The Vampire & Her Witch

In the room atop Ashlynn's tower, Isabell lay on a pile of cushions, listening to the increasingly loud patter-patter sound of rain on the tower's tile roof and the crackle of the small hearth that warmed the large, communal space. Not far from her, standing on a stool in order to peer into a small cast iron cauldron, Heila stirred a thick creamy liquid that smelled of mint and something else bright and fresh that Isabell couldn't identify.

"What is that aroma? Mint and something else?" Isabell asked, turning her head slightly to the side to watch Heila work. Her confrontation with Ashlynn had taken far more out of her than she realized at the time, and she felt like she finally understood the soldiers she'd seen staggering back to camp with terrible wounds who claimed that they didn't feel anything until the fighting stopped.

Her face, neck, and hands had taken the worst of the heat from the fire, and her skin felt tight, dry, and warm to the touch even half an hour after leaving Ashlynn's chambers. The black silk tunic and skirts that Heila had presented her with shielded the rest of her body from the heat, but they did nothing to cushion the other blows of mystical force that hammered her body while Ashlynn's magic raged out of control.

Thankfully, Heila had presented her with a potion that dulled the pain without dulling her mind the way essence of poppy would have. In fact, if it wasn't for the fact that she knew that her body hadn't been healed yet, Isabell would have considered sitting up to converse normally. But Heila had insisted that she wasn't healed yet, only comforted, and until she finished her treatment, Isabell was supposed to move as little as possible.

"There is a spiny plant that Auntie Amahle cultivates with great difficulty in the Briar," Heila explained, raising her wooden spoon out of the creamy liquid to check its consistency before returning to stirring. "It needs dry, sandy soil to grow and the Briar is a very wet place. But the gel from the plant is good at soothing skin and easing burns, so Auntie Amahle sent us with a jar of its gel when we left the Briar, along with several other useful things from her gardens."

"The other thing you're probably smelling is mint," Heila added. "Mint is a cooling herb, and adding its energy to this salve will help to remove the heat from your body. I'll be done with this in just a few more minutes, so just relax and you'll feel better soon, I promise."

"You don't have to use something so rare and precious on me," Isabell said as her eyes opened wide in surprise. "You said the Briar was all the way across the mountains and several days' travel south of, what was the city you mentioned? High Fen? You can't have brought very much of this gel over such a great distance."

"It's fine," Heila said, smiling at the genuine feelings in Isabell's voice. In High Fen City, at the gatherings of the wealthy, Heila had learned to hear the sort of false humility that influential people used when accepting gifts or trading favors, but she heard none of that from Isabell. Instead, she found the older woman to be a very direct and honest person in everything she said and did.

"You haven't met Talauia yet because she's tending to Lord Ritchel's wounds," Heila continued, still referring to Ritchel as an Eldritch Lord even though his title had passed into Ashlynn's hands. "Cousin Tala is the Thistle Witch, and she's part of Auntie Amahle's coven. She brought seeds and starts to help us cultivate a garden like Auntie's, filled with healing herbs that don't grow natively on this side of the mountains."

Of course, Heila didn't mention that Talauia also brought seeds for several plants that were incredibly toxic and could be used to create powerful poisons. There were some things, after all, that Isabell shouldn't hear about. At least. Not yet.

"You know," Heila added as she began to spoon the smooth, creamy salve from the cauldron into a shallow bowl where it could cool quickly. "You're much more impressive in person than Lady Ashlynn let on. She told us that you were brilliant and that she hoped you would agree to help us because you could do so many things, but she never told us how strong you are," she said as she began to use a whisk to whip air into the still cooling salve.

"I don't think I'm that impressive," Isabell said with a faint chuckle. "I couldn't even stand. I, I wanted to do so much more than I did for her," she sighed, closing her eyes and replaying her conversation with Ashlynn through her mind again, searching for anything she could have done to handle it better.

But more than anything, she wished she'd been able to give the wounded young witch the tender embrace that she so clearly needed at the end. By then, however, Isabell had lost most of her strength and only stayed upright by leaning on one of the sofas in front of the hearth.

"I don't think I've ever seen Lady Ashlynn hurting so badly," Heila said as she brought the light, frothy cream over to Isabell and began to apply a faint, very thin layer of it to the older woman's singed hands. "And I've never seen her lose control of her power."

"Most people would have run screaming from a witch who wasn't in control of themselves," Heila said. "I think… I think that, if Virve and I had been there, even Virve might have tried to run. She would have picked me up and carried me away to protect me from Lady Ashlynn until the storm passed or Lady Nyrielle woke up, but even Virve wouldn't have stood her ground the way you did."

"But you would have," Isabell said, sighing in relief as Heila's salve began to visibly restore her tight, inflamed skin. "Virve would have needed to carry you away because you wouldn't have backed down. You would have been right there next to me, trying to reach her through the pain and the grief, wouldn't you?"

"Of course I would!" Heila said instantly. "Lady Ashlynn, she, she gave me the life I'm living now. Without her, I'd still just be an ordinary chambermaid, doing laundry and mopping floors. I owe her everything I am, and I'd do anything for her."

"I think it's more than just the things she's done for you," Isabell said with a smile. "I think you've done as much for her as she's done for you. You aren't in her debt, you're her friend."

"How do you do that?" Heila said, pausing in her treatment of Isabell's wounds to stare at the older woman in genuine awe. "How do you see so clearly, even when we've only just met? How do you know just the things to say?"

Ashlynn had praised Isabell's keen mind, boasted of her vast knowledge and her worldly experiences as someone who journeyed across the sea to study her trade, but she'd never said anything about how clearly those gray eyes saw through to a person's heart.

Heila wasn't as sheltered as she'd been before. She'd met people who were cunning and shrewd in High Fen City, people who were cold and calculating in the High Pass, and people who lived for centuries and spent their idle time soaking in the sun and thinking for days before making a decision in Crystal Lake City.

But when it came to understanding another person's heart and the desires that shaped them, the only people Heila had met who could compare to Master Isabell… were her fellow witches.