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Her voice was hoarse, the cool professionalism eroded away by the pain and emotions and exhaustion of the week.

Lautric pulled a pen from his pocket, biting off the cap. He held her arm gently, eyelids drooping over his eyes in concentration. He lay the tip of his pen on the inside of Fern’s arm, the cold touch of metal and ink sending shivers through her as she watched him build his alchemical spell, symbol by symbol.

First and central, the phoenix feather, for renewal, and with it, the Rebis, for the combining of broken things into a whole. Then the grounding circles surrounding it: salt for stability and restoration, gold for perfection.

Fern looked up at Lautric. His eyelashes were dark and long, fanning over his cheek like the rays of a blacksun. His flush had disappeared, the colour draining from his face as he spent his energy on the spell. His alchemical symbol was very simple, but it was drawn perfectly. Its magic was small and precise, not grand and potent like the work of a great mage, but something more akin to household magic: common, clever and tidy.

The inner workings of Fern’s arms grew warm and soft in compliance, the shattered bones and traumatised muscles answering Lautric’s gentle command to knit themselves.

When he was done, the alchemical symbol disappeared as though her skin had absorbed it, and the pain, as if it had been held back by a dam, came flooding back in. Pain, processed by the brain, always lingered after a healing spell, while the body processed the unnatural speed of its own fixing.

Lautric, still holding her arm, looked up.

“How’s the pain?”

“It’s alright.”

Lautric gave a sad half-smile. “You’re trembling.”

She was. Fern shook her head and tried to pull her arm free, but Lautric said, “Let me dress your arm.”

“I can do it myself,” Fern said.

“Yes,” he said. “But you don’t have to.”

An unexpected and unwanted lump rose in Fern’s throat, and for a second, she was paralysed by the fear that she might cry in front of him. Desperate to conceal the sudden burst of inappropriate emotion, she nodded at Lautric and fetched the small cloth case in which she stored plasters, disinfectant and gauze.

She sat back down on the bed and watched Lautric as he worked.

He was silent and conscientious, daubing the gauze with disinfectant and brushing away the crusted blood gathering at the cut. Fern raised her eyes to his face. The cut on his lips from the previous night was healing into a satiny pink line.

Who had hurt him? She’d never asked, that night she’d bumped into him, and their attention had been diverted to the scream in the Arboretum. And now, Lautric had not pressed her for an explanation of her injury, so she could not press him on his, yet her curiosity burnt vividly. He looked up, and she was suddenly aware that while she was deep in thought, her gaze had remained on his mouth.

“Try to rest your arm as best you can.” He gave a small, sad smile. “I’m sorry to see you hurt.”

Unbidden, tears rose to Fern’s eyes, dropping from her eyelashes onto her cheeks. She daubed them away, surprised at herself and a little disappointed.

“Oh,” she whispered. She had not intended to cry; she rarely did. “I’m sorry.”

Without a word, Lautric took Fern into his arms. She stiffened, and tried to grasp the reins of her emotions, only for them all to come spilling out. Josefa scared in the darkness, Fern’s parents calling to her in her dream, Oscar hundreds of miles away, Essouadi’s tumour and Baudet searching for Vittoria.

Fern’s body slumped as though the mettle had been ripped out of her spine. She buried her face into Lautric’s shoulder; it was better than letting him see her cry. His woollen jumper smelled exactly like him, that sweet comforting smell, and something smokey and dark, like ashes or liquorice.

He held her in his embrace, one hand brushing up and down her bare back as she wept noiselessly. His skin on hers sent warm shivers shimmering through her like spellcraft; when was the last time she’d felt someone else’s skin on hers? She wanted to pull away from him, and at the same time she wanted to melt closer, to crawl underneath the soft wool of his jumper and plaster her heartbeat to his.

She tried to pull away, but Lautric held her face in his hands and brushed back the strands of hair sticking to her wet cheeks.

“Are you alright?” he breathed.

Fern nodded. She was hot with embarrassment and pain and longing. In his arms, she had never felt her own loneliness more acutely.

“Thank you for all your help,” she said, voice husky with tears, trying to reassert some professionalism into her conduct. “Consider your debt repaid.”

“There is no debt at all, Fern,” he murmured. “I would do it all over again, and for no other reason than wanting to. You must know this.”

His gaze lingered over her, almost tender. Fern’s face was ablaze; she desperately hoped she wasn’t blushing. It did not matter anyhow, because Lautric had leaned forward to kiss her tear-stained cheek, and Fern, without meaning to, had turned to catch his kiss on the corner of her mouth. She let out a gasp of a breath—Lautric caught it between his lips.

He kissed her mouth sweetly and chastely, his hands gliding gently down her cheek to her neck, his fingers slipping into her hair, cradling her skull. Fern opened her mouth, a silent invitation, and Lautric tasted her, histongue against hers a delicate intrusion, sending a curl of heat all through Fern until her entire body ached.