A Scholar's travels with a Witcher

by Spike368

Sent out to gather the knowledge of the real world. A young scholar from the University of Oxenfurt finds a wounded Witcher on the steps to the inn where he was staying. So he starts gathering the material for his journals. Rated T for language I will be publishing this story on Royal Road /profile/349358

122. Chapter 122

(A/N: Believe it or not. I am actually an Archnophobe. Not as bad as some people that I know, I can at least screw my courage up in order to take a cup, piece of card, and scoop the things out the window. But I need to psyche myself up for it. I jump and squeak in terror when one turns up where it shouldn't be.

I mention this because in imagining the most terrifying, theoretically sinister thing that Ariadne could be attuned with, much like Bruce Wayne chose bats, I chose Spiders. The theme has progressed somewhat since then however.

So for this reason:

WARNING: Scenes that might squick out particularly serious Arachnophobes.

If you wish to combat your Arachnophobia or want to know where the inspiration for Fluffy comes from. Then I point you to You-tube and tell you to search for Lucas the Spider. It will legitimately make you go "Awwww." At a spider.)

Flame but I loved this woman.

I was stood, watching her work, behind one of the bushes in her more central garden. The circle in the middle of all of the walkways where Ariadne likes to hold court.

Or so I'm told.

The fountain was not working, the... whatever it was... that kept the water moving was turned off due to the cold. The bushes were now completely empty of their leaves other than a couple of the more evergreen plants from the south so that the garden still had a small splash of colour and I watched as Ariadne worked.

The immediate surroundings of this area, are where her manor house complex comes to a focus. Off to one side is her own bed chambers that would, in theory, become our bed-chambers after we were married.

Further round were the bath house and the Dining rooms. But there was also quite clearly a feeling of things that should, or would normally, be on the inside being outside and exposed to the elements. I had not properly explored the entire thing yet as it seemed rather intrusive. But this was where things came to the point.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. There was the Kitchen attached to the dining room but, looking at the dining area itself, there were large doors so that guests, or just Ariadne when she wanted to, could either see outside or actually be outside when the mood took them. This was also the building out of the complex that housed the receiving area where she negotiated with her peers and held court for her subjects. Further round there was what she thought of as her "proffessional buildings". Meaning her Library where the more complex and magical tomes were stored, her workshop and her laboratory.

All of these buildings were connected, as I say, by covered walkways. But other than the rooves, the entire thing was held up by stone pillars. The pillars and the buildings themselves were made from a white stone of some kind. Not marble though, I rather suspect that it was some kind of sandstone but geology is not one of my better subjects. But the roofs were covered in fire-baked red tiles.

The fountain was a large, pointed affair. Not for Ariadne the small cherubic boy, peeing into a basin. The design was mostly chaotic and made little sense to look at until you realised that the appearance of the thing was not what was important to her. It was the sound of the water running over and through the various channels and shapes of stone that made it important. So what first appeared to be a chaotic series of swirls and channels, made sense only if you closed your eyes and listened.

The other purpose of the fountain was that it acted as a sundial. The hours of the day were carved into the stone around the courtyard so that anyone sitting on one of the many benches around the place could look up, at a moment, and see what hour of the day was currently passing. Not that it was doing that at the moment. It was snowing and looking up, the clouds were still heavy with it.

The weather had started to turn colder the day of my first conversation with Mark and Emma. Rain had turned into hail and then into sleet. But then that itself had stopped and the snow had started falling. And I mean really falling. So much so that I was surprised by it. Throughout most of my life, my winters have been sent in the Oxenfurt area, either at the castle or in Oxenfurt during my period of rebelling against the family.

The relative closeness of the sea and the saly weather air, or so I'm told by people that know more about the weather than I do, means that snow is relatively rare there. Something about the combination of salt in the air as well as the relatively higher temperatures in the winter. Apparently, living near the coast means that winters are warmer and summers are cooler. I have no idea why and although an effort was made to inform me, it was not information that I was properly able to take in.

But there, although snow was not entirely unknown, we would get an inch or two of snow at best. While growing up, there were still stories told about the winter when Sam was nine and I was eight. When the snow had fallen heavily enough that snowballs could be thrown without the danger of small stones and bits of dirt being hidden in the wadded up ice cold weaponry. The memory of that winter was one of those things that we talked about at family gatherings for years to come. You know the kind of thing.

"Remember that winter where it snowed so hard that Father couldn't get into town and we all built snow men in the courtyard."

I did.

Then I remembered Edmund coming round and demolishing all of our carefully sculpted snowmen and making Francesca cry at the destruction. But that particular aspect of the memory is not something that people like to think about when they are talking about times past through the rosy hue of nostalgia.

But I have now learned the truth. That it is not proper snowfall unless you can measure the resulting drifts in feet rather than inches.

So it had snowed heavily for almost two days straight.

I found those two days to be... remarkably soporific. It was amazingly peaceful. Astonishingly so.

Ariadne does have a small staff. More because a lady in her position is supposed to have a staff rather than because she wanted one. But as well as Samantha and her husband, there was also Samantha's sister (The sister's husband had chosen not to join her in coming to Angraal) a groundskeeper who dealt with those bits of land that were not covered by the herb-gardens and were not, therefore, Samantha's realm.

As well as this, there were two members of staff that helped where they were needed, either in the kitchen or out in the land. There was a groom and a couple of stable-boys. Four others did the cleaning and the serving of food and drinks. The Butler was a man that had served the household of the now, Duke and Duchess of Angraal when they still called themselves King and Queen of Angraal. He made no pretense of hiding the fact that he was placed in Ariadne's household in order to spy on her and to make sure that she didn't do anything that would otherwise upset anyone.

But he had come to respect his new Lady and, according to the gossip, would freely consult with Ariadne as to what he reported to the Duke and Duchess. That side of his responsibilities had long since been relaxed.

It seemed that when the winter had gotten it's grip and the more delicate of the herbal bushes had been protected with nets, blankets and covered in glass. The job of a lot of the staff was to keep the paths clear from the blown snow and to make sure there was plenty of light and flame about. Meaning that there were low metal bowls that were filled with charcoal, wood and oil that were then kept burning to spread warmth and light at all times.

I liked this. Both for the practical applications but also for the symbolic ones. It made me feel as though I was surrounded by small, literal symbols of the Eternal Flame that were kept burning all through the night. And I found that I could sit outside, undercover, wrapped in a blanket and near one of these fires and be perfectly warm.

It was peaceful and in the couple of days following the confrontation with Emma and Mark, I found myself beginning to relax.

This was a double-edged sword. On the one hand it meant that muscles, long clenched were letting go of their tension which meant that I was able to get to sleep far better than I had been able to do for months. But it also meant that this lack of tension in my body was reminding me of all the abuse that I had put the thing through in the last few months. What it boils down to is that I spent a good amount of time dozing and being asleep. That was not as good as it sounded though, because that meant that the nightmares could find me and I found myself keeping strange hours as I fell into the habit of sleeping when exhaustion overtook me and taking advantage of that where I could.

There had been some other changes as well in the time since the family intervention. I had moved my work space into Emma and Laurelen's building. They had a desk moved into the communal area there where I worked. Often with Lady Yennefer in tow as we sat and argued with each other on the final edit of the book on Jack. That was a fascinating piece of activity as it meant that I could see Lady Yennefer interacting with her peers. Or a peer anyway in the form of Laurelen.

I don't know what happened to Lady Yennefer to make her distrust her colleagues in the way that she does but it meant that she automatically found herself on the opposite side to Laurelen in every conversation. She would actively try and pick a fight with the, I would discover, younger and less experienced Sorceress before realising that she was being unfair and blaming Lauarelen for the faults of other people. Either long dead or elsewhere at the time.

It made for a rather uncomfortable scene several times until I once pointed out that both women were actually arguing the same side of the debate. Lady Yennefer stopped mid sentence and seemed to fold in on herself as she considered what had just happened and nodded. Memorably she rose and offered her hand to an astonished Laurelen.

"I apologise," She said. "I do not apologise often as I am rarely wrong. But in this case I am. I would like us to be friends."

Laurelen took the offered hand, out of shock more than anything else and Lady Yennefer left saying that she had some things to think about.

They still argue but if I am any judge, it has taken on a more healthy overtone. They argue about magic now, rather than politics of the mundane and magical variety. Lady Yennefer and my sister avoid each other a little bit. I don't know why. Mark is often in his own rooms doing church related things, but he joins us for evening meals. Except on those occasions where Ariadne has invited them all for dinner. Then they all look at me a little with a question in their eyes. Anyone can tell what that question was going to be.

"Are you coming?" The all ask and my answer has been the same.

"Not until we have spoken." Then they all make slightly judgemental expressions before moving off to eat some of the delicious food that Samantha's sister has prepared.

Samantha's sister is called Charlotte. She and I have already spoken on the matter and she has given me permission to use her name on the grounds that she works for a higher vampire Sorceress and if anyone ever threatens her, meaning Charlotte, then her mistress can eat them.

I did argue that Ariadne doesn't eat people but Charlotte shrugged as though this was unimportant information.

Things were actually a little unfair to me in this regard. I actually wanted to go and see Ariadne shortly after my conversation with my siblings. I just wanted a little bit of time to bounce the idea of setting aside the mission to find and rescue or avenge Francesca around in my head. I wanted to dwell on this a little and see if anything else occurred to me as to what I could do next.

It didn't.

But then one day I screwed up my courage before going to look for Ariadne... and then I couldn't find her.

Finally, I was forced to enquire as to her wherabouts from one of the servants that I haven't had anything to do with yet and he informed me that "The Lady has gone to visit with the Duke and Duchess. She will be back the day after tomorrow."

The man had a neutral expression as he spoke that conveyed a kind of sense of disapproval while also, rather eloquently, wanting to be cautious in case I really did become his Lord and have the power over his future that such a position would command.

I thanked him and retreated in the face of his disapproval and returned to my reading, writing and thinking for a couple of days.

Then the day dawned when she was due to be back. I would have wanted it to be bright and sunny although logic suggests that that might be the worst option given that sun bouncing off snow can lead to headaches. It was still cold and it was still snowing as the message came to me that the Lady had returned home and was catching up on her business in her study. Again I thanked the messenger and stopped to think.

It was one of those, staring into space kinds of processes where I just looked at a patch of wall for an interminable amount of time.

Mostly what I was doing was trying to figure out what I was scared of. That I was scared was pretty obvious but what was I scared of.

So it was a process. I'm getting pretty good at these processes now. I have to stop and think things through. The first step is to realise that something is wrong. Then it comes down to a series of questions as I try and figure out what's wrong. Including such things as "Am I tired?" or "Am I hungry?" or "Am I lonely?" I was learning that there was also a trap there though. Which was that it's also very easy to end up being paralysed with the questions without moving forward.

But in this case, it was relatively easy. I was frightened of the coming conversation. I was now sure of a number of things. I was certain that I still loved Ariadne. I was also certain that I had never stopped loving Ariadne. And I still wanted to go forward with the wedding. I looked back at the actions that I took in the immediate aftermath of the meeting with Kerrass' Goddess and I do not recognise the man that did those things. He seemed alien to me and it felt a little unfair that I was having to deal with the repercussions of his actions.

I was also encouraged by the fact that she hadn't kicked me off her property yet. Which she could have done really easily and no-one, least of all me would have blamed her.

What I was scared of here, was the unknown. I didn't know how she was going to react to all of this. I didn't know what she was going to say and what was worse was knowing that the only way that I was going to find out, the only way to banish the fear, would be to go and talk to her.

But I was coming to hate these conversations with the people that I loved. Really really hate them. I knew that they were necessary. And I always felt better afterwards. Emma and Mark together had been the worst. The easiest had actually been with Laurelen who had been understanding and had confined the conversation to practicalities and ways she could help with symptoms. But I hated them. I was getting an almost violent reaction to people asking me how I was doing.

So instead, I prepared for the coming interview. I ordered a bath as I was, and still do, still enjoying having scalding hot baths where I scrubbed myself within an inch of my life. Then I dressed carefully.

I have made the comparison before that going out to court is a lot like getting ready for battle. Each item of clothing is carefully selected and laid out. This to ensure that it fulfills all practical requirements as well as makes the right kind of statement as it is done.

Then each piece of clothing is checked to ensure that it is clean and in a proper state to be worn and presented. You would be surprised how often, event the best, cleaners and laundry people can miss a stain or not notice that some stitching has come loose.

Then the clothing is put on, one piece at a time, making sure that each piece was settled properly before moving onto the next piece. A couple of things became clear fairly quickly. The first was that I had lost weight since I had last worn these particular clothes and the second was that I felt desperately uncomfortable.

This time I was successful in my efforts to leave my spear in the room. Although my boot knife, eating knife and belly knife all came with me.

I had tried to dress in a way that Kerrass would approve of. I was reminded, starkly, by the first proper conversation with Ariadne. Not the time where Kerrass and I convinced her not to raise her banner in rebellion against, well, everyone. But the time after that. Where I wore one of Kerrass' last clean shirts and he sent me off like a lamb to the slaughter. Or rather, like a best friend sending a man off to meet the woman that he was falling in love with.

Even though neither of the two people actually falling in love were properly aware of what was going on. I have thought about that moment since then and I have been left wondering if he knew what was going to happen. If he had guessed as to the half-formed ideas that existed in Ariadne's motivations and the way that she was behaving.

And I wonder why he acted on it. I suddenly had an overwhelming desire to actually ask him and talk to him about the entire subject. It was not one of those cliches where, for a moment, I forgot that he was gone and I turned to talk to him. I knew that he was nowhere nearby, but I did feel his lack then.

I missed Kerrass. All the other times that I had gone to have excruciating conversations with Ariadne, he had been in the local area to take care of me should everything have fallen apart.

I stopped at the entrance to my little hut as I let that thought sink in for a moment. This is something else that I'm doing regularly. Filing away these little thoughts as they occure so that I can take them out later and have a think about them. Either over a confession with Mark, or a drink with the family. And hopefully soon, during a conversation with Ariadne.

But this wasn't moving the process on any further.

I took a deep breath and pulled the door open into the cold air.

Ever notice how it seems to be that little bit warmer when it snows rather than just before hand? Yeah, I don't know why it does that either.

But I had taken the preccaution of wearing gloves, heavy boots and a warm cloak anyway.

I found Ariadne right where I expected her to be. In her study.

Yes, I missed that bit out earlier when I described the building so all of those of you who are currently congratulationg themselves on being so clever, then this is the bit where I tell you that you are right. Ariadne's study is not a fixed structure. When it is not in use it is dissassembled and stored in various places. The furniture and the canvas as well as the frame are kept in one of the store rooms while the papers and things are kept in Ariadne's rooms.

Her study is, essentially, a tent that she can move around her grounds and gardens depending on when the mood grabs her. During the height of summer, it is little more than a canopy in order to keep the worst of the sun off while leaving the sides open to allow proper movement of breeze and full views all around. From that most basic of structures come the other parts. There are walls that can be put on all four sides depending on the needs of the protection from the weather, or prying eyes, or to keep the heat in. The frame has hooks and things tor the hanging of tapestries in order to aid insulation and I also knew from our various discussions that there were also several rugs that could be used in order to carpet the floor.

In this, relatively small structure there was a shelving unit which contained various scrolls that Ariadne might need at any time. What these scrolls tended to be were scrolls of accounts and records of her estate. As well as some of the more recent projects that she was working on so that if the fancy took her, or inspiration struck, then they would be close at hand.

Then there was her large desk and chair that varied in states of untidiness according to Ariadne's mood. My understanding was that it was organised into four quadrents. The area directly in front of the chair was assigned to whatever it was that Ariadne was working on at that exact moment. The area to her left contained letters, ledgers and scrolls that she hadn't dealt with or read yet. Directly in front of her were things that she was done with for now, but might need to be worked on again in the very near future and the area to her right which contained completed letters, orders and the like that needed to be actioned by messengers, stewards or secretaries.

There were a stream of new letters and things that would come in on her left as she worked without looking up and the same servants and pages would arrive to take off the completed letters and orders off into various directions in order to be actioned.

The drawers to her desk only contained spare ink, quills, blotting sand and any other things that she might need for her work. Not for her the small pack of clandestine toffee's that you find in the desk of any Oxenfurt Professor.

The structure also contained a large and comfortable couch that was big enough for Ariadne to lounge in and on with several moveable pillows that could be moved around in order to achieve optimum comfort. Along with a side table nearby that always had the book that she was reading at the time as well as the next book ready should she finish the volume that she was reading at the time. There was also a similarly large and comfortable arm-chair nearby for friends or individuals that she wanted to be sociable with but didn't require the formality of her receiving room.

Very occasionally, there were chairs placed opposite her desk for those occasions when she was discussing the estates accounts with her estate manager and the tenant farmers and village aldermen. A place for subordinates to sit although she would never call them that. This as well as people that she didn't want to waste too much time on.

I was very afraid that this would include me in this case.

The entire structure could be moved. I know that she had it out in the fields when she was helping with the harvest and it had been in various different parts of the grounds depending on her moods, how many visitors she was expecting that day and numerous other factors that were not my business.

We had talked about this during one of our long talks and one of the things that she was looking forward to during married life was going to be having me sat in the arm-chair reading as she worked, which I thought was a very sweet and endearing image.

She also enquired as to whether or not I would be interested in a similar set up but I declined. I would want my study, wherever it ends up being, to be inside. Ariadne might like different sights, smells, activity and sounds going on around her as she worked. But for me, distraction is the enemy of work and I prefer peace and quiet as I write. She was fine with this but did suggest that there would come a time during any given day when she would decide that I had done enough work and that she would come and get me.

Why does she have this particular setup? I asked her fairly early on, during that time where she was still in the process of building her complex. She told me something that chilled me to the bone and lets me know that I am not the only person that has struggled with what has happened to me.

I am paraphrasing here but this is what she told me.

"Shortly after I was born, my first home is where the current Duke's hall is in Angraal. But as I got older I decided that the site was not entirely to my liking and I constructed my tower. The place where you found me. Back then I had a strong desire for solitude so I wanted it to be intimidating from the outside in order to discourage visitors and I built it in an out of the way place. Just to make sure that few people would come across it be accident.

"When I designed it, I loved that building. It had everything that I wanted in one place. My Lab, workshop, library and study were all there. It was comfortable, more than capable of seeing to my needs and had everything that I could ever wish for. When it was all done, furnished and decorated to my liking I remember standing back and just looking at it. I remember thinking that I could be entirely satisfied if I never left that place again.

"Whenever I left Angraal for whatever reason, that would be the place I would look forward to coming back to. The closed in nature of it. The familiarity and the shelter. But then came the time of the uprising.

"When humans arrived in Angraal, I would alternate my times between the great hall and keep that it was for it's time. I know that it's laughable now in comparison to somewhere like Kaer Morhen or Coulthard Keep, but at the time, the hall and the Throne of Stone were impressive structures. But I would alternate my time between the keep and my tower and I always preferred my tower. Keeping things away from the townsfolk and villagers so that I could have time to myself. Time to just enjoy and not be concentrating all the time.

"Then the people locked me up in it and I couldn't leave it for several hundred years. Not until a certain Witcher and Scholar booted my door down.

"I hate that place now. I couldn't go and live there again. I went back once to see if there was anything there that I could salvage or use to my benefit but there was none and I couldn't leave it fast enough.

"But the thing that I missed most during my imprisonment was the feeling of fresh air. The sounds of the countryside, even something as simple as the wind and the rain in the leaves or the sound of birdsong. Things that I had ignored or otherwise long since stopped noticing and suddenly I was desperate to hear, see and feel it all again.

"That is what this building is about. I will admit, that part of it all is my sense of humour. I enjoy watching people who arrive, expecting the dark and sinister "Spider-Queen of Angraal" in all her cold and austere majesty. Only to find a woman in a summer dress, reading a book in a sunlit garden. But it is also true that I find that I prefer it now.

"Laboratories require cool and dark places to prevent adverse chemical reactions and the spreading of fumes. Libraries need to be kept dry, as do workshops. But a study? I can work and write and meet people and read in the open air just as easily as I can indoors. In doing so, I can feel the sun on my skin, the wind in my hair and smell the rain on the air. A small spell protects the papers from short term damp and as such, my working space is complete.

"Castles and keeps are designed for defense. Outposts of order carved out of the chaos that is the Wilderness. But there is nothing out there that frightens me. I can escape and I keep my people far safer than a castle could. So why shouldn't I enjoy these benefits.

"But there are times Frederick. More times than I can easily think of. Where I need to be outside. No matter the weather or the time of day. You should know this about me because it will certainly have an impact on our lives together."

I remembered that conversation then as I found her pavillion out in the central garden. The most sheltered place from the wind and the snow although I could see the snow building up on the roof.

There was a fire pot in the tent as well. An addition for the winter it would seem. As I watched, one of the servants checked the level of flames before adding a couple of logs. On top of the pot was a metal grate upon which rested a large pot with a spout. The same servant replaced one of these with another that he had brought, steam pouring from the spout, from the kitchen that he carried with thick and padded gloves.

Ariadne herself sat at the desk, moving the papers that she had received from one part of the desk to another and, very occasionally, onto the fire. To the outside eye, her system appeared to be chaotic, but like a lot of people that are far more intelligent than they allow to be perceived, there was an order to what she was doing. She could probably, almost certainly, lay her hands on any given piece of paper at a time. But unlike some people, she allowed herself to be distracted by the comings and goings of the various servants and pages. She stopped to thank them and discuss things.

I liked that about her. I couldn't do that. If I was in the flow of this piece of work or that piece of work then I resented the presence of servants and the people that were coming and going. But she stopped and thanked the man that brought another pot of the hot drink and exchanged a few words with him. She also spent time talking to someone who came in, a ducal messenger by his livery, and put a scroll onto one of the piles. She handed him a few more from another part of the desk and told him to take advantage of the hot drinks and the presence of a kitchen in order to get something warm inside him before he headed back out onto the road. She herself was drinking from a tiny little cup. The size of thing that dishes out portions of Schnapps or Vodka in the smaller inns and taverns out on the road. But this one was made of some kind of pottery.

She was beautiful enough to make my breath catch in my throat. She was not dressed in any particular kind of finery. But she was dressed richly. My guess was that she was making some kind of point, being prepared for anything or anyone that might just turn up at a moments notice. The kind of thing where you have to look rich enough that no-one is going to mistake you for a servant, but also not dressed ornately enough as to be impractical should you suddenly need to call for a horse or go stomping through the snow to deal with this or that.

She was wearing a long, greyish blue coat with fur lining at the sleeves and collar. So I guessed that there was fur lining underneath it. The coat was a little more voluminous at the bottom than the kind that the Empress wears in her day to day life but those coats are becoming a fashion now. The coat was high collared in order to protect the back of her neck from cold draughts. Underneath the coat was a thick shirt of some kind although most of that was obscured and she wore a long grey skirt and dark leather boots. She also wore gloves of the same coloured leather as the coat.

The high collar of the coat meant that her hair, tied into a loose plait in order to keep it out of her way and out of her eyes was pulled over her shoulder and down her front.

She had a pair of ear-rings on. Some kind of silvery metal if not silver itself. I have never gotten around to asking either her or Kerrass as to whether she is vulnerable to silver on the grounds that it might be insulting, but I also found myself wondering if this was another one of the statements that she makes with most of the aspects of her life. In this case she was saying "Yes it's silver. No it doesn't hurt me. Now is that because I'm not a monster or because I am just so powerful that I don't notice it? I will let you, oh observer, be the judge."

Either situation is possible. But it's due to a similar statement that she was also wearing a symbol of the Eternal Fire around her neck which she played with occasionally while she was reading a letter or thinking about a response before setting it to paper.

As I watched, she calmly removed her gloves and picked up the pot that the servant had carried with thick gloves and refilled her little cup with a steaming dark liquid. So dark it was nearly black. She replaced the pot and pulled her gloves back on.

As I think I've said. Ariadne is not hurt by fire, heat or cold. She could have sat in the snow completely naked and not see any adverse side-effects. But she would also claim that that doesn't mean that the experiences are particularly comfortable. I found the image a little amusing. That she was wearing gloves against the cold but took them off so she didn't damage them with the heat of the pot.

So again, why was she dressed warmly? Was it a comfort thing or was she saying to anyone that might be watching, including me, "See, I feel the cold too. I am just like you really."

I have no answer for that.

I stood behind my bush and watched her work for a long while and it occurred to me that I would be perfectly happy just watching her work for the rest of my life. That reserved and gentle sense of placid calm on her face. The occasional furrow of her prow as she concentrated on something. The light of pleasure sneaking into her eyes when she was reading a letter from someone that she liked. The twist of distaste as she read something that she disagreed with, written by someone that she disliked.

She was in the middle of one of those routines when a servant approached me from behind.

"Excuse me sir," He began, unsure of how to address me as most of them still are.

Other than Samantha who still, occasionally, resorts to "Hey you," or "Oi. Fuckface." She says it's just to remind me of who's in charge really. I have only a little doubt that if any dignitaries turned up, her behaviours towards me wouldn't be absolutely pristine enough to ensure that our household wouldn't put to shame even the highest house in the land.

I look forward to seeing her meet Ciri. There's a meeting of the minds if ever I've seen one.

But anyway, servant sneaking up on me.

"Excuse me sir." He said. "Her ladyship would like to enquire as to whether or not you would like to stop standing in the cold and come and join her in the warm."

He didn't bother waiting for a response and turned away. I knew what I would find as I turned back and sure enough. Ariadne was looking at me. I sighed and started to wind my way through the snow drifts that had been shoveled aside. As I did so, Ariadne returned to the letter that she was reading and making a note on nearby slate. I stood before her desk in the same way that I remembered standing in front of my father's desk when Sam and I had been caught in some kind of mischief.

"Excuse me Ma'am." I began. "But are you Milady Comtesse, Ariadne de Angral?"

She smiled slightly and looked up at me. I have no idea why I chose that form of address over any of the others that were available to me but... there you go.

She gestured at one of the seats that was set out in front of the desk. "Please have a seat, I will be with you shortly."

I thought I could detect a hint of amusement in her voice behind the formal words. There really was this strange kind of bubble of warmth around the tent and I shivered as the pleasure of warmth returning to a cold body. I pulled my cloak a bit closer around me and sat, looking at the woman that I loved while she worked.

I was still dreading the conversation, but I did feel better for being near her. As I watched, she finished the letter that she was working on. Picked out a black piece of wax and held it near the fire pot before attaching a blob to the bottom of the letter and putting her signet onto the letter. Then she leaned back, resting her hands in her lap and gazed at me steadily.

Yes, her signet is of a spider. She says she likes to keep people on their toes.

We sat there looking at each other for several long moments. Her gazing at me without blinking. Me, barely able to keep my eyes open.

Then she moved.

"Would you like some coffee?" She asked.

"What's coffee?"

"It's similar..." She considered what she was going to say for a moment. "Actually, it's nothing like tea. But it's similar to tea. The Ofieri bring it over. Zerrikania gave us tea, the Ofieri gave us coffee."

"So if it's similar, but at the same time, nothing like tea. What is similar about it?"

She reached into her desk and produced another one of the smaller cups. There was an absurdly small handle attached.

"It is similar in that you brew it with hot water, it is dark in colour and you drink it hot. Similar in that it artificially stimulates energy and brain function. It is also mildly addictive. Also like tea, it can be rather bitter, especially when you brew it strong which is how it's supposed to be drunk."

She considered this as well.

"Or at least, it is when I drink it anyway."

I nodded to show that I was keeping up.

"But because of the bitterness, people can alleviate the bitterness by adding milk and honey."

"Same as they do with tea."

"I see that you grasp the basics of the situation. I am quite taken with the drink. I have some honey and milk here in case visitors come to visit but I always suggest that people try it straight before anything else is added. For the first time anyway."

"Hang on." I began. "I've played these games before. Is this another one of this situations where people try and get the stupid, but curious, scholar to eat or drink something that is absolutely disgusting as some form of a joke."

Ariadne did not look up from carefully pouring.

"I don't know what would give you such an idea." She declared. "I would never play such a cruel jest upon you. After all, what could you possibly have done to upset me?"

I thought I could hear just the twitch of a smile at that last sentence.

"So in what way is it different from tea?" I wondered.

She carefully finished pouring a cup for me and topped her own cup to the brim.

"It is less calming than tea, nor is it as good at purging the human body from intoxicants." She put the pot back on the fire and replaced her gloves. "It is a good cure for a hangover, or so I'm told although I rather suspect that it is a good mask for the symptoms of a hangover rather than a cure, and can help get a person started in the morning if they are struggling to wake up. It is also brewed from a kind of dried bean rather than leaves."

"A bean?"

"Yes. They dry roast them before grinding it up. I am exploring whether or not I can grow coffee beans in Angral although the suggestion is that it's possibly too wet up here. Fortunately, Sorcery can provide a way in these circumstances. You ready?"

She lifted her own cup and saluted me with it.

I gazed into the murky depths of the cup.

"I will admit that the smell is rather pleasant." I said before taking a cautious sip.

Ariadne watched me carefully.

I took some time to consider what I was going to say.

"And that wasn't a joke?" I wondered.

Ariadne passed the pot of honey and milk over. "It is an acquired taste." She was definitely smiling slightly now.

"It would have to be. How long does it take to acquire may I ask? I wonder because I'm not exactly going to live to be 900 years old."

"I shouldn't think it would take that long. Personally speaking, this mixture is a little weak for me but the weather means that I can't get a regular supply in. Therefore I have to ration myself."

"That must be hard." I had helped myself to some milk and plenty of honey.

"You have no idea." She said flatly.

With enough honey and milk to make Ariadne wince, the drink was rather pleasant in a warming kind of way.

"So how are things?" I wondered lightly.

She stared at me for a long moment. She does this thing where she just gazes at me. It's as though her eyes are just looking straight through me as she considers me. I always suspect that she's running a kind of tactical thing. Where she plays out conversations, imagining what she is going to say next and then what I will say to that and on and on and on. I don't know why she does it with me but I have a tentative guess that it happens whenever I do or say something that she is not prepared for. Or that is surprising to her.

Sometimes, when I want to feel particularly paranoid, I wonder what will happen when she stops being surprised by me.

"Things are not bad." She said after a moment. "Having guests for Yule is not proving to be quite the party that I was expecting it to be."

She kept her tone light and floaty. As though we were two friends who were just catching up.

"But the harvest was pretty good so it looks like I can begin having my lands turn a profit over the next year, and set some land aside for a few experiments with various crops."

"Such as the coffee beans."

"Such as the coffee beans yes. The herbal thing is doing quite well but, to be honest, most of the fields are taken up, out of necessity, by various countryside staples. Wheat, barley that kind of thing. We also have quite a few fields that can be used for sheep and goats but are a little too rocky for cows or any other kind of cattle. I want to keep and breed horses as well but there doesn't seem to be enough room for that."

She grinned at me. "Yet." I suspected that there might be some things going on there that I didn't understand. A nuance that I hadn't grasped or did not know about.

"The downside to things is that I think I'm beginning to make the Duke and Duchess a bit paranoid again. They're starting to get nervous around me."

"Why?" I wondered. I possibly sounded a little bit more concerned than I actually was, but it did seem to chime with what I had heard was happening.

"I suspect, deep down, that it's just normal paranoia. I think that they are too used to humans, especially humans from Angral, wanting to take over their stuff and to usurp their position. This is not helped by the fact that I have managed to turn the fortunes of Angral around in a relatively short period of time. I think that they don't know what to expect from me and that therefore they expect the worst."

She sniffed.

"It's a little distressing, they were my first friends and now I catch them watching what they say around me."

"You are one of the Lodge of Sorceresses now." I tried to put in gently. Putting myself in the shoes of the Duke and the Duchess. "Anti-magic sentiment is one of those things that is bred into the bone around here."

"Along with the natural distrust and hatred of non-humans." Ariadne agreed. "As well as the fact that, to them and to their parents and to their parent's parents, I am literally the fairytale monster that they are trained to fear and distrust. I am the thing that lurks in the darkness and..."

There was suddenly a sly gleam of humour in her face.

"And I am still an unmarried woman." She finished. "You would be astonished as to just how much weight that sort of thing has around here."

"But your general levels of competence must do something to assuage that. Along with the amount of padding to their treasury that you've done."

"That is true. As is the fact that the local high-Priestess of Melitele thinks I'm amazing due to my resources in being able to grow some of the rarer medicinal herbs. The Bishop of The Eternal Flame also declares how good and holy I am to anyone who sits still enough to listen for long enough. But I rather think that my competence is part of the problem."

I frowned.

"They see how hard I work and..." She sighed. "I think that my method of working and thinking is alien to them. They are used to ambition. Raw, naked, self-fulfilling ambition. To them, that ambition is always about wealth and personal status. It is not helped that they used to be the King and Queen of Angraal whereas now they are the Duck and Duchess of Angraal. That drop in a title hurts even though it was done for the best possible reasons, by them, in order to ensure their survival.

"Something else that they kind of blame me for. Given that it was the incident of my freeing and your recording of the event that lifted this area into prominence and brought attention to the fact that people round here were still referring to themselves as the Kingdom of Angraal."

I felt like I should be taking notes.

"But is there not a list of benefits that have happened as a result? Surely their newfound fame and notoriety has brought in things like trade and, presumably, other things that I'm not thinking about."

Ariadne did smile then.

"Ah Freddie. I love you, but sometimes you really do slip back into being the rather naive young man that first came through my bedroom door on the brink of death. They are humans. They want to blame their problems on other people while taking credit for all the good things that come along. They don't even know that they are doing it."

She rubbed her head as though she had a headache forming and took another drink of coffee before, with perfect comedic timing, realised that she had already drained her cup and refilled it.

"Don't get me wrong." She said as she poured herself another cup. "I love them both. Them and their children and if they called on my oath then I would go. They are aware of all the logical reasons for their distrust and they know that it's ridiculous. They are good people, it's just that they are so used to distrust and paranoia that it is a habit that they can't get out of."

I nodded as I held up a hand to decline a top up of the strange dark liquid. With enough milk and honey, it was not unpleasant but I could feel a strange kind of jumpiness happening in my fingers. A nervous energy that I was not entirely enjoying and the only thing that I could imagine as causing this feeling was the hot liquid that Ariadne seemed to want to consume by the pot.

"There is also the possibility that when you first... escaped?" I asked.

Ariadne nodded.

"When you first escaped, you were rather dependent on their kindness and good graces. But now you are independent. You have friends at the Imperial Court, the Redanian court and amongst the Lodge of Sorceresses. Not to mention that your best friend is literally a dragon."

Ariadne grinned at the thought

"But maybe that is getting to them." I finished.

"It is a thought that had occurred." She admitted. "I have resolved to spend some more time with them and their family. I have decided that the way to their heart is through their children and as I will certainly be around when their son inherits, I am doing my best to be his friend and become an aunt figure to him. This is helped by the fact that he thinks Fluffy is cute and has asked if he could have one for himself. His mother disagrees."

We both laughed at the thought.

There was another period of the two of us sitting together in comfortable discomfort. An odd feeling to be sure. We were comfortable in each other's company and everything despite the fact that I still caught myself every so often with the realisation that I was talking to an Elder Vampire. One that I was in love with at that.

But there was also something hanging over us. Something that neither of us were quite ready to talk about yet. It hung over us like a giant weight on an increasingly fraying rope.

"I'm also having another problem that I hope, in the long run, that you might be able to help me with." She said as she rooted around in one of the drawers in her desk.

"Oh?"

"Yes, I have, increasingly been getting a large amount of correspondence from a certain kind of person that I thought I would run past you." She came out clutching a large bundle of papers that she held in a fist.

"I have suitors." She said in the same way that a person might say that they have genital lice.

"Oh?" I felt my eyebrows trying to climb up into my scalp.

"Mmmm." She did not smirk at me. But I was also left with the distinct feeling that a point was being made here somewhere.

This was not the topic of conversation that was hanging over us. I suspected that this was medicine and I resolved to swallow every single drop of what I needed to swallow.

No matter how bitter it might taste.

Ariadne sat back and started flicking through the letters. "You have commented in your regular articles, which I still read by the way, that you occasionally get letters or suggestions from people to say that what you should do is to throw me to the bed and give me a good ploughing."

I swallowed. She spoke with a kind of clinical detachment, absolutely no indication about what she thought about any of that. She glanced over the top of the paperwork and one of her eyebrows raised as though she was assessing the impact of her words on me.

The image did, and still does, conjure strange thoughts. Speaking personally, the first thought that occurs is that the only way that such a thing would ever happen would be if Ariadne wanted to be thrown onto a bed and ploughed. After that, I was not adverse to the idea of such an action but the practicalities of the entire affair were a little overwhelming.

Ariadne watched as all these thoughts skittered across my brain before nodding to herself and returning to looking at the paperwork.

"You may or may not be pleased to hear that this sentiment is reflected in some of the letters to me. They suggest that what I need is a real man to give me a good ploughing and that they would willing to take on the burden of such a thing if I was amenable."

She looked up at me again with enough expression to leave me wondering if she was trying to make a joke, or if she was hiding a smile behind all the papers.

"Obviously they did not say it in so many words?" I ventured.

"Not as such no. In fact they were rather cruder in their language if I'm perfectly honest. Then they tend to go on to making comments about their maniliness and the size of their genitalia that leave me wondering if these people are quite that stupid. From what some of them say, if they got an erection they would immediately have a heart attack or pass out due to blood loss. The sheer amount of blood to get such an organ erect would be... outrageous."

"Huh." I said weakly.

"At first I was angry, but then I saw such things for the desperation and arrogance that they were and kept them to have a good laugh at when I need cheering up."

"Do you need cheering up often?" I wondered.

She stared at me for a moment as I realised that I might be skirting a little close to dangerous conversation there.

"Sometimes." She said. "After a hard days work arguing with Lady Eilhart and Ida on this topic or that. But it does not do to offend these people so I normally send a politely worded response to say that I am currently engaged and waiting for my wedding night for such adventures to occur. That when those adventures do take place, that I am looking forward to sharing them with my husband. They normally take the hint after that."

I contemplated this sentence in silence for a moment.

"The use of the word "normally"," I ventured carefully, "suggests that there are sometimes some abnormal cases that do not work quite as well."

This time she let me see her smile. "Yes. There are other correspondents that are much more flowery and delicate in their enquiries. I am still a little new to some of these things and don't always pick up on the signals. As a result, I am occasionally trapped into a situation where what I think is someone merely being friendly, actually turns out to be someone sparking up a proposition, or wanting to arrange a tryst."

I could not fight down the thought that I was being made fun of and so I just accepted my fate.

"How badly have you been dissappointed?" I wondered.

"There was one instance... Ah, here it is," she pulled out a letter. "Where I thought I was going to a meeting in order to discuss the proper growing of certain plants and flowers that I might use for medicinal or alchemical purposes. This on the grounds that there is always time to learn something new. But it turns out that the rose that he actually wanted to discuss was the rose of my virtue."

She sniffed derisively.

"A discussion that was supposed to take place at a nearby waterfall. He was most offended when I kept asking questions about the makeup of the rose as well as the genetic properties of such a thing and whether or not the petals could be used as some kind of tea."

"Ok, now I know that you're teasing me."

"Not in the least. He claimed that he was actually rather insulted that I turned him down. He made comments about my leading him on and went off in a huff leaving me quite confused. Samantha had to explain it to me later."

"She laughed didn't she." I groaned.

"Actually, she was rather angry and suggested that for the benefit of the male gender and on behalf of woman kind everywhere, that I should have... now let me get this right. She was quite visceral as she spoke. Ah yes. "I should have ripped off his todger and used it to gag him before unspooling his innards and strangling him with them." She went on to suggest that her first desire was for me to remove his spine and beat him to death with it. I was not aware that her imagination could be quite so..."

"Graphic?" I supplied.

"Lurid." She finished. "The prospect is laughable of course. I have said many times in public, as have you, that just because I am a higher vampire does not mean that I am more or less promiscuous than the next person. But the criticism that you and I should just get it over with is frankly ridiculous. Your society favours men in that regard, which I've always found a little bit unreasonable. But the fact remains that in order for me to be part of the society that I find myself in, I must obey it's rules. And those rules are that you and I should not have intercourse until after we are married."

"Much though we might want to." I joked.

"Precisely. We have come close on one or other occasion though." She did not see it as one. "In all honesty, when I first suggested that you and Kerrass should come and winter here, I was given thought to wonder whether that was a good idea or not due to the temptation of having you sleep in a nearby room might be rather... tempting. However, without putting you under too much pressure, I do not think that you are entirely up to it at the moment."

I said nothing.

"Which is rather my point. On those occasions where one or other of us has been weak, then the other has, fortunately, been strong. But that is not the point. Why would people believe that, because I haven't had intercourse with you, that I would have intercourse with them?"

"It is a poser." I knew the answer of course. "It might be because they think that they are better than me."

"Freddie, even at your most selfish and stupid, you are ten times the men that these pustules on the face of your gender are."

I felt a little better about that.

Ariadne was watching me as she waited for my chuckling to die down. She was quite calm about it. Smiling gently as she watched.

This was it. This was the moment where the conversation shifted and we started to talk about what we actually came here to talk about. I could feel it. In the same way that there is a sense of anticipation just before a fight is going to start. Just before that happens, it's as though everyone just atakes a moment to take a deep breath. The real killers, people like Kerrass, Letho and, I imagine, the other trained killers of the Continent, are the people that don't need that breath.

But this was the moment.

Ariadne finished her drink in the same way that you or I would have a shot of some strong spirit before doing something terrifying. "Rivian courage" they call it although I always thought that that was a little bit unfair.

"So how are things with you?" She asked.

A clever question. But then it would be. One of the reasons that I loved this woman was for her cleverness. A mirror of my question which means that I can say as much or as little as I wanted. But I was here now and this needed to be done. I was struck with a premonition that if I didn't do this now, then the chances were good that I wouldn't do it at all.

"I am looking forward to several things." I spoke without thinking. "The first is the point in time where I can stop bursting into tears at a moment's notice. The second thing is that I really, really want people to stop asking me that."

I felt the pull of the tears then as well. Scrabbling at the core of me. Like a caged animal trying to get out. The words came out angrier than I wanted them to as a result.

"We ask because we care Freddie." She said carefully.

"I know."

"And, because we care, we are never going to stop asking."

"I know that too."

And as I always seem to, I finally lost my fight with the tears. Ariadne did not hug me, nor did she say anything. Anyone else, including Emma, Mark and Laurelen, would figit with the quill on the paper. Indeed, that had been exactly what they had done. Other than Laurelen, who seemed to know much more about dealing with people that have been through some stuff than I had expected.

But Ariadne just sat there and waited for me to finish, watching me carefully.

I fought for control. I didn't want her to see me like this. I didn't want anyone to see me like this but especially not this woman. The woman that I loved. I wanted to be strong in front of her, I did not want to lose that... I don't know... I suppose it is some kind of foolish male pride that wants us to stay upright and in control when we meet the women that we love.

I hated my weakness and I said so.

"Flame, I hate this." I said between sobs.

"It's alright Freddie." She said gently. "For you to know, because I think you need to hear it. It is no weakness to express pain, nor is it weakness to ask for help. I think you should have been told that regularly and often for some time now. I also want you to know, that the reason I am not just taking you into my arms right now is because I worry that it might be overwhelming for you. But Freddie? Look at me Freddie."

I did as I was told.

"I want to." She said. "I wish I could take all your pain and all of your worries away. I wish I could and I will do my best to do precisely that, for all the years that we can be together. I love you."

Like all of her declarations of love, she said it in a flat, almost simple monotone that made it seem all the more... true because of it. When she speaks like that, I have finally figured out, it is because she is doing her best to control her, rather extreme emotional reaction. I have yet to figure out a way to decipher those emotions though.

I looked at her through tear-filled eyes. "I am so, so very sorry." I said, finally articulating the thing that I have wanted to say.

I saw her nod.

"I've been thinking about that." She said. "And I have decided not to accept your apology. This because I have also decided that you have nothing to apologise for. You are sick. You have been for some time I think and if the truth be told, I was expecting something like this kind of breakdown when I came to see you in Skellige. After everything you went through there I was honestly surprised that you didn't. It was why I was so keen to come as I thought that that's what I would be doing there. Rather than meeting your friends."

She smiled at something.

"This has been coming for some time. Since your time in the North with the cult, maybe as far back as Toussaint. Something poisoned your mind there although I wonder at what it was, or whether it has always been there and it was just... activated in some way. You remind me of a bull charging at a wall. You hurl yourself at the walls over and over again and every time you get to a wall, until now, you have broken it down. Every single time, until Francesca, and now you keep throwing yourself at that wall, coming round it, trying to get at different bits of it in order to break it down but no matter how hard you try, you just can't get the wall down."

She sighed.

"I love you for trying though. So does everyone else that knows you."

I nodded and took some time to stare into space.

"But..." Ariadne began carefully after a while. "Just so we're clear. Your illness and injuries are an explanation for bad behaviour. But it is not an excuse. Now that you are properly aware of the consequences of your actions and aware of just what has been done, you have a responsibility to take proper care of yourself and to ensure that this kind of thing doesn't happen again."

"What if I can't?" I asked, expecting her to yell.

"Can't what?" She asked calmly, because of course she was calm.

"Can't take care of myself, can't tell when this is going to happen. What happens if I don't know if I'm doing it?"

"Then you must learn." She said. "I will help you if you want my help. Your family will do the same. You have made lots of friends during your travels Freddie. Please, I'm begging you. Let us help you with this."

"And if I can't do that? Don't get me wrong, I absolutely intend to take the steps that you, Mark, Emma and Laurelen suggest. As well as some other steps that I will learn soon I have no doubt."

"That depends if it's done deliberately or not." She replied. "If you do your best and you learn and take steps and backslide occasionally then we will help you. If you avoid this, if you ignore this, then next time this happens, because it will, then next time there will be fewer of us willing to help you get back on your feet. The time after that, there will be still fewer and then, one day you will turn around and there will be no-one to help pick you up."

"But if you love me..." It was the petty voice that spoke. Out of all of that time, that was the wail that I am most ashamed of.

"It would be because I love you that I would not be able to watch you do this to yourself." She said, frustratingly calmly. "If you know that I will always be there to pick you up, you will not have any enticement to pick yourself up. And that is what needs to happen here. And I think it's the thing that some members of your family have not quite picked up on yet."

She went to get herself some more coffee. "The truth of this kind of thing, is that we can tell you all of this stuff over and over and over again. We can tell you about how you should stop travelling, stop looking for Francesca or stop doing this and that. But you won't take it in unless you want to.

"We can forbid you from travelling. We can tie you up and keep you prisoner. But you will escape or lie or find a way to ignroe us. Then, one day, you will be gone to do more damage to yourself.

"We can only help you if you want to be helped. We can only help you if you know that there's a problem. And that you want to get better and fix it. I still love you Freddie. I doubt I will ever stop. But that is the last piece of your puzzle. Unless you want to get better. You won't."

I nodded, I don't know how I felt about what she was saying, but there was truth in her words.

"Will you hate..." I sobbed and choked on the words at the same time. "Will you hate me if I tell you that I don't know the answerto that yet."

She smiled slightly. "Never Freddie. I love you. Even if you destroy yourself I will still love you. Even if you drive us all away with foolishness. Even if I have to leave you, because I love you, so that you will learn from what is happening to you, I will still love you. I will love you for ever. For the rest of your life. For the rest of mine and, to all intents and purposes, I live forever." Then she frowned slightly. "I thought I had made that clear."

I felt a shocked burst of laughter bubble up as I realsed she was joking

"Let me put it another way Freddie," She began. "If we marry, and I only get half a Freddie, then I will be angry." She took a deep breath, "So, do you want to get married?"

I looked into her eyes. That thing that I was still a little afraid of and saw my answer. "Yes. Yes, I really do. I love you. I am so, so sorry." She nodded and looked at the surface of her desk. I could hear the wind blowing in the courtyard, small flurries of snow coming with it. The wind dislodged some of the snow that had formed on the edge of one of the rooftops and there was a flumpf noise as it fell down into the drift below.

"Alright then." She said calmly before looking up so that I could see the tears sliding down her cheeks. "Now can I hug you?"

I stared at her, appalled. There was real fear in her eyes, as though I might, even now, say no.

I nodded, not trusting myself to speak.

I still have not seen a Vampire move. All I can say with any certainty is that she made a noise, somewhere between a groan and a moan and I was in her arms as she have crouched over me and wrapped her arms round me. Her tears fell gently and I felt wetness in my scalp.

"I'm sorry." I sobbed over and over again. "I didn't mean to hurt you."

"I know Freddie," She mumbled just as often. "I know.

Another one of the many weights that I had been walking around under lifted from my shoulder in that moment and I felt as though I could float away. Indeed, I rather thought that I would have if Ariadne hadn't been holding me down.

"I have to stop being rational for a moment." she said. "Just for a moment while I stress just how angry I was with you and how angry I still am. I know you were ill. I know you are still ill and injured but it really hurt when you thought so little of me. It hurt when you thought I would care... You were up against a Goddess Freddie." She pulled back and wiped her eyes a little. "If you are ever, so stupid enough as to not talk to me. If you try and hide things from me again. So help me Freddie, I'll... I know you're sorry. And I forgive you. But don't you... EVER... do that to me again."

I smiled at her. Her eyes were apologising for the words even as she said them and I promised. I promised with all my heart, because how could I not.

"I will admit," I began after she had thrown her arms round me again. "That I might still do some stupid things occasionally."

"That's ok." She mumbled into my chest. "Just so long as you talk to me about them. That's all I want. If you make mistakes, then we talk them through without you hurting yourself or otherwise making yourself feel worse. And try to talk to me about them in advance will you. It might save us both some time if we can talk things through and prevent each other from being stupid."

"It might." I admitted.

We held each other for a while longer before she straightened up. "It occurs to me," she began, "that I have a couch in the tent, with cushions and a blanket. I am not done hugging you but it is warmer in there and..."

"I am alright with a couch. Although will there not be rumours?"

"My chaperones can still keep their eyes on me from in there." She said, helping me to my feet.

"You still have chaperones?"

"Of course. They get very annoyed when I teleport elsewhere as they are unable to follow. One of the heads of my household is an elderly, minor relative of the Duchess. Many factors removed, a widow and, to be fair, I would have been lost without her while I learned to keep a modern house. She hates a lot of the reforms that I have made but she has been invaluable. If you look over there, just past the fountain and through the window, she is in her bedroom knitting and watching us to ensure that nothing untoward will happen."

I could just about see the old woman. I got the sense that she was scowling at me.

"Will lying on the couch get us into trouble?" I wondered as I waved. Ariadne was moving cushions.

"No. We will become uncomfortable long before she gets worried. She will find some excuse to come and interrupt us before too much longer, never fear. Now lie down."

It took some adjusting to get us there properly, to a position that truly was comfortable and Ariadne's prophecy of us not being comfortable for long was clear and hovered on the horison. But for the few moments that we had, it was undeniably pleasant to lie there in the warm circle of my fiance's arms as she rested her head on my chest.

It was peaceful in that little pavillion, the added sound deadening qualities of the snowfall meant that we felt like we were in our own little bubble, kept away and separate from the rest of the world and I will admit, if that turned out to be true, then I would have been ok with that.

But I still had a number of questions that were niggling at me.

"Does your chaperone not approve of me?" I wondered.

She snorted. "My chaperone does not approve of anyone. She kind of sees that as her responsibility. But if she had a choice, I think she would prefer me to marry above my station. She is not the only chaperone though and one of the others has been championing your cause to anyone that will listen. This on the grounds that you were my choice and that therefore, my choice should be honoured, despite what other people might think. It is an ongoing debate and one that will not be settled until long after I am married. Or so I think anyway."

"What's the debate line?"

"The same as it ever is. The invention of romantic love versus the duty of a woman to marry for the purpose of her family."

"Invention of romantic Love?"

"Yes." She pulledd off my chest to look me in the face for a moment before settling back down. "Do you not know that?"

"I know many things, but the history of love is... I thought it was just one of those things that people acknowledge. You know, love is love."

She snorted again. "It has been one of my sources of confusion when it comes to talking to humanity. And that is your use of language. We've talked about this before about your use of the same word to describe different things."

"I remember, Love for friends, love for family, love for children, love for spouse, physical love, making love, falling in love."

"Mmm." Ariadne shifted her weight. "I had always thought that humanity had accepted the concept of Love but this simply isn't the case. I researched this before we got engaged when I was trying to figure out how to get you to love me and marry me."

"Oh?" This was news to me.

"Yes. It seemed as though things were made very complicated. I had little doubt that I would wear you down eventually and, in truth, it turned out that you had already decided that you loved me despite the abject terror that you felt... and still feel?" She looked up into my face again.

I took a deep breath. But I had promised truth and to talk my problems out with her. "Sometimes."

Her eyes narrowed slightly. "Do you want me to get off you?"

"No."

She nodded and settled back down. "We will talk about that later."

"I shall look forward to it." Curse it. I had promised truth. She snorted again.

"It seems that humanity had acknowledged Lust and filial, family love as well as the love of the state and country."

"Patriotism,"

"Yes and no. There is some overlap there but it isn't the entirety of the thing. But romantic love is not something that has been around for very long."

"What?"

In my defence, I was lying on a couch with a beautiful woman in my arms. And as a historian, I was interested in facts, battles, lifestyles and things. I had not examined the existence of emotions as a thing.

"It was invented in Toussaint," She said. "Coming out of the concept of courtly love which can essentially mean the adoration of a subject from afar, doing everything in your power to improve the status and the life of that subject while never giving into your "base" desires. The idea being that both people in a courtly love relationship would be aware of those feelings while never acting on them due to the rigors and responsibilities of courtly life."

"So it was an understanding that young and beautiful wives who were married to old men for money and title would look around for handsome and virile young men?"

"It was an understanding of that yes. While at the same time stating that the young woman and the handsome man would never act on those feelings in a physical way. No touching and definitely no congress."

"I would be willing to bet that it happened though."

"Frequently. But the ideal was there. Men, and women, actually gained great fame and honour from the concept. But what was never addressed was the underlying feeling. The sense of longing that existed between the two people. That was finally addressed by several scholars, including Master Dandelion in his early career although he has discussed the subject at length since. And it was called Romantic Love."

"I see. What were we talking about again?"

"The two sides in the debate amongst my chaperones as to whether I should marry you or marry someone else."

"Ah yes."

The discomfort level of the cuddle had now overwhelmed the comfort and pleasure that it had generated.

"So some people championed the romantic," I prompted.

"And others championed tradition. That I should marry for wealth, title, land, prestige etc. The fact that none of those things particularly interest me is beside the point. But they look down on you because you are a minor son of a Baron. Your academic accomplishments, personal courage and honour as well as the fact that said Baron was only a Baron through his own determination is immaterial."

All of that was true, but I would be lying if I tried to say that it didn't hurt a little bit. It's never nice to hear that people have been talking you down. Especially when those people might have an influence on the woman that I love.

"They miss a few things out though." Ariadne went on as she climbed off me and moved over to the large and comfortable arm chair. Pulling another blanket out of a box as she went and curling her feet under her as she sat.

"Oh? Such as?"

"The fact that I am only a figure of interest because of your efforts is immaterial to them. You have made me acceptable to the world now and while I am not averse to these developments, they seem to forget who I am, what I am and the past tense of both of those factors."

"Huh."

We sat in silence for a while. My thinking over everything that we had talked about, and the pleasure of just sitting, in the warm, on a comfortable chair with the woman that I loved. For her part, she had snagged a piece of paper from her desk and was reading it. In the absent-minded manner of a person who knows that they have a lot of things to do but is enjoying the conversation too much to set it aside.

I rested my head back on a cushion and waited for the next question to resolve itself in my mind.

"So have you had many other suitors?"

"I have."

I discovered, much to my astonishment, that I was jealous.

She laughed, clearly reading my emotions off my face with disconcerting ease.

"There have been several, I won't lie." She told me, setting the piece of paper aside. Most fall into the bracket of men who think there is something lesser in you because you haven't tried to plough me yet. Then there are those that think that there is something lesser in me for not having been ploughed yet."

"Wait what? Are you sure that those are two distinct groups?"

"Oh yes. Then there are some people that have fallen in love with me through reading about me through your work. They themselves fall into two categories. The first is the category where they meet me or gain stories of me and decide that I fall short of the romantic image that they have of me in their minds. Then they get angry at me for falling short, or at you for lying to them."

"This sounds like madness."

"It is, it really is. But then there are those that meet me and decide that I am even more perfect than they could possibly have imagined and go to great lengths to "woo me properly". It's quite sweet, entirely endearing and utterly without merit.

"There are also people that try and start negotiations anyway. A trend that I feel a bit guilty about if I'm honest. People that arrange marriages without any kind of formal courtship. I know that your society feels as though women are the lesser of the two genders but I rather thought that this was a bit unfair. The best part, or so I'm told," She gave me a teasing glare. "is all the gifts and flowers that one gets from admirers. But some people are moving towards cutting out the middle man entirely and just arranging the marriage. I think that would be fine the other way round but the Duchess has received several enquiries to start proceedings with me."

A small shadow crossed her face. "And how does the Duchess take it?" I wondered.

"The Duchess talks to me about it. I must say that her willingness to stand on my side of things has fallen a little short in recent times. She is catching the disease that she believes that I will calm down a bit once I am married rather than turning the countryside on it's head and once word got out that you had broken things off... well..."

She shrugged.

"That got out fast." I commented.

"Freddie, I love you but you're being naive. I'm an unmarried woman and a Countess. I run my own province. When that kind of thing is available, people tend to conveniently forget that I am also a Sorceress and a "Monster." Also, you tried to break off our engagement in a public courtyard when there were servants around, a relative of the Duchess and a visiting merchant. News like that spreads faster than a wildfire in summer."

I considered this. "I hadn't thought of that." There was a flicker of guilt that she squashed.

"Freddie, I will keep telling you this until you believe it. You are forgiven. I don't believe that you were thinking clearly. You were sick. You were not at home. Mad as a fox. One card short of a Gwent deck. Not quite the full Florin. Really out to sea. Any number of things. But people think that I should set you aside for that very purpose."

She harrumphed at the thought.

Then she stared into space for a short while before giggling.

"Then I deploy the boys."

With a line like that, I had to ask. "The boys?"

"Yes. Tom, Dick, Harry, Bert and Frank."

"Ariadne, you're being cryptic."

"Yes, and it's so much fun."

Watching a beautiful woman cackle evilly, especially one with a history as dark and, dare I say it, sinister as this one... well...

It was really hot.

"Ok, it goes like this." She got up and poured herself some more coffee, offering me some which I accepted, more for the heat than for anyhting else, "Just occasionally, there comes a male who will not be put off by courteous insistence that the marriage arrangement is already made and that neither party is prepared to break off the proceedings."

"My thoughts on the matter not withstanding."

"Freddie, I would have thought that you of all people are well aware of the fact that in the marriage, the bride and the groom's feelings are completely beside the point. The only reason that I have any import in the matter is due to the fact that I have no easily accessable father to consult on the matter."

"True," It is true at that. I was lucky in that I am able to marry the woman that I love. The fact that this was arranged before the two of us became quite as famous and influential as we are is beside the point.

Ariadne settled back down with a sigh of contentment. She looked, happy I suppose, relaxed.

Then she frowned slightly, it was a minute movement. Not much. I like to think that I am getting better at reading her emotions and her thought process.

"It's funny." She said. "When you and Kerrass first freed me from the tower I tried so hard to fit in with human society. In many ways I became more human than humans can be. I was good, dutiful and did all the things that I was supposed to do. I followed the rules and the, sometimes rather foolish, bounds of polite society to their logical conclusions. Then I found that, in doing so, I had gone further than many of my fellows had already done so.

"Apparently it's strange to put my people's feelings before my own. Ensuring that I distanced myself from my immediate predecessor's behaviour was also considered revolutionary. Going and spending time amongst my people so that I could learn, first-hand, what the problems of the people was rather than assuming that I would know from a distance. Because apparently, just being their Lord is enough for most Lords and Ladies. At first I assumed that it was just some instinct that humans get when they become Lords over their fellows. Then I realised that it was laziness, entitlement and wilful ignorance.

"So all of that seemed logical. I dressed the way they wanted me to dress. Something that was not entirely unpleasant. I danced, I attended parties and social functions. I collected taxes and attended church services. I even took education and was baptised into the worship of the Eternal Flame because that is what humans are supposed to do.

"So in many ways, I am more human than some humans are. But then I start getting criticisms. I start being told things like "A proper Lady does not behave in such a way." And then, rather foolishly, I ask why not. And I am told, as far as I can tell without irony, "It's just not done."

So many people are coming out of the woodwork in an effort to try and tell me how I am supposed to behave that it is somewhat off-putting.

"So now that I am behaving like a human, I find that, occasionally, I have to remind people of exactly who and what I am.

"I have had to start carrying around my staff in court."

"The one with the rearing Spider?"

"The very one. I had to figure out how to make it glow gently to remind people that it's magical and that I am magical. This, because quite regularly, men were coming up to me and telling me how I was supposed to behave. What's worse is that the way they did it was all... nice and beneficial. They told me that I should get married and leave such things to my husband. And that I didn't understand things because of my..." She pulled a face "femininity."

"They do know about Emma and the Empress right."

"As a matter of fact they do. And when they are not being hated for the fact of being female, they are touted as the exceptions that prove the rule that women are just less intelligent."

She sighed again.

"But hang on. The Duke regularly consults his wife on matters of state. I know that, you know that. I even wrote about it."

"Yes you did. And those same men condemn the Duke for being weak for preciesly that reason. They call him hen-pecked and talk about him as though he's tied to his wife's apron strings. But then suddenly this becomes my problem. In ruling my lands and my people in the way that I am, I am somehow making life more difficult for those around me. And I feel guilty for doing so. But it is not in me to do a lesser job. Because if I neglect my people then that makes me no better than those horrible people that just leech off their people."

I nodded.

The silence stretched for a minute and I watched as various things fluttered over Ariadne's expression. We had gotten off topic and I kind of wanted to get back on the topic. But this had the feeling of an old debate. A much discussed problem to which no satisfactory answer had been found. And I rather wanted to help with that.

"Would you like to know what I think?" I ventured carefully.

She flinched as though startled. Then she thought. "Yes please." Then she thought for a bit longer and said some more just as I was about to open my mouth. "Actually, I find that I would love to know what you think."

"First of all, let me say that I am, in no way, threatened by how amazing a Lady you are. I, for one, like that you know what you are doing. That you are clever, educated and want what's best for your people. So on the one hand, Screw what other people think. If, by your action, you are shaming the people around us by being a better Lord than they are then that's on them. Not on you."

"But the Duke could dispossess me."

"He could. But he won't."

"So sure?"

"Yes. Because he listens to his wife. His wife might see that there are other ladies in the Dukedom that are suffering because of your so-called impertinence. Where husbands are taking out their frustrations with you on them given that they can't get near you to punish you. But she will blame the husbands rather than you."

"I had not thought of that."

"Do not feel guilty. Again, do not lessen yourself to appease others. They are afraid of missing out because you are showing them up. You are showing them that they are being shitty Lords and Ladies to their people and their families. That you are a woman as well is an excuse that they are hiding behind. If you were a man, they would find some other excuse. You might find that they would turn on you for being a "monster" or a Sorceress or something. That's precisely the thought process that led to Hemmelfart and Radovid starting the Witch-hunts. That women could hold more power than they did."

Ariadne was nodding.

"You also have to admit that you have powerful friends. These people feeling threatened by you, how do they sell the goods that their... no I will use the word because it illustrates how they feel about their people. That their peasants produce. I would be willing to bet that at some point down the line, Coulthard trading gets involved. Suddenly, the Dukedom's entire trade process falls apart, other than yours. The Duke will know that and will not want to risk that. Let alone risking the Empress' wrath.

"And finally, the Duke will never remove you because of enlightened self-interest. He knows that he has your loyalty. You are his court Mage after all right?"

"Right."

"So if another rebellion starts up like..." I was forced to take a shuddering breath. "Like Dorme's..."

Sympathy flickered across Ariadne's face.

"Then you are going to turn up and set fire to the lot of them." I finished. "But even more than that. The more efficient you are, the more taxes you pay. The more taxes you pay, the richer he gets. The political play is clear. He's getting it in the ear at the moment by all those people that feel threatened by you. He has to be seen to do something so he puts some pressure on you. Then he can turn to them and say things like "Well I tried." And then washes his hands of the affair."

She frowned. "Human politics are so pointless."

"My understanding is that Elven and Dwarven politics are just as bad."

"True."

"You are the Countess de Angral. If he removed you, he would need to explain it to others. He cannot kill you so it would be your word against his. And who is the Empress going to believe?"

"You are right."

"You watch. When I get here and support your every decision, their ire will transfer onto me as they tell me that I'm supposed to control my wife and I will laugh and tell them that they should try and control the Elder Vampiric Sorceress."

She giggled at the thought. As I intended.

"Or I'll tell them that I much prefer the control to go the other way round, with you controlling me. Then I will embarrass them all by getting a dreamy expression on my face and saying "especially in the bed-chamber". Or I'll point out facts and figures about the increasing of output and revenue and all the other complicated words that Emma uses all the time which I guarentee you they know nothing about."

She laughed.

"And if you want to be really sneaky, invite their wives over for tea and cake. That'll fox 'em."

"Ah Freddie, I've missed you. I feel better already."

I smiled at her.

"The other day, I honestly found myself considering whether or not I should ease back." She admitted. "But then I was appalled that I could be so foolish."

"It's not foolishness." I said. "No-one likes pressure. These people are worthless Ariadne and we will show them how worthless they are."

She nodded and we sat in silence for a while.

"But you were telling me about men who wouldn't take your polite rebuttals calmly." I prompted. "Something about Tom, Dick, Harry and I forget the other two names."

She laughed again, a delighted sound. "Ah yes. Frank and Steve are the other names."

"Who are they?"

"They are the other members of my staff."

"I don't think I've met them."

"You haven't. You would remember. Fluffy is not satisfied with their training yet."

I stared at her for a moment. "What?"

She laughed at me. "I once told you that Spider's are not really thinking creatures, it's more that the web they weave that is the thinking entity. That the Spider's are the probes and the tools of that web and all the spider's knowledge is then fed into the web for other spider's to access and use."

"I seem to remember that I was in the presence of a beautiful young woman at the time and I might not have been thinking clearly."

"You are in the presenve of a beautiful young woman right now."

"And if I claimed that I was thinking clearly now, then I would be lying."

It felt so good to sit and talk together that it's difficult to articulate.

"But if there is one spider that knows more than any others, that thinks more independently than many others then that spider is Fluffy. He's really quite clever."

"I had wondered if he was keeping an eye on me for you."

"He was, but he took that responsibility on himself. He quite likes you. But he decided that we should have some more servants around the place and he went out to find some other spiders. If you go deep enough, there are plenty around the Dukedom leftover from my reign. I was called the Spider-Queen of Angraal and they still respect my authority in these parts. So he came up with five big ones."

"How big Ariadne?" I started looking around nervously.

"About the size of a large hunting dog or small pony."

"Fuck me."

"After we're married." She replied promptly. "They were quite useful during construction as they were able to come up with the right size stone and drag it along in their webs and lift it into place. It was really quite inspiring. Of course, some people were afraid and that was understandable but Fluffy took things in hand, It's very hard to distrust a Spider when he brings round a cart full of food to the local villagers and saves a child from a rock slide."

"Ariadne, I've been in caves of Arachnomorphs."

"Yes, and they are so badly named it is nearly obscene. Arachnomorphs actually have very little in common with Spiders. You will notice that they have four legs, not eight, and fire their webbing from their mouths rather than their asses. The way they are supposed to. I have long wondered if Arachnomorphs were a magical experiment by Alzur or one of his cronies that got out of hand and escaped.

"But mostly these Spiders work below ground. They act like the Kikkimores do in Toussaint, properly churning the soil and making sure that the ground is properly worked for the right nutrients and things. But as the manor and lands spread, it occasionally becomes necessary that we need more staff to move things around and the like. So Fluffy decided, as he is wont to do, to train Tom, Dick and Harry how to be Footmen."

"You're joking."

"I've never been more serious in my life."

She stared into space for a moment, watching a memory.

"So, as I was saying. When I first got out of the tower, I was desperate to show everyone that I was just like them. I did my best to behave like a human. I dressed like one, talked like one, behaved like one, I found out what I was supposed to do as a Lord of the Land and did that. I found someone that I loved in order to marry them so that I wasn't an unmarried female member of the gentry."

She looked over at me sharply. "Just so we're clear. Even if I hadn't been accepted by society, I would still have approached you. I knew that I was attracted to you with your humour, courtesy and bravery in the tower. I knew that I was in danger of falling in love with you when you stood up to me. Unheard of for a member of your species up until that point and I knew that it was too late later in the journey."

"When?" I asked. "How?"

"You are not going to like this." She told me. "This is going to makeyou feel awful. Remember when there was the village that had been massacred and Dorme had manipualted you into believeing that it was me that had done that?"

"Yes." A wash of remembered shame crept over me. I shivered. "I accused you of doing it."

Ariadne nodded, "I knew that I loved you then. Because in accusing me of that, you broke my heart."

I nodded. I took a moment to roll the thought around in my head for a while. "I supposed that saying that I am sorry is a little redundant."

"Maybe a little," she smiled gently.

"I am though." I told her.

"I know Freddie. Again, not your fault. You have grown since then and I should not have expected too much of you that early in our... friendship. You were still terrified although you were working to master your fear, I had not yet come to proper grips with the state and behaviour of humanity, or you for that matter, and there was, and still is, a massive gulf between human thoughts, feelings and culture. And Vampire ones."

I nodded. "You once told me that Vampires are beings of great passion."

"We are."

"And that I would find Vampire parties incredibly boring."

"You would, indeed, you will. Unless you decide that you don't want to go. I know that there is rumblings about what you are going to do about your search for your sister. I don't want to press or talk about that now. This conversation is about you and me and I don't want us to get distracted."

She said that quite firmly and precisely.

I nodded again. I was relieved. I was still coming to terms with the problem of my search for Francesca and was not ready to talk about it yet. Fortunately, there was plenty of inspiration to divert the conversation.

"I am looking forward to experiencing some of this passion that I keep hearing about though." I told her.

She laughed and then smiled wickedly. "Oh Freddie, the places I am going to take you and the things I am going to do to you when we get there."

I shivered again. But for an entirely different reason.

She laughed and clapped her hands in delight. "Oh, but this is going to be so much fun."

Then she subsided. "But I tell you these things to emphasise another point that I hope is clear. I love you and I would have loved you and approached you, even if it was not also convenient to have a husband to bring me more clearly into human society."

"I know. I sometimes wonder what that would have looked like or just how terrified I would have been."

She turned her head on one side and gazed at me. "Well, after we're married of course. We can explore that. We can pretend that I fled persecution and that you rescued me. Or that I decided that human society was not for me but I came to you anyway as the one part of humanity that I loved." Her gaze became hooded and frightening. It was frightening and I would be lying if I said it wasn't rather erotic. "The part of human society that I wanted." She whispered in a way that stroked the primal, terrified part of me.

I swallowed. "Umm, is there any more coffee?"

She laughed again, muscially and was the light-hearted young Lady of the Manor again as she rose to fetch us more to drink. "I see that such things interest you. Do not worry, we have plenty of other things to explore in our eroticism before we get to anything quite as intense as that. Unless you want to of course."

"There is a lot to consider." I swallowed. "And I am looking forward to having that conversation." I considered the words coming out of my mouth. "In fact, I am looking forward to having that conversation a lot. As well as a conversation about how I would set about pleasing you in the bed-chamber."

"As I say," She said, passing me a cup. "My erogenous zones are tolerably similar to human ones and..."

"And that means that I should be able to exercise what skills I have. I remember, I more meant to say that I am not sure I can handle those conversations right now. The thought is... rather overwhelming so that I find my brain shifting off it."

"I understand." She said. "You are still recovering. I am glad to see that your desire remains, even if it is buried underneath trauma."

She sat back in her chair and carefully arranged her blanket. "In the meantime. For my third attempt to get the point out into the open. When I first came out of the Tower, I tried so hard to be human that I have done my job a little too well. And now I find that I am having to remind people that I am also a Sorceress and a Vampire. They expect me to behave like a human. They expect me to bow to their wishes because I am a woman and they are a man. They expect me to ignore the fact that they are blatantly trying to cheat me and take too many taxes or to improve their profits on the trade margins.

"The fact that Emma could tie them into knots when it comes to these kinds of things is immaterial. Because I am a woman, I'm not supposed to notice. And when I do notice, I am expected to ignore the problem. Because I am a women. It's infuriating.

"They forget that although I have the face and body of a young woman just out of her teens or into her mid twenties."

"A beautiful one at that." I commented, aiming for the compliment.

"Thank you." She accepted with a nod. "But that actually makes it worse. Because I am beautiful, that also seems to make them think that I am stupid. But they also forget that although I appear to be young. I am in fact older than their nation is. People know who I am on a conscious level but they don't really believe it. Not really. They expect me to behave like their daughters or grand-children.

"But by far the worst is the knights and noblemen's sons that turn up and expect me to swoon over them because they are classically handsome, well muscled and skilled at arms. Especially as usually, not always but usually, that particular combination of skills and characteristics is enough to make a person dumber than a rock. And I've known some pretty intelligent rocks."

I let this slide for a moment. "Are you talking about Trolls or...?"

"It's all about the silicate constructs as part of it. But that's not important right now. The point is that the clever ones, or the charming ones, have already been diverted by the Duchess, or my own letters taking it as read that I am already engaged to be married. That I intend to marry later in the year and that my intention is to marry you. I have no intention of marrying... Nor do I intend, once married... Oooohhhh I get so cross."

She took a sip from her cup.

"One minstrel, undoubtedly pretty to look at assumed that you had made up much of your account on the matter and the subject of our early courtship and decided that I was marrying you for your wealth and position. And that therefore, I would be swayed by a pretty face and some awful, hack poetry. Most of which had been copied from earlier, far more talented poets. And again, because I appear, young and pretty, he assumed that my vampiric status was simply some kind of invention on your part in order to warn other people off or for dramatic purpose.

"This has happened astonishingly frequently more recently so I have decided to take some steps. If they refuse to believe that I really am a Vampire Sorceress. The Queen of Spiders then I shall prove it to them. While also being unfailingly polite and nice to the lot of them."

"This is where your new spider Footmen come into the story right?"

"Correct. Fortunately some of the human staff are coming to be in on the joke and where the visitor or potential suitor has done me the... courtesy," She hissed the word. "Of letting me know that he would be stopping by. Then the human staff make themselves scarce. The Spiders are getting quite skilled. Fluffy has trained them to be delicate with their mandibles and forelegs and as a result, tea, coffee and fruit drinks can now be served reliably well. The trays carried around on the back of Frank who wears a white cloth over his body which is tolerably thick and flat. Aided when we have time to strap a table to him. Then they can serve the drinks to the visiting noblemen.

"Samantha and her sister seem to approve of the entire endeavour and have even come up with other ways to give the spiders a uniform. The Spiders are all male but that does not stop Samantha making little aprons and bonnets for the spiders to wear. They do not understand why this is important but Fluffy thinks it's amusing and important therefore he bullies the others into doing what they are told."

"Is Fluffy, essentially, your major domo?"

"Not quite. Do not let him hear me say so and if you tell him that I said this, I will deny it. But he is not quite intelligent enough for that. As individual spider's go, he is very clever. But that still leaves him somewhere around the intelligence of a really clever dog who can talk."

"He can talk?"

"Only if you can listen. I may teach you some day."

"Errrrr."

Ariadne laughed.

"So these knights, Lords and whatever turn up and start to insinuate things about you. Things about me and that I would do better with a firm hand and a strong man to care for me. Then Tom arrives to lay out a table and a table cloth while Frank arrives with drinks and some small pastries on his back. Then Tom politely serves both the knight and myself as I sit there and smile sweetly at them."

I considered the image. It was very interesting. But...

"I can think of several ways that such a situation could go wrong." I told her. Armed knights tend not to enjoy feeling afraid. Nor do Lords for that matter."

Ariadne sighed. "You are not wrong and Tom has had to quickly dodge aside as weapons have been drawn. Fortunately that means that they have drawn steel in my presence and I am well within my rights to defend myself."

"That could still go wrong. You run the risk of making enemies."

"I do, but all of this goes away fairly soon."

"Why's that?"

"After we are married, these people will not have an excuse to stick around will they?"

I thought I could hear crunching noises in the snow. Footsteps approaching?

"I'm not sure that that's entirely true," I commented. "Also..."

Someone cleared their throats noisily.

Ariadne shot me a look that said tha tshe desperately wanted to sigh aloud. But couldn't. Then she turned towards the entrance to the pavillion.

"Yes?" She prompted.

An older woman stepped into view. My first impression of this person was unfair. I have spent some time talking to her since and although I doubt that we will ever really be friends, I do think that there is a foundation that can be built on for the two of us to become allies. Her name is Lady Carmoyne. Aunt to the current Duchess but very much a younger daughter where her Father did not have enough money to be able to provide a dowry enough to gather any worthwhile suitors. But too proud to allow his daughter to marry anyone she liked and therefore condemning her to a lifetime of spinsterhood.

She is old before her time. According to local legend, her hair turned grey in her late twenties and she was now in the back half of her forties. As far as I could tell at least. I was never impolite enough to ask her how old she was. She would be described as handsome rather than pretty, thin as a rail and her hair tied into a severe bun that she keeps in place with several long and pointy hair-pins. She always wears these severe dresses from her neck down to her ankles and her hands are always working at something. She has a bag on her waist which always contains some kind of cloth based task. Embroidery or knitting or something of that nature. The unfortunate air that this presents when she does not have one of these projects in her hands is that her her hands flex, leaving the impression that she is working not to strangle the person that she's speaking to. Which is often me.

She delights in children though. Something happens at about the age of ten which is when they stop being interesting to her and start being annoying. But the things that she works on are often knitted toys for the children. I would later find out that her favourite task is to take a child's doll and knit a full suit of clothes for the doll before presenting the doll back to the child to much appreciation from the child and the parents.

Ariadne likes her because Lady Carmoyne treats her as though she was precisely what she looked like. A young, pretty and unmarried woman. So Lady Carmoyne acted as a kind of mother figure, chasing Ariadne indoors when it was cold, making comments on what Ariadne chose to wear, insisting that Ariadne eat properly and also insisting that Ariadne could do better than me. The fact that I agreed with her was not important in Lady Carmoyne's opinion. But Ariadne enjoyed this attitude. Thus proving that even nine hundred year old Vampires occasionally enjoy a bit of mothering.

I knew none of that at the time however. She just stood there arnd glared at the two of us as though we were errant children and that I had been caught with my hand creeping up Ariadne's skirt.

I felt the almost overwhelming urge to apologise and felt stupid for thinking that.

"Begging your pardon milady but we were wondering if the gentleman should be out in the cold for quite so long?"

"Oh?" Ariadne's eyebrow rose. A maneouver that I assume she learned from Madame Yennefer. "I am driven to ask who "we" are?

Lady Carmoyne smiled. "We were just concerned that the gentleman has been ill for so long, we didn't want him to be feeling any worse."

"The gentleman, soon to be Lord of these estates we remind you, is not ill in the way that you imagine. Right now, the best route to health for the gentleman is to remain here with me."

Lady Carmoyne harrumphed unhappily before moving off.

"We do not have long." Ariadne confided in me as though we were conspiring against the crown. "I can normally put her off once, before something else will occur and she will appear again. She means well and I haven't really got the heart to properly dictate matters to her."

I nodded. "What a terrifying woman." I commented.

Ariadne laughed. "Should I be offended? I rather hoped that I was the only "terrifying" woman in your life."

"All women are terrifying." I told her. "Especially beautiful ones and you are certainly more terrifying than most..."

"Why?" She asked gently. "Why are you still so terrified of me?"

I considered.

"I will save the sappy things till last." I decided. "but that makes them no less real. Are you ready?"

She nodded.

"Obvious first, but no less terrifying because of it. I am afraid of you because of your nature. Of who and what you are. That has not changed. I am afraid that you will unleash the darkness that I fear in the heart of my soul. That part of me that likes the darkness scrabbles at my throat and I do not like it.

"There is a formless and instinctual fear of you that lives in the depths of my being. The same part of me that knows to flee from a Griffin as it plunges to strike. The same part of me that tells me that there are monsters waiting in the dark. That... childish, instinctual fear of monsters that is buried in the depths of all of us if we admit it. I look at you and I see a woman, but every so often I see a Vampire. And I know that I shouldn't treat a thinking and..."

"The term is "socialised","

"Thank you... I shouldn't treat a socialised, thinking, intelligent Vampire as any different than I would treat a human. Or an Elf. But I was never taught to fear humans and I was taught, by society and general education, that I was better than Elves. But you? I was taught to fear you. And lets be fair, history has more than one example of why people should be afraid of Vampires. Even Elder ones. But you talk openly and honestly about your kinship and association with Spiders. Giant Spiders and Arachnomorphs... I know, I know they are different but that still freaks me out. You are everything that I have been taught to fear since I was old enough to know what fear was and understand words. Old enough to hear the scary stories."

"Did you like the scary stories?"

"I did, and that's part of the problem."

Ariadne nodded at that.

"Irrational now." I continued. "I'm scared of what you are and what you represent and anyone that writes to me, or to you, and claims to be unafraid of who you are and what you represent is either foolish in the extreme or has not thought things through. I find that I cannot imagine that. You are nine hundred years old. A Sorceress. You have more power in your little toe-nail than I have in my whole being. You could pick me up and tear me apart and I would never, ever see you coming. And you want to marry me? That's terrifying."

I was pleased to see that Ariadne did not seem to be offended or upset by what I was saying.

"There is also the fear of my soul." I went on. "You have converted to the worship of the Eternal Fire and that helps. But I also know that you did that for my benefit. To all intents and purposes, you will never die. But I will. I was shown what damnation looks like in my dreams and tortures at the hands of the Beast of Amber's Crossing. Things that haunt me still and what I saw in those dreams looks like you. So much like you that I am terrified that if I love you. If I marry you and enjoy our time together. I am still damned. And again, I know that those images and dreams were given to me by a creature that was deliberately tormenting me. But I am still afraid. I am afraid that, when I die, and my soul is balanced for good or evil, then the fact that I loved you will outweight the good that I did. I know it's foolish, I know that Love is the tool of the Flame...

"Not to mention that your love has pulled me out of the darkness." Ariadne put in.

I smiled at that.

"But I am afraid, I cannot help it."

I thought about how to say the next thing. "I am afraid because of how beautiful you are in my eyes. Not only for my soul's sake. But also for life. I find that I believe that there is a price to all the good things that can happen in the world. That I deserve the bad and that the good is... luck or temptation. I occasionally wonder when I started to think this. But I look at the good and think "I'm going to pay for this later" and I see the bad and think that I deserve it. I don't deserve you. I don't deserve your intelligence, your humour, your charm, your wit and your physical attractiveness. I don't deserve it and I sometimes worry that I am being set up for a fall. That if I allow myself to love you, then the world will realise that it has made a mistake and will take you away from me."

I smiled at the next though.

"Now for the petty. I am afraid of you, and women in general, especially beautiful ones, because of how often my heart has been broken by them. Because of the pain of the refused proposals even though many, if not all, were people with whom I would have been vastly unsuited. Or the propositions for a drink a date or a night of pleasure. The upturned nose and the many different and varied versions of "ewww no" that I have received. Even though I know that I have no right to that affection, rejection hurts."

I laughed. "One day, I will tell you about the time I was turned down by a courtesan. It's a funny story looking back. This was before I was travelling with Kerrass and the lady in question was working on a wealthier client and wasn't interested in this scruffy, unkempt, inexperienced student. I know more about that kind of thing now and there were signs that I should have stayed away. But at the time? That hurt. That hurt a lot."

She laughed with me and I felt on firmer ground.

"Ok, are you ready for the sappy now?" I asked.

"Hold on," She said and re-arranged herself in her seat. "Just have to be careful that your words don't make me do something that Lady Carmoyne would disapprove of."

She tucked her legs more firmly under herself and arranged her blanket over her lap before gesturing to me.

"I am afraid of you because of how much I love you. The poet once said that desire is selfish but that love is selfless. I love you and I know that in doing so I am leaving myself vulnerable to you. And that terrifies me. I have only known feelings like this once before and that was with Marion in Dorne. She took care to protect me from these feelings, but when we walked away from each other, it broke my heart a little. I have no such protections from you and the feelings that I have for you are much more than I had for her. I worry about that. I am afraid of that. I am just a human. You know more than I do, you are stronger than I am, more powerful than I am, of greater rank than I am."

She opened her mouth to speak.

"I know." I interrupted her. "I know that rank isn't important to you but I was brought up for it to be important to me and I am not over that yet. So I am terrified with that love, that you could just change your mind at a moment's notice and leave me behind, heart shattered in the dust. I just don't understand what you see in me, and that terrifies me."

She watched me carefully, her eyes shining.

"And finally." I told her. "I am afraid of you because of just how much I love you. I was told that I was a berzerker in Skellige. I do not like that. Several witnesses claim that I massacred a beach full of Nilfgaardian sailors with an axe. I do not like that either. Especially as I have no memory of it. I am afraid of just how... lost I could be in you. I feel as though I stand on the edge of a precipice and if I take just a step forwards then I will slip and fall and I am afraid of that loss of control."

"I will be there to catch you." Ariadne whispered so that I could barely hear it. I laughed.

"And while afraid of the fall," I began. "I also look forward to being caught. I look forward to learning that you will always be there. I look forward to learning that my fears are unfounded. I look forward to my heart's realisation that it has nothing to fear from you. That the Spider's, your strength and your power love me as well. Because they are all part of you and I love you. More than I can say."

I felt tears but this time I did not curse their presence.

"I am so, so sorry that I hurt you Ariadne. So, so Sorry,"

She nodded and let her eyes fall from mine while I mastered myself.

"I knew that having you to stay was going to be dangerous for my self-control." She said. "But Oh Freddie, the things that I want to do to you right now." Her eyes rose again, hooded and shadowed with a beautiful and terrifying hunger. I felt my breath quicken in excitement.

But then she blinked and she was back to being the quiet and contained Lady of the Manor. "But I'm afraid, now more than ever. I must preserve what Society wants from me. And what they want is a decent and proper marriage."

I nodded.

"You said that I might still be making enemies?" She prompted, forcing the change of subject.

"Yes. Emma is possibly the best person to talk about that situation with rather than myself is it's the sort of thing that she has had to put up with over the years. Being a beautiful woman and child of a rich father, meaning that she could, in theory, command quite a large dowry. My sister has had quite a few admirers over the years."

Ariadne's mouth twitched. "She had mentioned it."

"So she normally finds some way to turn them down or find some way to discourage them before she was outed in public as preferring the sexual and romantic company of women to men."

"An outing that you helped with."

"I waved my hand. The guards knew it and when guardsmen know a thing then they tell their wives in the strictest confidence. Then their wives tell all their friends in the strictest confidence and the secret is all over the countryside. Also, I can't prove it, but if the guards knew it then Sir Robart de Radford. The yellow-bellied streak of piss almost certainly knew it and was the one that started spreading malicious rumours about the subject.

"So by the time I published the details of the matter in the magazine, then most of the scandal had already passed, or dismissed my truthful account as being rather passe."

I sniffed. "I hope you will not object to me calling that Scum-fuck out and skewering him when I do eventually find him on neutral ground."

"I don't think you need to worry on that account. I trust Kerrass' assessment of your capabilities in that regard. Did you know that I met him?"

"Who?"

"De Radford."

"I did not." I said flatly.

"He was one of the people that arrived to try and tell me how utterly awful the Coulthard family were and that I shouldn't give them the time of day, let alone marry a younger son of theirs."

I felt an old anger beginning to pool in the pit of my stomach. It was warming, comfortable and I greeted it like an old friend.

"When did this happen?" I wondered innocently.

"Oh, this will have been while you and Kerrass were in the south waking Sleeping Beauty. After your account of your adventures here had been published, more than one person came in an effort to sabotage our fledgling relationship."

"Did they now."

"Most of that was based out of honest anger and I let them down gently. They were the scions and relatives of people that had been burnt as a result of the cult being outed in Oxenfurt as well as a few people that were angry that they had been beaten in this merchant enterprise or that merchant negotiation. They were either legitimately grieving or understandably angry, respectively and I was able to be polite and otherwise send them on their way. But there were some, like de Radford who were just insulting and I turned him out on his ear."

"I wish I could have seen that."

"Fluffy got very cross with him and he fled in terror as some of Fluffy's friends arrived. I was still living in, essentially, a large tent at the time helping with the rebuilding of Angral and my people were rather protective as well. De Radford then spent some time riling the countryside up against me and me people were... less than impressed until the Duke had to throw him out of Angraal for his own safety. Otherwise there was a very real danger that de Radford would be found murdered in his sleep."

"Shame." I commented.

"I thought so. Then officials would turn up to investigate the death of the man and people would be questioned and so on. Someone would swing for it, they always do."

I nodded. "That too."

"What were you saying it was a shame about?"

"Because if he was murdered, I would miss out on the chance to murder him myself. I still like to think that I'm not a violent man, despite all evidence to the contrary, but there are some times when you just need to stab someone. Some people just need to die and that fucker is one of them."

"I will endeavour to stay out of your way when the matter comes up." She told me. "Unless I guage that you are not at your best, in which case I reserve the right to gate you to Zerrikania or Ofier. Depending on how angry you are."

"I will remember that. Tell me, at least, that he didn't at least try to marry you himself."

"Ask me no questions Freddie and I will tell you no lies." She smiled. "He did suggest that but, knowing what I did about him from you and your sister both, I cut him off before he could get too far down that particular chain of conversation."

"Good. Not that I need another reason to utterly castrate the fuck-knuckle."

She laughed.

"Enemies Freddie." She prompted again.

"Yeah, so, some people took it as an insult to their masculinity that Emma was not tempted away from her Sorceress to be seduced by their skills, charm, wit and intelligence. And she made enemies out of that."

Ariadne nodded.

"In your case it will be even worse. People will look at you, then look at me. And I know, I know. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and you are perfectly able to judge what you like for yourself without society's pressure. But I am a younger son of a minor Lord. Father's money is not important as I am a younger son of a Baron. Women are supposed to marry for rank, prestige and wealth. But I am a minor son of a minor Lord. And the Coulthard's made our money out of merchantile endeavours. People still call my Father "The Merchant Baron" as an insult.

"But you are choosing to marry me. Not them. True, I am Sam's heir at the time of saying that, but Sam's unmarried status will not last after Mark's... After Mark is no longer with us and Sam inherits everything. Land and title if not wealth. So my inheritance is still going to be small and people know that. I am not particularly attractive..."

Ariadne began to protest and I held my hands up.

"I'm not. Not according to the classic image of male beauty anyway and that's what these people care about. They are square-jawed, muscled and handsome. I am none of those things."

"I am not particularly attracted to any of them." Ariadne said. "I like intelligence, and your humour and your..." She smiled wryly. "Your odd sense of personal courage. And to me, you are very handsome. And I will not hear of anyone saying different."

"But I am not classically handsome."

She tilted her head on one side. "I will give you that." She admitted. "No bad thing though. As I have found that classically beautiful men tend to come across as being too arrogant for me."

"They are used to young women swooning over them." I told her. "Women are just as susceptible to cultural conditioning as men are. As Kerrass once lectured us both on as I recall."

Ariadne smiled at the memory.

"But a certain kind of man," I carried on. "Will be insulted that you decided to marry me, and not marry them."

"That's because I fell in love with you, and did not fall in love with them."

"Such matters are immaterial to the male ego in these cases." I told her.

She laughed at that.

"So, I'm afraid that you have made enemies." I told her. Some of them are not even enemies yet. But they will be. There is also the possibility that parents and Grand-parents of the men and boys that you turned down will become your enemy. Where, the boy or young man did not tickle your interest, then the parent will blame them, and then you. Even if the boy was legitimately afraid by you, for more than your obviously female nature. The older parent will not have been subject to Fluffy's... pranks and will not understand why their darling child failed to seduce you into loving them. Depending on how the upbringing has gone. There is even a danger that they will be insulted for you not falling in love with their... darling widdle boy."

Ariadne was staring at me. "Are you speaking about me, or about you and your father their Freddie?"

"I will not pretend that this subject does fall frighteningly close to my own experience."

There were more footsteps in the snow as Lady Carmoyne came into view.

"Cook would like to know how many people she is setting the table for tonight Milady," She said without even the faintest hint of defference.

Ariadne gazed at me for a long time. I nodded.

"Everyone on site tonight, I think." She told Lady Carmoyne. "We're not ready for a party just yet. But myself, Cardinal Mark, Lord Frederick and Ladies Emma and Laurelen. Enquire of Cardinal Mark if any of his staff need to be included as well."

"Then perhaps the gentleman should take advantage of the time to bathe before dinner."

I was about to open my mouth to comment before Ariadne interrupted.

"According to my information. The gentleman bathed before coming to see me."

Lady Carmoyne sniffed hugely. "Then, as my understanding is that his health is a little fragile. Might it not be better if you move your... socialising indoors?"

Ariadne pretended to consider this before nodding. Lady Carmoyne sulked off.

"I find it best to challenge her though." Ariadne told me. "Lest she get too complacent."

"Let me guess." I said, rising to my feet and offering Ariadne my arm. "The two of us being indoors means that she will find it easier to be able to keep an eye on us?"

"Pretty much." Ariadne agreed. "Also, do not be surprised if your sister and your brother turn up sooner rather than later under the impression that dinner will be ready shortly. Then we will receive word that dinner has been delayed."

"I have no doubt that you are correct." I began as the two of us walked into Ariadne's small complex of rooms. Where her dining room and things were. "But if you know all of this, then why are you so happy with being led along by this."

"It's part of society." She told me. "She's a good measuring stick of how the world wants me to behave. For now, that is useful occasionally, even if I do enjoy tweaking her nose a little from time to time."

We grinned at each other and giggled like children.

Ariadne led me along the pathway towards the main part of the house. A servant who's name I have yet to learn took my cloak and Ariadne's cloak. My boots were removed and found a particular cubicle while I was given a pair of slippers for walking around indoors.

This was a part of the complex that I had not been in yet and I made no secret of looking around. The first thing that struck me was that the floor was warm. The flooring itself was made from wooden boards that had been sanded and varnished to smoothness but there was actual heat radiating from them. Not much, you couldn't cook on it or anything but it was enough to take the chill off my toes.

We were in Ariadne's receiving room. It took me a while to see what was happening but the first thing that it all reminded me of was of a Skelligan longhouse. This was because there was a large fire pit in the middle of the room which provided a lot of the heat and light that came forth. Various chairs and couches were arranged in a variety of circular patterns around the fire so as best to take advantage of the light and the warmth.

Mostly those seating arrangements were of large and comfortable arm-chairs. I did see one or two other chairs of various designs as well as several comfortable looking benches and couches. Everything looked mobile so that it could be picked up and moved around with relative ease. I also saw a writing desk, several small tables for cups, goblets and things to be left on when the seat had been left. There was a Gwent table off to one side and a chess table as well. Ariadne's throne, from which she passes judgement on things that have been brought to her attention when she is holding court, was pushed well back and out of the way.

There were several small book shelves along the walls that were about half-filled with books. I didn't look at the time, but they mostly contained what my Father would have once dismissed as being "easy reading". The kind of thing where Heroes defeat villains. Where the boy meets a girl and they overcome the odds to fall in love. There were some small histories as well that denote simplified versions of famous events. There were several copies of my own articles, both in the original magazines as well as the collected volumes and my book on Witchers. Both an original prestige version as well as what would later proove to be a well read and annotated version. There was also a copy of every work that has ever been published that can easily be found on the subject of Vampires.

Apparently, Ariadne reads them when she wants a good laugh and annotates them as she goes. I read one later in the winter and Ariadne's commentary made an otherwise quite frightening book rather amusing. Something that would have mortified the original author so I'm not going to tell people which book it was.

Other walls had collections of various paintings. One was a portrait of the Empress. One of the official ones from the time of the coronation. It was very good. It portrayed the Empress in the traditional pose of sitting for a portrait but as though someone has just told her a filthy joke. Her hand was halfway towards covering her face out of embarrassment.

According to Ariadne, the artist was one of those contending to paint the first official portrait of the Empress for her first year of her reign. It was his "audition piece". Apparently, the way that it worked was that the Empress sat for the group of "finalists" so that they would all draw her in the same pose wearing the same clothes. Then the winner would be the person who painted the best version. The artist in question had endeavoured to set himself apart from the rest by painting this image of the Empress caught unawared by a her sense of humour. But where others would paint her fiddling with her signet ring to show energy, he had shown the amusement.

But it had been decided that it would be better for all if tradition would be obeyed in the first official painting of the Empress and this artist had been passed over. So Ariadne had bought it for a smaller amount of money before commisioning the artist to provide several portraits.

There were several other of these paintings by the same artist on the walls. There was one of Ariadne which I loved and still enjoy. As I write these words I am sitting looking up at it even now. It shows Ariadne sat properly in a formal dress of light blue. She is sat properly with all of the formal hair-do and make-up and jewellery that a lady is supposed to wear in these kinds of things. But something about the way the artist has painted her means that you can tell that Ariadne is laughing at the entire process. That she sees it for the ridiculous charade that it all is.

There was another, much larger painting that I found a little amusing but still a little embarrassing. It was a large canvas and it depicted the moment that I realised that all the people that had been congratulating me had been doing so in order to congratulate me on my betrothal to Ariadne. Not, as I had thought at the time, on the matter of my gaining the rank of Professor at the university.

It depicted me, standing on the dais with the Empress in her throne, Duchess Anna-Henrietta of Toussaint, Lord Voorhis and Francesca behind the throne with the Empress' blade. Emma and Laurelen were two steps down and Ariadne was at the foot of the dais. The Empress is depicted as laughing, Lord Voorhis is plainly amused. Even though the figure was noticeably smaller, I could see the careful blankness of Francesca's face and the mortified horror on Emma's face. Ariadne looked calm, serene and beautiful and I looked like a figure of comedy. One of those clowns in the street that slips and falls on a banana skin before farting loudly.

The painting was titled "Beauty surprises the Beast."

There was also a painting of me in there. I don't remember the occasion. I have not sat for a painting in some years. I was supposed to do so for the University so that I can be up on their board of faculty. I don't entirely approve of that on the grounds that, they only want to put me up there because I'm famous. I've delivered no lectures and taught no seminars so I don't feel as though I've earned that position yet. Nor did I sit for this one.

It's what artists, or so I'm told, call a sketch. Just an outline drawing with a few brush strokes on it to add colour and depth. There was no detail, not really, no background and there was no way that you could tell specifically what I was wearing. I had my head bowed and I was smirking at some internal thought.

According to Emma and Mark, it is a pose that I often have. A moment when I am thinking some private thought. A joke has occurred to me or I am thinking that this person or that person is being particularly stupid but I don't want to betray that amusement for whatever reason. Propriety, rank or respect. So instead, I just think my little internal thoughts.

Ariadne called it, the expression of a man who is the butt of someone's joke and has a comeback. But knows that the comeback is not as funny as the initial joke and therefore decides to allow the joke and to enjoy it in the moment.

I replied that it sounded complicated to me and she laughed. "It is another one of those times where humanity does not have a word for it."

"What do Vampires call it?" I wondered.

She made a noise that sounded like she was gargling in her throat.

But at the time, upon first walking in there I was just looking around.

"Do you like it?" Ariadne asked from behind. I didn't turn around. She sounded nervous.

"I do." I told her. And I did. I was looking at a well worn arm-chair fairly close to the fire. There was a book on a table next to the chair with a piece of cloth being used as a book mark. Over on the Gwent table there were signs that someone was in the middle of a game and the books on the shelves were not uniformally arranged, thus betraying the fact that people browsed, borrowed books and then put them back wherever they could find a space.

It was a room that was lived in. Despite the fact that people were obviously received here. And I guessed that it could be made effortlessly tidy and ruthlessly organised within moments if someone important arrived.

"It's a web isn't it." The layout of the room struck me suddenly as I identified what it reminded me of. "Central fire with heat radiating outwards towards the other rooms and doorways."

"Yes. There is just a small charm on the fire to reduce smoke. Something that Maleficent taught me centuries ago. Also another charm keeps the floor warm."

"Cosy." I commented. I found myself wandering over to the huge painting that depicted my greatest moment of triumph and embarrassment. The scale of the painting was ridiciulously huge. As always when I find myself standing in front of such a large work of art, I found myself wondering how you got such a huge painting into the room in the first place. The childish absurdity of thinking that it must have been painted in the room. For years I resisted finding out the answer to the riddle because I preferred the mystery until I accidentally saw one of these huge paintings being moved.

I was so dissappointed.

I looked up at the relatively smaller picture of me. Even though it was smaller, the embarrassment and the shock of the smaller figure was palpable.

"I didn't look that foolish did I?" I wondered.

Ariadne laughed.

"Freddie, come here. There is something else to say before your sister and brother arive."

I walked over, she was warming her hands before the fire.

"I love you." She told me. "I love you more than you can comprehend and more than I can say."

I took in a breath to respond.

"Do not be glib, or dismissive." She told me. "I was not joking, or exaggerating or otherwise being hyperbolic when I said that I think you are injured and sick. I have really enjoyed our time together today and over the coming weeks between now and when we all depart towards Toussaint, I look forward to many days similar to this one where I can introduce you to our lands properly, meet the villagers and the people that are around. I look forward to reading together, sitting together and making plans together. I look forward to discussing deep matters and I look forward to talking about nothing.

"In doing so, we will move you towards being whole and healthy again. In body as well as in mind. But I need you to register two things. The first is that this is going to take time. A lot of time and that the process is almost certainly not going to be over by the time we get to Toussaint. In fact, it is not unfair to suggest that it might never be over. You need to understand that Freddie. There are going to be good days and there are going to be bad days for a long time. And that you might never be completely ok ever again."

"How do you know all of this?" I wondered.

"It is a long conversation." She told me. "And it is not a pleasant one. It concerns the past history of the vampiric people and it does not portray us in the best light. Or me in the best light. And we do not have time for it now.

"Instead, you need to start to come to terms with the fact that, while we work towards you being better and better. There are very real things that say that you will need learn to live with this. We will all help you. But part of that is something we cannot give you. You need to come to that yourself.

"The second thing is this. You have addressed the matter of your soul. You have worked on healing the rift in your family and that too will still take a lot of work. I love you, but we would be lying to each other if we tried to suggest that there wasn't a lot of work that needed doing here as well, between us I mean. But there is one relationship in your life that needs addressing. Whether that involves healing? Or if the thing needs amputating on a temporary, or even permanent basis. I doubt the last but the possibility needs addressing."

I nodded. The truth was that I had been thinking about it for the last couple of days. I had wantedd to put it off for a bit longer. I had even decided to put it off for a bit longer. But it would seem that Ariadne was having none of that.

"I meant what I said though." She went on. "I am furious with him. If you forgive him then I will work to forgive him. If you cannot forgive him, then I will hate him for the rest of time. But you need to be the one that decides that."

I nodded again and took a deep breath.

"It's time to send for Kerrass." I decided.

(A/N: Thank you for reading and please stay safe out there. All my best to everyone.)