17. A Long Night

There was a jar in the middle of a corridor, next to a puddle of vomit at Zoe's feet. Inside was a paste that Braewyn made out of herbs she and Zoe had grown together in their garden. It was supposed to help heal wounds and to stop them from getting infected. Normally it was used on scraped knees and cuts from accidents, like the one the carpenter had had in his workshop around midwinter that had cut his hand to the bone and left him unable to work for a month.

Today, she would have to use it on a far more serious injury; one that could possibly kill a man she had come to respect and admire. She growled and snatched the jar up, stalking down the corridor until she reached the knights' rooms.

Zoe leaned against the wall once she had reached the one she was looking for, taking deep breaths. She had to go in to the room just in front of her, the one with Cador's name and a stylized snake carved onto it, and stitch up a man. Arthur, to be precise. She had to open the door, go into the room and put a needle through Arthur's skin and pull thread through it and tug it together and pretend to know what she was doing so that Lancelot didn't panic.

She pressed her hands to her face and tried to think of useful things instead of her own insecurities about her ability to help the future king. Like…like…like alcohol! Zoe thought. She focused on the fact that alcohol killed germs rather than the appealing prospect of getting very drunk very quickly. Although she didn't think Lancelot would take too kindly to her pouring ale on Arthur's side. Ale wouldn't do. She had to ask for any pure spirits lying around. The strongest alcohol they had.

I wish I had some antibiotics. Or penicillin. Or a fucking doctor! Zoe thought, rubbing her eyes. I wish I wasn't here and I didn't have to deal with all this shit. I don't want to do this, please, tell me this isn't real and I'll just wake up and none of this was real.

But when she pulled her hands away from her face the corridor was still there, and the snake seemed to be sneering at her. Yeah, well fuck you, Zoe thought, glaring at the carved reptile. She seized the handle of the door and opened it.

She almost wished she hadn't. Lancelot was there, pacing back and forward in the room, which was like all the other knights rooms that she'd been into, but a far creepier ambiance.

Maybe that had something to do with the unconscious, pale, bleeding man on the bed at the opposite wall. Jols stood at his side, his hands pressing on a bandage covered in congealing blood, a slightly frantic look on his face.

'I can deal with scrapes, Lancelot, grazes. This…it's beyond me. I'll do my best if there's truly nobody else, but…' Jols let his voice trail off as he saw Zoe standing in the doorway.

'Are you going to help or just stand there?' Lancelot snarled, grabbing her arm and shoving her onto the floor next to the bed Arthur was lying on. His feet were at the head of the bed so that his wound was easy to access.

'I'm here to help, but I need a few things,' Zoe said, trying to stop her voice from shaking. She tried not to look as confident as she felt-no point in worrying Lancelot more than he was already.

'Water, rags, bandages, thread, needles on the chest near Arthur's head. Candle positioned so that wound is lit. What else do you want?' Lancelot asked.

'Alcohol. The strongest stuff you can find. And somebody boil the water.'

'No bloody way are you drinking and then sewing Arthur up,' Lancelot protested. Jols nodded, backing Lancelot up. 'And why do you want the water boiled?'

'The water needs to be clean. And the alcohol's not for me-it's to pour on his wound, to stop it from festering.'

'Alcohol does that?' Lancelot asked sceptically.

'Trust me on this,' Zoe said, as confidently as she could.

Lancelot frowned, but flicked his hand and Jols got up and left the room immediately.

Zoe waited in silence while Jols was getting what she had asked for, one hand pressed tightly to the bandage on Arthur's side and slowly being covered in warm blood. She tried to ignore Lancelot glaring at her, but he was such an intense person that it proved difficult.

Finally, Jols arrived back and set a bucket of steaming water down within easy reach of Zoe and a stoppered bottle.

'Water's been boiled,' Jols said as Zoe dipped a rag in the water and wiped her hands clean with it. 'And Cook says the alcohol's the strongest stuff they've got - fresh from the still in the cellar- and that I owe him for the bottle.'

'I also need your knife,' Zoe said to Lancelot, setting the wet and bloody rag to one side and examining her hands for dirt or blood. She knelt next to Arthur, trying to avoid looking at the wound. She wasn't that brave yet.

'Here,' Lancelot thrust it at her, blade first. Zoe flinched, but accepted it, taking it carefully from the knight. There was only so much she'd be able to do if she cut herself on an undoubtedly sharp knife.

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath through her mouth, bracing herself for what she had to do now. She squared her shoulders, opened her eyes and looked at the wound in Arthur's side.

It was covered by a bandage, and that would have to be the first thing to go. Problem was, it was stuck there by dried blood. Zoe tried to pry it off, but stopped when a fresh, crimson flow told her she was tearing the wound open.

Zoe tried to not to throw up when she saw the new blood, and instead reached with a trembling hand for the rags and the water. She grabbed a rag and dipped it in the bucket of water, soaking it before pressing it above the bandage and squeezing. Bloody water trickled down Arthur's muscled side and onto the sheet below. It's going to be a bitch getting the bloodstains out of that, Zoe thought absently.

Some of the crusted blood washed away and Zoe was able to pry the bandage away from the wound. Zoe closed her eyes briefly, to steel herself for the job. But, inevitably, she had to open them again, because blood was trickling down over her hands, warm and bright and sickening.

There was something disturbing about seeing another person's bones, Zoe discovered. And it was equally disturbing to know that, for all the rumours of invincibility, years of training and aura of invulnerability Arthur had built up around himself, he was just as fragile as any of them.

'Is this clean?' Zoe asked, waving the knife. 'I mean, did you use it on anybody today?'

Lancelot made a sound of impatient frustration. 'Not today.'

'Good,' Zoe murmured, looking closely at the wound and ignoring the small voice in her head that said she shouldn't be playing with sharp objects, medical procedures or Arthur's life like she was. She had no choice but to do this.

She could see several pieces of thread still in Arthur's skin. Braewyn was right, she'd have to cut them out. The problem was the stitches were still intact, even if the skin they were supposed to be holding together wasn't. Zoe gulped and slid the knife carefully along the line of stitches.

Thankfully, the knife was every bit as sharp as Zoe had thought it was, and when she applied pressure to the thread, it parted easily and Zoe was able to pull it out without hacking away at Arthur's flesh clumsily. She pulled the now-severed thread through Arthur's skin, trying to ignore the fresh blood covering her hands and Lancelot glaring at the back of her head.

Zoe grabbed a larger rag and pressed it to Arthur's side to stem the blood-flow temporarily. She looked over her shoulder at Jols and Lancelot who were both watching her like hawks.

'Pour alcohol over the needle and the thread,' Zoe said, wiping blood away from the wound in an attempt to find somewhere to put the stitches.

Splashes and a new smell, sharp and potent, from behind her told her that she was being obeyed. Dirty fingers handed her a needle and thread still wet from its alcohol-sterilization. It wasn't a good, or reliable, method of sterilizing things, but it was the best she could do.

Her hands were shaking so badly it took her three tries to thread the needle, something she hadn't done since her second week in the laundry.

'What was that for?' Lancelot asked.

Zoe took a deep breath and pressed the needle against Arthur's skin, above his wound. 'That was to make the needle and thread clean,' Zoe explained. She dug the needle in, blood welled up around the entrance point and she fought off the urge to vomit once again. 'If they're clean, there's less chance the wound will fester and become rotten. That means less risk to Arthur. Alcohol hurts like a bitch on a wound, but it's all I have at the moment.'

'What about honey?' Jols asked. 'Surely that's better.'

'Braewyn put honey in her paste-thing,' Zoe said, not looking away from her hands where they were stitching Arthur's skin together. 'It's what makes it a paste instead of a collection of mashed up herbs. Both are better than just one, though.'

Sewing flesh was different from sewing cloth, Zoe thought as she fought not to gag. For one thing, cloth doesn't twitch when you hit a nerve, it doesn't bleed, it doesn't groan out in pain, Zoe thought. Cloth can't die if you go wrong. A badly-sewn seam won't kill somebody you care about. If Zoe made as mistake here, she could potentially kill Arthur. She had to stop several times to make sure that her hands weren't shaking too badly, and frequently checked that her stitches were strong and even.

She wasn't the only one checking her work. Lancelot was practically breathing over her shoulder the whole time she had a needle anywhere near Arthur's flesh. As she pulled it together with her stitches, the knight seemed calmer. And when the blood stopped flowing out of the wound and slowed to a dull trickle as she made the final stitches Lancelot let out a sigh of relief.

Zoe wiped her sweaty forehead on her sleeve and sat back. 'Jols, could you pour alcohol on a rag for me?' she asked, looking at the pockmarked man.

Jols nodded, and did as she said. Zoe took the sopping rag in her hands and ran it over the line of stitches in Arthur's side. Her hand was shaking harder than ever, but she barely felt it.

Arthur flinched away from what must have put his side in more pain and groaned, despite being unconscious. Lancelot grabbed Zoe's wrist. 'What the hell did you do to him?'

'It's the alcohol. It burns when it goes on, but it will help,' Zoe reassured the knight, trying to tug her arm free of him. 'Pass me the paste and the water, please. And a rag, and the bandages. I need to finish.' Zoe's voice was unnaturally calm.

Jols shoved the things at her, looking at her warily and Lancelot let got of her arm, although he didn't move away. Dipping a rag in the water, she quickly rinsed away the blood. Her hands were still trembling, she noticed. Then, she washed her hands in the water, dried them on another rag and then picked up the jar of paste.

Zoe opened it and looked inside at the greenish-brown goo inside. She sniffed, sneezed at the strong smell and scooped a glob out with her fingers. It felt…odd. Sticky and grainy and cold. But it smelled better than the blood, and Zoe remembered Braewyn telling her to smear it over the stitches when she was done. So she did.

'Could you sit him up, please?' Zoe asked when Arthur's wound was completely covered in the paste. 'I need to bandage him.' She waved a clean strip of cloth for emphasis.

Lancelot and Jols carefully manoeuvred Arthur so that he was leaning on Lancelot, but there was enough space for Zoe to wind the bandage around Arthur's torso.

'He'll need to stay still until the skin's healed enough. Once it has, make sure he gets the stitches cut out. It's probably bad if they stay in.' Zoe said, using her shaking hands to wind the bandages around Arthur's torso. He had impressive muscles, Zoe noted. And he's probably growing a rug on his chest, she thought.

'Are you done?' Lancelot demanded, sighing in relief when Zoe nodded and moving slowly so that Arthur was lying down again. He was still pale, but when Zoe tried to find a pulse, it was steady and strong.

'When he wakes up, he needs a drink of something non-alcoholic,' Zoe said. 'He's lost a lot of the fluid in his body and needs to drink to get it back.'

Zoe stood up for the first time in what felt like hours, stretching her back and wincing at the cracks she heard as her spine readjusted itself. 'If that's all…'

Barely waiting for Lancelot's nod, Zoe dashed outside and through the familiar corridors to the Round Table room. It was dark, none of the torches were lit and neither was the fire in the centre of the table - all seemed quiet and calm. Zoe pressed herself into a corner, staring at the legendary table and let her knees buckle so she was sitting on the floor, trying to draw strength from the solidity of the stone.

She wasn't crying. She wasn't throwing up. She just sat down, staring at her hands. She was cold, and she was shaking. Shaking so hard her teeth chattered.

And the blood. It was all over her hands. She'd washed them, but they smelled like blood. Like Arthur's blood. And there was blood on her dress, in her hair on her face.

'Zoe?' She recognized the voice immediately as belonging to Lamorak. He hadn't seen her, but he was looking around the room and it was only a matter of time before he saw her. He sounded tired.

'Here,' Zoe said. She almost didn't recognize her voice, it sounded weak and childish and it trembled.

'Lucia sent me to say that if you're finished with Arthur, you should go help her.'

'No.'

Lamorak finally found where Zoe was sitting and slid down beside her. A strong arm pulled her away from the wall and against his shoulder.

'Your first time?' he asked, sounding sympathetic.

Zoe nodded, still shaking. Lamorak's hands were warmer than she was, and it felt good to be comforted like this. Even if Lamorak was all bony and pointy.

'It's hard, isn't it?' Lamorak asked. The tone of his voice said Zoe didn't have to reply, so she didn't, and tried instead to soak up as much of Lamorak's warmth as she could. 'When there's lives to be saved or lost by what you do and the blood starts getting to you.'

Zoe closed her eyes and felt tears start to build up in her eyes. Her shaking got worse and she tried to press closer to Lamorak's skinny body.

'But there are kids there that are younger than you and they're in pain and they need Braewyn and Lucia and you. Are you going to help them?' Lamorak asked.

Zoe cried. Great, gulping sobs and violent tremors that ran through her body. But this time it wasn't terror. It really wasn't. Zoe wasn't scared anymore. She was too tired, she'd worn out all her emotional energy and she had nothing left anymore.

'You're getting snot on my shirt,' Lamorak said uncomfortably, shifting until he could look Zoe in the eyes. 'You coming?'

Zoe sniffed, wiped her eyes and nose and nodded tiredly. She let Lamorak pull her to her feet and lead her to the infirmary. Through the windows that they passed, Zoe could see it was dark now. The stars were bright in the sky, almost mocking the misery and gore down below them.

Lamorak squeezed Zoe's hand when they reached the infirmary and pulled the door open. It was quieter there than it had been earlier. The only screams came from a man whose hand Braewyn was amputating with Lucia's help. The other patients were only groaning quietly in their pain.

'Zoe's here,' Lamorak announced, pulling Zoe gently towards the two women.

'Zoe, did you do exactly as I said?' Braewyn asked, not looking up as the mangled hand came off and the man screamed one last time as Braewyn pressed a hot iron to the wound.

'Yes,' Zoe replied dully. She didn't feel sick, she didn't feel like she wanted to run away or cry. She hadn't even flinched. She felt hollow and heavy inside.

'I need you to help the ones who aren't hurt too badly. Wash, stitch, paste, bandage. Got that?' Braewyn asked, casually handing Lamorak the severed hand.

So Zoe did. She asked Lamorak to fetch boiled water and, when he brought it back, she washed her hands, and then the men's wounds. She got Lamorak to pour alcohol over needles and thread and used it to pull their skin together to stop the bleeding. She smeared paste over the stitches and wrapped it all up in bandages and sent them away.

She did it again and again and there was so much blood. Those men had bled so much and Zoe was covered in it. Her dress, the pale blue one that Braewyn had made for winter, was now streaked with red and rust. Only Zoe's hands were completely clean, and they were red and raw from the number of times she'd washed them in near-boiling water.

And some of the men she treated could barely be called men. They didn't look old enough to shave regularly, but their hands, their arms, their legs, their sides, their young faces were wounded. Torn up like so much meat. And their eyes were as empty as Zoe felt.

Then, there were no more men, and Zoe was left with the smell of blood, the redness of it, the sticky feel of it on her fingers. There was so much of it she could almost taste it.

'Zoe, wash up. Now.'

Zoe looked up tiredly to see Lucia standing there, equally blood-soaked and tired, but seemingly much less troubled and scared.

Zoe blinked and looked at her hands. The blood of the last Roman she had treated was still wet on them. Still crimson and not the flaky brown of dried blood, like the stuff on her forearms and face. She moved slowly, sluggishly, and dipped her hands in a bowl of water, rubbing away the traces of red.

'Your face too.' Lucia handed a damp rag to Zoe. 'And sit still while I fix your hair.'

Zoe wiped her face while Lucia gathered her black hair and finger-combed it. Lucia was talking, telling Zoe how well she had done while she dried her hair with another rag and plaited it. It was long enough for a plait now, Zoe noticed. She could toss her hair over her shoulder after Lucia was done with it and admire the intricate braid.

'Zoe, I'm going home. There's a Roman soldier whose mistress lives next door to me, he's going to escort me home. He'll walk you home if I ask him to,' Lucia said, putting one hand on Zoe's shoulder to get her attention.

Zoe shook her head, pulling her eyes away from her hair. 'I'll stay with Braewyn,' Zoe said.

Lucia nodded, accepting it as the truth. But really, Zoe didn't think she could manage the walk all the way back to Braewyn's house. And there she'd be alone. She'd have nightmares. She wanted somewhere where she felt safe and Braewyn's cottage, near the woods where the woads were hiding, wouldn't feel safe after tonight. Maybe it wouldn't ever feel safe again.

'Goodnight,' Lucia said. Zoe heard her steady footsteps as she left the infirmary and decided she'd better leave too. There was too much blood here for her to sleep peacefully, and sleep was all she wanted at the moment. Well, sleep and a toilet.

Lucia was gone by the time Zoe had gathered enough energy to move. She walked down the corridors until she reached what passed for toilets here. One good thing about the Romans was indoor plumbing. Now that she was no longer frightened or busy, she really needed to pee. The toilets were empty, which Zoe was grateful for, and there was water there that Zoe used to clean her hands when she was done. But they still smelled like blood.

She moved almost automatically, through the bloodstained hallways and down to the laundry. It was just as she had left it, the clean, mended clothes in neat piles, the unmended clothes in a pile on the floor and the dirty ones tossed in the corner. The room smelled like old socks, or maybe like the boys' changing room Zoe had accidentally walked into once while she was still at school. But she herself smelled like blood.

And then she couldn't stand it anymore. She tore the bloodstained dress she had been wearing off and threw it away from her violently, shaking with fatigue. Zoe stood and shivered in the laundry, staring at the ruined cloth.

When a particularly violent chill worked its way through the laundry, the cold forced her to move. She walked over to the piles of clean and mended clothes. She had none of her own here, and the knights would be sleeping rather than worrying if their tunics and trousers had been washed.

Zoe grabbed a pair of trousers belonging to Caradoc, the shortest of the knights, and pulled them on, wriggling until she fit in them. They were tight around her hips and bum, because Caradoc was quite thin and Zoe was a bit chubby and they were far too long, because Caradoc was easily more than a head taller than her. Nevertheless, they were the ones most likely to fit.

She looked for a clean shirt, but apparently the girls had focused on trousers, socks and pants that wash day. The only one she could find was one of Tristan's that came down to her knees and the sleeves of which completely hid her hands. On top of that, when the ties of the shirt were undone Zoe's mamillare, what passed for a bra in these times, was showing and she had the vague, but uneasy suspicion that it would fall off her shoulders if she tried to sleep in it.

Zoe looked down at herself and shrugged, moving to the pile of clean laundry and kicking it until it more or less resembled the pile of furs she slept on at home. She dropped down on top of it and tried to go to sleep.

She closed her eyes and took deep breaths, trying not to remember all the torn flesh she'd seen today, all the bones, all the tendons and ligaments. She tried not to remember how it felt to pull thread through skin and muscle. She tried not to remember the corpses she'd seen, or what men sounded like when their limbs were amputated.

Zoe managed to drift into a restless sleep, dreaming of blood and death and corpses waking up to talk to her and ask why she hadn't saved them. She saw Arthur die and Lancelot come to kill her, and she saw Gawain pull his chest apart along the line of the wound she'd seen.

'I thought I was special,' Gawain accused Zoe when she gagged and tried to pull away. 'I thought you wanted me.'

Gawain's hand, covered in blood, reached out to her and grabbed onto her shoulder, shaking her hard. Zoe woke up screaming.

'Shhh, it's alright. Calm down, shhh.' It was Lamorak's hand on her shoulder, not Gawain's. Gawain was up in the infirmary, hopefully unconscious.

'Oh holy shit,' Zoe panted, reaching up and grabbing onto Lamorak's shirt.

'Awake now?' he asked.

'Yes,' Zoe said, breathing deeply through her mouth. Zoe looked up at Lamorak, who was avoiding looking at her. Zoe frowned and looked down at herself. Sure enough, the shirt she'd been wearing had slipped off her shoulder. Impatiently, she tugged it up again.

'What did you want?' Zoe asked.

'Erm…' Lamorak pulled away from Zoe and stood up, looking studiously at the ceiling of the laundry.

'You can look at me, you know.'

'But you're not dressed!' Lamorak protested, flushing.

'Since when do you have a problem with looking at undressed women?' Zoe asked, sitting up and stretching. 'Anyway, I'm completely decent.'

'Er…right. Um…'

'Are you alright? It's just…you look terrible.'

Lamorak really did look awful. The bags underneath his eyes made him look like a racoon and his shoulders sagged.

'Braewyn needs you,' Lamorak said, ignoring the question.

'Why?' Zoe yawned. She stood up, ignoring how he hastily averted his eyes as she did so.

'She needs someone to watch Gawain tonight. She's old and exhausted, the knights are all tired and wounded, Vanora's got a new baby and Marius is over in the Roman barracks and too busy to help. Lucia's gone home already. You're the only one left, Zoe.'

'Me?'

Lamorak nodded and Zoe sighed. She bent over to roll the ankles of Caradoc's trousers up so she wouldn't trip over them and then rolled the sleeves of Tristan's shirt up so they wouldn't get in her way.

'Why are you wearing trousers?' Lamorak asked when Zoe started to walk out of the laundry. They both ignored the pile of clean clothes that Zoe had slept on, and Zoe left her bloodstained dress where she had thrown it.

'Better than wearing that,' Zoe said, gesturing to the bloody dress.

'Whose clothes are you wearing?'

'I think the trousers are Caradoc's,' Zoe said, yawning and wiping sleep out of her eyes. 'Shirt belongs to Tristan. How bad is Gawain?'

'The worst that's still alive,' Lamorak said. 'He got hurt badly, Zoe. There's a chance he's not going to live through the night.'

Zoe nodded solemnly and walked in silence after Lamorak. He didn't lead her to the infirmary, though. He led her to the knights' quarters and Gawain's room.

The blond knight was lying on his bed as if he was sleeping and not unconscious and fighting for his life. But he was too pale to be sleeping, and Zoe knew that Gawain always slept sprawled across the bed rather than neatly arranged like he was now.

Braewyn was sitting on the bed, leaning her head in her hands. She, too, was blood-spattered, but most of it had been caught on an apron that she'd been wearing. She looked older than Zoe had ever seen her, as if all the life had been sucked out of her.

'Zoe, you're completely indecent,' Braewyn scolded tiredly.

'What did you need me to do?' Zoe asked, ignoring the comment. Braewyn looked too tired to argue about what Zoe was wearing at the moment, and Zoe was too worried about Gawain to want to.

'If Gawain wakes up, give him some water, the pitcher's on the table,' Braewyn said. She gestured at a pewter pitcher and cup sitting on the table that was normally crowded with weapons, whetstones, oil and cleaning rags. 'Then put some of this in his water-just a pinch and no more or else you'll poison him.'

Zoe took the small bag from Braewyn and opened it, peering at the crushed leaves inside. 'What's in it?'

'Hemlock. That's why I said only a pinch. It'll send him to sleep, but it won't kill him. If his wound tears open again, you'll need to stitch it up. Needle, thread, rags, water and bandages are sitting on the chest there,' Braewyn said, pointing at the foot of Gawain's bed.

'Has the water been boiled?' Zoe asked.

'Yes, it has. I know how you are about that, Zoe,' Braewyn smiled tiredly. 'Then put more paste on it, and re-bandage it. If Gawain develops a fever, you need to get some of this down his throat-it's feverfew and willow bark and it needs to be in water. Change the bandages, too, if that happens, remember to put more of this on it,' Braewyn said, reaching for a pot of her herbal paste. 'If he's feverish you need to keep him as cool as possible.'

'Right-so if he wakes up, get him to drink and knock him out with hemlock. If he rips himself open again stitch him back up. If he gets a fever cool him down, pour feverfew and willow bark tea down his throat and change his bandages. Anything else, Braewyn?' Zoe asked, rubbing her forehead.

'If he dies-no, listen to me,' the old woman cut over Zoe's vehement objection. 'If he dies, go to Lancelot's room, not Arthur's. Arthur needs as much sleep as he can get at the moment.'

'I won't have to do that,' Zoe said.

'I hope you won't,' Braewyn said. 'If you need me, Dinadan has let me sleep in Palomides' room. The one with the leaping fish on the door. Oh, and these candles are for you to tell the time with. The marks represent an hour each, but someone should be here when the sun comes up in four or so hours. Flint and steel are on the table, there's a blanket for you on the floor near the chest. Goodnight, Zoe.'

Braewyn kissed Zoe's forehead and hobbled out, followed by Lamorak. Zoe retrieved the blanket-it was an old woollen one Zoe had washed several times in the laundry. She thought it belonged to Galahad, but she wasn't really sure at the moment.

Zoe tossed the blanket around her shoulders and sat on the cold stone floor, watching Gawain's far-too-still face, preparing for a long night.

xxx

A/N: Ok-here's the next chapter, and it's another dark one. I had a lot of time to work on this one-I was stuck at home during three 40+ degree days. I don't know what that converts into in Fahrenheit, but in Celsius it's a lot. I think it was 43, 44, 42 and then 39 the next day seemed comparatively cool. Today it's a lovely, humid 30 and I'm feeling chilly.

Anyway, enough rambling about the temperature here in Australia. Thank you to homeric, my lovely beta. I sent her the chapter last night and it was there when I woke up this morning. She's brilliant.

And thanks to everyone who keeps reading and particularly to my reviewers. I love you guys!

Disclaimer: I don't own this and I don't pretend to.