Chapter Text
As was the case with most things these days, Halbrand smelled the intruder before he caught sight of her. Roused from the depths of a much needed post meal nap, it took him a moment to shake off the last vestiges of sleep that clung like stalactites to his limbs, every grumble and groan out of his mouth cursing the fact that the forest he had now spent years cultivating into an apparent state of desolation had proved no match for a highly determined, golden haired village girl.
“Sire, I must insist that you stay in bed a little longer. It’s barely light out and the doctor said-“
“Fuck what the doctor said, there’s somebody here.”
Stumbling from the warmth of a four poster bed made by somebody else’s hands, Halbrand ignored the ringing in his ears and the slight chill that danced over his toes, the first kiss of winter already in the air despite many of the trees not yet allowing their leaves to change from green to yellow to red. With the curtains already partly thrown back, he was able to see the exact shade the branches were adorned with today but also, more importantly, out past the edges of the clearing his family had called home for too many generations. The smallest chamber in the north wing had long been his favourite because of the view, although there was little pleasure he could find in looking at trellises weighed down with late blooming roses, or the expertly thatched roof of the stables, when the only thing that currently mattered was the figure he could feel slowly making her way through the dense undergrowth, come out, come out wherever you are, and the way the late afternoon sun glinted off her braided hair the second she emerged.
From that distance Halbrand couldn’t make out much more, certainly not the exact expression on her face or the colour of her eyes, but the air seemed to crackle as she stepped onto the cobbled path and promptly strode through the barrier protecting his home. A ripple of magic pushed the sunset into a runaway gallop and he was forced to blink, the way the light hit the breastplate she wore beneath her silvery green cloak like she had come prepared for a fight surprising him; Halbrand couldn’t remember the last time he had faced an opponent who wouldn’t throw a sparring bout in the hopes of receiving an aristocrat’s favour.
“… Sire?”
He shook his head, irritated that a villager had held his attention for long enough to miss the point of Theo’s question. His days had started to become too alike since the incident that had left him near bedridden, all bleeding into one long cycle of waking and sleeping - and never at the right time of day - and he had started to miss normal, human interaction. “If she reaches the garden unapprehended I’m going to hold you personally responsible, Theo.”
“I’ll make sure the guards keep her from taking anything that doesn’t belong to her,” Theo promised with a barely audible gulp, his dark gaze never wavering from the meat of Halbrand’s shoulder as the man stepped away from his only portal into the outside world. “Would you like them to bring her in after-“
“She’s in chains?” As much as Halbrand might have been tempted to leave the girl to fend for herself in the untamed wild, now she was inside the barrier they would all suffer if some terrible fate befell her. “Unless she’d prefer to spend the night in the stables, tell them to bring her to the drawing room. I’ll speak to her there.”
“Of course, Sire.” With a deferential nod Theo turned on his heel and headed to the door, the weight of it still a struggle for the boy despite his recent growth spurt. “As you’re awake, should I ask my mother to bring you up some supper?”
Knowing there was little point arguing with his head of staff, if Bronwyn believed it was time for him to eat then there would be a tray delivered to him within the hour, Halbrand growled again as he staggered back across the ornamental rugs that decorated every floorboard in the castle for most of the year. Each one in his chamber was a different colour this season, making him feel like he was woozily traversing a draught excluding rainbow just to get back to the safety of his bed. “Nothing more than the red tonight, Theo.”
“I’ll let her know.” Holding the door open for a moment longer, he sent a bright smile in Halbrand’s direction. “It’s good to see you on your feet again, Sire.”
Halbrand didn’t disagree with the sentiment, waving Theo off downstairs to get on with the last of his duties for the day. Though, as he slid back under the bedclothes, hissing at the unwelcome change of temperature, he couldn’t help but think that there must have been something he’d missed; there had to be a reason why he wasn’t further along in his recovery at this point in time. Not so long ago even being cut to the bone wouldn’t have bothered him this much, and he certainly should have been able to shake off any effects of the poison that had kept the clearing isolated from prying eyes. Remembering when and why and how the trees had turned on him, as if it hadn’t been his ancestor’s blood which had helped them take root in the first place, hurt more than the treatments he’d been forced to endure, his mind stuck on the image of the last desiccated body he had found in the forest and wondering if that, too, would soon be his fate.
Fortunately finding the supposed ruins of the Smith’s Castle was no longer a rite of passage for the village boys before they left the village to become soldiers or surgeons or merchants, too many venturing too deep and being made to choose between a life of servitude or no life at all, the bright futures they had been promised left by the wayside. And while enough had tried to have their cake and eat it over the years, no one had gotten as close to the prize as the bittersweet creature he could still sense lurking on the periphery of his property.
Swallowing three times in quick succession to remove the taste of lemon tart from the back of his throat, his eyelids growing heavier by the minute, Halbrand gave in to the newest wave of exhaustion pulling him down into the pillows.
He would deal with the girl later.