It does not feel like she has slept for more than a few minutes when Fringilla starts up from her slumber, momentarily disoriented. It is pitch-dark. Somebody is tossing and turning next to her, moaning and muttering in their sleep. Cahir. The hut in the forest. Suddenly wide awake, Fringilla sits up. She quickly murmurs a spell to cast the inside of their shelter in a soft light. The torch must have burned out. Unfortunately, Cahir's fever has not. Fringilla feels his brow. It is hotter than ever, his skin glistening with sweat. He is moving his head from side to side, clearly agitated. His pulse is far too fast, the woollen blanket damp and tangled. From what she understands of his gibberish, he seems to be dreaming about the desert once more.

"Don't go there, princess!" Cahir suddenly gasps out, his eyes flying wide open, seeing something that is not there but that must be terrifying. "The monster - run!"

"Cahir, wake up!" Fringilla urges, shaking him gently by his good shoulder. "There's no monster here. It's a dream, just a bad fever dream. It's only the two of us. See?" He looks at her from glazed eyes.

"C-Cirilla?" Great, now he is taking her for a very white teenage girl with ash-blond hair. Well, at least Cahir does not confuse her with the monster from his nightmare, that is something.

"It's Fringilla, not Cirilla," she says with a warm smile while stroking a brown curl from his fever-wet brow. He blinks but does not seem to recognise her. Fringilla picks up the cloth that has dropped to the floor during the night, dips it in the bucket with water and puts it back in place on her sick friend's forehead. Cahir moans, his eyes falling shut.

Do people not also apply leg compresses when someone has a bad fever? It cannot hurt, can it? Fringilla gets more linen cloth from the chest, wets the pieces and wraps them loosely around Cahir's lower legs while he mumbles something that sounds like 'Don't eat the lizard'. Pretty reasonable advice if you ask her, but why on the continent would anybody want to eat a lizard in the first place? Or did he mean gizzard?

"The unicorn, follow the unicorn. He's your friend, Princess," he suddenly says out loud and clear. "I will find you, I promise."

"Cahir? Are you awake?" He moans and blinks up at her, trying to focus.

"Fringilla?" he asks weakly.

"Yes, Cahir, it's me." Finally he got it right. Flashing a big smile at him, she grabs the jug and fills one of the tin cups. "Here, have some water. You must be dastardly thirsty." Cahir does not answer but obediently swallows when Fringilla puts the cup to his parched lips. She makes him drink the entire content.

"Go back to sleep now. You'll feel better in the morning." Hopefully, she adds in her mind. But what if not?

It does not take long for Cahir to fall asleep again. As much as Fringilla wants to do the same, she dares not. No, she better change the cold compresses regularly. And, if he wakes up, get some more liquid into him. She can sleep all day as soon as the fever is down and Cahir is safely on the road to recovery.

... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...

Fringilla jumps awake when somebody enters. She must have fallen asleep at some point during the night after all.

"Breakfast's ready outside," a gruff but by now familiar voice says. Faoiltiarna. "You better hurry or there'll be nothing left." He throws a dark glare at Cahir who has not stirred. "The Dh'oine still alive?" Fringilla glance at her friend. He is breathing, she notes with relief. He must be deeply asleep or unconscious.

"Yes, he is. And thank you for your overly friendly concern."

"Spare your sarcasm, witch. We owe you nothing, and especially not him. You both fought bravely on Thanedd, yes. You, witch, might have saved our Queen's life. But it's his fault that we were there in the first place, that Filavandrel is dead, that we lost so many. You traitorous humans bring nothing but bad luck, death and destruction, even when you pretend to be our allies!"

"I'm sorry for your losses. I truly am. It's not how it was supposed to go," Fringilla tries to assuage. Anyway, it is not fair to put all the blame on Cahir alone. "Don't forget, your queen must have agreed to the plan," she adds. "You don't intend to question her decisions, do you, Faoiltiarna?"

"No, I do not!" He turns on his heel and marches out of the hut, his back exuding an air no less hostile than his face just a few seconds before. Fringilla sighs. Perhaps she should be more careful with how she talks to this particular elf for the time being. But he really makes it hard with his obvious aversion for humans. Although Faoiltiarna has a point, Fringilla has to admit. Somehow the elves always seem to be the ones who get the shit end of the stick. And Cahir did betray them, they only don't know about it yet.

Fringilla checks on Cahir's temperature for the umpteenth time since he has been in her care. Still hot, but she has the impression the fever has gone down a little. The effect of the cold compresses? Or does fever automatically go down in the morning? Who knows? Well, Triss would, or Marti Södergren, but definitely not she. Fringilla sighs, also for the umpteenth time, then renews the compresses before she exits the hut. She is hungry, but she needs to talk to Francesca first. Hopefully the elven Queen is awake and ready to see her.

However, to Fringilla's dismay, she is not. The guards in front of Francesca's hut tell her to piss off, maybe not using the exact same words, but the message is clear. Their queen does not wish to see anybody, not even if the sky came crashing down on their heads. Darn. The willow bark then. Fringilla grabs one bowl of porridge for Cahir and one for herself. Then she approaches Faoiltiarna who appears to be the second in command now that Filawandrel is gone.

"I'm sorry to bother you and my apologies for earlier but—"

"What do you want, witch? Don't beat about the bush, spit it out!"

"I need a bucket full of cold water. And hot water for tea. And I need to find willow bark. And something that helps with infection—"

"Aren't you a sorceress? Can't you just conjure up whatever you need?" he scoffs.

"I could, but I prefer the real thing if it is available. As any reasonable sorceress would." There is a cost to chaos, after all, and she does not exactly feel well-rested after spending most of the night changing cold compresses and holding her sick friend's hand while trying to calm him down during his fever-induced hallucinations and nightmares. "So, is it available? Please?"

Faoiltiarna grunts, but then he nods curtly.

"Thank you. I do appreciate it," Fringilla says with her sweetest smile. Hopefully, it looks more sincere than it feels.

... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...

It does not take more than a score minutes and an elf peeks into their hut. Not Faoiltiarna, thank the Golden Sun or whatever god is in charge here in this remote forest in Cidaris. The elf looks younger and not half as grim as Isengrim. He was one of the guards by the boats, wasn't he? With a smile, Fringilla beckons him to come in. The Scoia'tael not only brings the requested water, but also an infusion of willow bark in a big pot and an assortment of dried herbs and a jar filled with honey for a poultice that is supposed to cure infections of any kind. Perhaps Faoiltiarna is not as cold and uncaring as he pretends to be? Or did Francesca give the order? It does not really matter. What matters is that she has something now that will help Cahir. At least she hopes it will. Quickly, Fringilla cleans her empty porridge bowl, crushes the herbs and mixes them with the honey. Still half asleep, Cahir moans pitifully when she takes his injured hand and, very carefully, removes the dressing. The wound looks even worse than the day before, now not oozing fresh blood but bloody pus. Not only the hand is red, swollen and sensitive to touch, but also the lower part of Cahir's forearm. Shit, this cannot be good. Fringilla magically cleanses the cut to cause as little pain as possible, then lavishly applies the sticky poultice. Accompanied by more moans and whimpering, she finally wraps new bandages around Cahir's hand and most of his lower arm.

Now the willow bark tea. She fills Cahir's cup. The infusion is still too hot to drink, but Fringilla decides against waiting. The sooner she gets the anti-inflammatory, fever- and pain-reducing concoction into her friend, the sooner it can unfold its effects. Anyway, it does not take that much chaos to cool it down a few degrees. After murmuring the incantation, she tries a little sip. And grimaces. The temperature is perfect, but it is not exactly pleasant-tasting, no, more like bitter as gall. She should have saved some of the honey for the tea. Too late. Well, Cahir is a soldier, not a little boy. How stupid to think he would resent the taste of the medicine.

Once she has managed to wake Cahir enough, it is pretty easy indeed to feed him the tea despite the vile taste. She only needs to use a commanding tone of voice and he does what he is told. The advantages of ingrained soldierly obedience.

"Thank you, Fringilla," he even murmurs groggily when the cup is empty. And falls asleep again instantaneously.

The porridge has to wait then.