It was not until late into the night of their arrival to Satria's court that Violet found the words to explain what had happened. She whispered them into Satria's ear like something profane, tangled together as they were under silk sheets on a moonless night, a shivering, restless energy permeating to her very soul. She felt she had lost her detachment, the reserved unconcern that had carried her through life since she followed Satria that first time. The shadows all seemed to have faces, and silence was her enemy, for she could not help but wonder whether it was her own thoughts she was hearing or those of a stranger god. Her fury wasn't cold at all now but a molten pit, spitting wild fire and hate in all directions. At Bellatrix, for making her feel helpless, at Voldemort for continuing to defy and outmaneuver her, at fucking Esrid for tainting the most wonderful thing that had ever come to her, her right—she'd been chosen—
"You're afraid," breathed Satria, interrupting the chaotic stream of barely contained emotion pouring from Violet's lips. Violet blinked, her anger immediately turning inward. She must not keep doing this, could not afford to continue losing control and indulging the weakest tendencies of mortality. It had never been like this before. Was she really so dependent on Winter that even a partial separation left her … fragile?
Fuck that. Her fingernails bit into her palm, and she shook her head, smiling lightly. "Not at all. I was merely distracted by imagining what Lestrange might sound like when I start cutting parts off her."
"Hmm." Satria abruptly shifted, pressing herself against Violet, her eyes fluttering. "Then why is your heart beating like a rabbit's?"
Violet flinched away, smothering annoyance. If Satria wished to tease her, it would be a far kinder treatment of her weakness than the rest of Winter would offer her.
"I see." With a quick gesture, Satria cast aside the sheets and stood. She gave Violet an inscrutable look and gestured. "Come."
In addition to the already sprawling rooms that made up Satria's chambers, a long balcony ran along the exterior, wrought of an extravagant quantity of silver. Clear ice crawled like vines around the metal, and the floor was more ice smoothly shaped into something like a woven basket. It was cool and impossibly smooth underfoot.
Winter's bitter wind slid over Violet's bare skin, but she was not cold. Even now, she had that much. She still belonged here.
"I expect," Satria said after several long moments of slightly tense silence, "that you caught sight of the glittering travesty in my land?"
Violet frowned, caught off guard by the change of subject, but nodded. "I saw it. Didn't get too close." She grinned gamely. "Didn't want to unsettle Jon any more than I already had with all this."
"Mm. 'Jon.' Interesting that you decided to bring another mortal here. But no matter. You were wise to avoid it; incidentally, I would have been wise to do the same."
"What did you do?"
"I tried to destroy it, obviously. It doesn't belong here. Even the Reviled belong here, a plague, but a belonging one before Maeve's little misstep made his modifications. Even after, they're still of the Wyld in some tangential way, dubious as it may be. The Crystal, if you will, is not. Even a beast could see that. So I rode out with a dozen of my best to raze the works of the enemy and restore the rightful rule of Winter.
"What we found in that accursed place does not deserve to be described aloud. Suffice to say that it was like nothing I had ever seen before."
Satria clicked her tongue. "One decade ago, I would have laughed at the idea of encountering anything new to my timeless existence. Then I found you, and the circular tedium of passion that haunts we fae was given fresh clarity and purpose. I felt more alive than I had for …" She shrugged. "A thousand years? Ten thousand? It's the truth we would prefer to forget. So many of us become nothing more than caricatures, devoured from within by boredom, listless and dead while still breathing. The more deeply we embody our own nature, the less value our existence holds. Such is the curse, if you wish to call it that, of the fair folk. They cherish new experiences like … like a mortal treasures their children. Good, bad, horrific—anything new is a gift." Quietly, she added: "It is not an existence to be coveted."
A wire stand at one end of the balcony held a selection of wine bottles nestled among perfect white flowers, and Satria walked over to take one, filling two glasses. She turned back, and her face was bleak. "Crossing through that place was the most unfamiliar experience of any I have known. And I only wish I could forget it."
She passed one of the glasses to Violet and stared into space before continuing.
"I almost never left it. Armen didn't. And it seems that I will see far worse before long, if Maeve has her way. And do you know? I fear it. Anyone or anything would be mad not to, but there is no one but you whose tongue I would not tear out after hearing that. So don't hide your fear from me. Don't hide anything. It's only us, in the end. I've come to think that in all this beautiful, ugly dream we are the only ones who truly exist."
She grimaced. "Perhaps Maeve too, now. When I spoke to her last, she was … vivid, solid in a most peculiar way. Nothing like Mab. But she is nothing like us."
"None are," Violet said quietly. Then the full meaning of Satria's tale set in and she felt a deep, now familiar pang. "Armen is dead, then? Was it by iron, or will he return in time?"
"Oh, no." A mockery of a smile crossed Satria's face. "Were that he was! No, Violet, he's one of them now."
"What? How? He's fallen—what, twice, was it? And he must have been the least mad of all your Knights. Even if he died, there shouldn't have been any chance of him coming back as Reviled."
"He did not fall. He changed; rather, something changed him." Satria's lip curled. "Let us not speak of the matter further, lest it spoil a fine night."
It seemed Violet was not the only one to be unsure of herself. If even cold and ancient Satria, who could arrange a Queen's death or lay a trap for a Dark Lord with supreme dignity and uncanny grace, found herself daunted by the new, strange, and ever multiplying threats against them, there was some comfort to be found in that.
Or arguably the opposite.
"I would have come," said Violet softly. "You shouldn't have needed to go there alone."
"But you faced devils of your own, did you not? Perhaps we both fare the worse for separation from each other. Aside from that, you are beholden to me by oath no longer. I assure you, even with Maeve wearing the crown, Winter's teeth remain ever keen."
"I should never have left the Wyld," Violet said bitterly. "Ill fortune alone has come of it."
"Never at all?" A note of surprise and something more poignant entered Satria's voice. "Even for the magic of the mortals, the terrible power it grants you? You regret even that?"
"I don't … No. Not that." A shuddering sigh escaped her and she broke off, taking a sip of the wine to gather herself. Its bright tartness was invigorating and she went on. "But I'd give it all up if it would get that thrice-damned thing out of my mind, if I could just touch Winter again, if I could just …"
"Oh, Violet," Satria murmured mournfully. "You've fought so hard, haven't you? Esrid should never have stood between you and Winter. He will fall."
And perhaps that was what Violet was hoping to hear, said with more certainty than she could muster herself. The melancholic baring of hearts was suddenly unbearable, leaving her burning for sanctuary in colder matters of strategy.
"On the subject of Esrid," she said, "has anyone actually seen him? Or uncovered any proof of what he even is now? Winter referred to him as the Third, but for all I know my interpretation is wrong, and the third of what? How are we to know what to do if we don't know that?"
"You sound like Maeve," Satria said with a dramatic sigh. " 'Oh, Satria, can't you recognize the utmost importance of this expedition?' 'Oh, Satria, I do hope you're not allowing such quotidian concerns as the survival of your court to conflict with carrying out the unparalleled genius of my rule.' 'Now, Satria, don't you think you can spare a few more fighters to secure the High Court? The burden of the preparations are so great, after all.' She's convinced the only way we'll beat these fucking abominations is to kill Esrid, and right now we don't know what killing him would mean. Hence, the hurry for us to charge off into the realm of madness so Maeve, who was mad from the start, can save us all. By the stars, her smug assurance tries my patience."
She finished her wine, poured another glass, and drank that too. Violet slightly arched an eyebrow. "Feeling better?"
Satria huffed. "Indeed."
At least someone was. Violet turned her own glass in her hand, looking into the dark liquid. Winter had a talent for producing vintages exactly the shade of blood.
"I'm not sure we'll like what we find out there."
"No, I imagine not," Satria said. "But if Maeve is right about one thing, it's that we can't bury our heads in the snow and hope the Reviled leave of their own accord."
"We cannot trust her. I loathe the idea of facing unknown dangers with her guarding our back."
"Obviously. Yet, she has willingly fettered herself with shockingly unqualified oaths not to act perfidiously for the duration of the expedition, a most unusual act, as you know. Why, so generous was her phrasing that had I a mind to betray her, I expect I could devise a method that would twist her words in such a way as to leave her entirely unable to defend herself—helpless. But she is right; Esrid is the greater threat. We must act before we cannot."
"Of course …" Violet looked away. "Esrid. The way he was able to speak to me, to intercede himself between me and Winter, it's not …" She struggled for the words, the difficulty of relating what she intuitively knew beyond all doubt but for no reason daunting. "I don't think he's like you or even me anymore. I think—I think that only something like Winter could interfere with Winter that way. And whatever he is, he has nothing to do with Summer."
The admission seemed to linger overlong. Satria shook her head, stirring the delicate white strands of her hair plastered to her face by wind, and rested her hand on Violet's back. "Such a thing is inconceivable, and the possibility that it may nonetheless be true is dire indeed. But as mighty as our foes might be, I feel no fear. For we alone in all of Summer and Winter are not one but two."
Violet shivered under her touch and leaned against her. In silence they watched the first hints of sunlight spread across the land, tiny, dry flakes of snow catching in their hair and remaining unmelted on their skin. The merciless majesty of Winter stretched out into the distance, mountainous crags of snow-kissed black rock and endless forests seeming almost to return her gaze. With the dawn, a line of mounted of fae rode out, the hooves of their bloodthirsty steeds clattering on the court's streets. Out into the blanket of white they sallied, war banners taut and fluttering.
The mortal world would never be her home, but Winter was. And whatever thoughts of uncertainty or regret might torment her, she would fight for it for as long as she could hold a wand.
~#~
After much consideration and the consultation of the most cunning healers in Satria's court, some of whom could spin flesh like yarn and right even the oldest and most terrible of wounds—for an equally terrible price—they had made only marginal progress toward curing Violet of Bellatrix's curse. As for the matter of Esrid, well, Violet could trust only in herself and Winter for that, for even if she believed there was help to be found, there was no knowing where keen ears and forked tongues might lurk.
"Slumber is panacea," said the fae man, black of hair and with a short, angular beard. With a caduceus staff of gold and burnished rosewood and a demeanor of gentleness, he could have had been a benevolent angel of the wasting and afflicted. But the white bone that adorned him in his doublet's carved buttons and which crawled to entomb him from the fingers of one hand past his shoulder, like an insect's exoskeleton, marked him truly of Winter. "The long rest, but not the longest. The Lady in Iron will awake renewed under the light of a new moon, commencing with the same. Else, I fear there is naught to do but wait for that same time and vastly more."
"A month is a small price to pay to be free of your enemy's chains," Satria said, tracing her thumb over the weeping cut where the fae healer had taken Violet's blood. "The ritual he speaks of is no fearsome thing. I have twice undergone it myself to purge the taint of iron from my blood. There is no match for the feeling of renewal you will enjoy when you at last part the clouds of dream and rise. It may even resolve your other problem in the process, though I alas have no more certainty in that regard than you."
"It's no surprise a month seems paltry when you have seen so many," Violet said, laughing. She felt lighter than she had for weeks. "But … the new moon came and went just days ago. If one month is closer to two, I'll sleep well into June. And you said Maeve is insisting the expedition begin before the last of May. How are we supposed to convince her to delay? If we tell her the truth, for all we know she'll decide to consolidate her power and betray us when I'm helpless. If we're to do this, no one can know." She glared at the healer to reiterate her point, but he seemed unaffected.
"Maeve will not be deterred," admitted Satria. "Even the initial date planned for our departure would have fallen within your slumber, and that's not even considering the time needed to rendezvous with her."
"Then how am I supposed to accompany you into the lands of madness while I am in repose? Am I to be in two places at once?"
"You cannot," Satria said simply. She gestured at the healer and he bowed deeply, departing the room. Satria relaxed her grip on Violet's arm and took both her hands in her own, squeezing with an uncharacteristic firmness. "Listen, my beautiful Violet, listen. There are none under the stars whom I would sooner have at my back in that place, surrounded by betrayers and the very strangeness that brought a curse to our lands. But not at the cost of your life! I can see you more clearly than you think, perhaps more clearly than you see yourself. Do you think I do not see you push yourself ever harder, stretch yourself ever farther, as if you will not one day fly apart? How many times have you brushed the hand of Death in this year alone? I have seen you spill blood, and a thousand of Lord Voldemort's servants could not have touched you at your best. I vow it is true. You limp, and you are chained, and a terror assails your very mind."
Satria's eyes shimmered like sapphire. Her voice dropped to a silken whisper, and she gently brushed a lock of hair away from Violet's eye. "Since our strands of fate were woven as one, I have come to live like never before. No longer do I merely play the role I was given, of Lady Satria of a backwater court, content to trick and trap mortals with truthful words, to wave undying war against the sun, to march in lockstep in the grand clockwork of a thousand fae, dreamless and dreary in their celebration. You've changed me, and I wish to never again be that hollow thing. I imagine your death, that final, mortal thing, and I imagine centuries slipping by, and I imagine forgetting, Violet, I imagine forgetting. I never want to forget. You have given me life, where before I only breathed. It has never been this way with any other, mortal or not, and it never will. Without you, I would be dead again, beautiful Violet."
Violet made to respond, but Satria silenced her with a finger to her lips. Something immense shifted in her eyes, and she said something no fae should ever have, for no falsehood could they speak. "I would sooner my own existence end than yours."
Violet swallowed, stunned. Her throat seemed dry. "Satria—"
"Don't, Violet. No words are needed." Satria laughed. "What a jest—the mortal seals herself in ice while the Lady thaws. I only need you to tell me one thing. Tell me you will do as the healer said. Vow it. Vow that even when I am gone to march into unknown danger you will choose safety. Vow that when I return I will find you renewed and hale, in heart and mind."
Violet tore herself away, overcome with emotion, her chest heaving as if she had fought a dozen duels, and irrationally furious for it. I leave the mortal world to escape its trials, and still they follow me here!
"Jon can go with you," Violet said, each word paining her. "He's good with a wand. Not as good as me, but … and he's mortal. That could be important."
"He cannot." Satria sounded almost apologetic. "As you said, you will be helpless until you awake, and I trust none of my court to ensure you do. All are as hollow as I was."
"But you can't go alone," Violet said. Her voice broke. "You can't."
"And I won't," said Satria, and for just a moment her ever-cool expression seemed to warm. "I have not been alone for the last eight years."
~#~
The first thing Tonks did after regaining control over her body was look for a way to kill herself.
She recalled only parts of her time under Bellatrix's control, dreamlike fragments of what she had done. It was all the worse than if she had known for certain. Her imagination never failed to fill the blank spots with horrors, which seemed to grow and mutate into ever worse shapes with each passing hour.
It couldn't happen again. She would not let it. She should never have let it get this far, should not have been stupid enough to think she could resist, should not have been captured alive in the first place. Should not have held out hope.
Could she have escaped? If she hadn't been so certain that she was the one to bring her aunt's crimes to an end, if she had tried to Disapparate, could she have escaped? Could she? Could she?
A choked sob tore itself from her throat, dying in the cold darkness, and she lay on the rough stone curled in on herself and trying not to think of what she had done.
They'd died thinking she was a traitor. That she had hated them so much that she could—Mum hadn't hesitated a moment to let her daughter through the protections, and then—
Nausea overwhelmed her, and Tonks gagged on air, spitting and coughing onto the ground. And what had happened then? Violet—Merlin, Violet. She hadn't—she could not have killed her, but her memory was shattered. The poor girl's screams under the Cruciatus echoed in her ears without context, and the incantation, Crucio, Crucio, Crucio, sometimes in her own voice, sometimes not—she had a dark streak, that Valentina—and then cold had bitten her, the ache of which still throbbed in her bones. Her foot was a ruin of blackened, wrinkled skin that never seemed to warm.
That had to be a good sign, wasn't it? Violet was a force of nature. She hadn't killed the Savior, she couldn't have. Even… even the other thing was not as terrible as that. It could not be true. It was not.
You're deluding yourself.
God. What an Auror she had made. Bumbling, stupid Nymphadora, always good for a laugh as she tripped and stumbled her way through the training and mentorship. Even she had laughed at herself back then. She didn't laugh anymore.
Footsteps echoed through the rough stone wall, making her flinch reflexively. They were barely audible, but she had learned to pick them out from the droplets of water falling in the basement that had become her cell, from the groans of the old house above. Bellatrix was coming.
The lock turned, and the door opened. Bellatrix was there. She gave her a smile dripping with venom, her wand already in her hand. Dread clutched at Tonks's heart, but there was nothing she could do. She had known this was coming for hours.
"Do you think you've won, Nymphadora?" Bellatrix's voice was low and dangerous, with none of the delirious airiness it was infamous for. "I felt you trying to betray me. You were trying to fly into her curses, weren't you? You'd like that. Coward. It didn't work, though, and you didn't win. Potter escaped thanks to Snape's stupidity, but you still killed her little friend, didn't you? Imagine how much Potter hates you now. She would do far worse to you than I would, you know."
Tonks looked away, resting her head back on the stone. Perhaps she could dash it against the wall, slam into it again and again until all went black.…
"The Dark Lord says you're useless now," said Bellatrix, kneeling and cradling Tonks's face in both hands. "He says you're only fit to make your little friends sad now, and an Inferius would do that and better. But he doesn't understand, sweet girl. I'm your auntie, and I won't let you die, ever, ever, ever.…
"But you've been a bad niece, haven't you? You've been defiant, so I'll have to punish you." She giggled, her madness finally breaking through her veneer of severity. "I had hoped you would see sense on your own, but it seems you may need a little reminder of your responsibilities if you're to earn the name Black. Killing your traitorous mother and her Mudblood pet was a start, but you showed your willfulness then too, didn't you?
"I'm getting better at controlling you, dear niece. Soon we'll be able to fight for our lord together, side by side, like a family. But first … a little lesson."
Bellatrix smiled and closed her eyes, concentrating. Tonks felt her left arm jerk and ground her teeth, fighting to resist, but that had never worked for long, even in the beginning. Her arm jerked up, and her traitorous hand grasped a finger on her other and snapped it, a pale shard of bone piercing her skin. She was too tired to do more than flinch. All the while, Bellatrix was balancing her wand on end at the tip of one of her fingers, frowning in concentration, though her eyelid twitched when Tonks' finger broke. So she did feel something of what Tonks did when she was controlling her. Spitefully, Tonks jammed the broken finger into the ground, biting down on her tongue as her hand exploded in renewed agony.
"Circe's blood," Bellatrix hissed, her wand clattering to the floor, and Tonks felt a familiar tingling wash through her as Bellatrix broke their connection. "Stubborn bitch. I was going to heal that for you, but now … maybe we won't be a family. Maybe you are useless."
She pulled a knife from her robes and kicked Tonks in the stomach, making her double over. She seized Tonks's arm by the broken finger, cruelly yanked it straight, and with a flourish of steel, cut off her entire hand at the wrist. Finally, Tonks screamed.
Bellatrix dropped the severed hand in front of her, the fingers seeming to twitch with a fading vestige of life as it bounced off the floor. Revolted by her own flesh, Tonks felt her stomach convulse, and she gagged. Her arm didn't even hurt, and she vaguely recalled Mad-Eye describing what shock felt like. Maybe Bellatrix would just let her die.…
"Oh, shush. If you're a really good girl, I'll give you a new one. I'll cut one off dear Mummy and save it for you. That way it'll be almost like your own, won't it? Now, now, no bawling like a child. You know I only hurt you to help you. Episkey. Can't have you bleeding out, now can we?"
Her laughter seemed to echo through the basement long after she was gone. Staring down at the raw, patchy skin over the stump where her hand had been, Tonks could feel the tears coming again.
~#~
A week passed, and then another. Violet watched the moon with the obsession of a marooned man scanning the horizon. She was helpless; nothing she could do would alter the flow of time.
The preparations for the expedition were all around her. Though Maeve, as the Queen of Winter, would supply the bulk of the numbers, Satria's household force could oft be seen drilling outside the manor house, silver saber and lance and bayonet flashing in weak sunlight, snarling horses with eyes like smoke and the teeth of lions snapping at each other and prancing with anticipation. It was an impressive display in all, and Violet knew these were no weak-kneed fae of the inner courts, fit for show and little more, but well-blooded killers who had shattered the lines of Summer a hundred times over.
It might matter nothing, she knew. What use was a blade in the face of insanity?
Other times, those of sufficient power honed their magic, crackling bolts of vivid blue and black splitting the air and leaving the lingering scent of deep frost. Violet did not watch then.
Jon, for his part, seemed to be taking to the fae world with strange grace, though she supposed he fit uneasily enough among humans that perhaps it should have been expected. Once, to her deepest concern, one of her whisperers had informed her that Jon had fallen in with the creature called Malicar, a true serpent whose sadism and treachery was considered great even in Winter. She had swept down from the manor house, Elder Wand in hand, all her frustration and fury fueling a black rage, fully intending to free Jon from whatever debt he had stumbled into by slaying Malicar, however high he might had risen in Satria's Knights. But Jon needed no saving; true, he had paid a price when he was tricked into playing cards for flesh, not coin, but no sooner had his small finger been severed than he dealt himself back in. An old and skilled gambler, he had soon turned the tables, and when it was Malicar's turn to pay, it was done with a wicked iron knife.
The next day, Violet spotted Jon training amid Malicar's company, working to incorporate his mortal magic with their tactics. She watched him for a time, then turned away, unsure why the sight bothered her. She should be pleased he was forming allies, so why did her heart clench?
He looked strong alongside them. She truly would be more comfortable if Satria had not insisted he remain at the court when they departed, to watch Violet as if she were a sleeping babe prone to choking on its own spit. The thought darkened her humor, and she spent the next two days afield, returning only once the severed heads of Reviled decorated her horse's saddle. Satria was not pleased, but Violet was in no mood to indulge her further.
A letter reached her from Scrimgeour, demanding an explanation of her absence. Violet could sense the desperation beneath the bombastic words, but there was nothing she could do. She burned the letter, watching it curl upon itself and turn to glowing coals, wondering if she would never speak to him again.
The time of Satria's departure seemed to come out of nowhere, halfway through the third week of May. Two columns rode forth with Satria at their head, all resplendently garbed and trailing colorful banners. They would ride for a week and a half to the edge of Winter's lands and there rendezvous with Maeve's force. Then, it would be time to venture forth into the unknown.
The court felt empty for their absence, Violet having grown accustomed to it nearly bursting at the seams after the flood of arrivals following that day when Mab fell and everything changed. Perhaps they had been mistaken, then, to do as they did; or perhaps the mistake had been not acting sooner.
She had apologized to Jon for keeping him here, where he would be as useless as she was. He laughed and said, "Not like I'm complaining about being paid to sit around." He frowned. "I am getting paid, aren't I?"
~#~
The day Violet had been dreading had arrived. There was no moon; shadow cloaked even brightest snow.
She, Jon, and the healer stood alone in a frozen cavern, an hour's and some ride from Satria's court. Every inch of it was coated in ice, from the slick floor to icicles thrice as long as a man was tall. From the floor sprouted flowers of black ice, smooth and beautiful. A master could have spent lifetimes carving them, but here they grew on their own.
The rumble of swift water was a constant undercurrent. Beneath the ice ran a secret stream that connected unbroken to the Origin, that hallowed fount of Winter and Summer alike.
Jon was swathed in layers of wool and furs and was stomping his feet and muttering at the cold, resolutely staring back at the entrance. The healer wore a deerskin robe, ancient and cracked and stained with a century's accumulated blood. Violet was naked.
"That's not a bed," Violet said bitterly. "It's a casket."
It was a work of art. The sides were wood, so pale as to be nigh gray, and worked as smooth as a mirror. A silver band ringed the side, hinged with more of the august metal, and it secured the top, a domed panel of glass reinforced with struts of yet more silver. It was filled with the finest white bedding, as soft as clouds. A king could have been buried in it and felt no slight.
Yet, despite its beauty, the word buried had a tendency to outweigh all else.
"It is no such thing, my lady," said the healer calmly. "For time immemorial I have served this court and its inhabitants, and never have I lost one to this ritual."
"And how many times have you performed it?" Violet asked, quite accustomed to the truthful-but-misleading evasions of the fae.
He gave her a hurt look. "More times than I can count, my lady. Twice for the high Lady, if you'll recall her mentioning such."
"Yes, yes, I remember." She grimaced. "Must it be this way? A dark tomb, a casket? You are certain I will awaken in one month, not … one hundred? One thousand? If this is the sort of thing that relies upon a true prince to end, I'm obliged to inform you that the mundane world does not offer those in quite the abundance it once did."
A snort of amusement came from the cave entrance. The healer just looked weary. "Time is short, my lady. If we do not begin before sun kisses the sky, a whole month yet you shall wait."
That stopped her cold. She flicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth. "Quite right. I oughtn't be so hesitant. Let the die be cast."
Decision now made, Violet stepped up to the casket, the cool ice steps it rested on a comforting sensation on her bare feet. The sheets were soft as she slid under them, savoring the sensation on her skin. It would be the very last thing she felt for …
The long sleep, but not the longest. Hopefully.
The healer came over to you and waved his caduceus over her, muttering words of power in the fae tongue. He pricked her finger with a blade and smeared drops of her blood across her brow, her lips, and her sternum, then pulled the sheet to her neck. Next he produced a small object, consisting of two panes of glass with a crushed herb between them. He opened the latch and removed the herb. It looked such an innocuous thing.
"Open your mouth, my lady. The long sleep is an easy one, and when you awake, all will have changed."
Violet did as she was bade, but her heart was pounding, cold sweat forming where her skin touched the sheets. All will have changed. All will have changed. All will have changed. Was she mad, or did the words have the ring of prophecy? If she slept now, what would she awaken to?
Would she wish she had not awoken at all?
The herb was nearly to her lips when her hand shot out, fingers closing around the healer's wrist, nails digging into his flesh. His saccharine demeanor, his mocking deference—calling her lady when his one true Lady was Satria—it revolted her. She revolted herself. How could she castigate herself for her past mistakes, then blindly the path set out for her, as if it was not one she would regret more than any other?
She held the Elder Wand. She had dueled the Dark Lord to a standstill more times than even Albus Dumbledore. What good was sleep when her enemies did not rest? She could not Apparate, could not touch Winter, but she could still forge a red path through Satria's foes. She was still the Lady in Iron.
Esrid had not spoken in her mind since that first day back in the Wyld. He was still there, that she knew, but how could she let the mere fear of what he might do render her useless? He was unable to manifest himself as more than a voice except for when she used Winter magic, and of what worth were words alone? No, she could not let fear rule her.
She was not weak. She was not useless. She would not sleep.
What was one more vow for a mortal to break?
She threw back the sheets and rose, shoving the healer aside, ignoring him as he collided with the cave's icy wall and fall to the ground. She seized the Elder Wand from where it had been laid beside her in the casket, and its power screamed through her. Her tongue flicked out to taste the air, and it had the scent of ozone. The armor of purpose guided her.
Satria had said she would prefer to lose her immortal life than watch Violet die; she hadn't known how to respond then, but she would now. She would curse her and kiss her, for it was as Satria had said: their fates were intertwined, so what good was it for either to live while the other faded?
"Jon!" Violet called, striding to the starry sky outside the cave's exit. He turned at her voice, saw she was still naked, and groaned. She laughed and twirled the Elder Wand, and the snow underfoot rose, twisting around her to form a gossamer lace dress in starkest white. She considered for a moment, and the white shifted to black, a stain of ink against her skin. "Saddle the horses. It will be a hard ride if we're to catch them before they reach the Distant Lands."
Jon's eyebrows shot up, but he nodded, saluted lazily, and set off. Violet rolled her shoulders and laughed again. She had never been much for sleep, really.