Huzzah! I got an idea. Thanks to my reviewers and NoRestForTheWicked, who keeps proding me to update. If there are too many character screwups, you can call this an AU fic.

We trudged back up to the top of the slide we'd accidentally come down. Actually, Albert was doing all the trudging. I was flying and quite happy to be above the ground. I wanted to be nowhere closer to Fort Magrad.

"Are you coming along?" I asked turning. Albert was dragging his feet, probably to get away from me. He raised his chin haughtily and stubornly kept his pace. I shook my head and continued along.

"So that's what happened!" I exclaimed when I hit the top of the tunnel. Albert's curiousity got the better of him and he came to see what I was talking about.

"What?" He asked. He was excited, but keeping it under raps pretty well.

"They fell down the slide and came out here. If we'd just looked a little more we'd have found more foot prints and you wouldn't have had to fall down the slide like that." I explained. He gave me a shove for my efforts. I landed face down in the snow and dogded a spear aimed at my head.

"Is that really any way for a king to act?" I asked. "Especially one so generous and caring?"

"Everyone has people that they don't get along with. I don't know what got into me down there, but what ever it was, it's gone now and I fully intend to kill you." Albert had retrieved his spear as I scrambled up.

"Look, I told you already, I was justified. He was trying to kill me, just like you are now." I said. I was hoping his sense of logic would kick in and bring him back to reality.

A well aimed spear decided that wasn't going to work.

It grazed my shoulder nicely and managed to hit the spot where my armor was just a little open. I felt warmth begin to seep out of the wound.

Again Albert retrieved his spear. He held the it to my throat like a knife, taking advantage of my shock at the blood.

"It's not as... clean... as a knife, but it's still sharp and it will still slit your throat." He hissed in my ear.

"And if you kill me, how are you going to find you're way back to your friends?" I asked. The gravity of my situation was starting to sink in.

"The same way we've been looking for them." He said.

"Foot prints don't last forever. What if there's another snow storm?" I was trying to keep him talking, and I knew if I didn't, I'd be joining Lavitz.

"Well? What were you going to do when those ran out?" He asked.

"Fly up and see what I could see." I was blunt and hoped I hadn't made a mistake in that respect. He took a few seconds to think, but the time seemed interminable. Finally he sighed and let me go.

He waited in silence as I did what I could to bandage my shoulder. I had to remove a lot of my armor. I could feel his eyes on me but every time he thought I noticed, he looked away.

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"Are you still not finished?" Albert asked. I was trying to fit my armor on over my bandage but every time one fit in place, the other slipped.

"I need another pair of hands or something." I said, this time trying to slide the bandage under the armor.

"Why don't you just heal it?" he asked.

"Because I can't." I said shortly. I didn't need reminding of *them*. His eyes widened just a little.

"Just why can't you? I thought the Winglies were so powerful they could do anything." Albert was doing this just to get under my skin.

"That might have been true before the campaign, but after things got very different." I said. Anything to keep the subject off *them*.

"Something you don't want me to know?" Albert decided he might as well be that extra pair of hands and we managed to get both bandage and armor placed properly.

"Yes." I said. We left the ruins and went on to folow the foot prints to where ever they led.

Joyous! Another chapter done and dusted!