sewheil and Leah; the rest of us will walk,” Seffon says, gently extracting himself from under Leah’s arm and letting Teo take his place. She stands stiffly and goes to hold Leah up; once secure, she traces a new rune over Sewheil and starts up the charm again. They walk onwards, still slowly and laboriously, Leah wincing with every step.

They get to the Hold in another half-hour, dropping out of the spell at the gates. The guards open them immediately, and two rush in to take over carrying Leah through to the hospital. Teo collapses at the fountain and starts cupping handfuls of water, splashing them over her face; Leah is through the doors too quickly to see any more, Sewheil trailing after her and giving a command to the first servant she sees.

Leah is deposited on a cot, floating in a haze of exhaustion. Sewheil sets up the splinter-and-sinew spell, focusing first on Leah’s back, carefully avoiding the glowing stab wound.

The initial soothing barely makes an impact on her, and the intense pain during the quenching doesn’t even register past all the other pains in her body. Leah lies limp and lets the doctor do what she must.

Sewheil sets up a second round, for Leah’s arm. Leah watches this one, confused. When did I hurt my arm? Oh right, I blocked a hit with it. I didn’t even notice that it hurt.

That injury heals just as unnoticeably, and Sewheil moves on to the boot-print over Leah’s abdomen. She takes out a large silver loop and lays it over the skin, cool and smooth. Blue and copper flickers of light, like solar flares or the arcs of Tesla coils, begin to rise and snap, in repeating patterns. Sewheil watches for a moment, then takes a vial of ointment and traces a pattern within the loop.

Leah convulses. Her internal organs feel like they are rearranging themselves, and she feels every shift, every pulse of blood, every re-settling.

“Thẽ,” Sewheil says, lifting the silver loop and putting it away, then tugging down Leah’s shirt.

“What about the stab wound?” Leah asks, jaw still clenched; the pain hardly feels like it has gone away at all.

Sewheil raises an eyebrow at her. “I cannau fex uatevẽ tha es.”

“Huh? What does that mean?” Leah asks, with sudden concern. “Is it going to be okay?”

She washes her hands and comes back to take a look at it; she then takes a metal tray from the workstation and holds it up, angled, like a mirror. “Deu yu sy?”

Leah looks at the rippling red glow of the wound, distorted in the hammered metal of the tray. She then looks more carefully; the metal isn’t hammered, it’s perfectly smooth. The image is distorted, her skin rippling like the air above pavement on a hot day.

“Is it supposed to do that?” Leah asks, in mounting concern.

“Th ʁuman body? No, e esnau suppos’ teu deu tha.” Sewheil says it somewhat snappily, but not with anger. A more careful look at her face suggests that she is alarmed by what she sees.

Even the magic doctor doesn’t know what this is? Oh, that’s bad. But it fixed me?! Leah tugs down her shirt again, then looks in surprise at her arms. I can move again? Well at least there’s that.

She sits up slowly and tries to stand, but Sewheil pushes her back down with gentle but unyielding pressure. Leah sighs and settles back in, and takes the drink offered to her without argument.

Please don’t be coca, please don’t be coca… She takes a sip and instead discovers it to be the strange milk drink. Oh, fuck. I’ve missed this. The cup is small and shallow, barely a few sips, and Leah sits carefully on the edge of the cot to drink it.

Hurried footsteps ring through the hall outside; Leah turns her head to watch Jeno burst through the doorway, stumbling to a halt and looking around the room for her. Leah gives a weak wave, and Jeno rushes her, stopping just short of touching her when she sees Leah flinch deeply.

“No hugs,” Leah says, holding up her hands. “I still hurt.”

“What happened?” Jeno asks, sitting on the opposite cot and reaching for one of Leah’s hands, holding it as though it were made of ash and might crumble under too much pressure. “What’s the news, how bad is it? Is the city still standing? Are my parents still there?”

Leah wets her lips, considering what she ought to say. I don’t really have any good news, and I think she needs to hear good news. Also, I don’t want to tell her anything that Seffon might want to keep quiet.

Finally she decides on something safe to tell. “Eschen didn’t know whether you were alive or not,” she says, with a decisive nod. Jeno frowns a little, a worried look on her face. “That’s a good thing. It means that when we broke his connection to you, he had no way of checking on you, of reaching you within the Hold.”

“But…he’s still there?” Jeno asks, rubbing a thumb delicately over Leah’s knuckles.

Leah sighs. “He’ll be there for a while yet. Cheden and Devad both have ships at the docks, but the siege is over.”

“Over?” Jeno’s head snaps up.

“There’s no fighting, for right now.” Leah pats her hand gently, and winces as the movement sets off the pain in her side.

Sewheil comes back and ushers Jeno gently away; the girl seems unwilling to leave, but relents, wishing Leah a speedy recovery as she goes.

The hospital is quiet for the next little bit. The guard at the door makes sure no-one enters to bother her, and Sewheil sits a few cots over, flipping through a book with an intent expression, her long fingers tracing the words, looking for something. A servant comes with a bowl of soup, and Leah takes it with immense gratitude, though she must eat slowly to keep from accidentally jarring a muscle.

When did I last eat? I had coffee in the hospital…I had brandy with Eschen…some trail rations on the ride over with Vivitha…wow, I think I may have discovered why I hurt so badly. Nothing magic, just plain old hunger. I was just too busy to notice something like that, what with all the nearly dying and the chemical warfare and the running for my life. Funny how things slip your mind.

She finishes the bowl, scraping the dregs to catch every bit, metal spoon clinking against the ceramic. The food does much to help alleviate the pain, and to steady her trembling limbs. Even her headache clears up quickly enough, allowing her to really notice her body.

The scar from Eschen’s stab is still glowing with the same intensity. The light ripples slowly, and the muscles around the wound seems to be tensing and releasing of their own accord; that in particular seems to be the source of some of the pain, as each twinge seems matched to the movement of the skin. The wound itself is scabbed over and small, no fresh blood.

The rest of their party arrives an hour later; Seffon goes straight to the hospital to check in on her, looking over her wounds and testing her mobility, frowning at the glowing red scar under her right ribs.

“How did he give you this?” he asks, calling up a ball of white light to float over her stomach and illuminate the wound. “Sewheil, es thes a poison yu recognis?”

“Oh, no,” Leah says, suddenly realising the misunderstanding. “That was me.”

“What?” Seffon asks, eyes flicking up to her then back to the wound. Sewheil looks up from her book.

“I mean, Eschen did stab me, but the glow is from after. Leah’d had a tiny amount of healing potion in her possession for a long time, for years actually, and when Eschen stabbed me and threw a smoke bomb in the room I took the last sip.”

“Healing potion?” Seffon asks, eyebrows furrowed.

“Yeah, a red thingy, uhh…” Leah unclips the tin flask from her hip and hands it over. “There are a few drops left, maybe, if that could help you identify it.”

Seffon has already uncorked it and sniffed the bottle, tilting it to let a drop roll out over his finger. “Where did she get this?” he asks, voice soft, eyes wide. Sewheil joins him and takes the bottle, fingertips and eyes glowing white, tracing the edges of it.

“In Algi, near the border with Bair. It was one of the memories that Bitter Dream brought back.”

“Why didn’t you mention this?”

“Because I couldn’t find the potion; I assumed it was long gone, but actually I’d given it to Iris for safe keeping. This was just after I’d joined the group, apparently.”

“Which would make this how many years old?”

Leah hesitates. “They expire, don’t they? Potions go bad.”

“No,” Seffon says, sliding his finger along the rim to return the drop to the flask. “The opposite.”

“They…get stronger?”

“More potent, the longer you leave them aging.” Seffon nods, corking the flask and handing it back, though with obvious regret. “Most are too in-demand to be left aging for long; if your profession puts your life in danger, you inevitably end up needing it sooner than you expect. However, there is a catch.”

“Which is?”

“A fresh-brewed healing potion works in seconds; it will heal even life-threatening wounds, leaving a bright red scar with a faint glow. The longer it ages, the more it can heal, but the slower it works – and the slower it finishes working.”

“So it’s still in the process of healing me?”

“No, it seems it has almost totally healed your initial wound by now. But it will continue to heal you, possibly for days to come. Ƃau de th othẽ enzurys rea teu yõ hyleng?” This last he directs at Sewheil.

“Normally, b nau perfely,” Sewheil says, gesturing to Leah’s arm; Leah notices that, while the injury appears mostly healed, there is still a dark red bruise over it. “I assum’ e uas bycaus of ʁau often sy has ny’ hyleng laely.”

“Yes, on that note,” Seffon says, smoothing back his hair and sighing. “Leah, as with all magic, there is a limit to how much magical healing a person can safely receive over a given period of time. You’ve been in here far too often lately.”

“Well, most of that is because I don’t actually know how to fight, and yet I keep ending up in fights,” Leah says dryly.

“Which brings me to my first question,” Seffon says, leaning forward on the cot. “I sent you and Vivitha to deliver a message to Lord Valerid, not to fight; how did you end up sneaking the Duchess out of the city and duelling Eschen again?”

Leah recounts the quick version of their arrival: the boat; delivering the message; finding out about the baths; going out to try to buy time with Eschen. Seffon tenses up and frowns at this part, and Leah squirms a bit, finally admitting that it was a bad move on her part.

“I see that, I really do,” she says, looking down at her hands. “I just thought I might be the only person Eschen would listen to, instead of killing right away.”

“And were you at least somewhat right?” Seffon asks with a shrug and a smirk.

Leah returns the gesture. “I was. I traded information about the battery for information about what he was doing here.”

Seffon’s smirk falls away. “Whatever happened to not wanting it to fall into the wrong hands?”

“I was talking about Valerid, then. Eschen is born-magic; once he realised what the battery meant I could see he understood how it was dangerous, to him personally. I banked on him being too afraid of the implications to ever share the information. Besides, it bought me useful information.”

“Cheden now knows how to smother magic on a large scale? What’s worth that?”

“Eschen was given a mission to start this war, using Jeno as the catalyst. Meredith and the Baron both seemed to think there is cause to say this whole thing isn’t a war over honour or politics; it’s a usurpation.”