❉━━━━━━❈✾❈━━━━━━❉

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐃𝐀𝐑𝐊 𝐆𝐑𝐄𝐘 𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐍𝐄𝐒 and darkness behind the windows, made the abandoned Telmarine castle feel as unwelcoming as the frozen rocks of Cair Paravel. However, the company still shot over the drawbridge as if they could get caught into a crossfire any second.

Caspian and the Kings and Queens of Old hoped the power of the winter lady to create a local snowstorm wouldn't stretch this far, but they knew too little about her to be sure of anything.

They had rode all morning, day and most of the night to reach Caspian's former home, and though Darkan had had moments of consciousness, he had slipped into a feverish state when the night had fallen.

Sunfire trotted as smoothly as it could in order to not throw off its unconscious rider, but Mina and Noelle rode on their own horses at either side of him to make sure as well he didn't fall off.

Darkan's usually tanned skinned looked eerily grey and ghostly in the moonlight, and despite the freezing cold, beads of sweat trickled down his face.

The group stopped their horses at the foot of the stone stairs, and Mina looked on in concern when a tiny droplet of blood fell off Darkan's blood soaked clothing and it landed on the snow; the red and white standing in strong contrast with each other. They had bandaged his shoulder but the wound didn't appear as if it had stopped bleeding at all.

'He'll be alright,' Ella said to her when Phoenix and Caspian hasted their way over to Darkan and hauled him out of the saddle.

Ella desperately tried not to look at the second droplet of blood that fell in the snow with an inaudible splatter. Seeing the scarlet liquid caused her vision to blur and spin around, and instead her eyes shot between Mina and Oliver in a nervous manner.

The former Quidditch captain kept a close eye on his girlfriend since he knew how she reacted to blood, and he gave her a small nod and smile when their eyes crossed.

'It is just a shoulder wound,' Ella continued after she trusted her voice enough, but Mina ignored her. She didn't feel like agreeing or disagreeing.

'Bloody hell.' Phoenix grunted, not expecting Darkan to weigh that much, and he and Caspian struggled to balance Darkan's body between them by keeping his arms over their shoulders and their own free arms around his waist. Darkan's boots dragged limply through the snow as they walked slowly towards the stairs.

Mina dismounted and reached for her wand again once she stood firmly on the courtyard. She had attempted casting healing spells several times already, but her wand was still not cooperating. Maybe, she reasoned, if she concentrated even harder it would work this time.

With her wand tightly clutched in her hand, Mina followed the trio up the stairs, but Edmund jogged past them with two steps at once to open the massive doors.

The frozen lock wouldn't budge at first, but after Edmund threw his body against it for the third time, the hinges creaked as shrill as the cries of a wailing wraith while the doors swung open inwards.

The air inside the hall smelled like dust and moldy wood, and the strings of the spiders' webs ─ spun highly between the archways ─ glistened like dewdrops as the moonlight fell upon it.

'Charming,' Phoenix commented. 'I can see why you left, Cas─,' his voice got cut off, though, when something tiny with eight legs dangled in front of his eyes.

The spider lowered itself more and more, and a shiver ran down Phoenix' spine. With a smothered yelp, he swatted the spider away and shook his hand a few times uncontrollably to make sure the spider was gone.

Caspian raised an eyebrow and tried to hold in his laughter.

'It caught me off guard, alright?' Phoenix said, not yet ready to admit he was in fact afraid for all sorts of spiders.

'Of course,' Caspian responded, but his grin faded away when he adjusted his hand around Darkan's wrist and noticed the blood seeped through the fabric of his own gloves as well.

'This way,' Caspian continued, nodding to the stairs at the end of the hall cloaked with shadows, and they dragged Darkan to the nearest bedroom on the first floor. They lowered him on the dusty bed and Mina ushered the others out of the way, readying her wand and pointing it at Darkan's shoulder.

'Mina,' Phoenix began in a gentle but concerned tone, 'it won't work.'

Mina shook her head furiously. 'Don't say that. It will work this time, I know it.'

Phoenix suppressed a sigh while Caspian stared at the wand for a moment, still not quite comprehending how such a small and vulnerable stick could possibly summon magic. He shook himself out of it and walked towards the hearth to get the fire going while Mina closed her eyes for several seconds to gather all of her concentration.

'Vulnera Sanentur,' she said in full conviction, flicking her wand and forcing all of her magic through it. Still, nothing happened and Mina let out a frustrated scream.

'Why won't it do anything?!' she yelled and the unfairness of it all made her almost snap her wand in half. She threw it away instead, and it clattered against the wall and the floor before rolling away under the armchair.

Fury rushed through her veins and she stood on the verge letting out another angry roar when she felt two hands on her shoulders. She whirled around but calmed down as she realized it had been Elodie and Ella, both trying to console her with their touch. Mina's heart dropped further in guilt when she noticed Lucy and Vittoria standing behind them as well, carrying clean rolls of bandages in their arms.

'This is all my fault,' Lucy said with tears in her eyes, and the glassy blue colour of them suddenly reflected the flames of the fireplace as Caspian got the fire going. 'He got hurt because of me.'

'It is not your fault,' Mina said, her protectiveness of those younger than her resurfacing immediately and overruling all other negative emotions she felt.

'He's just being dramatic,' Mina continued and she remembered Ella's words from before. 'It is just a shoulder wound.'

Lucy gave a small nod while wiping away a tear that had escaped the corner of her eye, and she took a deep breath before walking towards the bedside with Vittoria following behind her.

She mustered her courage and undressed Darkan's upper body with steady hands, not at all taken aback by the blood; some of it dried up against his skin while some still seeped out of the wound. She might have lost her healing cordial, but she still knew how to treat injuries and the first challenge was to stop the bleeding before she could clean it.

'His fever is really high,' Vittoria said in concern, the back of her hand placed against Darkan's forehead.

Lucy hummed, chewing on her bottom lip as she thought of several explanations. 'He has lost a lot of blood. It should be reduced in the morning if we can stop the bleeding. Help me to get him into a sitting position so I can bandage his shoulder again,' she instructed as she grabbed two pieces of cloth.

Vittoria kneeled down on the bed and hauled up his upper body, straining her face in effort. 'Merlin's pants,' she huffed. 'For someone who lost a lot of blood, he's still heavy.'

Lucy pressed the cloths on the entry and exit wound, but before she could unroll the bandage over his shoulder and chest, Vittoria lost her grip on Darkan and he fell back on the bed with a thud.

'Sorry,' Vittoria apologised with a small voice while Lucy looked around the room.

'Any of you care to help?' she asked.

Ella had shielded her eyes with both of her hands but moved one of them blindly towards Mina.

'Mina volunteers,' she said, pushing the older Hufflepuff forward, because even though Ella couldn't look without feeling dizzy, she knew full well what was going on by just hearing the sounds.

Mina snapped out of her trance by the sudden jolt and averted her eyes from Darkan's toned body to Lucy's face.

'What?' she asked, a bit confused.

Lucy chuckled. 'Stop making goo-goo eyes and go help Tori.'

Mina's cheeks heated up and she quickly walked towards the bed while ignoring the giggles of Elodie and Ella behind her, and the knowing smiles of Vittoria and Lucy. The warmth she felt on her cheeks, though, was nothing compared to the heat radiating off Darkan's skin.

He burned under her touch, and Mina had to refrain herself from questioning Lucy's explanation that it was just the loss of blood. The blazing heat felt far more dangerous than just a fever, but she said nothing as Lucy bandaged the wound, and they carefully lowered him back on the bed.

'That's all I can do at the moment,' Lucy said, wiping off her warm forehead with the back of her hand to no smear the blood all over her face. 'The rest is up to Darkan now.'

Lucy and the others looked to the door opening when Caolán appeared into it, carrying a bucket of fresh water. He smiled when he caught Lucy's eyes.

'I have the─,' his voice became inaudible when he noticed the others stared at him as well, his insecurity washing over him like a rough wave.

Lucy stood up from the bed. 'Thank you, Cae,' she said, walking over to him to take the water she had asked for before she and Vittoria had left to tend Darkan's injury. She couldn't use it yet to clean his wound, so she placed the bucket on the floor by the bed for later.

'Will he be all right?' Caolán wondered, nodding at Darkan's unconscious posture. It felt strange to see him like this, without the daring energy that he usually carried with him.

'I hope so,' Lucy answered, and a heavy silence followed her words.

'June is almost finished with making dinner─ or, ehm, breakfast,' Caolán said, his voice a bit wobbly as he tried to change topics.

Phoenix gasped for air dramatically. 'Finally. I am famished.' He skipped past Caolán and out of the doorway while Caspian, Lucy, Vittoria and Caolán followed in his footsteps with an amused smile.

Ella and Elodie waited for Mina to join them, but she shook her head.

'You girls go ahead,' she said, 'I'll stay here. We can't leave him alone.'

'We can keep you company?' Elodie offered but Mina shook her head once more.

'It's alright, go get something to eat.'

Ella shrugged. 'If you say so. Try not to drool all over him,' she joked.

'Zip it, Ella,' Mina shot back with an embarrassed face.

Ella chuckled and hooked her arm through Elodie's before pulling her with her back downstairs.

Their footsteps echoed throughout the air for a moment and after the sound faded away, Mina walked towards the armchair, pushing it towards the bed. Her wand still laid underneath it and she gave it an angry glare before kicking it farther over the floor.

'Useless,' she muttered as she watched it collide with the stone edge of the fireplace. Her eyes then fell upon one of the cloths still placed on the bed and an idea popped in her head. She drenched it in the water and gently placed it on Darkan's feverish forehead before sitting down in the armchair.

Mina had not intended to fall asleep, but with his calm yet shallow breathing resonating between the walls, it almost sounded like a lullaby. She fought to keep her eyes open but as the minutes passed by and the crackling of the fire added to her exhausted mind, she nodded off.

Mina didn't know how much time had passed, but she shot awake when a loud crack reached her in her dream-like state. It had sounded far away yet close by as her tired mind slowly comprehended the sound. Her heart beat painfully in her chest by the unexpected awakening, and she had to blink a few times until it sunk in what exactly it was that she saw in front of her.

The bed was empty.

Mina jumped up from the armchair and whirled around her axis to look around the room. A grin tugged at the corners of her mouth, excited to see Darkan conscious again, but her smile dropped and changed into a horrifying expression when she saw him standing in front of the fireplace.

His skin had changed into a pale blue, almost translucent form ─ like those of the ice creatures they had seen on the outer wall of Cair Paravel. The icicles in his raven black hair sang eerily as he turned to look at her with all blue eyes, shining unnatural through the shadows surrounding them.

Mina tried to scream, but Darkan closed the distance between them quicker. He clasped his freezing hand over her mouth and the scream came out in a muffling sound.

Mina struggled to get out of his grip but tears sprang in her eyes as the freezing sensation of his touch burned through her skin like acid and wildfire at the same time. Her movements became uncontrollable as the agonizing feeling spread all over her body, burning into her bones until she feared they would shatter in thousands of pieces. It clouded her mind and when she reached her threshold of pain, she welcomed the darkness like an old friend. . .

❉━━━━━━❈✾❈━━━━━━❉

𝒄𝒉𝒂𝒓𝒂𝒄𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒔 𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒔 𝒄𝒉𝒂𝒑𝒕𝒆𝒓:

𝑫𝒂𝒓𝒌𝒂𝒏 𝑬𝒗𝒂𝒏𝒅𝒆𝒓 𝒃𝒚 @ 𝒎𝒆
𝑴𝒊𝒏𝒂𝒌𝒔𝒉𝒊 𝑩𝒉𝒐𝒔𝒂𝒍𝒆 𝒃𝒚 RockingGirl06
𝑵𝒐𝒆𝒍𝒍𝒆 𝑶𝒓𝒄𝒉𝒓𝒂𝒊𝒅 𝒃𝒚 𝐃𝐞𝐭𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞_𝐏𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐞
𝑬𝒍𝒊𝒛𝒂𝒃𝒆𝒕𝒉 𝑹𝒐𝒔𝒃𝒆𝒓𝒈 𝒃𝒚 -MoonlightRose-
𝑷𝒉𝒐𝒆𝒏𝒊𝒙 𝑻𝒂𝒚𝒍𝒐𝒓 𝒃𝒚 Avengers14
𝑬𝒍𝒐𝒅𝒊𝒆 𝑩𝒆𝒍𝒎𝒐𝒏𝒕 𝒃𝒚 @ 𝒎𝒆
𝑽𝒊𝒕𝒕𝒐𝒓𝒊𝒂 𝑭𝒐𝒔𝒔𝒆𝒕𝒕𝒆 𝒃𝒚 gracelikeaWave-
𝑪𝒂𝒐𝒍𝒂𝒏 𝒃𝒚 inej-ghafas
𝒂𝒏𝒅
𝑱𝒖𝒏𝒆 𝑷𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒏𝒔𝒊𝒆 (𝒎𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏𝒆𝒅 𝒐𝒏𝒍𝒚) 𝒃𝒚 IRIS-123roosje

❉━━━━━━❈✾❈━━━━━━❉