November 1069

I woke up sometime later, maybe a minute, my right arm numb from the shoulder down and my ears still ringing. Our horses had tried to bolt and been stopped by our wards, and were now conked out on the ground unconscious. The fires that had started raging after the sudden scattering of the campfire and the lightning strikes were being washed away, and Henri was helping Hubert up into a sitting position against the lower stump of a tree that had been blasted apart by lightning. My light had gone out, and had been replaced by a weaker, ruddier, and more diffuse glow. Salazar was busy cutting apart the blob the draugr used to be, and my head was pounding like AC/DC were holding a concert in my skull.

And all was right with the world.

I tried to get up, fell over, and decided the ground was comfortable enough before rolling over onto my back, panting. AC/DC gradually wound down their concert, and once I could sort of half-hear again, I tried to sit up. Once I managed that, I progressed to looking around for my iron baseball, which was fortunately just within reach. I strained my ribs in the process, but I put the baseball back in my pocket before I decided to attempt standing. It took a few tries, but I finally managed to find my feet, at which point my back started screaming at me.

"Ow," I said.

Hubert's face was raw, puffy, and torn up by cat claws. Once I felt comfortable ambling around, I made my way over to the unconscious form of Shadowfax, dropped to my knees, and started rummaging around one-handed, looking for my medical potions and bandages. It took three times as long to get them all out than it should've, but once I had them laid out I called for Henri to help carry them. Between the two of us we got Hubert to drink a crude antibiotic and wrapped up his head, saving a painkiller for later once enough time had passed that Hubert didn't need to test potion miscibility in his stomach.

Malfoy got the rest of the bandages; the draugr had been aiming a little better with its remaining front paw and come within a hair's breadth of tearing out his eye. As it was, he looked as scarred as I did.

"Harry," Salazar called then. "Get over here and burn the remains."

I gave Salazar a long-suffering look, then called my blasting rod to my working hand and slowly hobbled over. As I muttered, "Fuego," and started burning up the remains, Salazar grabbed my unresponsive right hand and leaned in.

"How did you control it?" he whispered.

I was too tired and hurt to deal with this shit. "How did you freeze a draugr with a look?" I shot back.

He stilled.

"We've all got our secrets, Salazar. Don't go digging in mine," I said. "Did Malfoy notice?"

"I doubt it, he had the wrong angle to see past your lash to your… drumming," he said.

"Great. Now let go. I can't feel your hand anyway."

Salazar frowned briefly. Then he flipped my hand around and summoned a light from the end of his wand, revealing that my veins and arteries were practically bulging out of my skin.

"That's bad, right?" I asked intelligently.

"Quiet," he muttered, then tapped the wand against my skin. I felt the sensation of foreign magic probing me and tentatively let it go. It stopped after about half a minute, and Salazar pulled his wand back.

"Curse of rot, but on the weaker side," he pronounced. "No need for amputation. Give it a few weeks or months, should run its course."

"Couldn't it have gone on my left? That hand's already scarred," I said, sighing. "But, thanks, I guess. Now let go before this gets weird and we start liking each other."

He did so, and my arm flopped back to my side.

"Can you pack the head in something, like a bag?" I asked. "Should probably bring it back to the castle."

We couldn't be bothered to move camp after that, and basically all fell asleep once the adrenaline finally wore off. We woke up to the crack of dawn, by which point my arm had gone from "numb" to "every nerve is on fire." I had to commandeer the painkiller potion at that point. The process of saddling up was a headache and a half. Salazar didn't come back with us; he said he was going to have a look around to make sure the draugr was the end of things, and would inform us once he'd done that. Personally, I was up for a brief stay at a castle.

Hubert and Henri's injuries were bad, but not mortal. Henri got off lighter than Hubert, just some strained and bruised arms. Hubert, meanwhile, was dealing with pain across basically his entire upper body, including a number of cracked and fractured bones. He'd be out of commission for months, if not forever.

We made it back to Trematon Castle as twilight was starting, and drew quite the crowd as we rode through the gates. I needed some help getting off my horse, as did Hubert, and once we were all off we were all swiftly bundled inside to Reginald's private chambers.

I sighed as I slumped into a seat, and then hefted the sack Salazar had packed the draugr's head into with a grunt, dropping it on the table. Reginald wrinkled his nose.

"Smells foul," he said.

"It's the decapitated head of a redead corpse," I said. "Of course it smells like shit."

Reginald glanced around at all of us – me, Malfoy, Hubert, and Henri – and our general state of injury before getting up, moving to the sack, and slowly opening it. He paused a moment later, which didn't surprise me.

The draugr's head had been "frozen" mid-transformation between cat and man, and looked completely and grotesquely wrong. It had partial cat ears that looked like blackened human flesh, a skull that was at once too long to be a human's and too tall and large to be cat's, and its teeth were all sharp and curved.

"Is this… the draugr?" Reginald asked.

I grunted. "Was in cat form before we killed it."

"Don't know what damn form it was in when we did," Henri added.

"We'll stay for the next few days to recover, and see if anything else happens," I said. "But if you could somehow arrange a ship back to London in the meanwhile, that would be great."

"I will see about that," Reginald said slowly, still peering into the sack. "What should be done with this?"

"Burn it, then throw its ashes into the sea," Malfoy said.

We were left alone after that, given leave to go back to our own rooms, and then, and only then, did I turn towards Malfoy and, taking a deep breath, in Latin asked, "Did you seriously fucking forget it could move through the ground?"

Malfoy scowled. "Draugr are capable of many different things. And neither you nor Salazar remembered it either."

"Yeah, but we weren't the ones pushing the draugr theory, which admittedly turned out to be right, and setting ourselves up as experts, were we?" I asked. "Also, we're not the ones that forgot it could move through the earth. You did. That seems like a pretty major detail to overlook, considering it ended up bypassing all of our wards. You're lucky none of us died. As it is a man probably crippled himself for life saving us."

Malfoy scowled, worked his jaw, sighed, and stalked off.

"Great response, very mature," I muttered to myself after he wandered off.

Over the course of the next few days, the pain in my arm went from "near debilitating" to just "constant roasting," and I could sort of barely move my arm and hand. You can probably tell from the way the writing's getting all ugly that I'm stuck using my left hand for the time being. Around the second day, I wrote a letter to Helga predicated on the assumption Salazar wouldn't find anything else to deal with, and that evening, as I was stretching my legs walking the walls, an owl arrived. It was smaller than Hogwig, was completely white, and also came with a letter for me. Crudely and awkwardly, I took and opened the letter, finding that it was in Salazar's handwriting. It contained two words:

It's done.

I sighed, rolled back my shoulders, and groaned. Then I looked at the owl. "Bring this back to Salazar, will you?" I asked, digging around in my pocket for the letter to Helga.

The owl cocked its head.

"No, I don't have any food for you. I wasn't expecting you. Go catch a squirrel or something, there's plenty of woods and trees around here."

The owl hooted in my face.

"Oh, just take it and go," I said, thrusting the curled up letter in its direction.

It glared at me for a moment, then nearly clawed me as it took my letter and flew off.

"And screw you too," I muttered, then made my way back down.

I found Malfoy, shoved the letter into his hands, and went off to find Reginald. He told me that a ship was either going to stop by the coast tomorrow, a slight detour between Fowey and London, or his men would come back by land because there were no ships. I thanked him for the help, then went back to my temporary room to sleep off the pain. It barely helped.

As it happened a ship did come by the next day, and an hour later Malfoy and I had embarked and set off on that eastward bound trading vessel. Maybe it wasn't the best idea, getting back on the seas with a damaged arm and hand while Mab's threat still hung over me, but I blame the pain in my arm. It was really, really distracting.

The boat trip passed without incident, and by the time we came back to London, my right arm worked well enough that I could barely mount Shadowfax on my own. Malfoy certainly wasn't helping. It took another day of painful, hard riding to get back to Berkhamsted, and when we arrived William's banners were noticeably absent from the castle's walls. I didn't bother following Malfoy as he set about asking where the king had gone, content in the knowledge I'd probably beaten him to the punch when it came to reporting what had happened, and just went home, slept for a solid twelve hours, and decided I wasn't leaving the village at all until winter passed and spring rolled around, meetings be damned.

Berkhamsted had a rather fluid and active rumor mill, courtesy of being a stop on multiple trade routes and occasional host of great noble and/or royal court, so it didn't really surprise me when Elfleda came by the next day. I welcomed her in and ushered her into the main room, where the pale skin and bulging veins of my right hand quickly became apparent.

"What happened?" she asked, sitting down next to me with a worried expression.

"Death curse," I said. "It's been getting progressively better, but it's still an incredible pain to use, and will be for a while."

"Death curse?"

"Everyone's got magic in them, sustaining their life and existence. Most people can't tap into it at all, but powerful enough practitioners can take that internal magic and use it to empower a spell. Now, doing that kills you, so practitioners generally only do it when they're already about to die. Thus, death curse," I said, gritting my teeth as I tried to clench and unclench my hand. "I got lucky with this one, death curses can be a lot nastier." I held up a gloved hand as she went to ask another question. "I met the Winter Queen."

Elfleda's face dropped. "Oh."

"Yeah. On the boat to Cornwall, actually. The first night. She said that the ocean was her domain, thereabouts, and that let her visit me."

"Oh," Elfleda said, brow furrowed. Then her eyes widened. "Oh. Oh God, I'm so sorry, I didn't, I didn't know she could do that."

Elfleda fell silent and I looked at her face, trying to decide if I believed her. After a moment, I sighed.

"Swear on your power," I said.

Elfleda looked up at me cautiously. "That sounds important."

"It is," I said. "Most verbal agreements and statements aren't really backed up by anything, just the belief the other party will keep their word and not lie. For those with magic and power, however, swearing by it is more substantial, because if you break your word and you swore on your power, you lose some. Break enough, you lose everything."

Elfleda averted her eyes and looked down at the table, not saying a word. I let the silence drag on, wondering what her response would be.

"I swear on my power that I didn't know she could do that," she said quietly. "I didn't send you off to meet her."

I let out a sigh. "It's alright. Thank you. I should've known better myself, frankly. And it's not like anything really happened."

Elfleda looked up at me, a bit confused. "It… didn't?"

I shook my head. "She showed up, threw her weight around, and then said she wouldn't see me again."

Elfleda slowly blinked. "The Queen… is Sidhe, yes?"

"Yeah," I said.

"Then that seems very suspicious to me," she said. "In my admittedly limited experience, Sidhe don't just stop being problems, you have to make them stop. Unless she's moving on from you?"

"No, she's not doing that. She just seems to think she can make me come to her, which isn't happening," I said.

"And why not?"

"Because there's no reason to," I said. "The current state of affairs kind of sucks, but it's one I can live with. I have no desire to go chasing after her." I sighed and relaxed my hand. "Anyway, can we move on from her? How's Eva?"

"Good," Elfleda said, brightening somewhat at the change in topics. "She's back at the castle, enjoying the timeless pastime of watching men and boys hard at work and practicing."

"Ogling the eye candy?" I asked.

Elfleda considered my words for a moment, then nodded. "A good description. They were busy with some sets when I left, and I wasn't sure how long you would be staying, so I didn't bring her."

"Well, I don't plan to leave until spring, so I'll try and make the most of the winter months," I said.

Elfleda frowned. "You aren't? But that Malfoy fellow is planning on leaving, to find the king. Are you not going to accompany him?"

"No, I don't feel like riding out again. Besides, I know something he doesn't."

Elfleda arched an eyebrow. "Oh?"

I leaned in slightly. "I sent a fully detailed letter to my much prettier and more persuasive colleague, detailing what we did and asking her to relay that information to the king. Half to beat Malfoy to the punch, half to show him, I mean the king, the benefits of cooperation with a group of wizards and witches."

Elfleda nodded approvingly, then looked at me in an interesting way. "Much prettier, you say? What's her name?"

"I'm not taking that bait," I said. "She's a colleague, that's all."

"Hmm. If you say so," she said, looking back down at my hand. "How bad is it, really?"

"Can barely raise it to my shoulder or grip things. Cup's about the extent of what I can lift. Oh, and every movement causes pain. But, you know, it works." I clenched my left hand. "Better than the time my left hand got burnt to a crisp."

"Oh?" Elfleda asked, turning to look at it. "What happened there?"

"An enemy of mine got smart and turned my usual tactics around on me. Way back when, my shield was better at blocking physical force rather than energy, like fire." I relaxed my fingers. "I've learned since then."

"I see. You are right-handed yes, not ambidextrous or left?" Elfleda asked.

"I'm a rightie," I said.

She nodded, then smirked saucily at me. "Would you like my help then, to spoon-feed you and spare you the pain?"

I choked. "That's uh, that's a bit, forward isn't it," I said in between coughs.

"I already visit your house frequently for long hours," she drawled, leaning into me. "You should hear some of the rumors going around."

"I'd rather not, thank you."

She laughed and pulled back. "If you wish, consider it recompense for my misstep with the boat."

I looked at her. "Are you insisting?"

"Are you declining?" she asked, eyebrow arched.

I sighed and looked away. "Look, it's not that I don't… enjoy the banter or appreciate the gestures, but I have a lot of baggage. History. And generally bad experiences with women being this forward with me. The relationships either ended horribly or they were trying to manipulate me from the start." I cocked my head slightly. "Both, in one case."

Elfleda's smile fell off, and after a few moments she sighed. "I'm sorry. I thought you'd appreciate it. And… it's instinct, almost."

I could see that. I'd run into a number of Winter Sidhe, and they were all distinctive. There were varying degrees of cruelty and pettiness and overt sexuality and a hundred other personality traits, but if there was one thing they had in common it was that, for all the ways in which they could and did work subtly, they were also very forward.

"I appreciate the thought," I finally said. "But I don't think it's appropriate right now."

Elfleda nodded and pulled back. "But is there something I can get for you, do for you?"

I paused and looked down at my left hand, recalling what I'd done as part of the physical therapy after it had been burned. "Maybe. Can you get me a lute?"

She frowned slightly. "The instrument?"

"Yeah."

"I will see what I can do," she said slowly.

I nodded in thanks. "Where'd the king go, anyway?" I asked. "I assume Robert went with him, seeing as how no one's come by to drag me to the castle."

"He did," Elfleda confirmed. "They went north to deal with some rebels, as I've heard it."

"In winter? Or just before?" I asked.

Elfleda shrugged. "I'm just repeating what I've heard."

I grunted. "Fair enough." I side-eyed her. "Not going to ask me how I got these scars?"

Elfleda laughed. "No, not right now. I'll save it for when Eva's present." She gave me a look. "You seem to draw enjoyment from making a teaching moment out of everything."

"I'm not that bad." I paused. "Am I?"