The soft scuffle of hooves on soft netherrack was the only warning that Phillip got before David dropped down into their little shelter, landing nimbly on the uneven ground. When he straightened, though, there was no sign of the boy's usual pomp or arrogance, his pale face reading only of dread.
"Phil?" he whispered. Phillip shifted, trying to communicate that he was alert, only to send a sharp stab of pain up through his wing and into his shoulder. He exhaled harshly, trying to find a comfortable position before he gritted out,
"Yeah, Dave?"
"I looked all over this area of the valley, for any sign of a way home." David sank down beside him, one of his own, slender arms wrapped in makeshift bandages and bound against his chest. "There was nothing." His tone of voice betrayed his quiet despair. "Not even tracks."
"Right." Phillip pushed himself up with his good arm, groaning as the fragile healing of his burned flesh ached and tore at the movement. "Guess we'll just have to start walking, then."
"And if we run into more ghasts?" David protested, extending his free hand in a halfhearted attempt to keep him still. "There's no more shelter out there, if we get attacked again-!"
"Then we run," Phillip interrupted. "Or we die. But sure as the sun rises, I'm not giving up until we're both dead and gone." He braced a hand on his knee, looking his young protege in the eye. "And I better not see you giving up, either." David met his gaze for a long moment, and Phillip could tell that he was trying to steel his nerves."
"Alright," he finally said. "Let's run."
"Good man." Phillip clasped his hand, giving it a squeeze. "Now give me a hand up, this old man can't get off the ground on his own." David broke into a hesitant grin, looping Phillip's arm around his shoulders and helping to drag him to his feet. Phillip took a deep breath, lingering in place for a long moment as he braced himself for the pain of trying to move. Then, once he had prepared himself as much as he could, he took a step.
The clack of David's axe hitting the ground was met by an irate hiss from the enderman, whose face was drawn in a bitter scowl.
"It's alright," Phillip said, trying to keep his voice soothing as he advanced. "We're not here to hurt you."
"Don't think it can understand you," David muttered from behind him.
"Well, if he can, I'm sure he doesn't appreciate your comments," Phillip muttered back. David just shrugged. "Stay back there, I don't want him thinking we have him cornered."
"Fine," David said. "But if he so much as makes a move, I'm finishing the job."
"Fine." Phillip sank down into a crouch in the nylium about eight feet from the cowering enderman, keeping his wings small and loose against his back to try and avoid looking like a threat. He could feel the enderman's purple eyes raking over him, studying, gauging the sincerity of his intentions.
Finally, the creature emitted a quiet, despondent groan, slumping against the face of the cliff and letting its hand fall away from the gaping hole in its chest.
Phillip resisted the urge to surge closer, afraid he had been too late. Instead, he carefully crept forward, and the way the enderman tensed at the movement assured him that it was still alive. It didn't hiss or growl further, though, and Phillip slid his arm out of the strap of his knapsack as he knelt beside it, reaching inside and digging around for a potion while David watched his back. The enderman's gaping chest wound was even more gruesome up close - though, he could see no sign of blood. Perhaps endermen did not bleed.
Phillip's fingers finally latched around the neck of a small, glass bottle, and he drew it from his back in order to administer it to his patient. No sooner had its eyes locked onto it, though, than the enderman emitted another horrible shriek, lashing out with one clawed hand and striking Phillip across the cheek.
"Phil!" David shouted, hooves thundering over the nylium as Phillip tumbled to a stop on the ground. Blindly, Phillip threw up a hand, shouting,
"David, stop!" The steps stopped. Phillip braced a hand on the ground, gritting his teeth as his head spun, and he shoved himself up the moment he had gotten his bearings and held up the potion into the enderman's line of sight. "It's safe, see?" he called out hoarsely. Pulling out the stopper, he tilted back his head and took a swig. Within moments, the fresh gash in his cheek began to close.
The enderman watched him warily as the scores from its claws drew shut again, as though there had never been a wound there in the first place. After waiting for what it deemed to be an appropriate amount of time, the enderman lowered its claws again, bending over and turning its gaze to the ground.
Taking this as an invitation, Phillip edged closer again, holding up the uncapped bottle before him. "Here," he urged. "Drink." He got no response, and in the time he waited his attention was drawing to the shimmering, inky liquid that glittered from the enderman's right shoulder.
"Oh," he mumbled. "He does bleed."
"His chest isn't," David interjected from a few feet back.
"No, but his shoulder." Phillip nodded to his finding. "Where you hit him." Carefully, he took another step closer, lowering the bottle into the enderman's line of sight. The claws twitched, then lifted, and the endermen slipped one clawed finger down into the neck of the bottle to prod at the liquid inside. Apparently satisfied, the enderman gingerly plucked the bottle from Phillip's hand, tilting back its head and pouring the contents down its throat.
The enderman's tense body shuddered as the magic of the potion began to take effect, its injured arm uncurling a bit where it had been tucked against its chest. Phillip's gaze dropped expectantly to the wound in its chest, but the gaping hole remained unchanged. Phillip's brows knitted slightly.
"Phil." David's voice caught his attention, and Phillip glanced over his shoulder. "What are endermen known for?"
"Uh…" Phillip glanced back at their patient for a moment. "Not liking eye contact?"
"Well, that," David acknowledged. "But also, teleporting. And our friend here hasn't done that a single time." Phillip's face dropped into a frown.
"So he hasn't. Do you think it's on account of his chest injury?"
"Could be," David said. Phillip mused over this for a moment, then opened his mouth to speak again, but the enderman beat him to it.
The enderman's speech was made up of distorted, breathy sounds, clicks, and warbles reminiscent of an overworld songbird. It spoke for several moments before falling silent again, still gazing down at the moss beneath them.
"Sorry, mate." Phillip gave him a rueful smile. "Can't understand you."
"I think we oughta find a better place to hunker down." David thumbed over his shoulder. "In case any unfriendlies show up." Phillip nodded, taking a step back.
"Come on, mate." He beckoned, trying to to prompt the enderman to join them. "Can you walk?" Silently, the enderman pushed off of the wall and rose to its full height, towering over the two of them as it waited for further direction. "Alright." Phillip turned away, assured that the giant would follow. "Come on. Let's go find a place to spend the night."
"Evangeline." Notch reached out to clasp her hand in both of his as she drew near, his warm eyes raking over her as he did so. "Doctor Ashton brought me up to speed on what occurred last night. How are you feeling now?"
"Fine," she answered honestly, her other arm linked with Herobrine's where he stood at her side. "If a little cold." Herobrine had insisted that she dress warmly before they even left the house, so she was wrapped in a thick, woolen cloak. There were slits in it for her wings, which she had painstakingly threaded through before they left for the castle, should the doctor feel the need to examine them again.
The previous night had been difficult for both of them. Despite being exhausted, and the threat of the wither consuming her having been banished for the time behind, the thought that she could be slowly dying had been a difficult one to come to terms with. And, from the fact that Herobrine had still been awake when she eventually drifted off around dawn, she could only imagine that he wasn't faring much better.
They hadn't talked about it. Not much. Evangeline saw little point, not when they were both distressed and lacked more than the barest amount of information. Herobrine had gotten her in bed, made her drink a few sips of water, then they spent the rest of the night in each other's arms.
"Have a seat," Notch prompted, gesturing to one of the plush couches, and Evangeline allowed Herobrine to guide her over to the nearest one. They were in one of the many multipurpose lounging rooms scattered around Notch's castle, this one with windows facing east, which allowed the morning light to flow through and illuminate the marble tile beneath them with warm sunlight. The atmosphere of the room, on the other hand, was far more somber.
Across from them, Notch sat down, and Doctor Ashton found a seat in an armchair.
"Now," Ashton began, opening the folder in his lap to reveal several sheets of handwritten notes. "I asked you a few questions about your symptoms last night, but it was late, and I would like to revisit them this morning." He took his glasses from where they hung on a chain around his neck, and set them on the bridge of his nose. "You told me last night that you had never had an experience like this before, correct?"
"That's right." Evangeline shifted in her seat, trying to get comfortable. "I felt very cold, I was dizzy and lightheaded, and I coughed up blood. Since I ate the golden apple last night, my only continued symptom has been to feel colder than I should for this time of year."
"I see." Ashton made a note on the sheet. "Did you eat a golden apple for breakfast as I instructed?"
"Yes."
"Did you feel any different from before you ate it to after?"
"Not enough that I would notice it."
"I see." Ashton frowned, but quickly wiped the look off his face. "Over the course of the last ten months since your injury, have you had any symptoms that you would attribute to the wither in your wing?"
"No." Evangeline paused, thinking back over the previous year. "No, other than some pain that I had assumed was from how brittle my wing was now. I confess I didn't think the wither was active at all anymore."
"Hmm." Ashton made a mark on his paper. "And have there been any events recently that you think could have sparked any sort of flare-up? An injury, perhaps, or even stressful news?"
"No, nothing like that." Perhaps Phillip and Tekno leaving on their mission could be considered stressful, but… no, even that had hardly been on her mind. Surely she had been more stressed than that in the past ten months.
"Then I can only conclude that it was only a matter of time before your condition worsened." The doctor looked to Notch. "My lord, do you have anything to add?"
"How did what you experienced last night compare to when you were first hit?" Notch leaned forward, his hands clasped in his lap. Evangeline wrinkled up her nose, reluctantly thinking back to that day.
Lava-heated bricks scorching her legs where she fell, but she couldn't feel the heat. Tendrils of ice snaking up through her her veins, strangling her heart, seizing her chest and blurring her vision. Salty tears dripping onto her face, from white eyes that seemed to be the only things that still exist. She's so, so cold…
"It was similar," she finally spoke. "In the feelings of cold and weakness. But it wasn't nearly as intense."
"Well, that's good, at least." Notch sat back. "Doctor, go ahead."
Ashton cleared his throat, flipping to the next page. "I brought up a few methods of treatment last night, and my lord Notch has agreed that some of them sound the most promising. You mentioned-" Ashton's blue eyes flicked up to meet Herobrine's. "That you witnessed another valkyrie perish to wither, and that a potion did nothing to stop it. What kind of potion was it?"
"Regeneration." Herobrine's tone was clipped. He had said very little all day.
"I see." Ashton noted it down. "It is possible that injecting a strong dose of regeneration directly into the base of the wing could counteract the infection."
"It's not an infection," Herobrine countered. "It's black magic. A golden apple is the only thing that we have found that can even affect it."
"Regardless of the classification, this is the less invasive of the two procedures that we are considering. Frankly, it can't hurt to try." Ashton adjusted his glasses, then looked up. "It will likely take us a few days, though, to acquire the potions."
"That's alright," Evangeline spoke up quietly.
"So you consent to the treatment, then?"
"Yes." Evangeline folded her hands in her lap. "It's worth a try. Like you said, it can't hurt."
"Very good." Ashton noted it down. "That is all I need from you, then."
"Doctor Ashton, you may be dismissed," Notch told him. "Herobrine, Evangeline, if you don't mind, I'd rather you stay a few minutes longer." Ashton stood, bowed- which caused his glasses to fall off his nose - and quietly left the room.
Notch remained quiet for a moment, waiting until the door had clicked shut behind the doctor before he cleared his throat to speak. "How are you holding up?" he asked quietly. Evangeline looked up at Herobrine, who seemed reluctant to respond.
"I…" she began instead. "...don't think the shock has fully reached me yet." Her hands knitted tightly in her lap. "I never thought… well, if I were to die, I never thought it would have been like this." Notch nodded, sympathetic.
"Herobrine?" he prompted. Herobrine remained silent for a long moment.
"I don't know," he finally said. Notch gave him a quiet nod.
"Well, if it would ease both your minds, I am confident that we can come up with a solution to this," he told them. "While this is uncharted territory for us, our healers are very clever. I see no reason to catastrophize just yet." Evangeline found her husband's hand and gave it a squeeze.
"Alright," she said. "Thank you."
"Of course." Notch stood, prompting them to do the same. "You may go home, if you like. Or I can have a guest bedroom prepared for you, if you'd prefer to stay close."
"Our house isn't far," Herobrine said. He looked down to Evangeline, who nodded. "We'll go home."
"Very well." Notch agreed. "Keep yourself warm, Evangeline, and make sure you're following the doctor's orders." Evangeline murmured her acknowledgement, then linked her arm with her husband's, and they began to make their way towards the door.