The sobriety potion had done its work too well. Sedgewick blinked in the bright sunlight. It stung his sensitive eyes and now he lacked even the haze of alcohol to put between him and his stark, unpleasant reality. He stared up at the Healer's Guildhouse and...hesitated. What would he say? That he understood why she did it better now? That something in him still felt cracked and broken. That he'd come in spite of that pain because he...he still...

"Do you need something, sir?" a young healer, an apprentice asked, her voice hesitating as if she didn't quite know what she was supposed to say. She took a step closer to the wide-opened gate. "Due to the attack, we're asking that all new patients used the Healing House in the Banking District."

"I'm not here for treatment."

The young woman eyed him up, the corners of her mouth grimacing. Drinking all night probably hadn't left him the picture of health. Her attention then narrowed in on his orange mage's hat.

"I'm here to see Miss Everbloom," he replied swiftly.

At the mention of that name, the girl leapt into action. "You'll need to come inside and wait."

"That will be fine." The girl led him up to the door and Sedgewick took in the sight of the guild house in the stark light of day. It was an older building, its walls around its courtyard nearly touching those of the buildings beside it. The stone seemed to lean inward toward itself, the effect either a safe cocoon or a suffocating womb. What would it have been like for Feyla to grow up in a place similar to this? He tried to picture it as they crossed the threshold inside. How she had lived in a house that wavered between life and death and somehow emerge still blooming. His childhood village had not had a healer, merely an elderly woman with a knack for potions and his own mother with a knack for lost causes. Nothing like this.

"Wait here, please," the girl said, waving her hand at the simple wooden chairs just inside the entrance.

Sedgewick took a seat and watched her scurry away. He twisted his hat in his hands but the motion did nothing to ease the twisting of his stomach. The doorway Feyla would soon walk through loomed large from across the room. Sweat seeped from his palms into his hat. This moment had been playing in his head since he'd sobered up. He started rehearsing what he planned to say once again. She'd walk through the door and freeze and he'd— he'd—

Or maybe she wouldn't freeze, maybe she'd run to him and scold him for the state of his clothes and the bangs under his eye while brushing her hands through his hair and whispering apologies through her tears.

But tears were so hard to handle and so hard to resist the urge to wipe away, to comfort. No, perhaps she would rage with her eyes churning like a storm in a bottle. Shout and lash out, asking why he'd returned. Yes, returned because he'd left this time, she hadn't. He hadn't been the one rejected and that made all and none of the difference.

Although he sat firmly in the chair, he felt adrift, washed in a sea of unfamiliar feelings and indiscernible desires. They churned and shifted him into a storm, drowning out reason and sense. The inside of his chest felt battered like the hull of a ship. He hurt and he continued to hurt even while he understood her actions better. Part of him wanted to embrace her and hold her close to his chest, begging that her whispered words of reassurance would seep into his skin and close the gaping hole inside of him. Another half of him wished that the sea inside him would freeze, hardening into a cool demand that she help him now or leave him forever.

But for now, the storm raged on and he waited.

And waited.

...and waited.

Someone should have come by now. There was no sign of the apprentice or Feyla. Not even a glimpse of That Healer or the woman who might soon become his mother-in-law. Sedgewick thrummed his fingers on the arms of the chair, his nails clacking against the wood. Was Feyla avoiding him? Or were those other two keeping her away while waiting for him to give up?

He stood from the chair, hat still in hand. His ears quirked as he listened for any sign of someone approaching to see him. Nothing. Well, if they thought that he would give up so easily then they were about to be disappointed.

Sedgewick marched down the hall in the direction the apprentice had come from. The guild house was oddly quiet. Perhaps the majority of the healers had left to aid the influx of patients at the Banking District's healing house. He passed by empty room after empty room and still came across no one. "Where the gates did that apprentice run off to?" he grumbled to himself.

"Sedgewick."

Sedgewick spun toward the direction of the sound, magic rising to the surface of his skin.

Delia Morrowbryn stood in the hallway, her arms crossed stubbornly. "I was on my way to get you."

"Your guild's hospitality is somewhat lacking. Where is Feyla?"

"My husband and I need to speak with you."

"I'm not interested." He turned away.

Delia rushed forward and grabbed his arm. "I don't have time for this. If you want to help Feyla then you need to come with me now." Delia glanced over her shoulder. Her ears were taut, her eyes wide. Like she thought the walls might hear her secrets.

But her words struck him more than her look. "Why does Feyla need help?"

"Stop being stubborn and follow me!"

Sedgewick yielded to the desperation in her voice and allow her to lead him into a patient's room further down the hall. "There had better be a good reason for—"

"I would say that my injury is making my head sick, but I would recognize an Elberic Peak's accent anywhere."

Sedgewick's words died in his mouth as he stared into the face of a man who could have passed as a cousin. His hair was more brown and even lying in the bed as he was, Sedgewick could already tell the man would have towered over him had he been standing. The bandaged leg sticking out from the blanket explained why he couldn't. But the shade of his skin, as pale as Sedgewick's own, and the lines of his face sent Sedgewick tumbling back to his childhood in a dizzying, unpleasant manner. He swallowed.

"So you're the one who has our friend in a tizzy. Funny, I always heard that the Minister of Magic was a Northlander from Cliffspeak or Balderin but that shows what Abreylians know of the land up there, hmm? You're probably used to correcting people as well. Not that I dislike Abreyla but no one can tell a Northlander from a Peak's man when really there is such a—"

"Who the gates are you?" Sedgewick asked. His head was already throbbing from the man's endless rambling and every word about the Elberic Peaks drove another spike into his brain and cracked open another painful memory from his youth.

Delia's shoulders rose indignantly but the man soothed her with a wave of his hand. "It's all right Delia, he's hardly had a decent day either. I'm Jaerick Halderson, Delia's husband and Desden's last target." He chuckled and gestured at the blast in his leg like it was a good joke.

"Your wife said that you wished to see me."

"In a moment. Tell me, what part of the Peak's are you from? No, no, let me guess, it's been so long. Elberin's Helm? No, you seem more like an eastern peak man. Perhaps—"

"Wyrm's Cliff," Sedgewick confessed in an attempt to make the man stop even though the name made his stomach clench.

"Aha! Wyrm's Cliff, I should have known, that's deep Peaks territory there. The stone is older than the boundaries of the fey kingdoms. Don't usually see many men leave that place. Not that many of our people leave to begin with, hmm? I'm from Elberin's Gauntlet myself. Not that far from you. I wonder if we're related! Who was your sire? It couldn't have been 'Alverdyne', that's not a Peak's name." Jaerick leaned forward eagerly like they were having the most pleasant conversation in the world.

Sedgewick was very close to saying that who his sorry excuse for a father was didn't concern Jaerick at all when Delia places a gentle hand on her husband's shoulder. "Maybe some other time, love. We can't let him tarry here."

Jaerick relaxed back into his pillows and cover his wife's hand with his own. His cheery expression became suddenly serious and an analytical gleam shone in the place of his enthusiasm. The change shocked Sedgewick into remaining silent. "Right, I'm forgetting myself. It's just so rare to see someone from home."

That isn't my home, Sedgewick thought. But like in his youth, he kept his harsh judgments on the place to himself. "Morrowbryn mentioned Feyla needing help."

"I would say she does. Your Miss Everbloom ran off with Dormaeus last night."

The floor underneath Sedgewick wobbled and the queasiness in his stomach threatened to release the wine and the sobriety potion all at once. Delia leapt up from her husband's bed, an arm reaching toward him in sudden concern. Feyla was out who-knows-where with that wizard. If Dormaeus's memories unraveled, she would be right there as a target. Assuming his brother's influence hadn't corrupted him enough to do so while still memoryless. "I need— Need to go find..." He swayed toward the door and moved to put his hat on.

Delia grabbed both his shoulders and held him steady. "Sit down. There's more and you look awful." When she was sure Sedgewick wouldn't topple, she scooted a chair from the corner of the room over and had him sit.

"You might already know, but I'm the one who created the spell that took Dormaeus's memories in the first place."

"I did know that," Sedgewick snapped. What more could these healers have to tell him? Thoughts of Feyla at the mercy of that wizard arose again and Sedgewick screwed his eyes shut to keep the room from spinning again. "Get to explaining the rest."

Delia and Jaerick exchanged a worried glance. When he spoke again, his voice was a whisper Sedgewick had to crane his ears to hear. "There's something else going on here. Something bigger than just my spell."

"What? All signs point to Desden wishing to restore his brother's stolen memories."

Jaerick winced at the word 'stolen'. "I designed that spell to help deal with trauma. Hours, maybe days of memories. It wasn't intended to hold back the number of memories it's holding. I'm surprised the spell hasn't cracked on its own already. And I'm not a mage; I didn't set out to make it unbreakable. The counterspell would just be the runes reversed. And with the magical prowess Desden has already shown..."

A cold realization settled over Sedgewick's skin and sharpened every word of Jaerick's in his mind. "Carrow should have broken the spell already."

"We examined Dormaeus when he was still here. My spell should have fallen by now, but something had been...added. Or change, I don't know. Wizards are your area of study, not mine." Jaerick rubbed his temple tiredly.

"What is that man trying to do?" Sedgewick asked himself softly.

"There's something else," Delia added. "Ever since Feyla fled with Dormaeus, Daydrel has been acting...strange."

Jaerick snorted. "Not that Daydrel has ever had the best logic behind his actions." He shook a finger at Sedgewick. "I've seen starving, desperate wyrms with more foresight."

Sedgewick cracked a half-smile at that. "I don't know enough about the man's habits to know what strange would entail."

"Just that he should be in a panic and he's not," Delia finished.

"Why did you both decide to tell me this?" He'd never met Jaerick and Delia certainly had no love for him.

"My reason is that I'm tired of seeing Daydrel fumble trying to fix the mess he made with my spell. We're not mages. Magic like this is beyond our level in my opinion. No insult to your skills, of course, my Delia. I'm sure had Arilla put you in charge, we would have been better off." Jaerick graced his wife with a warm look that sent her blushing. She smoothed his hair gently.

"And as for me, I—" Delia paused, looking anywhere but at him. "I shouldn't have pushed her to rejoin. She was happy when we first spoke and then I watched as her mother and her guilt started crushing that. She talked about you before she left. She regretted deceiving you. I still have...mixed feelings about her choice of you. But Feyla doesn't. She's going to try to catch Desden by herself. I think she's in over her head and you're the only person she might accept help from. Promise me you'll help her." Delia's voice which had been tear-filled at first, hardened into a command as she finally met his eyes to stare him down.

Sedgewick met her gaze willingly, evenly, and gave the only response he could ever give to that. "I promise."

Delia relaxed. "Good. Now you should go before—"

The locked door clicked open and Arilla swept into the room.

*******************

Author's Note:

Me on Saturday for the past four weeks: AHHHH I will never finish this chapter on time, it's only half done!

Me on Monday: I am speed and victory, fear me and my procrastination.

Annnyyyways, what did you all think? Did you see the twist with Desden coming? Will Sedgewick be able to get to Feyla in time to help? Did anyone enjoy reading about Jaerick and Sedgewick interacting as much as I did writing it? Let me know in the comments!