Groaning, Lewis stretched. He was lying on his side, surrounded by something soft and warm. It was a far cry from the hard floor of the castle courtyard he had felt in his last memory. The burning pain that had engulfed him before was gone as well. Slowly, he opened his eyes.

He was lying in bed with a thick red blanket pulled up to his neck. The room around him was lit by a dim, flickering light—probably an oil lamp, he thought as he looked around. Never in his life had he seen a room so elaborately decorated. Set into dark blue walls were high windows, obscured by thick red curtains. The rest of the wall was covered with portraits that hung in ornate golden frames.

As he looked at the portrait of Sebastian Vandemark that he recognised from his office in the castle, there was a quiet cough from somewhere behind him. Rolling on his back, Lewis sat up. His body ached like nothing he had ever felt before. Still, it was an improvement on how he had felt before.

At the sound of movement, Edmund looked up from the book he was sitting reading in a chair beside Lewis’ bed, a small oil lamp on the bedside table burning merrily.

‘Where am I?’ Lewis asked as Edmund closed the book, placing it in his lap carefully.

‘You’re in one of the bedrooms in the castle,’ Edmund said. ‘How do you feel?’

‘I ache a lot,’ Lewis replied, propping himself up against the pillow behind him gingerly. ‘What happened?’

‘You were poisoned.’

‘What? Again?’ he asked. How could that be possible? Since he had woken up in Whitecliff, he had eaten and drank the same as everyone else. He hadn’t had any injuries that could have caused it either.

‘Technically you weren’t,’ Edmund explained. ‘When you were poisoned at the tomb, it was something called a two-step poison. The first stage was what you experienced on the island. The second stage takes a lot longer to show. It was the second stage that got you during the coronation.’

‘How do you know all this?’ Lewis asked.

‘Emily told us about the poison after you collapsed,’ he said. ‘When George caught her trying to steal the crown, he told her about the second stage of the poison. She was coming to find you when you collapsed.’

‘Is she alright? She was covered in blood, and the guards were holding her the last I remember,’ Lewis said.

‘She’s fine,’ Edmund assured him. ‘She managed to throw off the guards after you collapsed. I don’t know where she got it, but she had a tiny crystal vial that cured the poison almost instantly. Even I don’t know what it was. She saved your life.’

‘Can I see her?’

‘In the morning,’ Edmund said. ‘Everyone is asleep at the moment. It was a long day.’

‘What time is it?’ Lewis asked.

‘Almost three in the morning,’ Edmund replied as he stood up. So, he had been unconscious for about fourteen hours, he thought. It wasn’t as bad as last time. ‘I think I’m going to go and get some sleep now that you’re awake, unless there’s anything else you need.’

‘What happened to the crown? George had it; did you catch him?’ Lewis said this before Edmund could leave the room.

‘George got away, unfortunately,’ Edmund said with a sigh. ‘The city is in lockdown at the moment, and we have people out looking for him as we speak. If he’s still inside the city, then we’ll find him. It’s only a matter of time.’

‘And if he isn’t in Tristan?’

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‘The dignitaries from other towns have sent word to their respective people to be on the lookout for him. We’ll find him sooner or later.’

‘Does this mean we stopped the prophecy from being invoked?’ Lewis asked.

‘I’m afraid it is a bit more complicated than that. I’ll explain everything to you in the morning,’ Edmund assured him as he opened the bedroom door. On the other side of the door, Lewis could see a dimly lit corridor. ‘Get some sleep; you’ve earned it after the last few days.’

‘Edmund, is it over or not?’ Lewis demanded. Regardless of the answer, he just wanted to know where he stood in all of this.

‘I can’t say for certain until we find George and recover the crown, but I fear we may have been too late,’ Edmund said as he slipped out the door. ‘Get some rest,’ he instructed before he pulled the door shut behind him, leaving Lewis alone in the lavish bedroom with his thoughts.

How could it not be over? he wondered. They stopped the coronation after all. What more could he possibly have to do to be free of this thing?

Despite what Edmund had said, it seemed as though Lewis wasn’t the only one awake when there was a creak outside the door. Looking up, he saw the door inch open, Emily’s head appearing as she peered inside cautiously.

‘Edmund said everyone else was asleep,’ Lewis said as Emily slipped into the room when she saw that he was alone, a pale blue dressing gown wrapped tightly around her.

‘There’s not much chance of that,’ she said, sitting down on the edge of his bed. ‘How are you feeling?’

‘I ache a little, but otherwise I’m fine,’ he said with a weak smile as he reached out, examining the cut above her eye. ‘Are you?’

‘It’s just a little cut. All the blood made it look a lot worse than it was,’ she said as she pushed his hand away, gently taking hold of it. ‘Do you mean it this time? You aren’t lying to me again, are you?’

‘I mean it,’ he said. ‘I promise.’

‘You should have said something,’ she insisted. ‘It hurts knowing that you don’t trust me enough to tell me.’

‘I do trust you,’ he said, wrapping his hand around hers.

‘How do I know that, though? You wouldn’t even tell me where you were going when we got to Tristan,’ she said quietly.

‘I went to find Robyn,’ he said, deciding that he could tell her now that they were out of any immediate danger. ‘She’s a friend of mine that I trust. I went to see her because I wanted her to help get you out of Tristan if the worst happened. I had to know that you would be safe if I didn’t make it.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

‘Would you have agreed to it if I had?’ he asked knowingly.

‘No,’ she muttered after a moment. ‘It doesn’t matter though; I thought my last memories of you were going to be you lying to me and disappearing off without telling me anything.’

‘I’m sorry,’ he said shamefully. He hadn’t really thought about it at the time; he was so focused on getting to the coronation in time.

‘Do you remember when we said we would talk about things once it was all over?’ she asked after a moment of silence. Slowly, he nodded, recalling the conversation they had had on The Wings of Gold before they got to The Misty Islands.

‘Edmund doesn’t think it’s over yet,’ he said.

‘I know; he’s already said it,’ she replied. ‘That’s not got anything to do with this, though.’

‘What hasn’t got anything to do with what?’ he asked as he sat up straighter.

‘I don’t know if I can do this anymore,’ she muttered as a single tear rolled down her cheek.

‘What?’ he asked, baffled.

‘In the last two weeks alone, you’ve been poisoned twice, and I’ve nearly been killed by a giant board game,’ she said. ‘I know you said to wait until it was all over, but I can’t. It’s too much! I couldn’t go to sleep because I didn’t know if you would still be here in the morning.’

‘You had the antidote to the poison, though,’ Lewis said.

‘That doesn’t matter.’

‘It does, though. You saved my life,’ he argued.

‘But what if I hadn’t had the antidote to it?’ she asked. You would have died in the courtyard where you fell. I don’t know if I would have been able to deal with that if I never got to

‘Never got to what?’ he asked, giving her hand an encouraging squeeze.

I never got to tell you that I love you,’ she said quickly, colour rushing to her cheeks. When he didn’t respond, she pulled her hand from his, standing up. ‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have, she muttered, breaking off when he caught her arm before she could leave the room.

‘Emily, wait,’ he said quietly, pulling her back towards him. Shuffling forward, he pulled her close, kissing her gently. As she wound her arms around his neck, he felt something deep inside him spark into life. ‘Will you stay?’ he asked, pulling back slightly. Silently, she nodded.

Pulling back the heavy red bedcovers, he watched as she discarded her light blue dressing gown to reveal a pair of green shorts and an old black t-shirt that he recognised as the one he had lent her the night they had first met. As she climbed in beside him, he threw the cover over her, pulling her closer to him. ‘I love you too,’ he whispered as he placed a soft kiss on the cut above her eye.

Smiling, she looked up at him. ‘What do you think will happen now?’ she asked.

‘It doesn’t really matter,’ he muttered as he closed his eyes. For all he cared, the world could worry about that while he got some sleep. ‘We can figure it out in the morning.’