Chapter Text
Matthew is sitting in bed next to Diana. She made him promise to stay. She’d pleaded, and he could never resist those blue eyes, even if they didn’t sparkle quite as they did the day before. He was reading a paper he was reviewing for a journal back in England, something about protein markers. He realized, almost all of a sudden, that his eyes had drifted over to a loose plait of blonde hair (Ysabeau insisted on braiding it herself) and the slow rise and fall of the heavy covers. They’d been like this for a few hours, Matthew trying to read a paper and Diana distracting him with her breathing and beating heart.
He leans down to pull the covers over her shoulders when the room starts to shift somehow.
It starts as a flutter; the pages of the paper move so slightly he would’ve thought it was his breath. Then he hears the tapestries ripple on the other side of the room; but all the doors and windows were shut on such a cold night. Something was wrong.
Matthew looks down at Diana again and hears her heart beating. It was not the slow and steady beat of someone in peaceful sleep. Maybe it’s just a dream, he tells himself. She’s had an intense couple of weeks; her brain has had a lot to process. Then, out of the corner of his eye, he sees her fingers start to twitch.
He can smell the adrenaline as it courses through her body. It reaches her heart, speeding it even further. Her inflamed, strained muscles start to contract. Her fingers move more and more. Is she casting a spell in her dreams? Is she reaching for something?
Matthew places a hand gently on her face to wake her - she doesn’t need a shock in a state like this, it would make everything worse.
“Diana,” he whispers, stroking her cheek. “Diana, wake up, love.”
His actions only seem to distress her more. Tears begin to leak from her lids and slowly trickle down her face. Soft whimpers escape her lips and she shakes her head.
Matthew reaches down and gently shakes her shoulders, mindful of the injuries scattering her body. “Diana. Diana, please. Just wake up, it’s only a dream, I’m right here. Wake up, please, darling, wake up for me.”
His paper, now fallen off the bed, is caught in the wind and whipped around the room. She’s getting worse. “Matthew! Matthew, !”
“Diana!” he yells as her eyes fly open.