While Daniel lay staring at the Quest Notification, Mari quietly returned with a vessel held in both hands. He couldn't put a name to it, something between a handleless cup and a shallow bowl, steam curling visibly above it in the cool air. She approached the bedside and, without seeming to notice the window hanging in the air before him, knelt once more with a smoothness and ease that spoke to long years of service.

  The moment Daniel’s attention slipped from the window, it shrank in on itself and popped like a bubble, vanishing from his sight. He winced, though there was nothing to be done about it. He had no idea how to bring it back, and truthfully, it was better gone. Out of his way.

  He tried to take the vessel from Mari, but his limbs felt as though they were made of lead. After a brief, frustrated look at the bowl, he released a breath that came out in a ragged gasp.

  Mari didn’t seem to mind. She lifted the bowl herself, guiding it gently to his lips.

  “Sip slowly, Master Aren,” she said softly. “You can make yourself even more sick by drinking too fast. It is all the kitchens had to spare. I’m sorry.”

  The liquid was thin broth, carrying only the faintest hint of spices that he could not identify.

  “Your half-brothers and their parents receive the meat,” Mari continued quietly. “The servants, and you, we are fortunate to get the bones. Whatever spices fell away from the rest and soaked into the marrow for our only seasoning. I would have brought bread as well, but I wasn’t sure you could manage it. I could ask the Physic, I guess, but...”

  But he would only advocate for a Kevorkian solution. Why worry about food and drink for one who is among the walking dead? Or less than that, given how he could not possibly stand, much less walk. Not now, anyway. But the Quest, if he could just hold out for a day, he would get better. That wasn't too much to ask. Was it?

  Daniel coughed, then managed the slightest nod. Between sips, he mumbled, voice barely carrying, “Hurts... everything hurts... too loud... too bright... where am I?”

  Mari pulled the broth away from Daniel’s lips and produced a small scrap of fabric to dab at his lips. Responding to that observation about being too loud, she whispered, "You are in the infirmary, Master Aren. The basement level of the guest wing of Waytinne Keep. You... you had an accident. What do you remember?"

  Daniel, of course, didn't have any memories. At least, nothing that Mari would recognize as being relevant. Of being Aren's. He could say something here, let Mari know that Aren was truly dead, and that he was a stranger in a strange land. But he was in very bad shape, and perhaps revealing that would cost him an apparent ally and perhaps earn a blade through the throat out of fear and ignorance.

  "I..." Daniel started to say, just as the door creaked a bit, pulled fully open. Mari whirled to look at the boy who entered. A boy no older than twelve, by Daniel's reckoning. Straw-colored hair, icy blue eyes, and flushed cheeks. Garbed in clothing a half step elevated above Mari’s rough homespun.

  "Mari," he said, his tone firm and cool. "Physic Callen said to prepare the boy for discharge. The Steward doesn’t want his kind lingering in the guest wing.”

  Mari stiffened, her face going pale, and then flushing hot. "Jory! Aren's scarcely conscious."

  Jory snapped, "He's awake. That means the bastard can walk." He shrugged, fiddling with the cuff of his tunic. "Or crawl. Either way, it isn't my problem."

  Mari's breath caught in her throat, and her eyes flashed. A moment later, the sound of a sharp slap rang out like a gunshot, and Jory recovered in a moment with a reddened cheek. As he balled up a fist, Mari tensed, breathing hard. Questioning why she let herself lash out like that. Jory glared at Mari hard. If looks could kill, Mari would be nothing more than a steaming scorch mark on the stone floor. But, he reconsidered it as it would be beneath him to strike at a Servant like Mari. Instead, he turned, imitating the cold brusqueness of the Physic as he left. But unlike Callen, Jory slammed the door behind him. Hard.

  Mari turned back to Daniel, her reddened eyes seething. “You’re not ready,” she muttered. “But they’ll send you out anyway. Back to the bastards’ barracks, I wager. Where they dump what they don’t want seen. None of them care what happens to you, not with the Baron preparing for that dinner tonight. They just want you out of the way, so if anyone so much as stubs a toe...”

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  She scowled, taking a few heated breaths. Then, with an effort, she forced a small smile on her lips. "I’ll help you get there. But only if you’re sure you’re ready to move, Master Aren. The broth has grown cold, anyway.”

  Daniel's stomach rumbled at the mention of broth, and Mari let out a soft sound between gentle humor and surprise. "I... I can manage..."

  He couldn’t.

  Even with Mari’s help, his knees buckled the moment he tried to stand. She was too slow to stop his collapse. Cold stone met flesh with a sickening slap. Pain flared. White-hot clarity cut through Daniel's haze. Before his eyes fell shut and his breathing, once again, stuttered.

  “Aren!” Mari cried, moving to his side as quickly as she could manage. She reached for him, dropping to her knees to quickly gather up his limp body into her arms.

  "Six years... and not even Death itself could keep you. They will not take you away. I will not lose you. Never again." she said softly, her voice firm. She had tended to his bruises, soothed his nightmares, watched him struggle in the role that Fate set out for him. The eldest of the Baron's bastards, seen as little more than a punching bag and a whipping boy for the three 'noble heirs'. She had no way of knowing if he could hear her. Perhaps it didn't matter. Not really. Some things need to be said, whether they are heard or not.

  Shifting Daniel's limp weight, she pulled him up from the floor. Thankfully, he proved to not be that heavy. Not a frail child who has been deathly ill. One whom Mari knew to be beyond all hope aside from the last mercy, the Wheel of Samsara... until he wasn't. She managed to lift him, awkwardly but sufficiently to get him fully off the floor.

  As Mari carried Daniel away, a frown creased her forehead. Daniel was mumuring something softly, incoherent. Whatever it was, it was decidedly not Darshevi. Not any tongue she'd ever heard before. Just nonsense syllables to her ears, yet... there was emotion there. Something there that made her heart ache.

  His breath, shallow and almost feverishly hot, caressed her collarbone. "We will get through this," she murmured, brushing a damp lock of dark brown hair from his clammy forehead before shifting his weight over her shoulder. Gathering him tighter, staggering somewhat with each step. Her long, coltish legs trembled, and a soft grunt escaped her. But she did not let go.

  "I have an idea," she murmured softly, half to him and half to herself. "My quarters are small," Muttered more to herself than to him, "but it is better than the bastards' barracks. I will care for you until you are strong enough. No one needs to know." Not like anyone would care. Servants went unnoticed. The Baron's bastards were many. One fewer wouldn’t stir a whisper. Although Aren was the eldest of the bastards, he was too weak, too damaged. Callen's words echoed, unbidden and unwanted.

  Dead boy, a waste of resources.

  Damn that soulless Physic. Aren was not dead! She had watched him die, and yet... he did not stay dead. There was something in him that refused to quit. He clung to life with a tenacity that shamed the rest of them.

  Footsteps echoed as she moved as swiftly and safely as she could, heading down the hall, keeping to the servant paths. Twisting corridors wound beneath banners bearing the Waytinne sigil. A regal wolf's head in silver on a field of dark blue, trimmed in bright gold. Regal, but cold.

  Around her, the muffled sounds of the keep carried faintly. Distant laughter. The ring of hammers from the smithy. Soft arguments between scullery maids. All of it drifted like smoke. None of it touched them.

  Eventually she reached her chamber, tucked away where no noble bothered to tread. Or cared.

  Later, far beneath the Great Hall, Daniel's eyes opened once more.

  He was not in a bed.

  A hammock of braided leather cords cradled his weight, a quilted blanket tucked around him with practiced care. The space was small. Stone walls on two sides, a wooden door on a third, a small fireplace built into the fourth, a clean stone floor with a small rug beneath where the hammock hung, and a rough wooden plank ceiling. Candle sconces flanked the door, half-melted down but unlit for now. A narrow desk occupied one corner, its surface neat, functional, and spare.

  It was basically a medieval monk’s cell, if monks were allowed small comforts. Very small comforts.

  A set of clothing hung from the ceiling on a pair of braided lengths of twine suspended between two of the joists overhead. Mari’s clothing. Which made this Mari's quarters.

  Daniel swallowed, throat dry, every breath still aching more deeply than he ever felt before awakening in this strange world. But... he was alive.

  For another day.

  Which was what the Quest demanded of him. To survive for a single day.

  It was that simple.

  Simple, and yet annoyingly difficult.

  The door started to open, the movement as silent as a whisper, and beyond was Mari. She stood in the middle of the narrow servants' quarters hallway with a small, tightly packed bundle in the crook of her left arm. She shoved the door open with a combination of one shoulder and her hip.

  She slipped inside, Mari glanced over her shoulder, then she closed the door. The door clicked shut behind her. Mari set the bundle on the small desk, hands lingering a moment over the folded clothes, stitched and washed, returned to their rightful place. She glanced at Daniel in the hammock, his chest rising and falling shallowly, and allowed herself a small, careful breath. For now, the world beyond the door ceased to exist.

  Six years of service might not buy much more than privacy and security. Or at least a quiet pocket of both, stolen where it could be found.