The Unsung Past

by tajuki

"In the rich textures of gray, where black and white mesh to create reality, we must realize that there were heroes on both sides, the blood of the innocent on the hands of all." Albus Dumbledore, from Foreword. A Founders Saga.

8. The Siege Of Christchurch

Chapter Eight

The Siege of Christchurch

"Mindful of hardships, grievous slaughter, the ruin of kinsmen,

The wanderer said: 'Time and again the day's dawning I must

Mourn all my afflictions alone.'"

-The Wanderer, The Exeter Book.

In the low lighted chamber, darkened by thick walls of rough-hewn stone Azria lay soaking in a tub of cold pewter. The temperature of the water had long since dwindled and melded with the chill of its metal container. As it was cold, it was no longer clear. Mingling with the water hauled up from the river by her maidservant, Azria's bath also contained deep, dark Scottish soil, dingy sweat from exertion and not a little bit of blood—some of which must be her dear brother's.

Only the highest points of her cheeks, her nose and her forehead broke the surface of the steady pool. Her concentration was bent on not disturbing the glass-like serenity and so endeavored to keep her breathing from rocking her body to the surface with every intake and plunging it back to the bottom when the air was spent from her lungs. It took her mind away from the grievous scene she had met two days before.

An all-too-sudden flash broke her concentration from the water and her breathing. Like lightening before her eyes, and quite as blinding, a succession of scenes hit her knocking her face below the surface. In surprise she gasped, flooding her lungs with water. What she had seen was horrifying. At first she had thought it was the battleground that she has recently come from, bearing her dead brother from it. But it was not. It was an aggressive siege bent on taking an enormous fortress whose back was pushed to the sea. There were faces she recognized: young Isabelle Gryffindor who could not get out. She was trapped in a burning room. Brave Christopher of the riding school—the steward of the Hufflepuff land—it was his son. She knew instinctively that he would not draw another breath.

The scene bled away, dissolving into a new one: the maid with the gift of forging from glass—a rare and admired talent—was standing upon a gallows, she had tears in her eyes. She was frightened. Her hands were bound behind her. What was happening to her? What had she done to incur such wrath?

When she tried to push this scene into an answer it had, like the one before it, drifted away; only to be replaced by a new scene.

This one was of Eomer. Azria tried to gasp, but this time she had no air, only water in her lungs. In vain she tried to call out but her words were mute. She could not make out the scene. When she tried to concentrate on the details they faded. Everything became white and she felt the energy drain from her as she floated just under the surface of her bath.

Rowena watched as Eomer worked. His project had taken them all but the last few moments of day to complete. Now those last touches of day were turned to gold by the sun which was setting over the mountains to the west.

She stood at a distance and watched him stoop to secure the last stone in the ground and cover it over with earth. His golden head bowed low, she thought curiously about its color and how it reflected the moods of the sun, Apollo—and certainly his life reflected that same tragedy.

Eomer looked up, dusting the dark soil from his hands. He caught her eye and was instantly made conscious of her scrutiny.
Rowena, in a moment of awkwardness, turned to the sun and peered into its rays.

"A red sun will set, bringing blood with it," she commented at last.

Standing, Eomer also looked that way, shading his eyes with a soiled hand. "I think you must be right, lady," he replied plainly.

Rowena never heard this comment. She began walking faster down the hill, almost at a run.

Alarmed, Eomer dropped his hand and followed. As he closed the distance between them, he saw what she had: two riders.

Before he could ascertain the identities of the pair of riders Rowena's voice had cut off his posturing.

"Eomer," she commanded breathlessly. "Find my daughter. She is hunting in the southern wood. Take a horse, you will go faster." She indicated a stable at the other end of the brief hill. It was the first building before the large complex of Brigidena that jutted out from the expansive loch.

Eomer nervously nodded and moved off slowly, watching Rowena race toward the unpleasant visitors, calculating exactly how long it had been since he had ridden, and thinking even more apprehensively on the two riders and the lady's reaction.

Looking after her with a moment of consideration Eomer decided that she was either a very brave woman or that she knew not what danger she would inevitably meet.

As Rowena's sons, Theoderic and Galahad where making for the small port that lay west of them called Cork, two sons of Gryffindor rode silently into Christchurch. The sun was setting behind the quiet fortress giving it a last halo of serenity. Isaiah saw this as he cleared the thick forest on the farthest northern border and felt his heart drop into his stomach—a last cruel teasing picture of what by nightfall might be lost to them.

Motioning to the expanse below, Isaiah turned to his companion. "The heraldic firelight before the dawn of the fight."

Faramir looked to the many campfires dotting the landscape below them. The enemy lay in wait for dark and then…maybe a surprise stoning. He saw Christchurch before them like a helpless Stephen. They were all going to be persecuted for what they believed. Or maybe he just lacked the faith that gave other warriors their courage—that is how one's name was remembered after he was gone.

Sucking in a calming breath and forgetting his apprehension, Faramir turned to Isaiah and asked, "How shall we slip past them?" noting how far-reaching the firelight was.

Isaiah was already tugging the reins of his horse and disappeared into the forest they had just penetrated.

When Faramir had caught up with him, Isaiah explained stoically, "For centuries my family's stronghold has remained in our hands."

Faramir felt that hope should not be given over to the enemy quite yet. They had not even made it to the walled city to assess the situation. He wanted to tell Isaiah this but Isaiah continued, surprising Faramir with his admission.

"We can hold out for months with more men against us than you see before us now. Follow the river with me and I shall show you, loyal squire of my father, the Gryffindor's best guarded secret."

Faramir considered the gesture of confidence that Isaiah was showing in him, but the words "loyal squire of my father" and the feeling Isaiah had conveyed with them communicated to Faramir just how little confidence Isaiah held in his companion.

Dutifully, Faramir followed the son of his lord.

Helga set her shoulders and walked into the long tournament room that Salazar had been pacing.

He barely registered her presence.

This made her angry, that anger quickly dissolving into steely resolution.

"This is not true, is it?" Helga asked, knowing she did not have to elaborate. Salazar would have an answer for her, but she had decided before she ever entered the room that no answer was satisfactory.

She was waving a letter.

Salazar stopped his deliberate movements for a small interval in order to stare at the letter, resolving that he already knew who the author was.

"I must know what you mean by instigating war between yourself and Godric," she demanded, placing herself between Salazar and his intended path.

He stopped and considered for a moment. He was inches from her, could reach out and touch her if he had wanted to. He kept his fingers locked behind his back.

"I would have to consider a foe of mine to be equal in strength to bring this to a war. In this case, I mean merely to strip him of every crutch that remains to him. Edward means to destroy him, not I."

Helga grasped for words. "There is no hope for him at Christchurch, then?" There was a long pause. "Why would you destroy your friends?"

Salazar circumvented her and continued on his course. "I knew sooner than not you would come to me with these questions. I confess, I have not found an answer to convey my meaning aptly enough. But I can say that I act out of self preservation. While Rowena and yourself," he paused and turned a glaring look on her, "and even my son have colluded with Godric and with Wallace, our school has been placed in Edward's hands. Wallace is dead—"

Here Helga interrupted, braving Salazar's contemptuous look. "Wallace is dead because you gave him to Edward. What is it you fear about the side of right?"

Salazar drew himself up menacingly. "I fear nothing… least of all you, Helga. What is it you want from this conversation?" He stopped again and faced her. "An apology? An oath to stop my plans? What do you want?"

"I want you to give me your interests in this school," Helga announced.

Salazar considered her for an eternity before carefully answering, "I will not."

"In thirty or more years our friendship has weathered many things. Your absence of many years in the crusades, my marriage, your marriage, this school's founding… I do not see how this partnership will last. Our visions are just too…" Helga struggled for the appropriate words for what she felt was a very delicate idea to communicate.

"My idea is visionary. All I want is for the survival of our kind, our talents and our ways. Three out of the four of us…friends did you call us? You, Godric and even Rowena want to push our people into the mould that we do not fit in. Your idea does not shape our kind; it clips and tears at our identity until the resulting mass is acceptable to the inferior. It disgusts me to think about it." He neared her forcefully. "I say to your kind request: no. What is more, I will have this school from your corrupting grasp and Rowena's as well. You will not be able to influence this school. You will be stunned to witness with what efficiency I will do it."

Helga stared, disbelieving. "You cannot possibly. The school resides on my land."

Salazar smiled.

It was a smile that told Helga that she had underestimated what power he held over all of them.

"Trust me," he replied with snakelike smoothness.

"This is all true, then?" a voice asked shakily from the doorway of the tournament room. "My Godric's friends have turned on him. They will steal his school away, his estate at Christchurch, his very life?" Rose asked standing just inside the room. Her hand rested on a wall to support her heavy frame, and another supported her large middle that protruded even under layers of heavy fabric.

"Rose, do not upset yourself in your condition," Helga answered uneasily. "I am handling this. Please return to your room. You should not be out in all this state."

"I saw the smoke from the stable," she said, looking past Helga and into Salazar's cold eyes. "I know what it is you have done."

"What shall be your course of action against me? Are you suggesting that you have alliances with others of your kind that would consent to assist your afflicted husband and his family?" he asked deliberately and sarcastically.

"My father—," Rose began.

"Lord Whitehall, your father, helped himself to a large part of the Gryffindor lands that the king offered for his assistance. It will be incorporated into his own lands when Edward's men have their inevitable victory." It was visible on his features how much he delighted in the horror reflected on the face of the frightened woman. He was so much enjoying the small triumph that he barely noticed Helga moving to traverse the space to Rose's side.

"You are cruel, Salazar. Truly," Helga proclaimed, reaching out to support Rose who pulled away from her.

"My daughter is with him," Rose said, more as a realization than as a proclamation. She had not finished the small sentence before she fell heavily to the ground, nearly blocking the doorway.

Helga stooped, patting her face, taking Rose's hand in her own. "Rose," she kept pleading. "Rose, wake up!" She looked to Salazar as he moved slowly closer.

In all her noise and fretting she did not hear Salazar's murmured, "Pestillentea

Helga's mouth was agape when her pleas of, "Salazar, help me with her," went unanswered.

Salazar merely stepped over the prone woman, calling as his steps disappeared down the hallway, "I shall send a servant."

In the shadow of the high and chalky cliffs two horses carried two riders.

Godric and Sarah had set the last ward stone, but not, Godric felt, before all of the chief actors of this scene had made it onto the stage. His plan to keep the soldiers from coming onto his estate and to the aid of those few hundred that already had set up camp against the walls of his city had failed. Already apprehension edged in on his consciousness that armed men were crossing into the border as he set that last stone.

There was one comfort in that at least: they were trapped on the estate.

Godric felt that he could deal with a finite number of enemies, just as long as Edward had no means of replenishing them.

He planned to enter his city undetected, gain a better vantage point of the situation. There would be time for reflection afterward—plenty of time, in fact, as they waited out the siege.

"There is singing on the cliff's ledge," Sarah commented, sitting rigidly on her saddle, aware of every hoof beat their animals made in the chalky soil of the beach. One of them needs only look over and see us. It would be all over.

"I mark the voice of five-hundred at best. Edward could not spare more," Godric replied confidently and calmly, belying the tense feelings in his shoulders and the rapid pounding of his heart as his horse trudged silently through the sand. They need only look over. "Indeed, he has sent them to take what is mine and to show me—and those like me just what a low place we should hold." His words sounded bitter.

"You do not think he will replenish his troops in two or three day's time?" Sarah asked, astonished at her cousin's coolness of manner.

"You have not asked me on the whole of our journey across my estate what we have been doing, dutiful cousin." Godric replied in measured words. He was scanning the distance as they made a bend in the cliff-face and the beach continued around and disappeared behind the distant wall. "I do believe he will send reinforcements. It is too fair a prospect. But they will never find this place. The wards have masked the land. No more can they walk into my lands than I can cross out of them."

"You mean to say," Sarah asked slowly, "we are trapped here with our enemies?"

"I mean to say," Godric explained, "we have cut off those trespassers above us and now we shall see what might the king holds over us." If he had meant to say more he did not. Sarah's arrow whined past him, startling his horse. He followed the trajectory as it imbedded itself into the rock face ahead of them—just before the path of two men and their horses.

"But there!" Sarah exclaimed, replacing her bow for her reins, "Our source for fresh water and safe passage is found out! Two guards meet us ahead, just at the mouth of the cave."

"Then they shall never see the light of another day," Godric proclaimed, unsheathing his sword and digging a heel into the side of his horse.

Godric's instinct had been accurate. A band of soldiers had slipped onto the estate just as he had placed the last of the ward stones.

High above them in the forest that slopes down from the north for several miles before leveling out into the city of Christchurch that band of soldiers wended quietly through the same woods Isaiah and Faramir had slipped in from.

Among the riders in scarlet and gold regalia, Claire sat uneasily in the saddle, afraid of what was to come, afraid of her situation and most of all afraid of being found out by her peers. She did not count on them remembering that it was she who had saved them from Salazar Slytherin's trap, but she did not count on getting caught impersonating a soldier in any case.

As if purposefully aimed at contradicting this resolution, Claire heard the soldier on her right side draw closer. She turned and saw that it was her companion, Christopher.

"I know who you are," he whispered, careful to cut off his accusation as two soldiers overtook and passed them in the dim woods. "The question is," he continued when all others were at a safe distance from them, "why you risk all for men wholly unconnected with yourself." He sat up in his saddle, no longer leaning intimately close to her. "Perhaps you do not know what danger you will meet with when we enter Christchurch."

Claire felt a sting of indignity. "I fully know what is at stake. And if I had not convinced the Scarlet Guard, I would have plunged headlong into the fray alone," she answered, staring into Christopher's unconvinced eyes with resolve.

He leaned over in his saddle, this time less for the intimacy of private conversation than to emphasize the gravity of his point. "This is the English. They will bring with them trained archers whose volley will blot out the sun. The cavalry will bear down on us like a storm at sea, the hoof beats like thunder. They strike faster than a flash of light. They will not even consider you before they run you through."

The head of guard was riding by. As a passing comment he offered, "Do not frighten the new recruit, Christopher."

"Sir," Christopher answered, sitting upright in his saddle again.

Both Claire and Christopher waited until they were alone once more to continue. "Do you seek to educate me, or to give voice to your own fears?" Claire jabbed.

Earnestly Christopher answered, "I mean to warn you. I thank you for the service you have done us against the Green Guard, but perhaps you should turn back now."

Claire lifted her chin and stared sharply forward. "There is nothing you could say that would induce me to such an action."

She heard Christopher exhale and pause. "Then, for my own peace of mind, stay close to me, that I may always know you are safe."

Claire did not answer. She felt indignant at the suggestion, but oddly warmed and comforted. She felt her nerves ease to know that she had a friend among strangers here. She nodded and kicked a heel into her horse's side to catch up to the rest of the guard.

The sun had set when they cleared the forest and were afforded their first look of the besieged city. Fires dotted the two mile stretch of land laid out between them and their master's home. Siege engines were being assembled, large stones collected.

Claire shivered at the awesome sight of man's actions fueled by man's hate.

"It will be on by morning," Christopher said somewhere close to her.

"We set up camp here," the head guard ordered.

Claire met Christopher's eyes and his look was warning: stick close.

Eomer felt his task was impossible: find the indecorous little hunter known as Maren. It would have been impossible had an arrow not whizzed past Eomer. Immediately he took to one knee.

"Maren," he called. "Put down your bow."

A young woman of fifteen came darting out of the thick underbrush to his left.

A moment of surprise registered on her perfectly pale features before she laughed.

"That shot would have sent me straight to the devil had I gotten you. My apologies," she offered.

Dressed in a brown doublet and protective leather guards for her wrist she looked in all respects like a young man. Her hair tied back with golden wild tendrils down her back and the skirt she wore half steeped in mud were the only signs that gave away her sex, save that she had a decidedly feminine way with her movements, not at all delicate, more of a bold assertion of her duality. You could tell that the skirt was imposed upon her by her mother. Dirtying the hem must be her way of communicating the ridiculousness of the thing.

"Think not on it," Eomer replied breathlessly. He rose and dusted off the knees of his frock. "I am sent to fetch you."

Maren stopped where she was, lowering her bow. "Why?" She looked past him as if the answer were written behind them. "What has happened?"

"Where is your steward's house? I think we may need his help," Eomer said, not answering her question.

"My mother," Maren demanded, tightening her grip on her weapon. "Where is she?"

"Lady Rowena instructed me to find you and I have. Do what you will, I cannot stop you. I am ignorant of the feuds of your land and I have no right to impose will or prudence on you. I only ask of you to point me toward your steward that I may apply for his help." Eomer stared impatiently at the girl and waited for her to decide her own course of action. She finally pointed east toward the main road.

"His is the first house you shall pass between here and the village."

Maren lifted her bow and ran past Eomer the way he had come into the wood.

Thinking better of it, Eomer did not allow her to get on her way immediately.

"Maren," he called.

She stopped, obviously perturbed at the interruption from her course.

"Those who wield the sword will surely die upon it," he warned.

She turned to leave the wood, calling out as she disappeared beyond Eomer's sight, "If it is my destiny."

He looked out in the direction she had gone for a moment considering the girl and her rash behavior. "Destiny," he repeated to himself, unsure whether he believed in the thing or not. Then he headed toward the village to find the steward.

"Six of the Guard is dead," Eowyn informed her father, closing the door to his private room behind her. "What is that?" she asked as an afterthought, sneering at an ugly speckled egg that was at least as large as a human head.

Salazar sat polishing the egg at a center table and ignored the last question.

"I mean to know how the Scarlet Guard was alerted," he announced resolutely.

Eowyn folded her arms across her chest. Contemplatively she murmured, "Godric Gryffindor will know of your plot by morning.

"Thank you, my pet," Salazar said, gritting his teeth. "I had not thought of that."

"What will you do?" Eowyn pressed.

Salazar continued polishing. "Continue as planned. Godric will not live." The pronouncement came as a fact from his lips—one he was warming to by the second. "It is futile after that. Rowena Ravenclaw will meet much the same fate." He smiled. "Helga will be far easier to deal with."

"Better and better," Eowyn said without feeling. She had heard all of this many times. There was still always a hint of doubt hanging in the room. "She is with child, you know," she added. She delighted in the small pieces of information she could accumulate around the compound of the two estates and the school. Even better was that information if it could in anyway catch her father off guard. He had not known of Helga and the child. She allowed herself a small smile.

"How are you so sure?" he asked, abandoning the egg—and propriety in front of his daughter—allowing a moment of shock to show on his features.

Eowyn pushed away from the door. She was pleased to have an avid audience in her father. She sat across from him leaning over the table conspiratorially. "A servant of her household told me of her circumstance. Her husband is dead. I wonder who the child belongs to."

"Why is that your business?" Salazar asked standing and replacing the egg in the cupboard in the corner and locking it.

"What is better? This same loose-tongued servant also told me that one of Helga's kitchen servants has disappeared. There was a pile of the maid's clothing found behind the outer wall of the kitchen, next to the stables. A boy from the riding school was the last to see her." Eowyn allowed herself another amused smile. "She stole his shoes."

"What are you on about, girl?" Salazar asked. His annoyance was reaching a fevered pitch.

Eowyn dropped her jaw as she saw he was not grasping the point. "Do you not see father? She disappeared just before the fire in the stable. The missing maid certainly has something to do with the death of the six soldiers of your Green Guard."

"For Christ's sake, child," Salazar shouted, only partially in disbelief. He mostly believed that there was truth in this. But he wanted peace to go over the facts without the incessant prattle of his silly gossip daughter plaguing him. "Leave me!"

Eowyn, caught off guard by his sudden outburst blinked. Standing slowly, she excused herself with a curtsey and a low apology under her breath.

Azria found herself lying in a pool of water. Covers of fur and linen had been pulled up to her chin. She had been laid in her bed, everything was damp feeling. She moved to get up, feeling the cool air hit her neck and shoulders. Her hair lay in dripping tangles on her pillow, down her back and around her neck. She felt as if she were being tied down by her own sopping mane.

Frightened by the imagined state of bondage she had awakened to, Azria sat up and screamed.

Several voices came back to her; all urging her, commanding her to lie still. Her stepmother's voice was mingled in with that of the more familiar sounds of her personal servants.

"You do not have the strength to be difficult, child. Calm yourself," Helga commanded from somewhere unseen.

Azria lay back on her pillow and craned her neck to the head of her bed. Helga was there. She had a hold of one of Azria's wrists.

"You nearly drowned yourself," Helga explained conspiratorially. She looked across to the other side of Azria's bed to where her handmaiden grasped her other wrist. "Catherine found you, and not too soon, I might add."

Azria could not understand why Helga was so accusing. She had not meant to fall under the surface of the water. She had been startled by something and sucked in a breath full of water. But what had startled her?

She wanted to explain, to tell Helga what had really happened in there, but she could not remember the circumstances herself.

Azria jerked her hands free of both restraints.

"I am not mad! I did not try to kill myself!"

"It is a most unforgivable sin," Helga continued without hearing Azria's words. "God gives us all grief and loss. You, I understand, have had more of a share in these than most. But Azria, this is inexcusable. I do not quite know how to proceed from here." Helga shook her head and shooed most of the staff from the room. Only Catherine remained behind.

"You need to rest. I will not have you carrying on this way. These are very dangerous times. You cannot give our enemies this power over us. There are some who would take advantage of your illness and do you harm."

Helga moved to the door and produced a key.

Catherine followed her.

Handing the key to Catherine, Helga's eyes never left Azria's. "She does not leave this room. If you need anything ask the servant posted outside the door. I do not want you to leave her side for any reason."

Catherine nodded one short nod and placed the key in an apron pocket after locking the door behind Helga.

What have I done to frighten everyone? What does Helga fear will leave this room…or enter it?

Azria drifted out of consciousness before she could puzzle the answers to these and other questions that clouded her mind.

"I have a feeling that we are being followed," Faramir said, stopping his horse and turning in his saddle. He peered past the ledge in the cliff face that jutted out behind them, blocking the path they had followed to this point.

Isaiah stopped at this pronouncement and studied that point for a moment as well.

"Come," Isaiah said finally, leaping from his saddle and picking up a piece of discarded pine. It had been long abandoned by the waves, high up on the beach and was dry. Isaiah tapped the end of the makeshift torch with his wand.

The moment that Faramir had taken his attention away from the path behind them an arrow whizzed past him, grazing his ear and imbedding itself into the rocks directly in front of them.

Isaiah dropped the torch and reached for his sword.

Faramir, still in his saddle, wheeled his horse and charged down the beach.

Isaiah saw his horse stop halfway down the sandy path and then skid sideways in the soft earth.

Their attackers had shown themselves. Although Isaiah could not see either of the intruding riders, Faramir's actions had told Isaiah that they were friends. He bent to pick up the extinguished torch and walked back, tracing the frantic hoof prints of Faramir's horse in the sand.

He was not astonished to see his father and his father's cousin, Sarah.

"I could have killed you. You ought to take care," Sarah was chastising Faramir.

"I apologize, my lady," Faramir said humbly.

Sarah looked affronted. "My lady?" she raged. "Call me Sarah."

Godric had jumped from his saddle to grasp the hand of his son with obvious joy. "Forgive me," he said turning to Sarah and Faramir, still squeezing the hand of his son. "Faramir, my squire, this is my cousin, Sarah."

Sarah smiled, instantly warming to Faramir. He nodded self-consciously and turned toward the cliff they had been studying before the arrow had flown past him.

Isaiah pointed with his torch, lit once again, "Going the same way, I assume?"

Godric nodded.

"I thought you would have still been in Scotland with Wallace?" Godric asked.

Faramir and Isaiah exchanged dark looks that did not escape Godric.

"Something has gone wrong?" Godric guessed.

"Wallace was captured and the battle did not favor us," Isaiah said, looking to the west, the sun lighting a million point of light out across the channel. "Aaron is dead. Who knows where Bruce has gone."

"How did you come to be standing here?" Godric asked certain that a large piece of information was eluding him. "Is my Guard with you?"

"Faramir and I left the campaign as it ended at Falkirk. Lady Verina sent a letter meaning to warn Aaron of Edward's plans for Christchurch. It did not reach him alive. She hoped that Aaron's small force might come to your assistance. Not many of them had survived. Faramir and I are all that is left to answer your call."

"Then I am happy you have come," Godric said, but there was no sign of happiness on his features. He seemed to look worn and worried and a lot older than Isaiah had ever seen him look.

Everyone dismounted and lead their horses to an outcropping of rock that looked like five steps that started a staircase. If you did not know to look for them you would not have known they were there.

Indeed, Faramir had been standing right at this point, the arrow was imbedded in the fifth of the steps.

He dropped the reins of his animal and slapped its rear, sending it off down the beach with the three other horses that had been ridden down here.

Sarah was cursing the loss of her two horses as Godric assured her they would find their way back to the river.

Isaiah was the first to reach the fifth step. From there it seemed to be less like a staircase than a succession of footholds and small recesses in the rock to pull you up.

Faramir brought up the end, tagging along after Sarah.

He watched where she went and emulated her moves as best he could. She seemed to traverse the vertical space almost effortlessly. She only had a few problems with her bow and quiver as they seemed to encroach upon her elbow space.

Faramir felt less sure-footed and was glad to see a small indention in the rock about two thirds of the way up the face of the rock. It was a space just big enough for someone to crouch into.

One by one, however Isaiah and then Godric and Sarah disappeared into the small space, leaving the terrace free. Faramir had not seen that the small space emptied out into a larger natural cave.

Once he had climbed to the ledge and thrown his arms out, legs dangling free over the beach below, Godric and Isaiah seized an arm and hoisted him over.

Faramir ducked the low overhanging that cut the cave off from the outside, blocking its view from nominal passersby. Underneath of this was a cavernous space that all four members of the party could stand in.

Looking up, Faramir noted a small pinpoint of light. There must be an opening up there somewhere, he thought, noting how high the ceiling of the space was. He could picture the camps of several of the enemy resting just above them.

In the center of the cave was a murky, stagnant black pool that smelled to Faramir like a stable that was long overdue for a cleaning out.

Around the edge of the black water there was a sandy bar where footprints marked a seldom used path. Faramir thought that those footprints could not have been new, but preserved in this ancient place for many years. He thought of his own footprints residing here for ages until they were discovered and trampled out by some newcomer.

The footprints led to an unassuming outcropping of rock that was cut back just enough to skirt past without touching the foul water. Isaiah moved toward this outcrop and then carefully past it.

The faint sound of bats met Faramir's ears and he realized that the ceiling must be covered in them. He followed the smoke trail of Isaiah's torch upward and saw several low-hanging rocks that seemed to slither in response to the light and smoke: bats. Their sleep having been interrupted, were making their presence known.

The pitch of the nocturnal animals escalated into a roar of screaming and screeching to which was added the flapping of thousands of tiny wings.

Faramir shut his eyes and mouth as droves of the creatures swarmed around him and past him, all funneling out of the entrance the way the four had come.

The party stood motionless for a while until the swarming stopped and the cave had emptied out into the hunting grounds of the night sky.

Faramir heard Isaiah at the front of the group curse. When he opened his eyes what he saw was black, oppressive and thick.

The torch had been extinguished in the swirl of air caused by the many flapping wings, snuffing out their only light.

There was a rustling and some low conversation before one of the wizards, Godric, had located his wand.

A Lumos brought everything back into dim light before fading and snuffing itself out. Godric called Lumos once more and a second flash from his wand brought everything momentarily into light.

The torch was located inches from the stagnant water. Isaiah retrieved it and lit it.

Now the only sound before Faramir was the quiet hissing and spitting of the torch's flames.

Once around the rock a cut passage led away from the dark underground lake and to the north, about five feet tall and three feet wide.

When Faramir saw this, Isaiah crouching low and entering, Sarah next and then Godric, he hoped that the tunnel did not last long. With a creeping feeling on his skin, he ducked and stepped into the musty opening.

Galahad eyed his brother nervously.

Theoderic had not spoken so many as ten words on the whole of their journey. Having their cause dashed upon the rock like a piece of discarded crockery had been a blow to all of them. Some men had paid the ultimate price to see their dream of freedom from Edward's rule given life and breath.

Galahad hoped that they had not seen the end of it all but had drifted off quietly and peacefully into the end of all things.

For those that remained, however, theirs was a price of having to live to see their leader torn apart—their cause, in essence, ripped to pieces. Galahad looked at the swaying form of his brother as he sat and stared aimlessly forward in his saddle.

Galahad felt the weariness of battle in his bones; his joints ached with loss and disappointment. There was a sort of dull warmth in his heart to think about home—not the school, but Ireland.

He was here.

As he looked at the sheep dotted hills, the gray and threatening sky as a backdrop, he felt home. The ominous clouds that promised a wet journey did nothing to chill the relief he felt at the prospect of being at his childhood home again.

How long had it been?

No significant amount of time had been spent here since the last time his father had visited. Galahad frowned. He had wanted to kill his father then. Had the feelings of hatred dissolved in the many years they had been from here? Had the blood Galahad had seen spilled in battle shaken his cavalier perspective on taking lives? He did not know.

He knew that after everything he had seen and done lately—and certainly by the time this rain had soaked him through, he would be welcoming the sight of a blazing fire.

As the first fat drops began to rain down, Galahad turned his attention to Theoderic again.

"Only about ten leagues straight in and we shall be home, brother," Galahad announced more to see if his brother would respond than to inform him of the distance. They both knew that they would be home before mid of night.

Theoderic nodded. It seemed he did not even blink the droplets of water out of his eyes as they blew into his face.

For nearly the hundredth time since Galahad had seen that light fail in his eyes, almost the very moment the axe fell on his friend and hero, Wallace, Galahad wondered what he was thinking.

Was he merely lamenting his fallen comrade with his silence?

Was he forming a quiet plot for revenge?

Had he merely given up on Scotland, on the school, on their people?
Galahad knew that his fight was not over. But it seemed as though his brother's was. He was at a loss as to what to say to him, how to convey hope. Hope did not want anything to do with this pair, Galahad thought, smiling grimly and turning his face up to feel the large Irish drops of mist catch and splash on his tired face.

Ten leagues to go.

"Everything is quiet," Claire said, pulling her elbows in tighter toward her ribs.

"Most of the camp down there has fallen off to sleep," Christopher explained.

"You mean have passed out," Claire returned.

Christopher only smiled.

There had been an endless breeze of drinking tunes wafting into the forest above for hours after sunset. Christopher tried to remember how long the silence had reigned now. It could not have been long before Claire had pointed it out. He could not guess how he could have missed the complete absence of the noise.

"When do you think it will begin?" Claire asked after a moment.

Christopher shrugged and slumped down against a tree.

"If they are wise they will start before dawn."

Claire nodded as if she could automatically discern the logic in his statement, but soon felt she could not fool him. "Why is that?"

She sat down against the same tree, wanting to push her back up to his to cut the chill from the night wind that was blowing up the hill from the cliffs. She thought better of this when she became unsure if it were the behavior acceptable of a man. She caught herself slipping up more and more in her private moments with Christopher.

She constantly had to remind herself that she could be sentenced to death for this impersonation. If she could slip up and give herself away now, she certainly would on the battlefield.

"Stop it," Christopher commanded after a moment of tense silence.

"Stop what?" Claire asked, alarmed.

"Thinking about what will happen if you get caught."

Claire pulled her cloak tighter around her. "There is a fair chance that I will."

The silence that followed told her that he agreed.

"I think it was a brave thing you did," he admitted finally.

When Claire's turn to answer with silence came it was only because she felt that all responses would be inadequate. She needed someone backing her up out here more than anything, perhaps even more than she needed her own reserve of courage. The thought also frightened her terribly.

"It was foolish. But so we all are, are we not?" Christopher added finally.

"Why would you say that?" Claire asked instantly. She felt him shrug in answer.

"Why are any of us here, really?" Christopher asked. "I do not know my lord, Godric Gryffindor. I have never been to this land and therefore feel no kinship with it or its people."

"Why are you here?" Claire demanded softly. She knew her reasons, even if she had not the words to convey them. Maybe he did not have the words either.

"I would have been dead right now if it had not been for you. If my only reasons for being here right now are to protect you and to see you safely home, then my coming here would not have been a waste," he said finally, sinking lower towards the tree's base and throwing an elbow up to shade his eyes though there was no light visible among the trees. "Get some sleep," he instructed finally.

Claire had a sudden pang of regret: what if he died tomorrow. Would I see him die? Would I be able to save him? She did not think she would be able to live a content life hereafter knowing that it was for her that he had come to this place and died. Listen to yourself, Claire. I am discussing the possible death of a friend. How callous am I?

But the thought still occupied her mind for many hours more that night while Christopher slept soundly beside her.

Faramir tried not to think about the dark. He tried not to think that the small passage felt like a crypt. No one would find us if we died here.

In the instant that he had completed this thought he saw Isaiah's light drop out ahead of him.

Isaiah has lost our only light. We will be feeling our way around in vast amounts of darkness for who knows how long.

But when Sarah also fell off the path of the small tunnel in front of him, Faramir realized where the light had gone. He also picked up the faint hints of moving water.

Isaiah and the torch, Godric and finally Sarah had stepped out of the tunnel into a lower, wider tunnel. At the center of this was the glint of water, fast moving water.

Isaiah was already moving toward the right of the cave. A large mineral deposit ages old served as a place to tie up a small boat.

Faramir climbed from the small tomb of a tunnel and immediately felt his breathing become easier. He climbed the sandy edge of the river and reached the ropes. He pulled the ropes off of the rock as Isaiah pushed the vessel with one hand, the other holding the torch that lit Faramir's way to the river.

With a whoosh of breaking water the boat was in the river.

Faramir felt the strength of the current as he and Isaiah held the boat to the shore.

Godric handed Sarah into the boat first and she grabbed the torch, holding it high.

Godric leapt in next and stood, reaching for another large mineral deposit that seemed to drip from the ceiling into the river. It was solid and served to hold them there against the current.

Isaiah nodded to Faramir.

Uneasily Faramir climbed into the boat, rocking and swaying before he was pulled down into the center of the boat by an exasperated Sarah.

Isaiah was last and leapt into the boat, pushing off from the shore as he did so.

With the movement of the current and Faramir's estimation of where the fortress lay above them, it should be less than an hour until they were out of this nightmarish underground lair.

"Sir!" Claire called in her most urgent whisper. She stood and stirred Christopher from his sleep as she did so.

The commander of the guard was in hushed conversation with two subordinate officers. He turned and glared, but the glare disappeared as he moved his eyes in the direction Claire had indicated.

A small band of English troops had come across the clearing in the earliest hours of the morning. No one had been awake to see them but Claire.

The commander reached immediately for his sword.

"Sir," Claire entreated once more. "If you give our position away they will only send more. If we wait for them to come to us…"

The commander nodded. "No one will miss them."

"No one will have to. Discard their bodies but keep their tunics and standards and we shall impersonate them."

The commander had stopped her suggestion before she could fully voice it by pushing her against the tree and knocking the breath from her. "A clever thought from an insolent boy. Wake the others and hide. They will be on us."

Claire nodded and rushed off.

"Do not put yourself out there to be discovered. I could not save you if you were found out," came Christopher's angered voice behind her.

"Wake them," Claire ordered him, pointing to a stand of trees and more of Godric's men sleeping under them.

Claire kicked the boots of some drowsing men. "Awake, men!"

She pointed to the nearing group of soldiers. "Hide yourself!"

To their confused expressions she added, "Ready your weapons. Surprise them. But no noise."

She turned and surveyed their patch of underbrush and found that everyone had been wakened and concealed. She heard Christopher whisper somewhere to her distant right, "They come!"

But she had not time to duck. She had been seen by the group of English soldiers as they entered the still forest.

"There!" one shouted.

Claire felt her heart race into her throat. She ran deeper into the woods.

She could not look behind her for fear that she would topple to the ground, but heard her pursuers being cut down one by one.

There was a cry of surprise from one soldier hot on her trail and then the commander had come from his concealed spot behind a tree and cut him down.

Claire could sense someone coming up close to her, parallel to her, directly on her right side but invisible in the brush. She could not out run him.

There was a strong metallic note as a sword was drawn near to her shoulder. She closed her eyes for a moment against the anticipation of being struck by the blow.

She thought she had been struck because there was a strong pain at her ankle and she toppled over.

The soldier pursuing her to the right jumped from the low cluster of trees and with a grunt embedded his sword in her attacker.

Surprise caused Claire to open her eyes and she saw Christopher bring down one ringing blow after another on the soldier that had struck her.

She remembered that she had been injured but her ankle no longer felt the pain of the blow. Claire sat up quickly and took the injured limb in her hands to examine it.

The answer was lying next to her: When she had closed her eyes against his anticipated strike, she had tripped over a root, thus the pain that she felt when she fell.

When Claire looked up she saw Christopher: teeth bared like a wolf, covered in blood. His victim was on his knees with an equally fierce look. Christopher dropped his sword and pulled a knife, pressing it to the man's throat.

Then Christopher caught Claire's look and he hesitated.

"Do it!" the captive man goaded.

Claire felt the muscles of her face tighten in what she could only assume was a look of complete fear.

But Christopher had paused because he had interpreted this look in a way that spoke a fear of him from Claire.

Claire was watching, unable to make a noise.

Behind Christopher another soldier, not of the Gryffindor standard, was crouching, moving closer like a stealth cat.

Claire's trembling hands found Faramir's knife before her throat could find words.

Quickly her fingers found purchase on its hilt and she pulled it free of her belt and flung it forward.

It found a niche between the man's collar bone and his chin and he stood sputtering for a moment before he sank to his knees. He stopped breathing before his body fell fully to the forest floor.

This pause in Christopher's actions gave his attacker a few moments to get the better of him. He twisted from Christopher's grip and pulled his sword from the spot where Christopher had discarded it.

Armed with a knife only, Christopher had only quick reflexes to buy him time.

Claire was counting on Christopher's ability to move fast and to keep out of sword's reach. She ran fast, ducking blows of neighboring skirmishes, dodging men who dodged blows.

The commander was being worn down by a more agile opponent, running him backwards, parrying stronger blows that he was giving.

There was a moment of silent connection between her and her commander. She nodded and stuck a foot out, unseen by her commander's attacker. He was pinned down the moment she took his feet out from under him.

And Claire ran faster to make up for the time this act had lost her.

She was looking for her crossbow. She had left it by the tree that she had spent the night resting against.

It was no longer there.

She spun wildly, looking anywhere for the lost weapon. She looked wildly for any weapon.

Claire scanned the swirling mass of fighting men. She could not hope to overpower any of them and take a weapon.

She looked along the floor of the forest where the dead lay.

There, at her feet lay a man staring up at her, his eyes unseeing. In his limp fingers lay her brother's crossbow. She knew it was his because of the unique inlay of pewter lions. It was not a costly weapon, but precious to him in other ways.

She lifted it and cursed. Where would she get arrows?

She spun around and caught sight of Christopher. He was growing tired. With no other weapon than his dagger, he could only dodge the stronger blows of the other. His attacker was smiling, sure that it wouldn't be too much longer until Christopher slipped up and gave him an opportunity to strike.

Claire cursed. Her voice sounded tinny and unfamiliar to her. She found herself thinking that if Christopher were killed she would face the rest of this conflict without a friend at all.

She ran to another poor dead soul, this time it was one of her own. He had traveled from Scotland to Christchurch with her and the rest of the Gryffindor company.

Claire muttered a quick apology and pulled the crossbow's arrow from the man's chest. It caught for a moment on a fragment of bone from his ribcage and Claire felt like she might vomit, pushed the thought aside and tugged harder.

It finally came from the wound with a soft sucking noise.

Claire, with bloody fingers, threaded the arrow and took careful aim. She had to wait for other battles to clear from her path.

Her patience paid off.

At the last moment, the attacker's hope had come: he pushed Christopher back against a tree whose roots were coming through the soil like the dead. Christopher tripped and fell hard on his back.

He lashed out with his feet and caught one of the man's ankles, but the man kept his balance.

Christopher knew then that he had been defeated.

That was when Claire's arrow hit the man between his eyebrows, just as he had drawn Christopher's sword over his head, preparing to plunge it into Christopher.

The impact crossed the man's eyes and he dropped the sword before sinking to his knees, and then forward onto Christopher.

Christopher lay there for a long time, covered in his opponent's blood, the man's body splayed out over his like a blanket.

Claire appraised her weapon, shocked at how lethal it was at such a distance.

"The sappers are at work," Godric announced sadly.

Isaiah looked to a standing pool at the base of a staircase. Small, concentric rings appeared and then faded only to appear moments later.

"Sappers?" Faramir asked, tying the boat to a jutting rock and climbing the sandy bank to the staircase.

"Undermining. They are digging a tunnel under my walls, maybe to enter, maybe to topple the defenses." Godric fell silent at the implications. He wondered if he had misjudged Edward's need of his city.

"Perhaps we should give them something they would never expect, father," Isaiah said broodingly.

"What is that?" Godric asked faintly, pushing through a door in the stone where a ring hung. Isaiah put his shoulder into the wall too, causing the hinges to creek. It finally gave in and swung wide.

"An empty city," Isaiah said.

Everyone was looking at him, Isaiah had found.

"Abandon the land of my fathers?" Godric asked, bewildered at such a thought.

"No," Isaiah countered.

As they stepped through into a stone tunnel, Faramir found that he was standing inside a fireplace. The passage led from the caves on the cliff to the fireplace of a great room.

The party filtered out of the fireplace and into the cavernous hall.

Faramir had not seen such a grand place since the great hall at the school; and that had only the appearance of loftiness brought about by the heavenly ceiling. This place was truly grand.

"We merely give the impression of having abandoned it," Isaiah explained. "All those who cannot fight can leave through the passage. The water is not deep, even a child could wade it." Isaiah looked to be calculating silently. "How many archers are quartered here?"

"Bishop Elfred has arranged everything here," Godric answered, more alive to the idea now.

"If the sappers do intend only to enter the city and not breech the walls, they will enter to find the place deserted, they will let open the gate and fill Christchurch with English soldiers. I will conceal myself at the gatehouse and when no one is there to man the gates, I will close out half of their force. Once led into a false security, our archers will uncover themselves and let loose a volley to divide that force yet again by two. Then it will come to the strength of their arm and ours. When we have no one else to bloody and ruin we will invite Edward's second force into Christchurch to their own fate." Isaiah finished with a small smile, going over the idea in his mind.

"Arrange the archers. I will find what fighters I have here. The evacuation of Christchurch will be overseen by the Bishop." Godric departed with an encouraging slap on his son's shoulder.

"We have work ahead of us, Faramir," Isaiah said with a smile. "Sarah, will you come too?"

"Aye," Sarah said, exasperated. "You did not expect I should run away with the other women and children?"

Isaiah winked and showed the others from the hall and to the battlements.

Salazar went to the grave of his mother once again.

He felt that something uncomfortable, something he did not want to hear or be confronted with was hanging heavily in the misty night.

Grudgingly he was seeking her council once more—he who had once looked up to the lady who stilled the winds and commanded the clouds to part or cluster thickly, bringing lightening. Now he felt he had long outgrown dependency on her.

And he would no longer blame himself for her lonely death.

A voice moved away on the air and took the flame of his torch with it.

"Mother…" Salazar whispered.

A snap of a twig on the path over his shoulder told him that he had been followed to this place. "Eowyn!" he hissed with irritation, turning on the assumed intruder.

A hooded figure stood on the path he had just taken to this place.

Slowly the woman lifted her head and Salazar felt her eyes on him. The stare did not feel familiar, but her shape was familiar.

"Eowyn," he said lowly. "I wish to be alone. Leave me."

In answer a hand came to her hood and lowered it. The moonlight, though faint, was enough to highlight the golden-silver hair that fell down from her shoulders.

The eyes, however, were not his daughter's, but those of his mother.

"Are you glad to see me, son?" she asked in a low voice.

He remembered that voice, melodious and deep. It was commanding of attention and never had that cunning ring that Eowyn's possessed. Neither was it bathed in kindness like Verina's.

"No, mother," Salazar answered. "My heart is in turmoil."

"What is it that you seek of me? Agreeance?" She stood like a stone carving in the middle of the path, her eyes unblinking, expecting an answer.

Salazar felt that she knew his heart and was compelled to speak its pain as plainly as he could, but not without some accusation creeping into the words as well.

"Nothing has turned out as you told me it would, mother," Salazar cried finally.

"Was it I who instructed you to seek out Helga's companionship? Verina was enough for you. But you have such a malcontented heart, son. You cannot settle on one thing. Has she made you happy?"

Salazar thought a moment. "No. I hate her and long for her almost at the same instant. But even without Helga, Verina has not made me happy."

"You make yourself unhappy. Not even by bearing you another child, perhaps another heir?"

"She will not let me see it, I know not if it is a son."

"Your quarrel will cost you." The words came so bluntly from his mother's lips that they spoke an irreparable finality.

There was a silence that mingled with the wind, it was felt but made not a sound.

"How must I proceed from here?" Salazar asked finally, desperately.

The image of his mother seemed to fade by the passing moment and began to drift in the fog away to the cliff opposite the river. She lifted a graceful hand and pulled her hood back over her face.

"However you see fit to proceed," came a voice finally disembodied and wandering.

Salazar's heart felt more burdened than when he had first set out on his midnight walk. He turned and continued on the path, resolved not to return to his home until he had a course for the future security of his family marked out fully in his mind.

Behind her eyelids the snow fell quickly, the air full of a stifling powder, a quiet so complete in a pristine world that would have been beautiful enough to break her heart. But she ran forward in the snow, only cursing what made her journey slower.

Her own voice cut through the white world on the verge of waking. "Eomer!" she shouted at the end of her wits, her heart feeling panicky.

In a distant, snow dusted evergreen two wrens answered her by fleeing urgently toward the mountains.

Falling like flakes of snow but with more urgency came the thought that it was too soon to lose him. How could she have lost him when they had only just found each other again?

She was focused on reaching the small stand of trees on the other side of which lay his father's estate. But her feet kept sticking in the snow that was piling foot after foot between her and her intended destination.

Her muscles were achy and her breathing desperate, throat stinging. She called his name once more and felt this time with her beating heart that she was heard.

But she stopped short when a darkly dressed figure stumbled away from the tree that the wrens had made a nest of.

"Eomer!" she cried once more and the figure stopped and saw her.

Her eyes connected with his.

But he did not see her.

He did not see.

He only fell forward to his knees and then pitched forward, face buried, into the snow.

Azria opened her mouth the call to him once more but no sound came out of her aching pipes.

But she woke up and lost sight of the white world and the still figure.

"He is in Eire," came the plain and unassuming answer of her brother, Mungo.

Azria sat up in her bed. She felt the cool air hit her forehead. She had been sweating.

Mungo put aside a leather bound book he had been studying.

"What?" Azria asked, perplexed.

"You called out for Eomer," he explained. "I merely offered that he is in Eire with Lady Ravenclaw."

"What is today?" Azria asked urgently, feeling her dream already slipping into forgotten regions.

"Sunday," Mungo answered.

Azria sighed heavily and slumped. "I missed it then."

Mungo nodded slowly. "Yes, but he understood that you were not well."

Tears fell and felt hot on Azria's cool face. "I wanted to be there to say goodbye. Why is she doing this?"

"I do not know. I do not think you feeble. Your fits do not come often enough to warrant such watchfulness. Maybe she is afraid of who might know about your…condition," he said carefully.

"For heaven's sake Mungo, what is it?" Azria spat, wiping her face and pulling her hair into a knot away from her neck.

"I believe mother is keeping you here because it would be dangerous if Lord Slytherin knew what it was you were seeing."

Azria leveled a hard look upon her brother.

"I do not even remember what it is I have been seeing. How would he see my visions?" she asked incredulously.

Mungo shrugged. "I am merely speculating."

"Speculate a way out for me. I refuse to remain locked up. I am a grown woman," Azria shouted.

There was a moment of silence to descend upon the room.

"I am sorry, brother." Azria let the apology hang in the air for a moment.

Mungo nodded and smiled before Azria continued. "Was his a beautiful ceremony?"

Again Mungo nodded solemnly. "It was a nice day to see him on his journey. He will find his way to the halls of our fathers."

Azria smiled sadly and looked toward the dawn breaking on the window pane. "Is that what heaven is like?"

Mungo thought for a moment. "I suppose it is different for everyone. Maybe it is a white shore somewhere to the west, just before the sunset."

"That sounds nice. I know Aaron would be happy there."

"Do not mourn for him. He would not be able to leave us if there are tears," said Mungo stoically.

"I loved him. He was a gentle child," Azria said with the hint of a smile tugging at the corner of her mouth, "until he grew taller than me."

"His heart was in the battle. For some, God supplies the courage to fight," he almost whispered.

Azria looked from the window and blinking the sun from her eyes, found her brother scrutinizing her.

"We all have our gifts; God leaves no one without them."

"I will miss him," Azria replied finally, lying back on her pillow, staring at her brother's steady, patient face until she closed her eyes again and fell asleep.

"When it got dark, I thought you had left me, father," Isabelle said, jumping from the bed that the maid had just struggled to tuck her into.

"I did not leave you, my dear. But I must ask of you one thing," Godric said, collecting his child in his arms and setting her on his lap as he sat at the foot of the empty bed.

"One thing?" Isabelle asked, a small hand fingering the hilt of her father's sword, tapping out some unnamed tune on it.

"Yes," Godric said urgently, but with some innate indulgence in his voice, "you must go with your maid and the Bishop and some others."

"Now, when the maid told me I must go to sleep?" Isabelle asked.

Godric smiled. "Do not pretend with me. I know that you have not the smallest intention of sleeping now. Do you remember when Isaidore took you down into the dungeons of the school?"

"Yes," Isabelle said eagerly. She smiled with bright eyes and hazelnut curls falling into her round face.

Godric took careful inventory of her similarities to himself and of Rose, and those small differences that she possessed from his other children. How he would miss her if he did not come out of this. His favorite, his impish child that he indulged maybe too much, she must be spared from this.

"Are not you coming too?" she asked, her lips curled into a waiting pout.

Godric shook his head. "I must stay, beloved. No more questions. We must hurry now."

He lifted his small child and set her down on the bed, moving to collect her cloak and slippers and quickly call for her servant to dress her.

With one look back at her as he closed the door he meant to remember her as he saw her there, with a grin on her face, bending her neck around to catch the last glimpse of him before the door shut them away from each other.

All of the bloodshed and conflict that he had ever involved himself in, every man he had ever killed, he knew that all of that sin was washed away in the way she adoringly watched him with that grin on her face. She kept him human. That was how he explained it to himself.

"Is the Bishop prepared to lead everyone out who does not mean to fight?" Isaiah asked, meeting his father in the inner bailey of the compound.

"Everything is set. Isabelle goes with them," Godric said, his mind somewhere other than on this conversation.

Isaiah stared penetratingly. "I was not made aware that Isabelle was here. Why did you bring her?"

Godric came out of his thoughts. "Because she asked to accompany me and I did not see the danger in it."

"There is danger enough now. What if the sappers find the tunnel?" Isaiah persisted. "No one inside the city is safe, even if they make it out, they could be cut off and surrounded on the beachhead."

"Isaiah, what will you have me do, keep her here" Godric asked impatiently, "where the siege is sure to be bloody no matter what our tactics be?"

"I am sorry, father. You are right. She stands a better chance to leave with the others." Isaiah changed the subject and moved to strategy. "Your fighters and horses are in the hall," he indicated the lofty building to which the fireplace and the tunnel entrance belong. "The archers are concealed on the battlements. Sarah has instructed them. Faramir and I will be near the gatehouse. Once the sappers come through they will come to the gatehouse to raise the portcullis. This will allow a number of enemy soldiers through and into the courtyard. Stay hidden until the gates are closed again."

"But that means you and Faramir will be left to your own devices for an unknown period of time," Godric interjected with some doubt.

"There should only be three or four men in the gatehouse to raise the portcullis." Isaiah moved quickly with his father into the hall where men were assembling and weaponry being inventoried. "And when it is down again, cutting Edward's men in half, the fight can begin."

Godric nodded crisply. "It is a good plan." He clapped his son on the shoulder and gave him a long look.

Isaiah knew what his father was communicating. He reached up and grabbed his father's shoulder and pulled him into a firm embrace. "May God bless and watch over you, father," he said.

"No father could be prouder, son. I have full confidence in you," Godric said in departure.

Isaiah moved off to the gatehouse where Faramir waited for him.

Godric watched as the tunnel was filled with the feeble, the women and the children and then shut up as the procession headed off into the blackness, then put his fighters into order and awaited the sappers.

Claire watched as Christopher exchanged one tunic of gold and scarlet for another. He was now a man under Edward's banner.

He looked up from the belt he was fastening around the loose hanging tunic. He held her gaze for a moment before Claire averted her attention to the corpse whose chain mail she was struggling to take off.

Christopher cleared his throat uncomfortably and crouched next to Claire.

"Thank you again for your services," he offered with a sheepish smile.

Claire avoided looking at him and searched for a clasp on the mail shirt of the dead man before her. "I had to do it. I distracted you." She was silent.

Christopher raised the man's arms over his head and began inching the mail shirt up over the slack face.

Claire heaved a heavy sigh and sat back in the mud. "I did not kill any of the Slytherin guard at the stable."

Christopher tugged the shirt free and handed it to Claire. "I killed them," he said matter-of-factly. "Do you want the boots?"

Claire shook her head, unable to speak. She blinked back a tear and hoped no one would see. "They would not fit me," she said finally, quickly wiping at a stray tear on her cheek.

Christopher stood and, almost too late, forgot that he should not extend a hand to help Claire up from the ground. Instead he retracted the hand as Claire almost reached out to take it and placed it self consciously against the hilt of his sword.

Claire pushed herself off of the forest floor and collected the tunic and chain mail, finally lifting the helmet of the dead man—not even a man, more her own age, just a boy, really.

"Do you need help?" Christopher offered in a whisper, looking around for eyes and attentions that might have wandered their way.

Claire stared down at the gear in her hands and shook her head again.

Christopher followed her to a stand of trees off of the path, the sounds of their party of soldiers growing dimmer in the thick quiet of the wood.

"I will stay here," Christopher said, pointing to a spot by a pine. He turned his back and rested his helmet under one arm.

Claire went still further into the underbrush with her costume and looked back periodically, embarrassed at having to cause so much fuss.

Turning hesitantly to see how she was coming along, Christopher watched as Claire slipped one arm from her soiled tunic. There was a little bit of blood. Her fall earlier had apparently injured her.

But it was not the superficial wound that had Christopher's attention.

Remembering his post, he turned and watched the path again. Soon, though, he found himself turning to catch sight of her perfectly smooth, white shoulder, her slender arm. This was the only skin exposed and Christopher was content to just stare at that shoulder. No need to go further.

But Claire turned to speak to him and their eyes met.

There was nothing accusatory in her tone. She was accepting of the attention, and did not regard it further but to say, "The tie at the back is knotted. I was in a hurry, you see, when I had dressed last."

Christopher did not reply.

He took his knife from his belt and crouched behind her.

Fingers lightly grazing her bare back, he held the knot away from her skin and slid the knife beneath it, fraying it and finally cutting the tie away.

He half expected her to say something about the impropriety of the scene.

But what came from her next surprised him more than anything else about her: "I killed him."

"Killed who?" he asked, replacing the knife in his belt.

"That man," Claire answered. "I shot him between the eyes."

"And I am grateful," Christopher interjected, catching her tearful gaze and holding it earnestly, as if to communicate how much.

"I thought I could do this, Christopher," Claire admitted finally.

He admired the way his name sounded when she said it. She had not called him by his name before.

"But now I have doubts," Claire confided. Her tears were falling freely now and her face communicated such intense anguish, Christopher was sure he had never felt something like that before. He was sympathizing with her now.

Unknowingly, his hand moved to her bare shoulder and he pulled her to him, the sensation of her skin under his hand would be something he would remember all of his life, he thought.

Then she turned and put her arms around his neck, pressing her lips fervently to his.

He answered her kiss with another.

"Stay here. I will come for you when it is over," he said with lips pressed against her. "I will be your sword."

"I am not a coward," Claire said finally. "But I cannot live, knowing I have taken a life."

"I would not want you to kill anymore. I love you as you are now," Christopher admitted.

Claire held him at arm's length, a look of surprise on her face. "Do you?"

"Yes," Christopher admitted. "And I pray you feel as I do."

Claire surveyed him a while longer. "I do feel as you do, Christopher."

He could not fight the smile that came to his smudged and grimy face. "Say it again."

"I love you, Christopher. You and no other," Claire repeated, throwing her arms around him and holding him to her as she felt his grip around her waist tighten.

The commander's distant call for departure broke them apart finally.

"Stay here," Christopher instructed. "I will come for you."

"You will not forget about me?" Claire teased, picking up his English helmet and placing it over his rough and tangled curls.

"No," he answered with a smile.

She pulled his helmet closer to her face until his nose touched hers and then let him go with a final kiss.

For Isabelle the wonders of the underground river held little interest when she wanted to be with her father.

After all, he had promised when they made their journey down from the school that he would take her for a horse ride through the country.

Now, according to the Bishop Elfred, they were leaving Christchurch altogether. And her father was not among the travelers of the underground cave.

One thing, beside the fact that there was also a river, was different about this cave from the dungeons of her school. There was a large pounding sound that came from the other side of the rock, like a giant hammering just on the opposite side of the wall.

This did not frighten Isabelle at first, but feeding off of the reactions of fear from the maids and children around her, Isabelle soon grew to dislike the noise.

She began to think of ways to slip out of this boat, crowded with six other children. But they would tell the maid, even if she crept as quietly as she could into the water.

Her moment of distraction finally came, however, when the hammering grew so loud and so furious that it culminated in one large crash that shook the tunnel and even brought some of the ceiling of the cave down on them.

A sharp piece of rock fell right into the boat and hit a girl next to Isabelle, also punching a hole in the boat.

In the chaos of falling rock, a good few of the torches that lighted their path were lost.

Isabelle sank out of the drowning boat and past others flailing about in blackness so complete that it resembled the grave. The current was carrying her and some others, prone and floating, back up to the place in the walled city where they entered the cave through a secret fireplace passage.

Isabelle's companions on the current were not moving and she knew that she was alone with the dead.

She continued to float for some distance endeavoring to be still and to keep her head above the frigid current. At a distance, from the corner of her eye, as she lay unmoving in the water, she saw the staircase pass.

Isabelle knew that it was now time to fight the current and reach the sandy place where she could climb back up to the staircase.

The river moved fast and she could not offer much resistance and soon she was tired. But she felt that if she drifted slightly to the left a little more, and then just a little more, she would hit the sandy bank and pull herself out of the tugging water.

The sand stretched away back around a bend and to where she assumed she had passed the stairs.

There were no footprints here in the sand. Most people, she reckoned, did not like staying in the river past the staircase. That was where the footprints were most abundant.

No one went past them.

A small part of Isabelle's mind did try to coax her forward into the place where no one else had gone.

But she remembered her mission and resolutely hiked back up the sandy bank, retracing the distance that the river had carried her past her intended point and finally came to the stairs.

The iron ring on the heavy stone door stood mocking her.

She saw through a crack in the hidden fireplace entrance, fire. But it was not coming from the grate just beyond the half opened door, but from the larger space that was the hall itself.

Isabelle put an arm through the door and then shut her eyes against the heat of the burning room and pushed the rest of her small body through the opening.

A tapestry fell from atop the fireplace burning in front of her and trapping her in the fireplace of that great burning hall.

Faramir heard the crash and bang of an explosion somewhere below the city. It was muted by several feet of rock and soil, and the powder that had been used must have been weak if it could not blow through the flagstone of the city's lowest levels.

He estimated that there would be at least thirty minute's wait more until the sappers appeared in the inner bailey.

He saw Isaiah's calculated expression of thought and guessed what he had been wondering: had the tunnel been struck by the blast?

Faramir hoped that it had not been the case. After all, no one knew of the tunnel from the city. They could not have been seeking it.

But it could have been stumbled upon just the same.

That was when the first trebuchet launched a rock at the gatehouse wall.

The foundation of the spiral structure rocked.

Faramir and Isaiah exchanged looks.

Hesitantly they both left their concealed posts in a small armory room just off of the main mechanism room.

Through arrow slits in the stairwell Faramir could see at least five wooden catapult-like structures, trebuchets, lined up behind milling groups of soldiers.

Added to the weakened structure of the walls by the underground blast, the impact of several rocks the size of paving stones being hurled at the gatehouse could topple the thing.

He prayed that the sappers would show themselves quickly.

If the gates were opened and the English given entrance, the stoning would certainly be halted—no use in ruining perfectly functional walls.

As if in literal answer of Faramir's request, two men, swords in hand appeared on the staircase.

A look of shock painted both of their faces. They had expected the gatehouse to be as empty as the rest of the city appeared.

Sadly, there was one answer to their speedy arrival: the tunnel had been found out.

This was written on Isaiah's face as well.

Realization in Isaiah turned into steely resolve that he transformed into raw might.

In one drawn swing of his sword, one of their visitor's swords fell clanging on the stairs, joined by his hand.

The man cried out, his cry stifled with one strong arm wrapped around him, Isaiah's finger's clasped hard over his mouth.

"You would not want to give us away?" Isaiah asked, bent near the man's ear. Before an answer could come forth from the man, Isaiah's sword rent a tear in his gut, exposing intestines.

The man gurgled in final comment and fell heavily to one side of the narrow stair.

He turned and found Faramir and the other soldier nowhere.

He heard them, however, at the top of the stair in the mechanism room.

There was barely room for the large iron winch that served to draw up the portcullis, let alone space for hand-to-hand combat.

Isaiah skirted the wall to one side.

As Faramir backed the other hapless visitor in his direction, Isaiah easily stuck a foot out causing Faramir's opponent to lose his footing.

He fell against the winch wheel. There was a sound of a bone snapping.

Faramir was on top of him in an instant. He buried his sword in the man's chest.

The grimace of the defeated soldier's face would be something that Faramir would find hard to shake from his memory.

The dying man rasped for a moment and then his features fell slack.

"Help me move him," Isaiah commanded.

Faramir replaced his bloody sword in scabbard and took one arm, toppling the dead body to the stone floor.

Isaiah kicked at the body with more force than needed to clear enough space to gain a footing under the heavy crank.

The exertion of the task showed on both of their faces as slowly, inch after inch, the crank was lifted, running over one iron tooth on the wheel before sinking quickly into the recessed groove, only to be coaxed one tooth further.

"I did not count on having to raise the damn gate myself and invite our enemies in," Isaiah grunted as they strained to lift the crank.

"That was to be their job," Faramir answered, nodding in the direction of the dead English soldier bleeding at their feet. "It is truly a shame they forced us to kill them when we did."

Godric's men and horses had been dispersed by his command.

Large gathering places such as the great hall would be the first place the sappers would look before they secured the city and opened the gate.

Some horses were left in the stable after they had all been assembled and counted.

The riders were also concealed there near their horses, some in rafters; others beneath the hay.

Godric now watched from a dark corner of the inner bailey, behind a merchant's empty stall. Here he lay waiting for the sappers, watching with a vantage of most of the courtyard, wary of any possible entrance that the enemy may make use of.

He did not wait long when his worst feared scenario was played out.

Godric held his breath has he watched six sappers inch through the doors of the banquet hall where his men had just recently assembled—the very room whose fireplace stood guard as the entrance to the tunnel.

How long would it be before he could get into that tunnel and see if the elderly, women and children down there in the river were safe? Perhaps they had made it past the point of the blast before the sappers had broken through. He prayed for them, and most of all for his daughter. Immediately regretting the decision to rely on the tunnel for the concealment of such a number of innocent and undefended people momentarily paralyzed him with guilt.

The six sappers spread out.

Two milled about by the entrance of the hall, two headed in the direction of the stables and armory and two disappeared into the gatehouse.

Godric turned in his crouched position and looked up into the battlements above him.

Sarah was peering over awaiting a signal from him.

Godric motioned with two fingers at the sappers guarding the hall.

As they turned and retreated back into the hall Sarah's arrow cut one down silently. When the other turned to speak to his companion another arrow caught him in the shoulder, only wounding him.

As he stumbled backward, the soldier opened his mouth to call out to the others. Sarah's third arrow caught him in the chest.

The soldier lay back, gasping.

Godric checked the gatehouse and the stable for the others. He ran back to the hall and grabbed the dying man by the throat.

"How many are in the tunnel?" Godric commanded through clenched teeth. "Tell me and I shall ease your suffering."

"Two remain in the tunnel," the soldier answered shakily.

Godric nodded. "God speed," he offered, producing a knife he slit the soft flesh and arteries of the man's throat.

The portcullis began to rise at a distance behind him.

Godric turned and moved down an alley to the left of the hall. Two of his soldiers lay in wait, concealed behind a stand of empty barrels outside of a cooper's stall.

"There are two in the tunnel," Godric ordered. "Save as many of Christchurch's citizens as you can and I shall be eternally in your debt."

The two Gryffindor knights stood and nodded.

Godric moved silently in the direction of the stables.

Christopher was momentarily surprised when they slipped in among Edward's force around Christchurch and a soldier turned his way and inquired as to their delay in hunting up wood for the archers' fire pit.

"It is all wet wood in that forest," Christopher lied feebly before punching the questioner hard in the face, bending the nose piece on his helmet into a skewed arc.

Christopher leapt on the man, toppling him backward. Pinning him down, he removed his dagger and buried it in the man's jugular.

"What is all this?" a ranking officer in Edward's service asked, ready to meet out harsh punishment for brawling.

He saw the blood and his eyes went wide, not knowing what to make of the scene.

An arrow from another of Godric's men cut the officer's comment short and he fell forward.

Christopher looked over at the stand of siege engines and trebuchets. Most of them had been taken over by Gryffindor fighters and burned. Battles still raged over the last two flanking the gatehouse. The stoning, however, had stopped.

And soon Christopher knew why the stoning had come to a halt: the gates were opening. The city had been taken from the inside it seemed.

"It cannot be!" one of Godric's men gasped over the din of the army ahead of them pouring into the city.

Christopher looked too. A dim feeling of numb disbelief washed over him and for a moment he just stared. What had they all fought and risked their lives for? There was no one inside the city to protect.

Like lightening a sharp pain came to Christopher under one rib. He looked down at the soldier he had been pinning to the ground, his hand fell away dead, leaving Christopher's own dagger lodged in his right side.

Instantly his breathing became shallow and he gasped, never seeming to get enough air.

The English soldier had taken the knife from his own throat as his life ebbed away and stabbed Christopher in his moment of distraction and stark disbelief. What a sorry soldier I turned out to be.

Christopher thought of Claire once more, remembering the feel of her bare skin. It made the burning in his lungs less painful.

She will still be waiting for me when it is over.

Christopher sank to the ground and slumped into a crouching position, no longer able to hold himself up.

All around him men were flooding from the sloping field into the city.

And then the gate crashed down again.

Christopher closed his eyes.