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Chapter Text

Diana Bishop had always known that Philippe de Clermont’s death haunted her husband, but she hadn’t truly understood the depth of Matthew’s suffering until she found him, once again, in his study late at night, staring at the same worn piece of parchment he had carried with him for decades. The letter. The one Philippe had written before his capture, before everything changed.

Matthew’s fingers hovered over the ink, tracing the familiar strokes of his father’s hand. His face was drawn, the shadows under his eyes deepening as he read the words he had committed to memory long ago.

"You are loved, Matthaios. Always."

Diana had seen this ritual play out before—on sleepless nights, when Matthew thought she wasn’t looking. It was as if he believed that if he stared long enough, he might find some hidden meaning between the words, something that could absolve him. But the burden never lifted.

"Come to bed," she said gently, stepping into the room. The twins had long been put to bed, and it was just the two of them now.

Matthew didn’t respond right away. His gaze stayed fixed on the letter, as if tethered to it.

“I should have saved him,” he murmured at last, voice raw. “Not just from the Nazis or Benjamin’s torture, but from what came after. I should have found a way or at least refused to—to end his life.”

Diana swallowed. They had spoken of this before, but Matthew’s guilt was a wound that never fully closed. He had been the one to end Philippe’s suffering, to release him from a ruined body that could never heal. And though Matthew had done it out of love, out of mercy, it had marked him forever.

She sat beside him, resting a hand on his arm. “You did what Philippe asked of you.”

Matthew shook his head, eyes dark with old grief. “I should have been stronger. I should have found another way.”

And that was when it hit her—another way. A possibility so radical, so dangerous, that no historian—no witch—would ever consider it. But Diana wasn’t just any historian, and she wasn’t just any witch. She was a time-walker, and she could go back. The thought struck her with such force that she almost reeled from it. It was reckless, impossible, forbidden. To interfere with something so deeply entwined with their past—so pivotal—could unravel everything.

And yet.

She looked at Matthew, at the weight he had carried for almost eighty years. She thought of the father he had loved, the man who had given them all a legacy, a home, a family.

What if she could change it? And just like that, the idea took root.

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Diana knew she couldn’t act on impulse. Time-walking was dangerous enough under ordinary circumstances, but to pull someone out of the past—someone who had already died—was something else entirely. She needed information.

She spent weeks in the library at Sept-Tours buried in research, poring over every record, every reference to Philippe’s capture the de Clermont family had ever written down. Most of the details had come to light only a few years ago when the family had gone to save Matthew from his own son, Benjamin: Philippe had been captured by the Germans in early 1944 while trying to liberate Ravensbrück. They’d moved him to Auschwitz-Birkenau, where they discovered his true nature while trying to tattoo the prisoner number onto his skin. The Nazis had learned what he was—what he truly was—and they had wanted to break him, to experiment on him. Philippe had been held at Auschwitz for some time, witches in the service of the SS experimenting on him, before they’d handed him off to Benjamin and the real torture had started.

Diana’s hands clenched into fists as she read about the experiments conducted on her father-in-law and remembered what Benjamin’s torture had taken from Philippe. The witches had tested pain thresholds, measured regenerative abilities, had experimented on blood draining and reintroducing foreign blood to his system, had tried to determine just how much damage a vampire’s body could take without dying. And after all of that, Benjamin had gone on to systematically destroy Philippe’s body, breaking his bones over and over again, taking one of his eyes, starving him until there was no way Philippe’s body could even try to mend the inflicted damage.

The only consolation—if one could even call it that—was that Philippe had been tipped off about Benjamin’s involvement with the Nazis and had one of the imprisoned witches at Auschwitz scramble his memories. He’d been able to keep all important information from Benjamin because of that, making it impossible to gather anything by drinking his blood and thus invading his memories.

The spells of the witches in Benjamin’s service had made it impossible for Baldwin and Matthew to find and rescue their father—until Benjamin had lost his interest in Philippe. Once he’d broken him completely and realised, he wouldn’t get the desired information from him, Benjamin had not bothered to keep Philippe’s location a secret anymore. Because by then it had been too late.

And Diana knew it was even worse than she imagined it, knew Matthew had seen it all, felt it through Philippe’s blood when he’d drained his father. No wonder Matthew had never truly recovered, no child would ever be able to after witnessing such violence wrought on one of their parents. It didn’t matter that Matthew was a vampire, that he’d seen countless atrocities over the 1500 years of his life, even committed a few of them himself—Philippe was his father in every way that possibly mattered, and seeing his torment had broken something in Diana’s husband.

She turned next to the Book of Life. There were no recorded instances of a time-walker removing someone from their rightful place in history. But that didn’t mean it was impossible. She needed to understand the consequences. Would Philippe’s rescue unravel history? Would it change Matthew in ways she couldn’t foresee?

The weight of the past was heavy, but the possibility of undoing this particular tragedy was intoxicating.

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She couldn’t go in blind. If she was going to do this, she needed to be certain it was possible. So, Diana began experimenting with time-walking in controlled ways, small jumps, moments where she could alter tiny details without disrupting the larger timeline. A misplaced quill. A shifted book. A letter that was never sent. The results were… promising.

She consulted the weavers’ texts, the old magics that whispered of time’s malleability. There were risks, but also… possibilities.

And every time Diana thought of Matthew and the endless grief in his eyes, she knew the real risk was doing nothing.

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It had to be precise. She would need to time-walk to a moment before Philippe was beyond saving—before his mind and body were too far gone. She had to be careful, had to ensure that no one saw her. And most importantly, she had to bring him into the present without altering the past beyond repair. Which meant she couldn’t save him from falling into captivity entirely, it still needed to happen, as loathe as she was to admit it. Because Philippe’s capture had been an integral incentive for the entire de Clermont family fighting the supernatural allies of the Nazis, contributing to the effort to end WW II.

She mapped out every detail: the time (late 1944, weeks before Philippe’s original rescue by Baldwin and Matthew), the place (his cell at Chelm where he’d been imprisoned by Benjamin), the moment of extraction (preferably sometime during the night, although time-walking was hardly ever that precise). Diana had never attempted something so drastic. Time-walking back to a single point was one thing—pulling someone through time was another entirely. It would take every ounce of power she had.

But she was ready.

She had to be.

For Matthew.

For Philippe.

For all of them.

Chapter Text

When Diana had approached him with her idea of saving Philippe from his fate by time-walking to the past and pulling him into the present, Matthew had initially refused—vehemently. His wife, sensing that it would be of no use to argue, had simply nodded and told him he should think it through—that she wouldn’t act against his wishes—before letting him sit with the idea. And now, a couple of days later, Matthew sat in silent turmoil, his fingers pressed to his temples, the weight of the decision bearing down on him. Even after everything, after years of grief, guilt, and longing, he still wasn’t sure. The idea of pulling Philippe from the past was an impossible hope he had never dared to entertain. He had spent decades telling himself it was unchangeable, that his father’s death had been a necessary mercy. But now, for the first time, there was a choice.

And he was paralyzed by it.

Diana, however, was not. She was well into planning her father-in-law’s rescue, and while Matthew agonized over whether he could allow himself to want this, she was calculating every possible risk, every step she would need to take to ensure success.

They knew exactly where Benjamin had held Philippe, and Diana remembered the cell at Chelm castle all too well after saving Matthew from that exact same place six years ago. Back in 1944, the witches working with Benjamin had kept Philippe’s location hidden with their concealment spells. Matthew and Baldwin had only been able to rescue their father after he’d been broken so thoroughly in both body and mind by Benjamin that he was of no further use to Matthew’s disavowed son. Philippe had been transferred to a concentration camp just outside Lublin where his sons had finally found him.

By then, it had been far too late to save Philippe, Diana knew, so she would go to the cell at Chelm and extract him from there. The fact that she remembered it clearly—the placement inside the castle, the layout of the cell, the sensory impressions—would even work in her favour, considering time-walking was easier when she was able to visualise the place she wanted to go to in her mind.

Diana stood at the long wooden table in the library of Sept-Tours, notebook open in front of her, pen tapping against her palm as she organized her thoughts. Appearing inside Philippe’s cell should be feasible. Time-walking most importantly required a connection—either to a place or a person—and she had both, as the memories of Philippe from 1590 were hers in abundance and she had a good mental image of his surroundings during his imprisonment in 1944. The real challenge wasn’t getting there, it was getting back.

Pulling another person through time wasn’t impossible, but it was dangerous. The body and mind weren’t meant to endure such a rupture, and Philippe would already be in a fragile state. What she was planning would put unimaginable strain on him. He would be malnourished, broken in both mind and body, and, worst of all, he would have already given up. If she brought him through time only for him to wither away, it would all be for nothing.

Diana frowned as she considered it. She would have to tether Philippe to her magic, wrap him in a protective cocoon of power and will him forward. She had done something similar before when she had carried the twins inside her and time-walked. And once he was here… Once he was here, she would need to ensure he could heal which would be the real challenge.

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Diana turned from her work when she heard the familiar creak of the study door. Matthew entered, moving with that quiet, controlled grace he had even in his most conflicted moments. His grey-green gaze flickered to the notebook and Diana’s tablet on the table.

“You’re already planning,” he said, not accusingly, but with something like resignation.

Diana met his eyes. “Yes.”

Matthew exhaled, raking a hand through his hair. “I don’t even know if I can do this, Diana.” His voice was raw. “I don’t know if I should.”

She had known this would be difficult for him. Matthew’s grief had calcified into something almost sacred—unchanging, immovable. He had lived with Philippe’s death for nearly eight decades, shaped a not inconsiderable part of his understanding of himself around it. And even if eighty years wasn’t that much time, at least not if measured by vampiric standards, undoing it terrified him.

Diana stepped closer. “You don’t have to decide yet. But I do.”

His brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”

“I mean that if I wait for you to make peace with it, it’ll never happen,” she pressed gently. “Because you won’t ever make peace with it. This guilt, this grief—you’ve lived with it so long that you don’t know how to exist without it. But that doesn’t mean Philippe has to stay dead.”

Matthew closed his eyes for a long moment. “Diana…”

She reached for his hands and took them into her own, anchoring him with her touch. “I need you to hear me, Matthew. I can do this. I know the risks. I know how dangerous it is. But I also know that I can’t stand by and do nothing when I have the power to save him.”

His throat worked as he swallowed. “And if it goes wrong? If he doesn’t survive?”

Diana’s grip tightened. “Then at least we tried. At least he had a chance.”

Silence stretched between them. She could see the war in his eyes, the battle between fear and hope, between love and loss.

And then, finally, Matthew nodded. A small, almost imperceptible motion, but it was enough. Diana exhaled, reaching up to press a quick but heartfelt kiss to his cold lips before turning back to her work. She had a plan to finalize, spells to prepare, and magic to weave. Because she was going back, and this time, Philippe de Clermont would not die in 1945.

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As a passionate scholar, she had always been meticulous in her research, and when it came to Philippe’s survival, Diana was determined to leave no stone unturned. Blood alone would not be enough—it hadn’t been in 1945, when Matthew and Baldwin had rescued him. They’d force-fed him Ysabeau’s blood, and even that had barely sustained him. Properly healing him would require something more, something precise, something that balanced supernatural intervention with medical science.

At first, she’d considered attempting to heal Philippe herself. She was a weaver, after all—she could manipulate magic in ways most witches couldn’t even fathom. But healing magic wasn’t her specialty. She could close a small wound, mend a bruise, ease pain. She’d done so for Rebecca and Philip plenty of times. But Philippe? His injuries were on an entirely different scale. Diana knew about Philippe’s condition after his 1945 rescue what Matthew had told her about it: the severe malnutrition, the muscle wasting, the organ damage from starvation, the sheer trauma his body had endured. He’d barely been able to tolerate the sight of blood, let alone drinking it. If that had been true then, it would be just as true now.

Philippe would need more than just time, rest, and blood. He would need someone who could rebuild him from the inside out. Someone who understood not just magic, but medicine. Because in order for magic to truly heal, the witch or wizard casting it had to understand exactly what they were healing. A broken bone, for example, could be magically repaired—but only if the witch knew the size and shape of the bone, how it functioned, how bones naturally knit back together, and what complications could arise if it wasn’t set properly. Trying to heal something without that knowledge was dangerous—like performing surgery blindfolded. That requirement alone narrowed the field considerably. There were few witches who possessed both medical expertise and a natural talent for healing magic. Fewer still who could be trusted with Philippe’s care.

Diana spent days combing through every possible lead—digging into witches who practiced in the field of medicine, searching for any who might have the skill and knowledge necessary. It had to be someone capable of balancing science and magic, someone who wouldn’t be intimidated by Philippe or the de Clermont name. And that was how she found Dr. Lyanne Benedikt.

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Diana spent three days reaching out to the few witches she trusted, making careful and discreet inquiries, and it was late in the evening when her phone finally buzzed with a message from her contact in New York:

I have someone. Lyanne Benedikt. She’s been with the coven for about five years. Trauma surgeon at Mount Sinai. Knows her stuff. No biases against vampires. Trustworthy. She’ll call you soon. Xoxo Maya

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Diana hadn’t expected a response so quickly, but that evening, just as she was about to close the tabs on her tablet for the night, her phone rang. The number was unfamiliar, but when she answered, a confident, no-nonsense voice greeted her.

“Diana Bishop?”

“Yes,” she said cautiously.

“This is Lyanne Benedikt. Maya told me you have a… delicate situation that needs my expertise.”

Diana relaxed slightly. “Thank you for calling. Did Maya explain—”

“She gave me the bare minimum,” Lynn interrupted, amusement lacing her tone. “Something about a secret rescue mission that requires both medical and magical intervention. She was very cryptic, but I got the impression that this is very important.”

“It is,” Diana confirmed.

“Good.” A pause. “So tell me what I’m walking into.”

Diana considered for a moment before speaking carefully. "It involves a rescue. Someone—a vampire—who has been through something... severe. Blood alone won’t be enough to heal him. I need someone who understands both medicine and magic, someone who can rebuild a body that's been pushed to its absolute limit."

Lyanne didn’t respond right away, but Diana could tell she was thinking, weighing the information. Then, a soft exhale.

"So, worst-case scenario levels of damage. Multiple organ failure? Extensive trauma?"

"Yes."

"How long?"

"He will have been held for more than half a year by the time we can get to him."

Another silence. Then, with an edge of grim understanding, the other witch said, "You’re talking about chronic starvation, non-existent healing abilities, muscle atrophy, neurological damage. Possibly PTSD, if we’re lucky and that’s all it is."

Diana felt a flicker of admiration. Sharp mind, indeed.

"I’m going to need full control over his medical care," Dr. Benedikt said after a moment. "No interfering, no second-guessing unless you actually know what you’re talking about. If I do this, I do it my way."

Diana didn’t hesitate. "Agreed."

Lyanne made a thoughtful noise. “I can stabilize him. I can manage his pain, make sure his body doesn’t go into complete shock. But you need to understand something, Diana—your patient is not going to walk out of this fully healed just because I put my hands on him. Magic can only do so much, you know that. And from what little you’ve just told me, this is going to be a long recovery.”

Diana exhaled, a weight lifting from her chest. “I understand. I just need him to have a chance.”

There was a long pause. Then Lyanne’s voice shifted, more serious. “And who is this mystery patient of yours?”

Diana hesitated. “His name is Philippe de Clermont.”

Silence. A silence so heavy that it made Diana’s stomach drop.

“Dr. Benedikt?”

No answer. Then, finally, a slow exhale. “Lynn is fine. But you have noticed my accent, right?” the doctor asked, her voice oddly flat.

Diana blinked. The accent—subtle, faint, softened by a long time spend abroad. It was something she hadn’t paid attention to before, but now, as Lyanne pointed it out…German.

Diana’s mouth went dry.

“Oh.”

“Yeah,” Lyanne said wryly.

Diana scrambled for words. “I—I didn’t mean—”

“I know,” the doctor interrupted, her tone unreadable. “You wouldn’t have called me if you did.”

Diana pressed her fingers to her temple, suddenly understanding the weight of what she had asked. Philippe had been held by Germans. Tortured by Benjamin, who’d been German. Lyanne Benedikt might not have been there, might not have been involved in any way, but there was history here.

“I’m not them,” Lynn said quietly. “And if you were worried about that, let me put it to rest right now—I would never stand with people like that. I hate what they did. What they were. If I could go back and make them all burn, I would.”

Diana swallowed hard. “I don’t doubt that.”

Another silence stretched between them, this one more thoughtful.

“You really think you can save him?” Lynn asked at last.

“I have to.”

A long pause—then: “Alright, I’m in. Let’s talk about how we can pull this off.”

Chapter Text

Diana found Matthew in the small, candle-lit study adjacent to their bedroom, where he had taken to retreating in the evenings. He was seated in the leather armchair near the fireplace, his head bent over a book he wasn’t really reading. His posture was tense, the shadows flickering over his sharp features as he stared at the page, lost in thought.

She knew him well enough to recognize that his mind wasn’t on the words in front of him. He was still circling the decision he had yet to make.

Diana took a deep breath and stepped inside. “We need to talk.”

Matthew looked up immediately, his sharp grey-green eyes locking onto hers. He studied her face, reading the weight behind her words. He closed the book and set it aside. “Go on.”

She sat down across from him, leaning forward, her elbows on her knees. “I found someone who can help Philippe.”

Matthew’s gaze sharpened. “Who?”

“A witch named Lyanna Benedikt. She’s part of Maya’s coven in New York, but more importantly, she’s a trauma surgeon at Mount Sinai.”

Matthew’s eyebrows lifted, clearly surprised. “A doctor?”

“A damn good one, from what I could find out and from what Maya told me.” Diana gave him a small, pointed look. “And she has no problem with vampires.”

Matthew frowned, absorbing the information. “And she agreed to help?”

Diana nodded. “I spoke to her myself. She’s pragmatic, intelligent, and completely unshaken by what I told her.”

Matthew leaned back, his fingers drumming against the arm of his chair. “That’s a rare combination.”

“It is.”

Silence stretched between them for a beat before Diana hesitated. “There’s one more thing.”

Matthew caught the shift in her tone immediately. “What is it?”

Diana inhaled deeply. “Lynn is German.”

She braced herself for his reaction, and she saw the flicker of tension in his jaw. He didn’t speak immediately, his expression unreadable.

“I know what you’re thinking,” she said quickly. “And before you say anything, you need to hear me out.”

Matthew folded his arms, his gaze darkening, but he gave her a nod to continue.

Diana shifted slightly, choosing her words carefully. “When I told her Philippe’s name, she went silent. And when she finally spoke again, the first thing she asked me was if I had noticed her accent.”

Matthew’s eyes flashed with understanding, but he said nothing.

“I didn’t think much of it at first, but later, I kept replaying the conversation in my head.” Diana sighed. “She feels responsible.”

Matthew’s brows pulled together. “For what?”

“For what happened to Philippe,” Diana said simply. “For what her country did to him.”

Matthew’s mouth tightened.

Diana leaned forward, holding his gaze. “I don’t mean that in a rational sense. She knows she isn’t guilty of anything. She wasn’t even born when it happened, and she doesn’t know about Benjamin or his role in Philippe’s suffering, either. But that doesn’t change how she feels.”

Matthew exhaled, rubbing his fingers against his temple, trying to block out the memories of the photographs Benjamin had taken of Philippe while torturing him. “Diana…”

“No, listen,” she pressed. “She told me, in no uncertain terms, that she hates what the Nazis did. That if she could go back and burn them all to the ground, she would.”

That seemed to give Matthew pause.

“She didn’t do this, Matthew,” Diana continued softly. “She didn’t experiment on Philippe. She didn’t torture him. But she feels like she has to atone for it somehow.”

Matthew looked away, his jaw clenching, his fingers flexing slightly. Diana knew this reaction well. It wasn’t anger, not exactly. It was something heavier, older—a deep, bitter understanding of history’s weight, the way it never truly faded, and the role his own son had played in Philippe’s undoing.

Diana softened her voice. “She’s not the enemy, Matthew. She’s our best chance at saving him.”

Silence filled the room.

Matthew finally leaned forward, resting his forearms on his knees, staring at the flickering fire. His voice was quieter when he spoke. “I don’t blame her.”

“I know.”

“But I do blame them, almost as much as—” He sucked in a breath before continuing, “as Benjamin. God, how I wish I’d never…”

Diana swallowed. “I know that too.”

Matthew ran a hand over his face, trying to shake off the dark memories of Benjamin’s endless cruelty. “You really believe she’ll do everything in her power to help him?”

Diana didn’t hesitate. “Yes.”

Another silence.

Then, slowly, Matthew nodded, and Diana exhaled in relief when her husband met her gaze, something unreadable in his expression. “Alright,” he said finally. “We’ll bring her in.”

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After Mattew had finally agreed to go ahead with the plan, Diana knew there was one more conversation to be had, and this conversation was going to be even more difficult than the one with Matthew. Baldwin was, above all else, pragmatic and fiercely protective of the de Clermont family’s legacy. He had spent centuries—if not millennia—trying to live up to Philippe’s expectations, and more than that, he had been there in 1944 when they had originally rescued their father—when they had been too late to truly save him.

And now she was about to tell him that everything they thought was unchangeable might not be.

She found Baldwin in the grand hall of Sept-Tours, standing near the wide stone hearth with a glass of wine in his hand, staring into the fire. The light from the flames caught the copper of his hair, and his posture was tense, rigid with thought.

She approached cautiously. “Baldwin, we need to talk.”

He didn’t turn immediately, but she saw the way his shoulders stiffened at her tone. “That much is obvious.”

Diana exhaled, bracing herself. “I know you’re not going to like what I have to say, but you need to hear it.”

Baldwin finally turned, his sharp golden eyes locking onto hers. “Go on.”

Diana took a breath. “I’m going to time-walk back to 1944 and bring Philippe here, to the present.”

There was a beat of absolute silence.

Then, Baldwin let out a harsh, humourless laugh. “You what?”

“I’m bringing him back,” she repeated, standing her ground. “I can do it. I will do it.”

Baldwin’s jaw clenched. “You don’t get to make that decision on your own.”

“I didn’t,” she shot back. “Matthew knows. And he’s agreed to it.”

That seemed to strike a nerve. Baldwin’s expression darkened, and he set his wine glass down on the stone mantel with deliberate care. “Matthew agreed?” His voice was low, dangerous.

“Yes.”

His eyes flickered, and she saw it—the brief flash of something deeper beneath the anger. Shock. Hurt.

Baldwin shook his head, stepping closer, his presence towering. “Do you have any idea what you’re risking?”

“Yes.”

“No,” he snapped, “you don’t.” He took another step toward her, his voice sharp with barely contained fury. “This isn’t just about bringing Philippe forward in time, Diana. Do you understand what will happen if you succeed? You’re changing the entire course of history.”

“I know the risks—”

“Do you?” Baldwin’s tone was razor-edged. “What if he doesn’t survive the transition? What if he’s too far gone to want to live, like he was in 1945? What if we bring him here and he—”

He stopped himself, but Diana knew exactly what he was thinking.

What if Philippe wasn’t Philippe anymore?

She softened, just slightly. “Baldwin…”

But he wasn’t ready to listen. “We buried him, Diana,” he bit out, as if she needed to be reminded of Philippe’s sarcophagus in Sept-Tours’ chapel. “We grieved him. Do you have any idea what it did to us to see him like that? To know that, in the end, he begged Matthew to end his life?”

Diana swallowed hard. “Yes,” she said quietly. “I do.” She didn’t need to add Which is why I want to do this; it was heavily implied.

Baldwin exhaled sharply, pacing away from her before whirling back around. “You think this is mercy? You think you’re saving him?”

“Yes,” she said, fire creeping into her voice now. “Because I refuse to accept that he had to die. I refuse to accept that the only way to help him was to let him go.”

Baldwin’s hands curled into fists. “You don’t get to rewrite history just because you don’t like how it turned out.”

Diana took a step toward him, meeting his gaze without flinching. “And you don’t get to ignore this possibility just because you’d rather not deal with the ramifications,” she countered. “You and Matthew—you decided long ago that Philippe’s death was something you had to live with. That there was no other way. But now there is, and you’re hesitating, and I really don’t know why.”

Baldwin’s jaw tightened. He was losing patience.

Diana pushed forward. “You were there. You saw what they did to him, what Benjamin did to him. You know what he suffered. And you’re telling me that if there was even a chance to undo it, to give him back his life, you wouldn’t take it?”

His silence was answer enough.

Diana exhaled, pushing a hand through her hair. “I know this is hard. I know it changes everything. But Philippe isn’t just history, Baldwin. He’s your father. And both Matthew and you are still suffering from his loss, even now.”

Baldwin stared at her for a long, tense moment. Then, finally, his expression shifted—just barely. The anger was still there, the resistance, but underneath it was something raw, something wounded.

Diana pressed forward, her voice gentler now. “I have found a healer. A witch who’s also a trauma surgeon. She’s the best chance Philippe has at surviving this and actually healing from it. And Matthew—he needs this, Baldwin.”

Baldwin let out a slow breath, turning away, rubbing a hand over his face. “Damn you, Diana.”

She let the silence settle. Let him process.

Then, after what felt like an eternity, he turned back to her. His face was still stormy, his posture rigid—but there was something else there too—reluctance, resignation, and, settling in almost against his better judgement, hope.

Finally, he nodded once, curt and sharp. “Fine.”

Diana let out a quiet breath of relief.

Baldwin levelled her with a hard look. “But if this goes wrong—if this destroys him more than it saves him—” His voice dropped lower, edged with steel. “That’s on you.”

Diana met his gaze head-on. “I’ll take that risk.”

Baldwin exhaled, shaking his head. “God help us all.” And with that, he turned and walked away.

Chapter Text

Lynn had dealt with her fair share of difficult conversations in her career—trauma patients on the brink of death, families demanding miracles, military medics who barely blinked at gut wounds—but she wasn’t prepared for Baldwin de Clermont’s sheer brutality when describing his father’s injuries.

She stood at her kitchen counter, her notebook open in front of her, phone pressed to her ear. The sun was setting beyond the city skyline, but she barely noticed.

Baldwin’s voice, clipped and emotionless, filled the silence. “By the time Matthew and I found him, he was little more than skin and bones. He hadn’t fed properly in months. Starvation had truly taken hold, and in the end, we had to force-feed him to keep him alive because he couldn’t even stand the sight of blood anymore.”

Lynn closed her eyes, gripping the pen tighter. “Go on.”

“They had been testing how much pain a vampire could endure before his body shut down.” His tone didn’t change, but there was something dangerous beneath it, something old and barely restrained. “His bones had been broken repeatedly—his hands, his legs, his ribs. They let them heal just enough before breaking them again.”

Lynn exhaled slowly, forcing her voice to stay neutral. “Were they reset properly at any point?”

“No.”

Her jaw tightened. “Which means improper healing, possible malalignment.”

A pause. “Yes, almost certainly.”

Which meant she would have to deal with that mess on top of everything else.

Baldwin continued, his tone darkening. “They also used magic on him. The witches his captor worked with weren’t gentle. They forced him to relive pain, broke his mind as well as his body.”

Lynn swallowed. She had suspected as much, but hearing it confirmed was different. “Neurological trauma,” she murmured. “Could be memory loss, PTSD, dissociation—”

“He wasn’t himself by the time we got there,” Baldwin said bluntly. “He managed to hold on for a couple of months, but eventually he begged Matthew to end it.”

Lynn rubbed her fingers over her temple, exhaling slowly. Alright, okay… That’s what we’re dealing with.

She forced herself into clinical mode, pushing emotions aside. “His healing—was it functional at all? Did his body respond to any attempts at recovery?”

Baldwin hesitated. “Barely. His ability to regenerate was nearly gone by then.”

“Because of the starvation?”

“Yes. And because they experimented on his blood.”

Lynn froze, pen hovering over the paper. “What do you mean?”

“They were studying him, Doctor Benedikt,” Baldwin said, and for the first time, there was something lethal in his voice. “They were fascinated by what made him different—the first vampire they had ever captured. They drained him. Over and over. Replaced it with human blood, animal blood—seeing how much he could survive on before he deteriorated. And that was before the real torture actually started.”

Lynn swallowed the bile rising in her throat. “Jesus Christ.”

“Exactly,” Baldwin said, voice flat.

She shut her notebook, her heart hammering. This was worse than she had thought. Far worse.

She took a steadying breath. “Alright, at least now I know what I need in terms of a medical setup.”

After she’d ended the call, Lynn looked at what she’d noted down. The list was long, longer than even she had expected. She sat down at her desk, fingers flying over the keypad of her MacBook, sending an email that meticulously listed every detail to Diana and Matthew.

Philippe would require a fully equipped medical suite, including an adjustable hospital bed with lateral support, IV poles and infusion pumps, monitors for heart rate, oxygen saturation, and blood pressure (even though she wasn’t sure how useful they’d be on a vampire, she needed some form of tracking). Lynn also requested a ventilator and general oxygen supply—if he went into respiratory distress, she needed to be prepared.

They also needed a well-stocked blood supply, units of animal blood and blood from a de Clermont, stored properly at the right temperature to avoid clotting issues. Surgical supplies were next on the list: a portable ultrasound, sterile sutures, and orthopaedic tools in case Lynn had to reset any improperly healed fractures (which, by the sound of it, would be inevitable). Medications were also a priority. Philippe—even with his vampire physiology— would need antibiotics, because if his system had been compromised by human and animal blood exposure, he might have lingering infections or imbalances.

He’d also need a strict pain management regimen with which she would have to be careful—typical opioids might not react well with his system, but Lynn would not let him suffer. And lastly, Philippe would need IV fluids. His system had been deprived for too long—he needed hydration, electrolytes, anything to stabilize him. Lastly, Lynn added a lab to the list, just in case she would need to tweak any chemical components to fit his vampiric metabolism.

Diana had promised resources, and now Lynn was going to put that to the test. She fired off her email, then leaned her head back against the seat, closing her eyes. She had seen near-dead men before, had saved them before—but this was different. This wasn’t just about stabilizing a body, this was about bringing someone back—physically, mentally, magically. And no matter what it took, she would make damn sure Philippe de Clermont survived.

-------------

The next day, Lynn stood in her Manhattan apartment, phone pressed between her shoulder and ear as she flicked through her closet with one hand, yanking out clothes and tossing them onto the bed. She had packed for medical missions before—she had even travelled on short notice for emergency surgeries—but this was something else entirely. This wasn’t just a job, it was risk, a secret, a chance to rewrite history.

Diana’s voice crackled through the line. “You’re sure you can leave this quickly?”

Lynn huffed as she shoved a stack of tee shirts into her duffel bag. “I made a few calls this morning. Told my department head I had a family emergency and signed off on my patient handovers. It’ll raise some eyebrows, but it won’t be a problem.”

There was a pause on Diana’s end. “You’re taking quite a leap of faith here.”

Lynn snorted, zipping up one bag and moving to her bookshelf. “Understatement of the century, Bishop. But let’s be honest—if I’d hesitated, you would’ve found someone else.”

Diana sighed. “Probably not, actually. You’re the only one I trust who can do this. Matthew and I will handle things on the administrative side. We know people who will make sure your career doesn’t take a hit because of this.”

Lynn exhaled, rubbing the back of her neck. “I appreciate that. But honestly? I’m not worried about my career. After all I’ve done for the hospital, all those all-nighters, they owe me at least a year off”

Lynn grabbed a slim black notebook from her desk—the one where she kept sketches of spellwork diagrams, her handwritten notes on magical medicine. She tossed it into her bag, followed by her headphones and her phone charger. Then, she got right back on topic. “You got my email, right? We need a sterile environment for post-op care, an actual medical setup. And I don’t mean a 17th-century apothecary, Diana. I need modern equipment.”

“We’ll get everything you sent us,” Diana promised. “We’ve already started setting up a space at Sept-Tours. Matthew’s technically a doctor, so we’ve actually been able to order most things regularly, no need to rely on dubious resources.”

Lynn made a considering sound. “Alright. Make sure the blood is fresh—animal blood and blood from someone in the family, both diluted and undiluted. Baldwin told me Philippe couldn’t handle blood when he was originally rescued in 1945, that he had to be force-fed—so we need something that won’t completely shock his system.”

Diana hesitated before saying: “Matthew will handle it.”

Lynn hummed. “Good. Please also make sure to get the exact types of pain medication I’ve listed, as well as the antibiotics, and—" She hesitated. “After everything Baldwin told me, he’ll be in a lot of pain, Diana. I can manage some of it magically, but the rest…”

Diana’s voice was quiet. “We’ll get what you need.”

Lynn exhaled, running a hand over her face. “I’ll land in Paris the day after tomorrow. You still good to collect me from the airport that afternoon?”

“Of course,” Diana’s tone softened. “Thank you, Lynn.”

Lynn’s jaw tightened. “Don’t thank me yet.”

She hung up, her pulse thrumming, and stared at the duffel bag on her bed.

She had spent years treating people on the brink of death, pulling them back when no one else could. But this? This was different. It wasn’t just about saving a life but about changing fate itself. And she would be damned if she failed.

Chapter Text

The chaos of Charles de Gaulle Airport was something Matthew was familiar with—he had passed through it many times over the years—but tonight, it barely registered. His attention was focused on the slim, fair-haired woman stepping through the arrival gate, a single large duffel bag slung over her shoulder and a rolling suitcase trailing behind her.

Lyanna Benedikt was not what he had expected. He knew, of course, that she was only in her mid-thirties, but something about her presence—the quiet confidence in her stride, the sharp, assessing gaze she swept over the airport—made her seem older, more seasoned.

She spotted them almost immediately and made her way over without hesitation. “Diana,” she greeted, giving her a quick, appraising look before turning to Matthew. “You must be Matthew.”

He extended a hand. “Lyanne. It’s good to meet you in person.”

She shook his hand firmly, her grip strong and steady. “Just Lynn is fine. And you don’t have to sound so formal—I promise I won’t bite,” she added with a mischievous smile.

Matthew let out a quiet chuckle, appreciating the dry humour. Diana smiled beside him. “Come on,” she said. “Let’s get on the road. We have a long drive ahead of us.”

Lynn nodded and adjusted the strap of her duffel bag. “Sounds good to me.”

-------------

The three of them settled into the car, Matthew taking the wheel while Diana sat in the front passenger seat. Lynn slid into the back, stretching her legs out with a sigh after the transatlantic flight.

“How long is the drive?” she asked, taking off her jacket and getting comfortable.

“A little over six hours,” Diana said. “We figured it would give us time to go over some more details.”

Lynn smirked slightly. “And to interrogate me a little.”

Diana glanced back at her with an amused look. “Can you blame me?”

Lynn shrugged. “Not at all.”

Matthew observed the exchange with quiet interest as he maneuvered the car onto the highway. There was something about Lynn that intrigued him. She had a way of carrying herself that was neither defensive nor overly open—self-assured but not arrogant, pragmatic but not cold.

She had agreed to this knowing the risks, knowing how much this would upend her life for an indefinite period. And she hadn’t hesitated.

“So, you’re originally from Germany?” Diana asked, twisting in her seat slightly to look at Lynn.

Lynn nodded. “Born and raised. My family still lives there.”

Matthew caught the slight hesitation in her voice. Not discomfort, exactly, but a careful awareness of the subject.

“You have siblings?” Diana prompted.

Lynn shook her head. “No, I’m an only child. My mom had me when she was in her late thirties, and after I was born, she was told it would be too dangerous to try for another child.”

She huffed, shaking her head slightly. “And that’s without the doctors knowing about my mom being a witch and magical complications being a very real possibility as well.”

Diana cast her an empathic look. “Must have been hard for your mother. But it sounds like it was the right decision.”

Lynn exhaled, shifting slightly in her seat. “From a medicinal standpoint, it absolutely was. Didn’t stop me from asking invasive questions about why I didn’t have a sibling like most other kids when I was young, though.” She grimaced. “I was a menace as a child, I swear.”

Diana’s expression softened. “Most children are, in their own way.”

Matthew huffed, a small indulgent smile curling his lips. “Isn’t that the truth.” Then he glanced at Lynn in the rearview mirror. “So is your dad a witch as well?”

Lynn hesitated for a moment before remembering that a) Matthew and Diana were the original renegades when it came to Congregation stipulations, and that what they were about to do was b) even more of an affront to the Congregation’s tender sensibilities.

“No, my dad’s human. Took him a while to come to terms with everything after mom told him about the supernatural world when they got serious with each other. But mom always says that he had one—very major—freakout and hasn’t looked back ever since.” She smiled indulgently. “Dad’s practical like that.”

“You’re still close with them?” Diana asked.

“Oh, absolutely,” Lynn said. “As much as I can be with living in New York and them living in Cologne.” A soft smile spread across her face while she talked about her parents. “My mom, Andrea, has been retired for a while now, she was a teacher. And my dad, Karl, is slowly stepping back from his job at the architectural firm he’s been working for. They’ve actually been considering moving to New York permanently for a while now, to be closer to me.”

Matthew found himself watching Lynn more closely now, fascinated by the emotional layers beneath her composed exterior. It was obvious from the way she talked about them that she had a very close relationship with her parents.

And yet, she’d chosen to move across the Atlantic to follow her calling as a surgeon, willingly leaving her family behind to build her own life and a career that spanned both magic and science. And now she was throwing herself headfirst into their world.

“So you didn’t choose a medical profession because one of your parents was a doctor,” he remarked. “What made you decide to be a surgeon? And why not become a healer in the traditional magical sense?”

Lyn’s brows furrowed while she collected her thoughts. “I had a lot of human friends growing up—still do, actually. I guess I never felt that comfortable with committing fully to the supernatural community just because I’m a witch. I like to make my own choices, weigh the pros and cons, and not make a decision because some tradition or ancient history says this is how it has to be.” Lynn snorts. “Guess I get that from mom.”

Shrugging her shoulders and smiling a little ruefully, she continues. “I’ve always had a knack for healing magic, it just comes to me naturally. And when I took my advanced Biology classes in high school, I discovered that I was also good with the scientific, the technical side of medicine and I became interested in combining both things.”

She looked at Matthew in the rearview mirror. “My mom encouraged me to pursue that idea, helped me apply for internships at a couple of hospitals in Cologne. And when my final grades were good enough to let me pursue medical studies straight away…” Lynn huffs softly. “Let’s just say I didn’t hesitate, and I’ve never once regretted it.”

Matthew raised a dark eyebrow. “Not even when you lost a patient?”

A shadow passed over Lynn’s face for a brief moment before she answered. “Losing a patient is devastating, no doctor who isn’t a complete sociopath will ever tell you differently. And while I often use my magic in critical moments it still happens. It’s one of the hardest things I had to learn to accept: you can’t save everyone, even with magic.”

She exhaled sharply, pulling her shoulders back. “But losing a patient never made me regret choosing my job because I know I gave them their best chance at survival. It’s just not enough sometimes.”    

Diana smiled emphatically. “And here you are, about to risk everything for someone you don’t even know.”

Lynn met her gaze evenly. “I don’t know Philippe, that’s true. But I wouldn’t say I don’t know you.” She grinned. “It’s hard not to when you’re part of our world because, let’s face it, you’re both basically living legends. And I also know Maya, and I trust her judgment.”

Her expression turned serious, her voice quiet but firm. “And after what you told me about Philippe’s story, about what happened to him and what you’re willing to risk to get him back—” She sighed. “I’d have to be an unfeeling cow to turn you away. I know I can help Philippe and, Hippocratic oath or not, I won’t walk away from that just because it would be more convenient.”

Matthew felt something shift inside him at those words.

He had known many people who were skilled, many who were compassionate but very few combined the two the way Lynn did. Most healers—supernatural or human—were pragmatic, seldom idealistic, and rarer still emotionally invested.

Diana, as always, saw it too. “You really do feel like this is something you have to do, don’t you?”

Lynn didn’t look away. “Wouldn’t you?”

Diana nodded slowly. “I would.”

Matthew tightened his grip on the wheel, something settling in his chest. He had been sceptical at first, uncertain if bringing an outsider into this was wise. But Lynn wasn’t an outsider, not really. She understood the importance of family, the love a child had for their parent. And she understood the importance of helping someone who couldn’t help themselves.

He glanced at her again in the mirror, studying the determined set of her jaw, the quiet fire in her eyes. Yes, she was exactly the kind of person they needed.

-------------

The drive through the French countryside had been a long one. It took almost six hours to get from Paris to the part of the Auvergne where the de Clermont’s ancestral home was situated, and by the time they arrived at Sept-Tours, the chateau was bathed in moonlight, its towering silhouette standing against the star-strewn sky. Despite the hour, someone was already waiting when they pulled up.

Sparing only a brief glance for the medieval architecture of the chateau, Lynn stepped out of the car, rolling her shoulders as she took in the imposing figure standing by the entrance. Baldwin de Clermont was as formidable as she had expected—at least 6’5, broad-shouldered, his short copper hair glinting in the dim light, golden eyes sharp and assessing. And even though both of them looked to be in their mid-thirties, he was older than Matthew in every way that mattered, his authority resting not just in his title as head of the family, but in the sheer force of his presence.

He barely spared her luggage a glance before his gaze fixed on her. “Baldwin de Clermont.” He offered formally, extending a large hand that nearly swallowed her own when she took it.

Lynn arched an eyebrow. She had expected a less reserved welcome after they’d already spoken with each other over the phone. Then again, discussing the physical and mental consequences of months of brutal torture could hardly be considered polite conversation. “Lyanne Benedikt, but please call me Lynn.”

Diana shot Baldwin a warning look, but he ignored her. His eyes raked over Lynn, scrutinizing. “I expected someone a little older.”

Lynn’s second eyebrow joined the first. “And I expected more subtlety.”

Matthew made a sound that was suspiciously close to a chuckle.

Baldwin’s expression remained unreadable, but something flickered in his gaze—mild amusement, perhaps, or grudging approval at her lack of intimidation. Without another word, he turned and strode inside.

Lynn exhaled, casting a glance at Diana. “That went well.”

Diana rolled her eyes. “That was Baldwin behaving.”

“Fantastic,” Lynn groaned, before picking up her weekender and entering the chateau.

-------------

After a quick tour and time to freshen up, the four of them settled in the study for a very late nightcap. A fire crackled in the hearth, casting flickering golden light across the dark wood and bookshelves. Baldwin poured himself a generous glass of wine and, after a pause, did the same for Lynn.

She accepted it with a nod, swirling the dark-red liquid in the glass. She had been warned by Diana and Matthew that Baldwin would test her and tried to prepare accordingly. But there was something about his presence, about the predatory focus in his amber eyes that unsettled her as he sat across from her, his gaze sharp and assessing.

As she’d expected he got right to it. “After Diana’s explanations and our phone call I assume you’re sufficiently briefed on Philippe’s condition to know that this is not going to be a typical case.”

Lynn took a measured sip of her drink before answering. “Yes, that much has become very clear.”

His eyes narrowed slightly. “And yet, you agreed.”

Lynn set her glass down on the table between them. “Yes.”

Baldwin leaned forward. “You don’t know us. You don’t know him. So tell me, Doctor Benedikt, why are you really here?”

Diana frowned. “Baldwin, she already explained—”

“It’s fine,” Lynn cut in smoothly, her tone calm. She met Baldwin’s gaze without hesitation. “You want to know if I have ulterior motives, if I have some kind of hidden agenda, don’t you?” She gave Diana a quick glance. “That’s what Diana and Matthew were too polite to ask.”

Baldwin didn’t blink at her not-so-covertly calling him rude. “I want to know why a woman with no connection to this family is willing to upend her life for an impossible mission.”

Lynn exhaled, sitting back in her chair, her fingers tapping lightly against the side of her glass. “You think it’s strange that I want to help?”

“I think it’s exceedingly rare,” Baldwin corrected. “Especially when there’s no personal stake involved.”

Lynn was silent for a moment, choosing her words carefully. “I’ve spent most of my professional life trying to save people who, by all medical reasoning, shouldn’t survive. I’ve seen men and women with wounds so severe that even modern medicine could barely hold them together. I’ve fought to give them a chance because that’s all any of us can ever do, and because I’m damn good at turning impossible odds in someone else’s favour.” She leaned forward slightly, her blue eyes steady while she chose her next words very carefully. “That’s what this is, Baldwin—a chance.”

Baldwin studied her, his expression unreadable. “You don’t believe in lost causes, then.”

Lynn’s lips curved in a faint, wry smile. “Not until they’re actually lost.”

Matthew, who had been silent until now, finally spoke. “You do realize how dangerous this could get for you when word about Philippe’s return inevitably gets out? Being involved in de Clermont affairs is already a risk under normal circumstances but aiding us in knowingly acting in opposition to Congregation statutes….”

Lynn met his gaze. “I do.”

“And you’re not afraid of any possible consequences?”

Lynn considered that for a moment. “No, not really. I was never that immersed in the supernatural community anyway, so it would hardly matter if they kicked me out for good.”

Baldwin frowned slightly. “Then what do you fear?”

Lynn exhaled. “That I won’t be enough. That no matter how much I do, how hard I try—Philippe might not make it.”

Diana’s expression softened.

Matthew nodded slowly, understanding something unspoken. Lynn had spent years fighting against impossible odds, had saved lives, yes, but also lost them. And those losses, however few, had stayed with her.

Baldwin studied her for a long moment before speaking again. “And if Philippe doesn’t want to be saved?”

Lynn’s expression didn’t waver. “Then we help him anyway. Because people don’t always know what they need when they’re drowning.”

That, more than anything else she had said, made Baldwin pause. Silence stretched between them, heavy and considering. Then, finally, Baldwin leaned back in his chair, taking another sip of wine.

“Alright,” he said at last.

Lynn raised an eyebrow. “Alright what?”

Baldwin’s lips curled slightly. “Alright, Doctor Benedikt, you’ll do.”

Matthew chuckled softly, shaking his head, while Diana sighed exasperatedly. Lynn, for her part, let out a half relieved, half incredulous chuckle. “Well, if that’s true I must insist that you start calling me ‘Lynn’.”

Baldwin merely tilted his head in consideration and took another sip of his drink. It was obvious that he still had his reservations, probably would for a while. But he saw something in Lynn that he recognized.

She was a fighter, and she would do everything in her power to save his father.

Chapter Text

Lynn woke to soft morning light filtering through the heavy curtains of her bedroom suite. For a moment, she just lay there, taking it in—the deep, quiet stillness of the chateau, the weight of the duvet, the faint scent of old wood, lavender, and fresh linens.

It was… strange. Not unwelcome, but strange nonetheless.

She wasn’t used to this kind of quiet anymore. For years, her mornings had been filled with the relentless pace of hospital life—monitors beeping, pagers going off, the hurried energy of an ER that was always bustling. Even at home, her apartment in New York had never been silent. The distant hum of the city, the occasional siren, the ever-present pulse of life—it was always there.

But Sept-Tours had a different kind of pulse, one that was older, quiet and steadfast. Lynn had felt a similar rhythm only once before, and that was at her grandparents’ little red summerhouse in the Swedish countryside where she’d spent her holidays as a child.

It hadn’t held the same kind of historical weight, obviously, but it had been similar in the way the morning light fell through the curtains unobstructed by buildings, in the absence of noise and the hectic pace of everyday life, in the building’s deep-rooted connection to the land surrounding it.

And despite the uncertain and stressful days that no doubt lay ahead, a long-lost sense of tranquillity settled across Lynn’s shoulders, as if Sept-Tours itself was telling her she was in the right place at the right time.

Sitting up, she carded a hand through her hair before swinging her legs over the side of the bed. The rug protected her bare feet from the coolness of the stone floor, and she took a moment to appreciate the space she had been given.

The bedroom was more than comfortable—antique furniture, soft, elegant linens, and a view that overlooked the sprawling countryside of the Auvergne. It was a far cry from the sterile white walls of hospital quarters or the cramped Brooklyn apartment she barely spent time in.

Lynn took a deep, fortifying breath as she stood and stretched. Enjoy it while you can, Benedikt. It won’t be peaceful for long.

-------------

Diana met her outside her room, looking well-rested and already prepared for the day.

“Good morning,” the older witch greeted, falling into step beside her. “Did you sleep well?”

Lynn smiled, twisting her hair into a low bun while they walked. “Morning. Yeah, I did. Never slept in a more comfortable bed or sheets with a higher thread count.” She wasn’t used to such amenities and refused to take them for granted, even though it was obvious that Sept-Tours, for all its medieval-ness, breathed that particular kind of quiet luxury. “Thank you for the accommodations, it’s a lovely suite.”

“I appreciate you saying so, but really, it’s the least we can do for you,” said Diana, waving off her gratitude. “You’ll be staying for a while, and Matthew and I want you to feel as much at home as possible.”

Lynn smirked. “Does that entail Matthew saving me from Baldwin’s scrutiny or should I prepare for another interrogation over breakfast?”

Diana chuckled. “I think you passed the test last night.”

Lynn made a thoughtful sound. “Oh well, I suppose we can go for round two another time.”

Diana laughed, pleasantly surprised at Lynn taking Baldwin’s abrasive behaviour in stride. “I’m sure he’ll be available for another debate, but I, for one, need breakfast first. Let’s eat and then we can go over the last details.”

The kitchen was warm and welcoming, filled with the scent of fresh coffee and baked bread. The spread was simple but hearty—fresh fruit, pastries, eggs, and meats. Lynn poured herself a cup of coffee, inhaling deeply, while Diana prepared herself a strong cup of tea.

As they sat down, the older witch got straight to business. “We’re almost ready. Matthew and I went over the last steps the night before, but he wants your final input before we go through with this.”

Lynn nodded, grabbing a croissant from the breadbasket. “I would like to check the medical suite today, make sure everything is where I need it and acquaint myself with the space and the equipment.”

Diana nodded. “Everything you asked for was delivered and modified accordingly, but Matthew will take you through the setup himself.”

Lynn took a sip of coffee, considering. “Sounds good. I also need access to the lab space he set up. I want to do some preliminary testing on the blood supply, both animal and vampire, and make sure the diluted transfusions are available in varying ratios of plasma and blood.”

Diana tilted her head. “Do you think there might be an issue?”

Lynn exhaled. “I don’t really know, but it’s best not to take any chances. Philippe’s system will have been compromised for a long time, and if we give him something his body can’t tolerate, we could make things worse.”

Diana’s gaze darkened slightly. “Understood.”

They finished breakfast quickly, and as soon as they were done, Diana led Lynn toward the wing of the château that had been remodelled to accommodate Philippe. Matthew was already waiting for them.

-------------

Lynn had expected something, but she hadn’t expected this.

As Matthew pushed open the heavy oak doors, she was greeted with a space that looked nothing like the rest of Sept-Tours.

It wasn’t just modern, it was state of the art.

The walls were still the same thick stone, but the floors had been redone with smooth, sanitized surfaces in a deep shade of blue. Vampires usually weren’t susceptible to infections, but since both Baldwin and Matthew had mention Philippe’s healing abilities being nearly non-existent after they’d rescued him in 1945, Lynn was glad they’d be able to keep the suite at least somewhat sterile. Because she was pretty sure that at least some of the bone malalignments would require re-breaking and surgery.

Bright but dimmable overhead lights replaced the usual muted medieval ambiance of the chateau, the medical equipment gleaming underneath the lights. Lynn let her gaze linger, acquainting herself with the setup of the room.

The specialised critical care bed alone probably cost more than what she made in three months as a surgeon. It was fully electric, with a multi-positioning frame and a height-adjustable base to facilitate transfers. The split side rails were collapsible for easy access and care and featured built-in touch controls to move the individual sections of the bed. The lateral tilt function allowed for an automated side-to-side rotation every 1–2 hours to distribute pressure evenly.

When Lynn pulled back the deep blue sheets, she recognized the mattress system immediately because they used it at Mount Sinai as well. It was elaborate, consisting of a low air loss mattress that generated alternating pressure, auto-adjusting to the patient’s body weight and posture thanks to sensors embedded beneath the surface. She also took note of the additional smart bed features: a weight sensor and alerts for position changes and movement.

An integrated vital monitoring dock was connected to the bedside systems which included a wireless telemetry unit to track vital signs, several infusion pumps, IV poles, and the ventilator she had requested. Along one wall, a set of cabinets and counters had been stocked with every supply she had listed, from sterile dressings, various surgical kits to specialised pain medication and anaesthetics.

Lynn let out a low whistle. “Damn. When you said you had resources, you weren’t kidding.”

Matthew shrugged, a lopsided smile pulling at his wide mouth. “I am technically a doctor, so it wasn’t too much trouble. And we told you we’d make sure you had everything you needed.” His gaze darkened. “And I want Philippe to have every possible medical advantage available.”

Lynn noted the fierce determination in Matthew’s tone but also the hint of desperation in his eyes. It had to be hard, going through all these preparations to bring back someone who’d been dead for the past eighty years. Matthew was adjusting to the thought of getting his father back while some part of him was still reluctant to even entertain the idea, to allow himself this hope.

She reached out and gave the vampire’s forearm a quick squeeze. “You did perfectly, Matthew, that much is obvious. And I promise you I’ll do my part to make sure your father receives the best possible care.”

The grey-green eyes studied her for a moment, finding only resolve and confidence in her blue gaze, before he gave her a sharp nod.

Lynn turned back to the hospital bed to check the positioning system, familiarising herself with the controls, the automated rotation feature, and the pressure relief system of the mattress as well as the various digital data readouts on the screen.

After hearing Baldwin’s account of Philippe’s condition post-rescue, Lynn expected him to be bedridden for some time. And even though vampires could stay in one position far longer than humans without getting uncomfortable or suffering adverse effects, no one was sure how true that was for a vampire in Philippe’s condition. So ensuring optimal positioning, relieving pressure, and preventing unnecessary strain on his body had to be a priority.  

In addition to getting all information available on Philippe’s condition, Lynn had further prepared for taking over his medical care by exchanging a slew of emails with Matthew about the specifics of vampire physiology, wanting to be as informed as possible about her patient’s unique needs. She may have treated vampires before, but none of them had been in critical condition. The trauma surgeon had asked about things like baseline vital signs, breathing and circulatory peculiarities, as well as blood and medication intake.

In the end, it hadn’t been that different from studying patient files to prepare for surgery, just a little more… unusual. And Matthew had promised her to get adapted medical equipment that would actually provide viable data.

Lynn moved on to inspect the ventilator that had been modified to accommodate the much lower respiratory rate and volume need of a vampire. The average warmblood needed 10-12 breaths a minute—Philippe would hardly need more than one breath per minute, maybe 2-3 if his body was struggling. She had only requested the vent as a precaution, since Philippe had not originally needed supplemental oxygen. Still, no one could say for certain what condition Diana and Matthew would return Philippe in, so Lynn preferred to err on the side of caution.

She ran her fingers along the controls, mentally cataloguing the technical alterations to the settings and display readouts. She also checked the available tubing—noting there was both an endotracheal and a tracheostomy kit—the suction machine, and the humidifier.

The wireless telemetry system had been adapted as well, fed with data for baseline vital signs such as blood pressure, heart rate, respiratory rate, and blood oxygen levels.  The data for the calculation of the baseline values came from both Matthew and Baldwin, since the two were approximately Philippe's height and weight.

Damn, that’ll take some getting used to, Lynn thought while Matthew explained that vampires had a resting heart rate of one beat every two minutes. A distressed heartrate, he added, would probably be around 2 bpm. The blond witch memorized the stats, just like those for a normal vampiric body temperature—88 degrees.

Lastly, she inspected the infusion equipment and the blood storage. There were several central line placement kits for long-term IV access, three infusion pumps for rate-controlled administration of blood and meds, and a blood refrigeration unit.

When she checked the labels, she was pleased to see that each unit had been carefully labelled: animal blood, both pure and diluted with special plasma in various ratios, as well as pure and diluted vampire blood—both from Ysabeau and, surprisingly, from Baldwin.

She nodded to herself before looking up at the dark-haired vampire who was still watching her as she moved through the space with practiced efficiency. “You’ve been more than thorough, Matthew. I couldn’t ask for more.”

Matthew pressed his lips together. “Then we can only hope that it is also enough to help Philippe.”

Lynn gave him a calm but determined look. “When you and Baldwin saved him in ‘45, neither the medical equipment nor the high-precision surgical tools we have today were available. Not to mention modern medications and my magical healing ability. So your father already has a better chance of making a full recovery than he did back then.”

“And if something does go wrong?”

Lynn sighed, knowing that this was Matthew’s biggest fear concerning what lay ahead. “Then I do what I do best. I keep him alive.”

She turned back to the room, scanning it one last time. Everything was in place and ready, and now all that was left was the impossible part: bringing Philippe home.

-------------

Later that day, as Diana and Lynn approached the library, they could hear the unmistakable sound of voices raised in heated debate. The heavy door wasn’t entirely closed, allowing the sound to spill out into the corridor. Lynn arched an eyebrow at Diana, silently asking if they should keep walking.

Diana raised a hand, signaling for patience. Let’s hear what this is about first.

Inside, Matthew’s voice was sharp with frustration. “You can’t come, Maman. It’s too dangerous.”

A woman’s voice cut through the room like a blade. “And you think I care about danger? After spending eighty years without him?” That must be Ysabeau, Lynn thought while she listened. Diana had given her the basics on most of the de Clermont family members, including Philippe’s terrifyingly beautiful mate.

Diana had asked her to be careful around the formidable vampire, explaining that Ysabeau still harboured prejudice against witches because of the role their kind had played in Philippe's death. Ysabeau had been dismissive when Diana and Matthew first told her that they wanted to consult Lynn for her medical expertise, and she initially refused point blank when she learned that the doctor in question was a witch, and a German one at that.

In the end Diana had managed to convince her mother-in-law by making it clear that Lynn—with her unique abilities combining healing magic and medical expertise— was the best chance Philippe had for survival and recovery. Ysabeau had reluctantly agreed but also made it very clear that she was far from happy with the arrangement and would not be held accountable for her attitude towards Lynn.

If that was all she knew about Ysabeau, it would have been easy to treat her with similar aversion. But Diana had also told Lynn how Ysabeau had nearly gone mad with grief after Philippe's death, and she emphasized how much her mate's death had affected her emotionally. Finally, Diana had mentioned that Ysabeau had accepted her as Matthew's partner quite quickly, despite her grief and her more than understandable dislike of witches, and that she had become like a second mother to Diana.

And Lynn, having witnessed the emotional toll the death of a loved one could have on their partner a hundred times over in the ER, often being the one to deliver the news, had decided to simply approach Ysabeau with an open-minded attitude and a willingness to understand, and not let the vampire's prejudices affect her.

“It’s not just about danger. It’s about control.” Baldwin stated firmly, always the voice of reason.

There was a moment of silence before Ysabeau’s bell-like voice rang out again, colder this time. “You think I will lose control?”

Diana sighed and put her head in her hands, a gesture that told Lynn exactly what the older woman was thinking: This is going to be a nightmare.

Matthew’s sharp reply came almost immediately. “Maman, listen to yourself. You can’t see what they did to him and not react—think about the last time. You won’t be able to hold back, and if you lose control in that place, in that time, it could unravel everything.”

Ysabeau’s voice was laced with steel. “So you expect me to stay behind? To sit idly while my Philippe—”

“That’s exactly what we expect,” Baldwin interjected, his voice cutting. “We don’t have a choice.”

Ysabeau scoffed. “You always have a choice.”

Baldwin let out a low, humourless laugh. “Not this time. If you go in there and see him like that, you will rip that place apart. And if you do, we risk exposing everything, Philippe included.”

Diana exhaled quietly. Finally. Baldwin, at least, saw reason.

Lynn put her hands in her pockets, watching Diana’s face carefully. “Should we go in?” she murmured.

Diana nodded. They had to end this argument before it escalated further, and Ysabeau had to meet Lynn sooner or later.

When they pushed open the door, the three vampires immediately turned toward them, the tension in the room almost suffocating. Ysabeau’s green eyes were blazing with fury, Matthew was visibly restraining his own temper, and Baldwin… well, Baldwin looked about as close to exasperated as he ever did.

But Lynn’s gaze was drawn back to Ysabeau who was both devastatingly beautiful and terrifyingly elegant. Her honey-coloured hair was swept back into a heavy, low knot, and she was dressed in a cream ensemble that practically screamed Chanel, the monochromatic palette minimizing her paleness. Her body was tense with agitation, shoulders pulled back into an almost aggressive stance as she turned around to face the two witches. When her emerald gaze landed on Lynn, her eyes flashed coldly.

“Not now, Diana. I cannot deal with the witch at the moment.” The words landed like the crack of a whip, sharp and precise.

Well, Lynn thought wryly, at least she didn’t immediately bite my head off.

Chapter Text

The tension in the room was so thick you could have cut it with a knife, the air shimmering with leftover fury.

Matthew, always the negotiator, tried to placate his mother. “Maman, please, we’ve talked about this—”

“And I told you I would tolerate this arrangement, but I do not recall making any promises to be on my best behaviour. Do you honestly expect me to be civil towards—”

Her bell-like voice cut off as if there were no adequate words to describe the abomination that, to Ysabeau, was a witch descendent from those who had tortured her mate.

Diana took another step towards her mother-in-law. “Ysabeau, Lynn is not the enemy,” she said calmly.

Emerald eyes closed for a moment as Ysabeau visibly gathered herself. Her shoulders dropped a touch and her jaw ground briefly before she looked at Lynn.

“Pardonnez-moi,” she said, her words still clipped but her tone not quite as harsh. “Diana and Matthew have made it very clear that you are the best chance for Philippe to make a full recovery, Dr. Benedikt.”

Ysabeau was a good couple of inches shorter than Lynn who stood at five-six, yet somehow having to look up to meet the witch’s eyes didn’t diminish her air of superiority one bit. “And despite the fact that I trust their judgment it is not easy for me to accept your presence, considering what your kind has done to Philippe. And that is something I cannot forget.”

“I don't expect you to,” Lynn replied. “I know what my people did during the war. And I've heard a first-hand account from Baldwin about the trauma Philippe suffered during his captivity.”

The blonde witch exhaled sharply at the memory, but her voice remained calm and measured. “So I certainly don't expect you to forget about what happened and welcome me with open arms.”

The look in her cornflower blue eyes grew intense. “But I'm here to help save him, Ysabeau, whether you like it or not.”

Ysabeau’s jaw clenched. “And why do you care? You don’t even know Philippe. Why would you choose to help him?”

“Because someone has to,” Lynn answered, “because Diana and Matthew asked me for help, because I know I can help him.” She shrugged. “Take your pick.”

“That sounds awfully noble for a witch with no ties whatsoever to my family.”

Lynn’s eyes flashed dangerously, the first real sign of anger at the other woman’s words. “Well, considering your daughter-in-law is a witch and also the person who’ll risk a time-walk to 1945 to get your mate back, I suggest you rethink your stance on witches sometime this century.”

Ysabeau’s mouth opened, but Lynn cut her off before she could make what surely would have been an indignant remark. “And witch or not, my parents raised me better than to turn away from something worthwhile and right just because it’s complicated.”

The vampire’s mouth snapped shut and her green eyes sharpened, appraising Lynn like one might a sword—testing its weight, looking for flaws.

After a moment, the de Clermont matriarch gave a sharp nod. “Well, then, so be it. I welcome you to Sept-Tours, but don’t expect too much civility on my part.”

Lynn, who recognised an olive branch when it was being offered, inclined her head. “I don’t need civility, just space to work without anyone interfering.”

Ysabeau’s lip curled faintly. “And what if I interfere?”

“Then you’ll be jeopardizing your husband’s best chance for survival.”

Lynn held the other woman’s gaze in the silence that followed, willing her to understand that she wouldn’t back down, that if she was going to treat Philippe, she wouldn’t let anyone—not even Ysabeau—get in the way of her patient receiving the best possible care.

When the silence had lingered almost too long it was Baldwin who, to everyone’s surprise, barked out a single laugh. “I was wrong to doubt you, Doctor Benedikt. You might just survive this family.”

Lynn saw the corners of Matthew’s mouth twitch at his brother’s words while Diana couldn’t quite suppress an amused snort. Even Ysabeau turned around to look at Baldwin, eyebrows raised in exasperation. And just like that, most of the tension in the room dissipated.

 -------------

Still, Diana wasn’t finished and resumed the original discussion. “Ysabeau, I know you want to go with me,” she said calmly, “but you can’t.”

Ysabeau’s expression hardened. “Because you agree with Matthew and Baldwin. You believe I will be a liability.”

Diana met her gaze evenly. “Yes.”

Ysabeau exhaled sharply, turning away as if to distance herself from them all, but Diana pressed on.

“You know I’m right. I can barely prepare myself for what I’m about to see, and I know it will be overwhelming. But if you come, if you see what they’ve done to him…” She took a careful step closer. “You will not be able to stop yourself from taking vengeance.”

Ysabeau’s fingers curled into fists.

Matthew stepped beside Diana, his voice softer now. “Maman, think about what he would want. Do you think he would want to see you in that place? Do you think he would want to witness you descending into that kind of rage?”

Ysabeau’s jaw tightened. “He wouldn’t want to be there at all.”

“No,” Baldwin agreed, his voice quieter now. “But we have a chance to change that. And the only way we do this right is if we follow the plan.”

For a long, long moment, Ysabeau didn’t move. “You all think I am too fragile for this.”

“No,” Diana said immediately. “You’re not fragile at all. That’s why you can’t come.”

Ysabeau turned back to her, eyes sharp, assessing. Then, at last, she let out a quiet sigh.

“You’re all infuriating,” she muttered.

Baldwin smirked slightly. “Obviously. We learned from the best.”

That earned him a sharp look, but the fight had left her. With one last glance at Matthew, Ysabeau nodded. “Fine.”

Diana felt the tension ease slightly. It wasn’t exactly a victory, but it was enough.

Lynn, who had remained silent through their exchange, finally spoke up, her voice calm. “He’s going to need you when Diana gets him back.”

Ysabeau looked at her, eyebrows slightly raised.

Lynn met her gaze without flinching. “He’s going to be lost, in pain. And probably fighting everyone who tries to help him. That’s when you’ll need to be strong.”

Ysabeau tilted her head in consideration before—giving the faintest of nods—she turned and left the room without another word.

Baldwin exhaled and poured himself another glass of wine.

“Well,” Lynn said, running her hands over her face and into her hair. “That was fun.”

Matthew let out a short, tired laugh. “Taking up Baldwin’s words from earlier: Welcome to the family.”

-------------

The air in Sept-Tours was thick with anticipation the next day. It was a quiet, almost unbearable kind of tension—the weight of what they were about to do pressing down on everyone in the chateau.

Diana and Lynn had both forced down their breakfast, the vampires forgoing any kind of nourishment, and by mid-morning everyone was assembled in the medical suite.

Lynn stood at the head of the bed, dressed in slate scrubs, her blonde hair pulled into a low knot. Every tray and instrument on the side table had been aligned with surgical precision. Her gaze flicked over the monitors one last time. The bed, sensors active. The infusion lines, prepped. The various blood units, stored within easy reach.

She’d run through the checklist three times already, but it was hard to truly feel prepared and ready in the face of what they were about to do.

Across the room, Baldwin stood like a sentry, arms folded, his copper hair catching the overhead lights. He hadn’t spoken much this morning, but his presence was unmistakable—heavy with tension, ready to act if anything unforeseen happened.

Ysabeau was seated by the window, still and impossibly regal in ivory silk. She hadn’t offered advice, nor commentary, but Lynn had caught the way her fingers trembled once, briefly, when the sterile sheets were laid out on the bed.

Matthew and Diana were the last to enter the room.

Diana’s face was set in determination, but Matthew—Lynn studied him closely. He was composed, but there was something else beneath the surface. An old pain, something raw and barely restrained.

This wasn’t just about bringing back a father or a husband, it was about undoing something Matthew had never truly healed from.

Diana took a deep breath and turned to them. “This is it.”

Silence settled over the room, the weight of the moment fully sinking in.

Lynn shifted her stance. “One last thing,” she said, voice firm. “Once he arrives, I need space. No interference, no hesitation. If he’s destabilized from the transition I’ll need to act immediately.”

Matthew nodded, his jaw tightening. “Understood.”

Diana turned to Baldwin. “If anything goes wrong—”

“Let’s just hope it won’t,” Baldwin said immediately, uncharacteristically reassuring.

She gave him a look, then turned to Ysabeau. “You have to let Lynn do her job.”

Ysabeau’s emerald eyes flashed, but she nodded once. “I understand.”

Diana exhaled, then turned to Matthew.

Matthew reached for her hand, fingers lacing tightly with hers. “Ready?”

Diana nodded.

Then, she lifted her free hand and began to weave the spell.

The room darkened slightly as the air around Diana shimmered, threads of time and magic intertwining, silvery light curling from her fingertips. The atmosphere grew thick with power, the weight of the past and present colliding.

Lynn felt the hair on her arms rise, an ancient force stirring in the room.

The threads of the spell coalesced, stretching outward as Diana and Matthew took their final breath in the present.

Then—

They stepped forward, and vanished.

The room fell into silence, leaving behind only the lingering energy of the spell.

Lynn exhaled slowly, rolling her shoulders. “Now we wait.”

Baldwin didn’t move from his post by the door, but Ysabeau’s fingers clenched at her sides, her jaw tight. Lynn noted the tension in her posture, the barely restrained anticipation.

It would not be long now.

Chapter Text

Diana had thought she was ready.

She had prepared herself in every way possible—mentally, emotionally, strategically. She had listened to Matthew’s hesitant, halting descriptions, had forced herself to absorb Baldwin’s cold, clinical recounting of Philippe’s injuries when he had relayed them to Lynn. But nothing, nothing, could have braced her for the devastating reality of Philippe de Clermont’s suffering.

As the magic settled around them, as the shadows of the past resolved into solid, suffocating stone walls, Diana’s breath caught in her throat.

The first thing she noticed was the smell.

Rot, blood, sweat, and something worse—something sour and inescapable, the lingering scent of suffering that had embedded itself into the very stones of this place. The air was thick with it, damp and oppressive. And for just a moment, Diana was in this very cell in a different time, with fire tingling at her fingertips and freeing another de Clermont. She shook off the memory of rescuing Matthew, her magic sharpening her senses despite the darkness.

And then she saw him, shackled to the wall like an animal, barely more than a husk of the man he had once been.

She had seen Philippe de Clermont in his prime. When she and Matthew had time-walked to 1590, she had met the man in the flesh—not just as a legend, not just as a name spoken in reverence, but as the formidable, sharp-witted, and impossibly strong patriarch of the de Clermont family.

She had seen the intelligence in his bronze eyes, the way he carried himself like a king without needing a crown. She had felt his presence, the sheer force of it, the way he commanded a room with little more than a glance.

She had known Philippe, but the figure before her now was unrecognizable.

His right eye was gone, the empty socket a hollow wound, darkened with dried blood and neglect. His remaining eye was closed, his head bowed against the rough stone wall, as if he no longer had the strength to keep it upright. His hands—hands that had once effortlessly wielded a sword, hands that had absentmindedly strummed the strings of a kithara, that had so gently touched Diana’s forehead when Philippe made her his blood-sworn daughter—were ruined, the fingers gnarled and twisted, the wrists grotesquely swollen and nearly black with bruises beneath the broad iron cuffs.

His left leg—Diana’s stomach churned at the sight of it—had been shattered and mistreated so many times that the bones had healed improperly, leaving the limb bent and useless.

The grey, tattered remains of his prison garb clung to him, stiff with blood and filth, exposing ribs that jutted out at unnatural angles. She could see it—see how they had been broken again and again, the shards puncturing his lungs, possibly his diaphragm.

And in the suffocating silence of the cell, the only sound that reached her ears was the wet, laboured struggle of Philippe trying—and barely succeeding—to draw breath, the frequency far too fast for a vampire.

Until another strangled sound shattered the silence, and it took Diana a moment to realize it hadn’t come from Philippe.

It had come from Matthew.

Diana turned her head just in time to see what little colour he had drain from her husband’s face, his grey-green eyes wide with something far beyond horror. He swayed slightly on his feet, his lips parting soundlessly, as if his mind refused to process what his eyes were showing him.

Diana felt her heart crack in her chest. She had never seen him like this before, not when they had returned from rescuing Jack, not even when he had spoken of what it had cost him to end his father’s suffering.

This was something else entirely—a grief so deep it seemed to be breaking him. Matthew had always carried this weight, had always known what his father had suffered, had relived it while drinking Philippe’s blood when he had been forced to end his life. And now, eighty years later, he had to face it again.

Philippe stirred slightly at hearing Matthew’s voice, but it was a feeble movement, barely more than a twitch of pain. He didn’t even have the strength to lift his head.

Diana’s stomach clenched. She had seen Philippe as he was meant to be. She had spoken to him, had laughed with him, had stood in his presence as an equal, had embraced his broad shoulders.

This wasn’t just suffering—and for a second Diana wondered how no one had known about Benjamin’s role in Philippe’s torture until much later. Because this? This systematic destruction? I had his handwriting all over it.  

“Dieu…” Matthew’s whisper was barely audible, his voice breaking.

Diana turned to him, placing a firm hand on his arm, trying to ground him. “Matthew. Focus.”

Matthew didn’t move. His hands were clenched into fists at his sides, his entire body trembling with barely contained emotion.

Diana knew what he was thinking.

How did we ever leave him in a place like this?

How did we not kill them all?

How did he endure this?

She tightened her grip on his wrist, trying to shake him out of his stupor. “We don’t have time. We have to do this now.”

Matthew sucked in a ragged breath, forcing himself to move, to function, and nodded.

Diana stepped forward, forcing herself to push past the horror, past the ache in her chest, and knelt beside Philippe.

“Philippe,” she whispered, her voice soft, desperate. “It’s Diana. We’re here. We’re taking you home.”

Nothing.

No movement, not even a flicker of recognition. Just the same, wet, gurgling struggle to breathe.

She pressed a hand gently to his shoulder, and that was when she truly realized just how thin he had become. His once-powerful frame was skeletal, his skin waxy and stretched too tightly over his bones.

He wasn’t just weak, he was .

Diana clenched her jaw. No, not yet. Not today.

“Matthew,” she said sharply, “the shackles.”

He moved without hesitation this time, surging forward and gripping the iron bands. They snapped like brittle twigs under his strength, chains rattling to the floor. Philippe didn’t even flinch.

Diana carefully slid her hands beneath his arms, steadying him. He was so light. “Philippe? Can you hear me?”

There was a faint, ragged sound escaping his lips that wasn’t an answer—just pain.

Diana looked up at Matthew. “We need to get him home now.”

Matthew nodded tightly. His face was still a mask of anguish, but his movements were gentle as he lifted Philippe’s frail form into his arms.

Philippe didn’t fight, didn’t resist.

He didn’t react at all.

Diana swallowed hard, forcing herself to focus. One of her hands gripped Matthew’s upper arm and the other gently closed around Philippe’s right elbow which looked relatively unharmed compared to the rest of him. She closed her eyes and concentrated on the spell, pulling at the fabric of time, weaving the magic that would bring them home.

The cell around them shimmered. The scent of blood, of decay, of suffering, faded.

She and Matthew took a step forward—

And they were gone.

-------------

The moment Diana and Matthew stepped through time, materializing back in the medical suite at Sept-Tours, Philippe’s already fragile state collapsed.

His body, kept on the edge of complete failure for so long, couldn’t take it. The strain of time-walking had drained the last remnants of his strength, tipping him into full systemic shock. His already erratic breathing stuttered, his heartbeat—a sluggish, failing thing—began to falter, and his emaciated body began to tremble in Matthew’s arms.

Lynn’s voice cut sharply through the room the instant they arrived. “Matthew, onto the bed. Now.”

Matthew, though visibly wrecked with emotion, obeyed instinctively, lowering Philippe onto the hospital bed’s pressure-sensitive mattress with utmost care before stepping back. The sensors lit up beneath his body, registering mass, position, and erratic vitals almost immediately.

Diana released the magic holding them together and stumbled slightly, her own strength drained, but Baldwin caught her before she could collapse.

Lynn was already in motion, reaching for Philippe while snapping on her gloves—but the moment her fingers brushed his temple, she froze.

Something shifted inside her. A surge of warmth, neither physical nor magical. Something… deeper. Older. It was as if her magic recognized him, felt something in him that it wanted to reach for.

She shoved the sensation aside. Deal with it later. For now, focus.

Lynn pressed two fingers to Philippe’s throat, feeling for a pulse. It was there—but weak and erratic. His breathing was almost non-existent, his ribs barely moving. A look at the screens confirmed what her fingers had already told her: heart rate at 4 bpm, breathing at five breaths per minute—too fast for a vampire.

She gritted her teeth. Not on my watch.

Lynn turned to Matthew who was still hovering beside the bed, white-knuckled. “Has he been given anything since you reached him?”

“No,” Matthew rasped. “He was fading fast. We had to go.”

“Alright,” Lynn said, her mind quickly weighing the risk against what Philippe’s ravaged body needed most. “I want to try blood—family blood first. Best chance at uptake.”

She met Ysabeau’s gaze. “You’re his mate, so we try your blood first. Matthew, we’ll prep yours next.”

Ysabeau didn’t hesitate, even though the look she gave Lynn made it clear she only allowed being ordered around because of the direness of the situation.

The coldness in her green eyes faded quickly, though, when she looked at her mate’s ravaged body. She stepped forward, biting into her wrist and pressing the wound to Philippe’s lips.

Lynn watched, heart hammering in her chest. Come on, take it.

But Philippe—who should have instinctively responded to the taste, who should have latched on in desperation—remained utterly still. His throat didn’t move. He didn’t even flinch.

Ysabeau frowned and pressed her wrist more firmly against his lips, her free hand gently cradling the back of his head. “Philippe,” she said, her voice thick with emotion. “Drink, mon coeur.”

Nothing.

Lynn cursed under her breath as Ysabeau pulled back, a flicker of unease in her green eyes. “He should be reacting.”

“I know,” Lynn said tersely. She grabbed the prepared IV line from the tray and set up the transfusion of Ysabeau’s blood that had been pre-drawn and stored, inserting the catheter with practiced precision. If he couldn’t drink, she would get the blood into him another way.

The line ran red. The blood—pure, powerful, familiar—should have strengthened him. Should have done something, just as it had done the last time around when Philippe had been rescued.

But instead, Philippe’s body rejected it.

Within moments, his heart rate became more erratic, his breaths shorter, shallower. His body shuddered violently in response to the infusion. The monitor blared a spike in heart rate, then a plummet.

Lynn was already disconnecting the line.

“He’s rejecting it,” she said, voice flat. “I have to pull the feed and flush the line.”

Ysabeau was already backing away, her face drawn, her hands trembling slightly. “He won’t take it,” she murmured, horrified. “My blood—it’s killing him.”

Matthew looked stricken. “Try my blood. It’s not as potent as Maman’s.”

Lynn nodded once, already in the process of connecting a transfusion bag of Matthew’s pre-drawn blood.

Again—Philippe’s vitals plummeted, his mouth opening in a silent gasp, and the monitors screamed another dip.

Lynn cursed this time and yanked the IV line free.

“He can’t tolerate it,” she said through clenched teeth. “We’re going to kill him if we keep trying, it’s too much.”

Matthew’s hands clenched into fists. “But he needs it.”

“I know that,” Lynn snapped, already adjusting the IV setup. “But his body doesn’t. He’s been starved too long. If we force potent blood into him, it’s going to shut his system down completely.”

Baldwin, who had been watching with dark, unreadable eyes, finally spoke. “So what’s the alternative?”

Lynn barely spared him a glance. She turned to the fridge and pulled a chilled bag from the lower drawer—animal blood, thinned and pre-treated for slow release. She hooked it up, adjusted the flow rate, and connected it to a different line. “This.”

Matthew scowled. “That’s not enough.”

“It’s all he can take right now,” Lynn shot back, her voice as sharp. “We need to restart his body, not overload it. He needs time to adjust to nourishment again.”

She set up the new IV, adjusting the flow rate, watching Philippe’s vitals like a hawk.

“If this doesn’t work,” she muttered, “we’re out of time.”

The blood began its slow descent into Philippe’s arm.

This time, his body didn’t reject the infusion. His heart rate remained erratic but didn’t plummet further. His shuddering eased—slightly—and the room let out a collective breath.

“Okay,” Lynn said softly. “Okay. That’s something.”

Baldwin stepped forward. “Is it enough?”

“No,” she said immediately, shaking her head. “It’s barely a start. We’re going to have to rebuild him inch by inch, make his body relearn how to survive.”

Matthew leaned heavily on the bed rail, eyes fixed on Philippe’s face.

“But he’s alive,” he whispered.

“Barely,” Lynn said. “But yes.”

She looked down at her patient and placed a careful hand over Philippe’s sunken chest, feeling the too-fast rise and fall of his breath. For just a moment, she let her magic flare gently—just enough to begin identifying the places where the healing needed to go first.

And again, she felt it—something deep in him answering back. Not words, but a recognition. Like her magic had been searching for him all along without knowing it until now. Lynn shoved the feeling away once more.

Because right now?

Philippe de Clermont was still dangerously close to slipping away and it would take all of her skill, determination, and focus to make sure he remained with them.

Chapter Text

Lynn had seen it happen before—the moment when a patient who was too weak, too broken started slipping away. And now it was happening again, just as she was determining where her healing magic needed to be directed to first.

The rhythmic beeping of the monitors, which indicated that despite all the adversities, Philippe's body—his heart—was still fighting to stay alive, began to falter.

His breathing, already too fast for a vampire, was becoming shallower by the second, his chest rising and falling in weak, uneven stutters. The gurgling sound in his lungs deepened, the wet rasp of fluid in places it shouldn’t be. His diaphragm, overworked from months of untreated trauma, was beginning to fail. Every few moments, Philippe’s body twitched in an involuntary spasm—his brain trying to force in air that his scarred lungs could no longer take in.

Lynn’s pulse jumped. Not now. Not after everything.

She grabbed her stethoscope and pressed it against Philippe’s chest. The sound confirmed what she had already feared. His lungs were compromised, his muscles too weak to sustain even the basic function of breathing, and the past minutes of stress—being pulled through time, his body rejecting nourishment, the shock to his system—were pushing him past his limit.

Ysabeau, who was standing unnervingly still at the side of the room, noticed the shift almost as soon as Lynn.

“He’s getting worse,” she said, her voice tight, almost as if she were trying to will it not to be true.

Matthew had already moved in, hovering over Philippe’s bed, his expression strained with barely controlled fear. “Lynn?” His voice was clipped, urgent.

Lynn didn’t hesitate. “He’s tiring out,” she said sharply, already gloving up again. “We have to intubate.”

Baldwin straightened at that, his amber eyes narrowing slightly. “You need to—”

“Yes,” Lynn cut him off. “If I wait another minute, he’ll arrest. His lungs are barely functioning. They’re too damaged, too scarred. We need to ventilate him before the rest of his organs—vampire physiology or not—start failing.”

Diana, her face still pale from the strain of time-walking, swallowed. “Will he be able to tolerate it?”

Lynn was already pulling the ventilator closer. “He has to.”

She turned to Matthew, the only other trained doctor in the room. “Tilt the bed back. 15 degrees. And prep suction in case I need it for clean visuals.”

Matthew moved instantly, adjusting the smart bed’s console. The head of the bed lowered with a soft mechanical hum, angling Philippe’s face upward. His skin looked grey now, death-like in a way that chilled even the vampires in the room. Ysabeau stood with her back pressed against the wall, a marble statue carved from anguish.

Matthew handed Lynn the laryngoscope as she leaned in over Philippe’s body, bracing his jaw gently but firmly.

“He’s not sedated,” Baldwin said through clenched teeth.

“He doesn’t need to be,” Lynn murmured, “He’s not conscious. I wouldn’t do this if he were.”

When Baldwin didn’t answer her, she turned to him and immediately saw the tension in his jaw, the barely concealed fear in his eyes. In a split-second decision Lynn decided to give him something to focus on instead of sending him from the room.

“Baldwin, hold his head steady.” It wasn’t strictly necessary, not with Philippe being unconscious, but it would give Baldwin something to do and, more importantly, an opportunity to touch his father.

The copper-haired vampire didn’t question her. He moved to the other side of the bed and—after hesitating for just a moment—placed a firm hand against Philippe’s skull, bracing him with unflinching precision.

Lynn adjusted her grip on the laryngoscope before tilting Philippe’s head back slightly to open his airway. Then, she opened Philippe’s mouth, careful not to strain the soft tissue already bruised along his throat. Even with his vampire physiology, the trauma to his trachea was visible—raw, darkened from past damage.

Lynn maneuvered the scope into place and carefully slipped it past Philippe’s slack lips and down his throat. Easy, Benedikt. Slow. No mistakes. Even unconscious, he was barely reacting. Too weak even for a gag reflex, she thought. Finally, she could visualize the vocal cords, the delicate opening into his airway.

“Clear line of sight,” she murmured. “Inserting.”

She could feel the eyes of every vampire in the room on her. Ysabeau, silent but fierce, watching her every movement like a predator waiting for a sign of failure. Baldwin, impassive but focused, his grip on Philippe’s head unwavering. Matthew—Lynn didn’t even have to look at him to feel his desperation. His body was practically vibrating with tension next to her, his hands clenched into fists at his sides as he looked on.

With practiced ease, she threaded the endotracheal tube through the cords and into the trachea, careful not to push too deep. “Tube is in.”

Lynn reached for the bag valve mask, connecting it to the endotracheal tube and squeezing it to manually inflate Philippe’s lungs. His chest rose—a good sign. She listened again, confirming placement. No air in the stomach, breath sounds on both sides.

She nodded once. “I’m securing the tube.”

Baldwin kept holding Philippe’s head steady as she carefully taped and secured the tube, watching for any sign of reflex resistance. There was none.

Matthew, focussed on the procedure despite his emotional upheaval, handed her the ventilator tube, already primed. Lynn connected it with a soft ‘click’ and then turned the machine on.

A hiss of air followed—a slow, steady breath delivered by the ventilator into lungs that could no longer manage it on their own. The monitor beside the bed blinked and stabilized, oxygen saturation climbing slowly from the danger zone.

Lynn moved with practiced efficiency, adjusting the ventilator settings. A normal human patient would have required a different approach, but Philippe wasn’t human. His lungs, just as any other vampire’s, processed oxygen differently, the tissues requiring far less than a human’s because they were more efficient. If he had been healthy, he would have hardly needed to breathe at all. But he wasn’t healthy.

Her fingers flew over the settings, adjusting them to match what Philippe’s damaged system could handle: low pressure to avoid rupturing his already compromised alveoli, low volume because his chest couldn’t handle a full tidal volume. She paused before typing in the respiratory rate: 3 breaths per minute. Still too fast for a healthy vampire but judging by his increased breath frequency before he’d slipped into respiratory arrest and the state of his lungs, his body needed higher oxygenation for now.

The machine’s rhythmic sound of artificial breaths adjusted to the settings, continuing to fill the silence, and after two cycles Philippe’s chest rose in sync with the machine and his breathing evened out.

The tension in the room didn’t disappear, but it shifted—less of a suffocating dread, more of an uneasy relief.

Lynn exhaled slowly, pressing two fingers against Philippe’s throat to confirm what the telemetry data told her on-screen. The weak, erratic pulse was still there, but at least now, his body wasn’t fighting for air.

“He’s ventilating,” she said softly. “For now.”

Ysabeau, who had barely moved since they had arrived, stepped forward. Her eyes were rimmed in scarlet, but she didn’t cry. She stared at Philippe—at the tube in his throat, at the machine breathing for him—and something flickered in her green eyes.

“Will this be enough?” she asked, voice carefully measured.

Lynn didn’t sugarcoat it. “No. But it buys us time.”

Ysabeau exhaled sharply, stepping back.

Matthew who had watched his father intently, turned his face away for just a moment at Lynn’s words, one hand covering his mouth.

Diana placed a reassuring hand on his arm. “At least he doesn’t have to fight so hard just to breathe anymore, Matthew.” She swallowed, her blue eyes impossibly bright with tears. “He needs to conserve what energy he can for what’s to come.”

Matthew nodded, but his jaw was tight, his shoulders rigid. “I know,” he conceded, all too aware of the fact that Philippe’s life was still hanging by a thread.

Lynn wiped a hand over her face, exhaustion creeping in, but she pushed it aside. “We’ll just have to make sure to give him every conceivable chance.”

She turned back to Philippe, watching the rise and fall of his chest as the ventilator delivered each breath, her hand gently brushing against the side of his ribcage. Once again, she felt the slow stir of something ancient, this time reacting to her touch, not her magic. An image flashed before her mind's eye, and for a moment Lynn caught a glimpse of the face of a lion staring back at her.

She shook herself subtly, turning toward the screen. “I’ll keep the respiratory rate at three until he stabilizes. If the blood gas levels improve, I’ll dial it back. If he worsens…”

She didn’t finish the sentence.

She didn’t need to.

-------------

The medical suite had gone quiet again, the only sounds those of the ventilator releasing its steady rhythm and, beneath its careful hiss, the monitors humming softly, their green glow illuminating the ashen angles of Philippe de Clermont’s face.

Lynn stood next to his bed, the sleeves of her scrubs pushed to her elbows, hair pulled back tightly, and she was finally able to take the time to really look at the man lying on the sterile sheets of the hospital bed.

She had known it would be bad, had prepared herself.

Baldwin had described Philippe’s condition in excruciating detail, and intellectually, she had absorbed every word, cataloguing the damage in her mind the way she would for any other trauma patient. She had dealt with catastrophic injuries before—missing limbs, patients barely clinging to life, bodies broken beyond recognition.

But none of that had prepared her for this. None of it had prepared her for him.

Philippe de Clermont, once one of the most formidable creatures to ever walk this earth, lay before her—a hollowed-out shell of what he had been, sustained by machines, magic, and pure will.

Lynn swallowed the bile rising in her throat as she forced her hands to move, clinical, precise, despite the horror clawing at her gut. Time to see what she was really dealing with here.

She started at his face.

The missing right eye was the first thing that hit her, no matter how much she had expected it. Her gloved fingers hovered over the sunken socket, dark with old infection and scar tissue, the remaining skin around it uneven—not a clean wound. They took it slowly. Her stomach churned at the thought. The orbital bone felt fragile beneath her touch, several old fractures having damaged the bone structure.

The remaining eye, though intact, was sunken, the surrounding skin bruised and stretched taut over his gaunt features. The eye itself was bloodshot, hypersensitive, refusing to open fully even under gentle coaxing. She didn’t press it.

His cheekbones were too sharp, his jaw hollowed, the signs of severe, prolonged starvation written into every line of his face. Her gaze travelled over the entirety of the body on the bed. Philippe was a tall man, at least six-foot-four, his bone structure indicating that he’d been broad-shouldered when healthy, probably well-muscled like Baldwin, not as lithe as Matthew.

Now, he looked like torture had eaten him from the inside out, the weight sensors of the bed registered him at barely fifty-seven kilograms.

Lynn moved lower.

Both shoulders were dislocated, the tissue around them swollen and mottled with bruises. He’d clearly been left hanging for days—maybe weeks—at a time. Her fingers gently traced the left scapula, which gave beneath her touch in a way it absolutely shouldn’t.

“Fractured scapula,” Lynn murmured, half to herself. “Multiple fragments.”

Her hand shifted to his clavicles.

“Both broken,” she said quietly, glancing toward Matthew, who stood nearby, pale but silent. “Clean breaks, but one’s healed crooked. The other feels like it shattered twice.”

His ribs—God, his ribs—jutted out in harsh, unnatural angles, the damage so extensive it was painfully obvious even through the thin barrier of his wasted skin. Some had healed badly, fragments misaligned, calcified where they had no right to be. Others had clearly been broken again and again in the same places—his tormentors hadn’t given his body time to properly knit them back together before shattering them anew.

She ran her fingers down Philippe’s right side, counting the swell of improperly healed fractures. The bones felt jagged under the skin, and some moved when she touched them—unstable fragments. Others had healed with edges still pressing inward, digging into the scarred, fragile lungs beneath.

“Seven ribs on the left,” she murmured. “Five on the right. Healed and broken again. Repeated punctures. One fragment still mobile—floating. That’s dangerous, needs to be treated asap.”

She looked up at the monitor. His oxygen saturation was stable, barely—but still too low for her liking. “He’s breathing,” she said quietly, “but not exchanging well. His lungs are too scarred. The alveoli probably collapsed in sections.” The state of his lungs also explained his increased breathing frequency right before his lungs had started to fail.

She exhaled once, trying to centre herself, then moved lower to his abdomen.

His skin was a map of old wounds and bruising, but what worried her more was what lay beneath—his liver was likely compromised, his body too weak to process what little nourishment he might have received.

She could already tell his gut was practically shut down, his entire digestive system likely atrophied from disuse. Even for a vampire who almost exclusively digested blood, this would mean complications once he was ready for oral blood intake again.

Her hands travelled to his arms next.

His wrists—Lynn swallowed a curse—were ruined. Not just broken, but crushed, the joints visibly misshapen beneath his skin. Both wrists twisted unnaturally inward, the bones fused by repeated fractures, the tendons shrunken and scarred by pressure, heat, and tension. His hands were grotesquely swollen, the fingers gnarled, twisted wrongly in ways that suggested not just single fractures, but repeated breaks, the bones realigned by brute force rather than medical care. The ligaments and tendons were shattered, torn, irreparably damaged.

Her jaw clenched as she gently palpated the left arm, her fingers ghosting over deep, barely healed scars. Restraint wounds. His captors had bound him so tightly that his own body had torn against itself.

She had seen similar injuries before but never on a vampire. Never on someone still alive. Her stomach twisted, and she had to force herself to move on to Philippe’s left leg.

The moment she peeled back the ruined prison garb, her stomach dropped. It was even worse than she had feared.

The entire limb was a map of torture.

Multiple bone calluses, protruding beneath wasted skin where fragments had healed in grotesque misalignment. The femur bulged outward, as if the bone had fused incorrectly, knitting itself back together in jagged, unnatural formations.

The knee joint was fused at a stiff angle, swollen with fluid. The lower part of the leg was warped—tibia, fibula, all of it wrong. The tibia bowed visibly, a ripple of unnatural shape beneath skin thinned by starvation.

Lynn let out a slow breath, teeth clenched. “They shattered this leg again and again. Let it heal wrong, then broke it again. Over and over.” And she knew that without major intervention, he would never walk on it again.

She finally stepped back, staring down at Philippe, the weight of everything she had just confirmed crushing.

Even for a vampire—

How the hell did he survive this? How had he lasted? How had they kept him this close to death for months without actually letting him cross over?

She pulled off her gloves, tossing them into the waste bin. Her hands were shaking. “I’ve seen torture victims,” she said hoarsely. “I’ve seen near-death. Burn wards. Bone cancer. Combat trauma.”

She looked up at the others—at Baldwin, at Matthew, at Ysabeau.

“But I’ve never seen anything like this.”

The silence in the room was absolute. No one spoke—because what was there to say in the face of such destruction wrought on someone you loved?

Ysabeau had not moved from her spot near the wall, but Lynn could feel the fury radiating off her in waves—barely restrained, barely contained, something ancient and lethal simmering beneath the surface.

Baldwin stood rigid at the head of his father’s bed, his arms crossed tightly over his chest, his expression carved from stone. His amber eyes burned with something deep, unreadable.

Diana’s face was pale, her blue eyes glistening with unshed emotion, her hands clenched at her sides.

And Matthew—

Lynn turned to him last.

Matthew hadn’t moved during her examination. Hadn’t breathed.

His grey-green eyes were locked onto Philippe, his entire body coiled so tightly that he looked moments away from shattering. His fists were clenched so hard that his knuckles had turned white, his jaw set in an expression of such raw, violent agony that Lynn had to look away.

She swallowed. Hard. Then she exhaled and straightened. “He’s alive,” she said finally, her voice quieter than she meant for it to be. “Barely. But he’s alive.”

Nobody spoke.

Lynn turned fully to Matthew, forcing him to meet her gaze. “He’s not stable. He’s just... paused. We’re holding death at bay by hours.” Matthew swallowed, his throat working hard.

Lynn took a breath, bracing herself as she stepped toward the console and began entering notes into the monitoring system. Her voice was flat now, controlled. Her movements methodical.

“His body—every part of it—is failing. He needs to be rebuilt from the ground up.”

Matthew finally found his voice. “Can he recover?”

Lynn didn’t turn around.

“I don’t know,” she whispered.

Then, after a beat she added: “But I’m going to try. And I don’t care what kind of miracle I have to pull.”

Chapter Text

Lynn stood over Philippe’s wasted form, her mind a battlefield of calculations, strategies, and brutal reality: debating what could be fixed now and what would have to wait. There was so much to fix, so many injuries needing immediate attention, and yet she had to be careful because his body was too weak to survive multiple major interventions at once.

The first step would be to keep him under.

For now, she needed to ensure he stayed unconscious—not just for any interventions, but because his mind could not afford to wake up yet.

She exhaled, then glanced up at Matthew. “He’s in too much pain. Even unconscious, he’s fighting it,” she said gently but firmly. “I have to put him under.”

Matthew frowned. “Completely?”

“Medically induced coma,” Lynn confirmed. “It’s the only way. If he wakes like this—disoriented, in agony, intubated—he could harm himself. Or worse, rip through the work I’ve done.”

“And for how long will you keep him under?” Baldwin asked.

“As long as necessary.” Lynn kept her voice even, steady. “The coma will let his system reset. It’s not just about the pain, it’s about stabilisation. His body is currently burning through what little energy he has trying to stay alive.” She met Baldwin’s intense gaze without flinching. “He’s not ready to be awake, and the coma will give him a chance to rest without feeling any pain or panic.”

Ysabeau’s lips parted, but to everyone’s surprise she said nothing. Her eyes were fixed on Philippe’s face, as though willing him to open his eye despite everything.

“I’ll need to place a central line,” Lynn continued, turning to her supply tray. “His peripheral veins are too damaged to sustain long-term infusions. I’ll go subclavian—right side, the collarbone is fractured, but not as severely as the left. I can stabilise it magically for the procedure.”

She worked efficiently, cleansing the site near Philippe’s right clavicle, hands moving with surgical precision. With a focused murmur, she summoned a healing charm, the soft golden shimmer of her magic coalescing around the damaged collarbone—just enough to keep it from shifting during the catheter placement.

Once the area was prepped, Lynn picked up the central line kit, her gloved fingers moving confidently though each step. Closing her eyes for a moment and letting her magic show her where she needed to go, she guided the needle slowly between the rib and clavicle until she reached the subclavian vein.

“Vein accessed,” she said softly, threading the catheter guidewire in with care.

When the catheter was secured and flushed, Lynn smoothed the edges of the dressing into place before looking at Matthew. “Let’s switch the infusion.”

Matthew passed her the bloodline, and Lynn gently removed the existing IV from Philippe’s forearm, reconnecting the diluted animal blood infusion to the central line, watching as the new flow stabilized on the monitor. Philippe didn’t stir. His breathing remained controlled, guided now entirely by the ventilator.

Then she drew up the sedative from one of the two small vials she’d prepped.

“This will put him into deep sedation first,” she explained. “To prepare his system. Then the anaesthetic will carry him into a full coma state. I’ve calibrated the dose precisely to his weight and compromised condition.”

Matthew gave a slight nod, but didn’t speak.

She injected the sedative first, slowly over the course of thirty seconds. Philippe’s brow smoothed almost imperceptibly. The minute tension in his throat and jaw began to slacken. The monitors showed a slowing heart rate, but still within safe limits. His oxygen saturation remained steady, and the muscle twitches that had rippled through his limbs began to still.

Then came the anaesthetic, and a few seconds passed before Philippe went completely lax, now protected in a deep, healing stillness of medically induced unconsciousness.

Lynn exhaled sharply. “He’s under,” she said softly. “He’s stable.” She checked the central line once more before looking up at Philippe’s family.

“Now we wait a little to see how he tolerates the sedation. Once I’m sure there’ll be no immediate complications, I’m going to start treating his lungs and ribs.”

The words barely left her mouth before Ysabeau turned away from the bed abruptly, one hand rising to her mouth as though to catch a sound she couldn’t let escape.

Diana moved toward her carefully. “Ysabeau…”

“I can’t—” she began. “I have to go. I cannot watch him like this,” she said, voice hoarse and fraying at the edges.

Matthew’s eyes flickered to her, pain shadowing his features. But he didn’t argue—and neither did Baldwin or Diana.

The blond vampire turned, stiff but regal even in retreat, yet her green eyes were shimmering. “Tell me when you’ve finished treating him. I will not come back until then.”

“Understood,” Lynn said quietly. She had seen many reactions from family members in the ER when she had to deliver difficult news, so she knew that even the most stoic person could act irrationally or extremely emotionally under such a burden.

But after Ysabeau's insistence on going back in time with Diana to save Philippe, Lynn had expected Philippe's mate to fight harder to stay by her mate's side, come what may. Then again, she didn’t know much about their relationship or how the trauma of losing Philippe had affected Ysabeau, so Lynn wasn’t really in any position to judge.

So she added: “He won’t be alone.”  

And with that, Ysabeau was gone—the click of the door behind her a final punctuation mark in the quiet room.

The silence lingered.

Lynn stepped back, finally allowing herself to feel the fatigue. She looked at Philippe, now still beneath the sheets, the ventilator cycling low and slow. The monitor lights blinked steadily, green, yellow, red, and back again.

And deep in her bones, the resonance of her magic still echoed where she had touched his skin—something unspoken, something unfolding.

-------------

Philippe lay quietly now, his brow no longer furrowed in pain, and his body, for the first time in months, was at rest. But Lynn still felt the weight of his suffering pressing down on her. She knew that stillness was not peace—not yet. It was only the first lull in a battle that was far from over.

She looked at the screen, the ventilator hissing softly behind her and feeding each carefully calibrated breath into lungs too broken to move on their own. Oxygen saturation was at 81 percent, barely enough even with full support.

Philippe’s chest rose and fell with the mechanical rhythm, but it moved unevenly, poorly. Each artificial breath made subtle ridges shift beneath the skin—ribs healed in unnatural positions, pressing inward, fighting against the very act of breathing.

Lynn pulled on a fresh pair of gloves and ran her fingers gently over Philippe’s chest, mapping out the damage beneath her hands in detail.

His ribs were a disaster. She had seen a lot of traumatic chest injuries before—gunshot wounds, stabbings, crushed ribcages from car accidents. But what she saw in Philippe went beyond mere injury. His ribs had been systematically destroyed.

The bones were a chaotic puzzle, some healed incorrectly, others barely knitted together at all. Her fingers hovered over his left side where, just under the pectoral muscle, she felt the unmistakable give of a floating rib fragment—a sliver of bone no longer anchored, free to drift like a blade with every breath. Scar tissue webbed through the damage, stiffening what should have been flexible movement, the internal trauma woven through every breath he had taken for months. No wonder he couldn't oxygenate.

The ventilator was essential. Even if he wasn’t human, even if his respiratory system wasn’t as demanding, Philippe’s lungs needed time to heal. Right now, they weren’t capable of pulling in enough oxygen on their own. His body was already working on the bare minimum—every function on the edge of complete failure.

Lynn’s throat tightened.

She could see it—see what they had done this to him, how they had broken him down over and over while starving him, weakening him, waiting just long enough for his body to try to heal before doing it again. His tormentors hadn’t just broken his ribs for the sake of it, they had weaponized his own physiology against him. And he had survived it, if only by the skin if his teeth.

Lynn exhaled sharply. Alright, Benedikt, focus! You have work to do.

-------------

Philippe’s lungs—if left untreated—would never regain proper function. The scar tissue was everywhere, hampering his ability to expand his chest fully, suffocating him slowly even now.

And this would not be a one-time fix. Lynn knew better than to believe in miracles, having learned the hard way that healing magic—true, deep regeneration—was not instant. It wasn’t a matter of waving her hand and willing the bones back into place.

Philippe’s body had suffered too long, his healing factor non-existent at this point. She would have to rebuild him, step by step, piece by piece. And that started with aligning his ribs and beginning the process of lung regeneration.

Lynn pulled up a stool, positioning herself at Philippe’s side. She took a deep breath, rolling her shoulders back, and placed both hands over his sternum before letting her magic rise to the surface. It hummed beneath her fingertips, deep golden, coiling in response to her will.

Healing magic had always come naturally to her. It wasn’t something she forced, but something she guided—it wanted to heal, wanted to rebuild, and all she had to do was serve as both a conduit and a focus.

The moment she opened herself to it, she felt it—felt the shattered ribs beneath her hands, the fractures, the jagged edges, the unnatural fusions. Her magic showed her the damage the way no X-ray or MRI ever could.

Twelve ribs were affected, seven broken, four fused wrong, one shattered. There was torn cartilage and a multitude of scars tethered to lung tissue. On top of that Lynn could sense collapsed airways, inflamed alveoli, and fluid ghosting the left pleura.

With that much damage it was almost impossible to decide where to begin, so Lynn let her instincts take over. The soft golden light blooming under her palms slipped into Philippe’s body and began to wrap around the broken bones with careful precision.

Slowly, oh so slowly, she urged the bones to align, coaxing the rib fragments back toward anatomical positioning—not forcing, but guiding them gently into place. It was delicate work, a slow unravelling of past trauma, a careful reconstruction of what had been destroyed.

The floating rib slid back toward the cartilage as if pulled by thread. A low creak beneath her hands told her the bone was rotating correctly, even if the process was painfully slow. Lynn’s magic pulsed in response, a steady, rhythmic energy knitting Philippe back together.

She didn’t rush it. If she forced the bones into alignment too quickly, she could make things worse permanently. She needed sustainability, not speed. The spell wrapped each rib in a cushion of magic, reinforcing it with gentle pressure. Stay here, it said. Stay aligned. Let healing begin.

As the ribs settled into alignment, the blond witch shifted her focus deeper, pressing into the scarred tissue of his lungs which was where the real challenge lay.

Lynn gritted her teeth. Healing organs was different from healing bones. Bone was structure, solid, repairable with precision. But lungs were very delicate organs, intricate, a thousand tiny capillaries and airways, and Philippe’s were heavily compromised by repeated injury.

The healing process needed to be even gentler here, even slower. She directed her energy carefully, reaching into the lungs themselves, magic threading through the scar tissue. It mapped the places where Philippe’s own healing had been forced to rebuild too fast—easing apart layers of rough, inflexible tissue, encouraging the cells to regenerate properly, beginning to dissolve the old scars and lingering damage.

It would take multiple sessions to fix this—she knew that now. Magic could spark the healing, but the sheer extent of the damage was beyond what one healing session could accomplish. She could start the process, but Philippe’s lungs wouldn’t regain full function overnight. It would take days, maybe weeks, with each session building on the last, coaxing the body to remember how to repair itself the right way. Not just survive, but function.

Still, she was making progress. She could feel the tissue responding, the hardened, damaged areas softening, the airways beginning to open again.

When Lynn finally withdrew her hands, sweat clung to her brow. The gold shimmer faded from beneath her skin as she reached for a towel, pressing it briefly to her face, then turned to check the monitor for his oxygen saturation—85 percent.

Better. Still not good but better.

-------------

Lynn rolled her shoulders, flexing her hands. The magic had taken a toll, the effort of maintaining such precision draining, but she was satisfied with the first session.

Baldwin, who had remained just as silent as Matthew and Diana throughout the process, finally spoke up. “Well?”

Lynn exhaled. “It’s a start.”

Baldwin’s amber eyes flickered to Philippe’s still form, his gaze sharp, assessing. “How long until he can breathe on his own again?”

Lynn let out a tired sigh, rubbing a hand over her face. “His ribs will hold for now. I’ll need to reinforce them again over the next few days, but at least they’re aligned properly now.” She hesitated, then continued, “His lungs will take longer. Much longer. The ventilator will stay for now.”

Baldwin’s expression didn’t change. “Weeks?”

She sighed. “Maybe longer. His body has been in shutdown mode for too long. His healing is gone, and we don’t know when—if—it’ll come back. So it’ll take time to rebuild.” She hated not having a definitive answer, but the extent of the damage and Philippe’s non-existent healing abilities made it impossible to predict exact recovery times.

Baldwin was quiet for a moment, then nodded. “Then we’ll wait.” He looked over at Matthew and Diana and saw his own determination in their eyes. They would be patient, give Philippe all the time he needed to recover, no matter how long it took.

Lynn breathed a sigh of relief, grateful that Philippe's family was able to accept the uncertainty of his recovery. She brushed her fingers over the ventilator tubing, double-checking that everything was secure.

Philippe was still fragile, still teetering on the edge of life and death. But for the first time since she had laid eyes on him, he wasn’t losing ground anymore.

Chapter Text

With the worst of the immediate danger having passed, Lynn turned to Matthew again, who had settled down in one of the chairs pushed against the far wall. Diana stood at his side, one arm curled around his shoulders as if she could physically shield her husband from Philippe’s suffering. Baldwin stood slightly apart from them, leaning against the windowsill, still as if carved from stone.

Lynn looked up and met Matthew’s grey-green eyes. “I’ll need your help to get him out of what’s left of this,” she said, nodding towards the filthy grey garment still clinging to Philippe’s skin.

Matthew’s jaw worked visibly, but he gave a tight nod and got up from the chair. “Of course.”

The process was slow because the fabric of Philippe’s prisoner uniform was stiff with blood and filth, matted in places to open wounds. Lynn brought scissors and a sterile basin while Matthew carefully began cutting along the seams.

Neither of them spoke for the first few minutes. When they peeled the fabric away, the full extent of Philippe’s trauma came into view—and Lynn felt her stomach twist again, even after everything she had already seen.

Most of his upper body was covered in deep bruises layered beneath raw lacerations, ridges of bone pressing against paper-thin skin. His neck and the upper parts of his shoulders showed signs of past electrical and magical burns—white, starburst- and lightning-shaped scars in different stages of healing. The skin around his wrists and ankles was torn and ragged with lesions near old shackle points where the metal had chafed and worn the tissue down. His hips were skeletal, the muscle long since wasted away, his abdomen sunken.

Matthew stood still, the cut remnants of the prison uniform hanging from his hands like rags. He didn’t look away—but he was rigid, as if a single breath would cause him to shatter.

Lynn said nothing, she simply pulled a sterile sheet and draped it gently over Philippe’s lower body. It wasn’t necessarily for warmth but for dignity, something no one had shown him for months.

Matthew noticed the gesture and, after a long silence, said quietly, “He would have appreciated that.”

-------------

Lynn opened the wound care tray, her movements smooth and economical. She started with Philippe’s right eye socket, gently irrigating the cavity with sterile rinse, her magic woven subtly into her hands to check for signs of deep infection.

Matthew watched, a knot tightening in his chest. “He wouldn’t allow this,” he murmured suddenly.

Lynn glanced up. “What?”

“If he were awake,” Matthew said, voice low and trembling. “He wouldn’t allow any of this. The care, the exposure, the weakness. He’d rage at being seen like this.”

Lynn didn’t stop her work, but her eyes softened as she reached for a gauze pad and gently dried the edges of the empty socket. “Then it’s a mercy he’s not awake right now,” she said. “Because this isn’t weakness. This is survival. And if he ever says otherwise, I’ll fight him over it.”

That startled a quiet, brief huff of something like a laugh from the dark-haired vampire—more pain than humour. “I’d like to see you try, though I don’t doubt your determination” he said. She smirked faintly in response.

Then, Matthew asked: “Will he heal?”

Lynn glanced up, then back at the wound. “The eye is gone. But I might be able to regenerate the socket partially, maybe even his eyelid—enough to close it without infection so he won’t… feel incomplete.”

Matthew’s throat worked. “He’s already lost so much.”

Lynn didn’t reply. She only rinsed the cloth and pressed a silver-infused gauze lightly into the hollow before sealing it with a layer of protective gel and an adhesive dressing.

Once the eye was flushed and bandaged, she moved down to his neck and upper shoulders where the skin bore both half-healed scars and fresh marks looking like starbursts and lightning bolts—signs of magical torture, most likely electric pulses meant to inflict as much pain as possible. She flushed the wounds with antiseptic rinse and applied silver-infused gel to reduce inflammation.

-------------

Working her way down Philippe’s body methodically, Lynn cleansed and bandaged the torn skin and lesions caused by shackles around his wrists and ankles.

Then, she reached for the hydrogel dressings and looked over at Matthew again. “Help me shift him onto his right side, please—just a little. I want to take a look at his back and flank.”

Matthew nodded and moved in, sliding his arms carefully under his father’s shoulder and ribs. Lynn shifted Philippe a bit more to reach the sacrum where an early pressure sore had bloomed, a result of his prolonged confinement and starvation. The skin there was reddened and fragile.

Lynn applied a cool hydrogel pad, smoothing it over the damaged skin, and the wound seemed to sigh beneath it. She repeated the process with spots on his hip, his shoulder, and the back of his left heel—anywhere his bones had pressed against unmoving surfaces for too long. The pads would draw out the bacteria and keep the skin hydrated while it healed.

Matthew steadied Philippe while Lynn moved. “You’re good at this,” he said suddenly, his voice soft.

“It’s what I do.”

“No,” he said. “I mean—you treat him like he’s still… whole. Like he’s a man, not a patient.”

Lynn paused, tape halfway across the last dressing. She looked up at Matthew. “He is a man,” she said. “And he’s still here. Every breath, even the ones this machine gives him—he’s fighting for it. So we fight with him.”

Matthew lowered his gaze and nodded once.

After Philippe’s back had been tended to, the dark-haired vampire gently laid his father back down and Lynn went over to her supply tray once more. “We’ll have to monitor for sepsis,” she explained. “His vampire healing is… barely flickering, almost non-functional, which is why I’m starting a broad-spectrum antibiotic now.”

She drew up the dose and injected it with practised ease, watching the line as the medication entered his bloodstream. “Without his healing, we’re fighting bacteria the human way. I’d rather be aggressive than too late.”

“You’re doing more for him than any of us ever could,” Matthew noted, voice low.

Lynn turned to him then, her eyes tired but steady. “I’m doing exactly what you and Diana asked me to do, what you knew you couldn’t—shouldn’t—do yourselves.”

The blond witch placed a gentle hand on Matthew’s forearm. “You and Diana brought him back, don’t downplay that. But your father won’t survive just on love and hope, and even magic can’t undo everything he’s suffered. This is going to be a long fight.” She looked at him intently. “He needs time, care, and all the support you can give him. He needs to be reminded he still matters.”

Matthew’s voice cracked just slightly. “He didn’t believe that last time around. Not anymore. Not after… what happened.”

Lynn turned back to Philippe, her hand shifting from Matthew’s forearm and coming to rest lightly on the sheet over her patient’s chest.

“Then we have to prove it to him now.”

Philippe’s face remained slack, his brow smooth under sedation. But somehow, there was less pain clinging to him now.

-------------

Baldwin stood in the shadowed doorway of the medical suite, arms folded tightly across his chest. He hadn’t spoken more than a few sentences in over an hour.

Now, he watched. Watched as Matthew, quiet and careful, helped undress their father’s broken body. Watched as Lynn, steady and methodical, moved from wound to wound with a healer’s certainty and a soldier’s resolve. Watched as Philippe, the man who had once seemed immortal in every way, lay unconscious—intubated, motionless, mutilated.

And though Baldwin stood still, everything inside him seethed. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be.

Philippe was never meant to return like this.

For eight decades, Baldwin had mourned him the only way he knew how—by burying it, hardening, taking up the mantle of head of the family with a mask of iron and fire. He’d spoken Philippe’s name less and less, trying to forget what had happened in the weeks following his father’s rescue, not wanting to remember the helplessness and despondency of a man who, to Baldwin, had always been more inconceivable myth than father figure. And now here he was, not a myth—a man, stripped of his power, his strength, and breathing through a machine.

He could barely stand to look at him. And yet, he couldn’t look away.

-------------

His gaze shifted to Lynn, whose entire being was focused on tending to Philippe. She was precise but gentle, careful not to jar what was left of broken bones and ruined joints.

Baldwin had resented her when he’d first heard her name—a German witch, of all things. One more stranger meddling in de Clermont affairs. But that prejudice had begun to melt the moment he’d seen her work. She didn’t flinch, didn’t falter. And she didn’t try to claim Philippe, she simply served.

Now, watching her dress wounds with hands glowing faintly with magic, a strange gratitude rose inside him—foreign and raw.

But so did fear.

Because he knew his father. He remembered perfectly how proud Philippe had been—fiercely so, enough to seek out solitude whenever he had been struggling lest someone take it for weakness; enough to ask his own son for death rather than live on as a man deeply wounded in both body and mind, regardless of whether there had still been hope for him to get better. And Baldwin couldn’t help but think, If he wakes… and sees himself like this…

He clenched his jaw. Will he want to live?

--------------

When Matthew murmured something to Lynn about Philippe not tolerating care, Baldwin nearly interrupted—but stopped himself.

Instead, he stepped a few paces into the room, the soft tap of his boots on the floor enough to make Lynn glance over her shoulder.

“You’re doing all of this,” Baldwin said quietly, “knowing he may not even thank you for it.”

Lynn didn’t stop working. “I’m not doing it for thanks.”

“No,” Baldwin said, more to himself than her. “You’re doing it because no one else could.”

He looked down at Philippe’s pale face, the bruising around his mouth, the soft hum of the ventilator. There had been a time when the whole world, creatures and warmbloods alike, trembled when this man spoke. And now it was machines and a witch’s hands keeping him tethered to life.

It should have felt like weakness. But instead—somehow—it looked like defiance.

He’s still fighting, Baldwin thought. Even like this. Especially like this. And for the first time in decades, he felt something break open in his chest.

Not grief, not rage—but love.

Old. Buried. Terrible. Unbearably fierce.

He didn’t speak again, just stood beside the bed as Matthew adjusted the sheets, as Lynn prepared the dose of antibiotics, as Philippe was fed another breath he couldn’t take on his own.

And silently, Baldwin whispered a vow to the father who had once raised him up and now lay reduced to ruin: If you fight to stay, I will fight with you. No matter what you become.

-------------

After putting away the wound care supplies, Lynn moved to the bedside monitor and began to adjust the pressure-relief system embedded beneath the mattress—a low air loss surface designed to circulate airflow beneath the patient’s body, shifting pressure points to prevent skin shearing and bedsores.

“Airflow cycle adjusted,” she murmured to herself. “I’ll run alternating pressure every twenty minutes. Increase flow along the sacrum and left scapula… adjust weight sensitivity to compensate for—” she glanced at the weight tracking—“fifty-seven kilograms.”

She tapped a control panel. “Head elevation to twenty degrees.” The bed responded with a low hum, the upper section lifting slowly, easing the strain on Philippe’s chest wall and helping with lung expansion. Philippe, sedated and unaware, lay pale and still in the centre of the high-tech sanctuary.

“We need to reposition him fully,” Lynn said, looking at Matthew once again while she pulled on new gloves. “We’ve done basic care, but his spine needs to be aligned and his joints immobilised—especially the left side.”

She rounded the bed, lowering the guard rails. “We’ll start with the shoulders.”

Matthew stepped up, gaze briefly sweeping over Philippe’s face—still and pale, the ventilator hissing in slow intervals.

“I’ll take the right first,” he said.

Lynn nodded. “Be gentle but firm and watch the clavicle. I’ve stabilised it magically, but it’s still broken.”

Matthew slid his arms beneath Philippe’s back and shoulder, gently bracing the right scapula as he guided the dislocated joint back into place with a soft ‘click’—the motion quick and practiced. Philippe didn’t move, deeply sedated, but the ECG spiked briefly before it settled again.

“Good,” Lynn said. “Left side next. Let me guide the angle, the scapula is fractured and the clavicle’s unstable.”

Matthew adjusted his grip, and Lynn supported the limb, gently pressing her fingers along the fractured ridge of the shoulder blade. A soft golden shimmer of healing magic stabilized the bone enough for Matthew to guide the shoulder carefully back into its proper joint. Another soft pop, another joint returned to where it belonged.

But nothing about it felt right.

“He’ll hate this,” Matthew said under his breath. “Being touched, being seen like this.”

Lynn didn’t look up. She was already moving to Philippe’s hands, slipping soft orthotic supports beneath each one. The fingers were curled unnaturally, ligaments torn or shortened, the bones misaligned.

“He might,” she said evenly. “But I’ll take his anger over infection or immobility.”

Matthew exhaled slowly. “He always said pain was the price of control.”

“Well,” Lynn murmured, “he’s paid enough for ten lifetimes. He’s earned some help now.”

-------------

Once the upper body was aligned and supported, they turned to the left leg—the most severely damaged part of him.

Matthew lifted Philippe’s body as Lynn gently slid a foam positioning wedge beneath his left hip and flank, elevating the twisted limb just enough to reduce pressure but keep it still. The knee joint bent unnaturally inward, and Lynn grimaced sympathetically as she adjusted a second support to correct the torque. The entire leg was warped unnaturally—the femur bulging outward, tibia sunken and twisted. The muscle was wasted, taut with old, scarred tissue.

“I’m prepping him for surgical re-breaking and external fixation,” she said as she examined the leg. “I’ll go in within twelve to twenty-four hours. Depends on how he tolerates the coma for the rest of the day and through the night.”

Matthew crouched beside her, brushing a hand along Philippe’s shin. “You’ll re-break it?”

“Yes. Clean fractures at all major misalignment points. Then set it with an external fixator frame. Once he stabilizes, I’ll start soft tissue grafting and gradual muscle stimulation.” She carefully began to clean the skin with antiseptic rinse and a disposable washcloth.

“Will he—” Matthew’s voice cut off abruptly, but Lynn knew what he had wanted to ask.

“He will walk again,” she said gently. “Maybe not like before—not without support—but he’ll be able to use his leg.”

The last thing she did was use a surgical skin marker to gently draw lines where she would re-break the bones. Her hands were steady, but inside, something burned. It wasn’t rage or even sadness, just resolve. She was going to bring him back, bone by bone, breath by breath.

Finally, Lynn stepped back, the toll of the last hours catching up to her all at once. She reached for a water bottle, took a long drink, then looked at Philippe—now fully positioned, supported, sedated, ventilated.

He looked both more human and more broken than ever before. But also, for the first time since they’d brought him back, he looked like he might make it through the next 24 hours.

-------------

After taking a break for a few minutes to eat a protein bar and drink some more water, Lynn washed her hands meticulously and put on a new pair of gloves before stepping up to Philippe’s bed again. She glanced at the monitor tracking his fluid intake and perfusion data: the animal blood infusion was steady, the saline balanced. But there was still one last thing to do.

She exhaled quietly, well aware that the next words to come out of her mouth would be some of the hardest Philippe's family would hear today—not in relation to his physical injuries but concerning his dignity and the respect for his body.

It wasn't a rational reaction, she knew that. She had seen too many relatives who hadn't batted an eyelid when Lynn described surgical procedures to them yet had reacted with discomfort or even hostility when they learned that this part of the treatment needed to happen as well.

“I’m going to place a Foley catheter,” she said, her voice was calm, factual. But the words held weight.

Across the room, Diana, seated now in the chair Matthew had vacated earlier, straightened slightly, her blue eyes locking on Lynn’s. Matthew, who stood near the head of the bed, simply nodded once in silent understanding, though a shadow passed over his features.

And Baldwin, having resumed his post against the stone wall with his arms folded and jaw tight, narrowed his eyes. He didn’t speak, but his discomfort rippled beneath the surface like the crack of a fault line. Lynn didn’t need words to sense it.

“Surely, that’s not necessary. He’s a vampire,” Baldwin said finally, voice low. “We process fluid intake—especially blood—differently.”

“I know,” Lynn replied, already gathering the sterile kit. “But Philippe isn’t processing anything the way he should right now. He’s receiving continuous animal blood and fluids because of severe dehydration and malnutrition and because he cannot tolerate anything else at the moment. His kidney function is likely compromised, and I need to be able to monitor even minimal output.”

“Still,” Baldwin muttered reluctantly, averting his eyes. “He would despise this.”

Lynn didn’t flinch.

“I’m not doing this to hurt his pride,” she said softly. “I’m doing it so he doesn’t die from something as stupid as an undetected urinary blockage or a silent infection. The Foley’s soft silicone. It’s the safest, least invasive option, and it will spare him further interventions down the line.”

Matthew said nothing. But his jaw, too, was clenched, and his hand had settled—unconsciously—on the edge of the bed near Philippe’s shoulder in a protective gesture that seemed almost pained.

Diana, ever the bridge between emotions and common sense, spoke next.

“Do it, Lynn. He would never admit it, but if it were one of us in that bed, he’d demand it be done right.”

That earned her a faint, strained smile from Lynn. “That’s what I thought.”

She pulled the blanket down just enough, exposing the area she needed to access while maintaining as much modesty as possible. She’d seen countless patients in similar states—soldiers, burn victims, trauma cases with bodies in collapse—but this felt different.

Maybe because Philippe had been a legend before he became her patient. Maybe because he was still a man, and he deserved to be treated like one.

“This is just precaution,” she murmured, talking to him without really realising it. “You’ve already been through more than anyone should. And I won’t let you suffer complications on top of everything else.”

The procedure took barely minutes. No bleeding, minimal resistance. Philippe didn’t stir, his body remaining still beneath the anaesthesia, his expression unchanged. And a few seconds later, the closed system bag began to fill—only slightly, a pale, clear trickle of fluid. Lynn exhaled in relief. This confirmed some renal function which was better than nothing. Still, she would need to monitor the output to track Philippe’s hydration status.

She taped the line securely to his right thigh before checking the collection bag one more time. Then she pulled the sheet gently back over his abdomen, covering him again.

“It’s done,” she said.

No one spoke at first, then Baldwin murmured, “He would never have allowed any of this.”

Lynn’s voice was quiet but firm. “He didn’t have to allow it. He just had to survive long enough for someone else to choose it for him.”

Baldwin looked away, jaw working.

Diana stood and crossed to Philippe’s side, gently brushing the back of her fingers across his bruised temple. “He’ll understand. Not right away. But he will.”

And in the stillness that followed, Lynn placed her own hand gently over Philippe’s heart, just for a second.

Beat. Ventilator. Beep.

“He’s as stable as I can make him,” she said. “Now we wait. And when it’s time—we fight again.”

--------------

The room had settled into that particular kind of stillness that followed a long stretch of urgency—when the immediate threats had been addressed, and what remained was the slow, deliberate work of healing.

Lynn’s eyes flickered over the monitor readouts, her voice low and even. “Heart rate’s steady. Blood pressure holding. Ventilator’s stable. Central line’s clear. Urine output minimal, but present.” She glanced at the bag. “No discoloration which is good.”

Then she turned to face the others: Matthew, still near the head of the bed with one hand now resting on the side rail. Diana, standing on the other side of Philippe’s bed, her brow furrowed but gaze soft as it lingered on his face. And Baldwin, silent as ever, watching from a distance that seemed both physical and emotional.

“I’d like to give Philippe a bed bath,” Lynn continued. “He’s stable enough for it. It’ll help keep his skin healthy, and it’s one of the few small comforts we can offer him right now. And,” she added, her tone softer now, “I think it’ll help you, too. To see him a little more… cleaned up. More like himself again, less like a prisoner.”

No one disagreed with that.

------------

After filling a basin with warm water and adding a small amount of mild, antiseptic body wash Lynn took up a disposable washcloth and began to clean Philippe’s face and neck.

The right side of his face had already been cleaned when she treated his eye socket earlier—so now, she dipped the soft cloth in warm water, wrung it out, and gently pressed it to the left side of his jaw, cleaning carefully around the endotracheal tube, gently wiping away dried blood at the corners of his mouth. Then behind his ears, down the curve of his neck, and the hollow of his throat, avoiding the half-healed burn scars she’d treated earlier.

Diana stood next to Lynn, soft towel in hand, and dabbed Philippe’s skin dry in the wake of the washcloth. “I never thought I’d see him look so fragile,” she murmured sadly, brushing the backs of her fingers tenderly over his temple.

His cheekbones were sharper now, painfully so with the weight loss. The bandage covering his missing right eye, the scars, the bruises darkening his pale skin, the lines months of suffering and pain had etched into his face—almost nothing about him reminded Diana of the man who had sized her up so thoroughly that first night at Sept-Tours in 1590, sitting across from her in his study and giving off the impression that he was privy to all of her secrets before she'd even uttered a word.

She had likened him to a Greek god back then, and she still remembered Matthew’s sulky comments when he realised that Philippe’s beauty and power—unparalleled even for a vampire—had not gone unnoticed by her. And while Matthew’s jealousy had been completely unfounded, Diana couldn't deny that Philippe de Clermont had simply been the most beautiful creature she had ever seen.

And somehow, despite all that he had endured, his features were still unmistakable. The straight line of his nose, the set of his brow, the sharp cut of his jaw, the shape of his mouth still looked regal. Still Philippe.

“That’s the thing about strength,” Lynn said, her hands still for a moment while her gaze drifted over Philippe’s face, “It’s not about muscle or stature. It’s about how many times you keep going.” Her words made Diana wonder if the younger witch saw the same thing she did: that even months of torture, pain, and deprivation had not been able to completely break Philippe's inherent strength.

Lynn moved next to his shoulders and arms, mindful of the clavicles, using soft, circular motions to cleanse the thin, scarred skin. Each arm was cleaned from shoulder to wrist, the worst of the grime peeled away. She was slow, respectful, methodical.

Not just treating a body but caring for a man.

“Matthew,” she said without looking up, “I’ll need your help turning him when we get to his back.”

He nodded. “Of course.”

When they reached the chest and abdomen, Lynn folded back the blanket only enough to work—maintaining Philippe’s dignity wherever possible. The ridges of his ribs were stark beneath the skin, every breath from the ventilator lifting him like a threadbare sail.

Matthew helped lift and turn Philippe gently onto his right side so Lynn could clean his back, taking care not to disturb the dressings over his sacrum, his hip, and left scapula.

“There are hydrogel patches here,” she reminded Diana softly. “Be careful not to touch the edges.”

“Got it,” Diana said, leaning in with the cloth to pat dry the surrounding skin, her expression carefully neutral while her hands oh-so gently moved the towel over Philippe's battered back.

With Matthew supporting Philippe’s weight, the two witches worked their way downward, cleansing his hips and upper thighs, never lingering, never careless. Lynn left the left leg untouched—it had already been sterilized and prepped for surgery—but she gently washed the left foot, careful of the hydrogel dressing covering his heel.

Then she moved to the right leg, cleaning the bony knee, the shin, the arch of his foot. The calluses were long gone. What remained was frail skin, clean now, at least.

After his body was clean, Lynn picked up a no-rinse shampoo cap, warming it between her hands with a pulse of magic before slipping it on over Philippe’s tangled bronze-blond hair. She massaged it gently over his scalp for a couple of minutes while the cap foamed inside, loosening blood, dirt, and dried sweat.

His hair had grown out in uneven lengths, but she was careful not to pull. When Lynn peeled the cap off, the strands were damp but markedly cleaner.

Diana stepped forward then, a wide-toothed comb already in hand. “Let me take care of that,” she offered, her fingers brushing over the darkened hair.

She worked carefully through the tangles, whispering under her breath as she smoothed strands free. “I imagine you’d hate this too, all this fussing. But I don’t care. You deserve to be clean and cared for, Philippe.”

-------------

Finally, Lynn pulled a soft, pale blue hospital gown from one of the supply cabinets and looked at Matthew once more. “Help me put this on him?”

They moved in sync—Matthew supporting Philippe’s weight while Lynn guided his arms into the sleeves, careful of the shoulder joints. She draped it across his chest and torso, smoothing it down over his thighs, leaving the back open and ties undone to avoid pressure and allow for easy access to lines and dressings. But even that thin covering felt like a restoration of dignity.

Matthew looked down at his father, eyes unreadable. “He looks… better,” he admitted.

“Because he’s being cared for,” Lynn said, pulling up the sterile sheets and covering Philippe up to his chest. “Even if he doesn’t know it yet.”

Diana pressed a hand to her father-in-law’s shoulder, her voice thick. “He knows. Somewhere in there, he knows.”

And Baldwin, still in his corner, exhaled—barely audible. But it sounded just a little more like relief than it had an hour ago.

As they stepped back from the bed, the machines still murmuring, the ventilator still breathing for him, Philippe de Clermont no longer looked like a ruined prisoner. He looked like a man slowly being brought home.

Chapter Text

The medical suite felt quieter now, more settled. Philippe’s body, treated, cleaned, and draped in a soft hospital gown, seemed less like a shattered monument and more like a man being tended back toward life. The ventilator cycled in its slow rhythm and the monitors continued their steady, muted beeping. The scent of antiseptic lingered in the air, but it no longer dominated—a relief for the delicate sense of smell of the two conscious vampires in the room.

Lynn pulled off her gloves before reaching for her notebook. She knew how quickly a detail or a dose could be overlooked when intensive care dragged on for weeks, when too little sleep and too much adrenaline were taking their toll. So she meticulously noted down the medication doses, not just for herself but for Matthew’s benefit as well—to stay on top of Philippe’s treatment plan and share the responsibility for his father's medication schedule.

“Alright,” she said, straightening up and turning to Matthew, Diana, and Baldwin, who had now taken seats around the perimeter of the room. “We need to organize the next twenty-four hours. Philippe is stable for the moment, but that could change quickly. Which means there’s no room for assumptions or overconfidence.”

Matthew gave a brief nod. “Then let’s draw up a schedule. Preferably one that gives you the chance to rest before you perform surgery tomorrow,” he added, throwing her a stern look.

Lynn’s brows shot up at Matthew’s emphatic tone, but she didn’t argue—at least not outright. Flipping to a clean page, she started writing. “I’ll remain primary for now. I’ll do neuro checks, monitor the ventilator settings, keep an eye on the central line for signs of infection or clotting, and track fluid output.”

Diana cleared her throat pointedly. “You did hear what Matthew just said, right?”

“I’ll rest in short stretches between checks and then for a couple of hours if Philippe stays stable.” Lynn’s tone was pragmatic. “Trust me, I’m used to this kind of rhythm from working ER shifts for years and I know my limits.”

She looked at each of them. “I’d also like to have one of us in here with Philippe at all times to keep an eye on him and the monitors—even though I’ll have the telemetry data with me on the tablet while I sleep.”

Matthew folded his arms. “I’m staying. For as long as it takes.”

“You also need to be functional when we go into surgery,” Lynn reminded him, not unkindly. “You’re the only other person here with formal medical training, I’ll need your hands tomorrow. And while I’m aware vampires don’t need as much sleep as humans—” she fixed him with a piercing look, “don’t underestimate the emotional strain of the last few hours.”

When she saw the stubborn set of Matthew’s dark brows, she sighed exasperatedly. Apparently, she needed to spell it out for him.

“You just brought your father back after he’d been dead for 80 years, relived your own trauma from rescuing him, and then assisted me with triage and critical care,” Lynn said, ticking off each point on her fingers. “That has to affect you, Matthew. I’d be worried if it didn’t.”

“We’ll split the evening and night shift,” Baldwin interjected gruffly, arms crossed as he stood from the wall. “Matthew can take the first six hours, I'll take the midnight to morning shift. I don't need any rest since I won't be assisting you, and I'd rather be here than pacing the corridors.”

Lynn paused, then nodded. “That works. Matthew, you start your shift at 6 p.m. and rest during the night. If all goes well during that time—no destabilization, no respiratory decline—then I’ll take my longer rest as well. Maybe four hours. I'll squeeze in another nap before I get ready for surgery.”

Diana stepped forward. “What about me?”

“You can stay with Philippe until Matthew's shift starts, but you need to rest,” Lynn cautioned, looking at Diana's pale face and her eyes that glistened with fatigue and emotion. The sight of her reminded the German witch that it was Diana who had pushed for this rescue mission, that she was the one who had refused to give up on Philippe. Ultimately, Diana was the reason Matthew and Baldwin’s father now lay motionless but alive in the hospital bed behind them.

“You brought him back, and I can only imagine how much that must’ve drained your magical reserves; and your emotional ones as well. You've already done more than any witch could have done.” For a moment, the two blonde women just stared at each other—a silent battle of wills—before Diana finally gave in with a reluctant smile, realising she wasn’t the only witch with a stubborn streak a mile wide.

“I know you'd all rather stay with him the whole time,” Lynn acknowledged, “and I realize that sounds a little hypocritical coming from me, but you have to take care of yourselves too. It's going to be a long few days, maybe even weeks, before Philippe is stable.”

She closed the notebook gently and looked between them. “Today, we keep him alive. That’s the only objective.”

“He’d hate this. All this fuss, the machines, the supervision. The indignity of being watched constantly,” Baldwin said, and then, after a pause he added quietly: “I’d hate this.”

Matthew knew that Baldwin had always been Philippe's favourite son because they were cut from the same cloth. That was also the reason why they clashed so often, their temperaments too similar. Once they had made up their minds, they were both incredibly stubborn and firmly convinced they were right, seeing their own inability to give in and accept another perspective reflected in the other. In the end, Baldwin had always obeyed, however reluctantly.

And Philippe had never been blind to his son's flaws—his lack of self-control, his irascibleness, his arrogance—which was why he had left the leadership of the Knights of Lazarus to Matthew and not Baldwin.

But Matthew also knew that Baldwin was the one who best understood Philippe's mercurial temperament—with the possible exception of Ysabeau. That meant he was probably right when he said Philippe would hate it. The dark-haired vampire exhaled slowly and stared at his father's sleeping face. “You're right, he probably would,” he murmured, “and yet he's still fighting, even unconscious.”

-------------

The library of Sept-Tours was silent, bathed in the warm light of a late September afternoon. Books lined the tall wooden shelves and the old stone walls and tapestries were glazed in the golden sunlight. At the far end, by the tall window that overlooked the fields and hills below, Ysabeau stood as still as a statue. His mother looked beyond exhausted, Matthew thought, despite the way her blond curls were artfully draped over her shoulders and the meticulous ivory Dior suit she wore.

She didn’t turn even though her heightened senses must have picked up on his footsteps long before he entered the room. She also didn’t speak when he stopped a few paces behind her. The silence between them was not unfamiliar—it was an old language in itself, spoken when grief was too large for words.

But today, the quiet felt different. Hollow. “He’s stable,” Matthew said quietly, after a long moment. “Lynn’s keeping him sedated. She and Diana are with him now.”  

Ysabeau didn’t move.  

“I thought you might want to sit with him,” he added carefully, mindful of Ysabeau’s temper. Still, she said nothing.

And Matthew, who had learned patience from his father and silence from his pain, waited. Finally, his mother’s voice came, soft but strangely toneless. “I don’t know if I can.”

Matthew frowned. “You can. He’d want you there, Maman.”

Ysabeau’s gaze didn’t leave the window. “Yes. That’s what everyone keeps saying.”

The stillness deepened. Matthew stepped closer, his arms crossed now, bracing against the chill he felt—not in the air, but in her. “You’ve hardly looked at him,” he said. “Not really, since we brought him back.”

“I looked,” she said, too quickly. Then, softer: “I just didn’t… feel what I expected to feel.”

That stopped him. Matthew studied her carefully now, the sharpness of her profile against the sunlight spilling through the window, the fine lines around her green eyes that had never seemed so obvious before.

“What did you expect?”

She turned her head slightly, just enough that he could see her expression. And for the first time in all his long life—with the exception of the first few years after his own turning, perhaps—Ysabeau de Clermont looked uncertain, doubtful of her own heart.

“I thought it would feel like joy,” she said. “Or relief. Maybe even a return.”

Matthew’s brow furrowed. “And it didn’t.”

She shook her head. “It felt like… like watching a stranger be resurrected in Philippe’s body.” She blinked. “The shape was his, and my heart ached for him. But the most fundamental part of me—my soul—did not reach for him.”

Matthew’s breath caught. Because he knew what she wasn’t saying, knew the ache behind her carefully controlled tone. Realised, suddenly, that they had all been so focused on saving Philippe from his fate, they had never once stopped to ask: what does it mean to return someone to a world that moved on without them?

“You grieved him,” Matthew said, more to himself than her. “For eighty years.”

“I buried him,” she replied, “not just in the sarcophagus down at the church—and the Gods only know what’s in there now—but with every breath. Every day, I remade myself without him.” There was no anger in her voice, no bitterness. There was loss and something dangerously close to guilt.

Matthew looked away, one hand resting on the edge of the windowsill. The sunlight caught on his knuckles, giving his skin a warmer shade than its usual marble paleness. It made him think about how Philippe’s skin had always carried that olive hue so typical of his Mediterranean origins, as if even his vampiric nature could not fully drive the memory of sunlight from it. And how his father was now so pale that his skin appeared almost greyish.

“We brought him back because he never should’ve died that way. What Benjamin did to him, what we couldn’t stop…”

“I don’t blame you,” Ysabeau said quickly, turning now, her eyes catching his. “Not you, not Diana. I agreed to the plan, didn’t I? I wanted him back. I still want him back.”

“But?”

She hesitated before continuing, barely audible: “But what if the Philippe I loved is still gone?”

The words hit Matthew like a silent blow. Because they had done something irreversible, hadn’t they? Something not even the gods had dared: They had defied the timeline of a bond, of mourning, of letting go.

And now… they couldn’t be sure what had returned.

“I thought bringing him home would fix what was broken,” Matthew said at last. “In me, in us… In all of it.”

His mother gave him a long, aching look, but didn’t reply to his words. And that told him something even more profound: She was grieving again. Not because Philippe had died, but because he hadn’t stayed dead and something between them—some essential thread—had not survived the resurrection.

“I’ll sit with him again,” she said, after another long silence. “I owe him that. And more.”

And Matthew didn’t press her any further, didn’t ask for more than she was willing to give.

-------------

The day passed slowly while they kept vigil.

Lynn emerged from her first long rest just before midnight, pulling her hair back into a tight bun as she entered the medical suite. The air was warm, sterile, the lights low and gently dimmed for the night. The machines hummed as they had before—but she could sense it, subtle and sure: Philippe was holding; and that eased some part of her soul she hadn’t even realised needed reassurance until now.

Matthew sat at Philippe’s side, long fingers curled around the edge of the bed rail, eyes fixed on his father’s face. He didn’t look up at her entrance.

“You should rest,” she reminded him.

He didn’t flinch. “I will. Baldwin’s next.”

“I mean it,” Lynn added. “I’ll need you clear-headed for surgery prep tomorrow.”

He nodded after a beat. “I just… I keep thinking he’s going to open his eyes. Just for a moment.”

Lynn approached slowly and checked the monitor. Vitals steady, no signs of distress. But she saw the tightness in Matthew’s shoulders, the grief he wasn’t letting fall.

“He’s not ready yet,” she said gently. “But he’s not slipping either.”

That earned her the faintest nod, and a few minutes later, Matthew rose and gave her a grateful glance—one that didn’t need words.

Shortly after his brother had left Baldwin entered, silent as a storm cloud, his presence filling the space. Over the past couple of days, Lynn had grown used to his brooding silence; but tonight, something was different.

Tonight, as he walked toward the bed, his movements were slower, more measured. And when she asked for help repositioning Philippe to ease pressure on his left scapula and hip, he didn’t hesitate. Together, they turned him: Lynn guiding, Baldwin supporting his father's weight, cradling him with a kind of care Lynn hadn’t expected from someone who held himself with such authority.

She caught it then. Not in his hands, but in his eyes—the flicker of something raw. Grief, yes, but also love. Bone-deep, shielded under centuries of brusqueness and control.

“You’ve done this before? Back in ’45?” Lynn asked quietly, brushing a damp cloth over Philippe’s temple.

Baldwin’s mouth was a grim line. “Not like this.”

Lynn glanced up. “What do you mean?”

He adjusted the pillow beneath Philippe’s shoulder. “The first time… when we brought Philippe home, he wasn’t quite as bad off. But he also didn’t last long enough for us to truly care for him. There wasn’t time to hope. He didn’t let us.”

Lynn’s hands paused. “But you’re hoping now.”

Baldwin said nothing, but the silence held the answer.

-------------

Ysabeau visited the medical suite only once that night.

Lynn noticed it during one of her hourly checks. She had returned quietly, expecting to find Baldwin still at Philippe’s bedside, but instead she saw Ysabeau sitting in the chair, her spine stiff, her expression unreadable. She hadn’t touched Philippe, hadn’t moved closer. She simply watched him, like a woman seeing a ghost she didn’t quite recognize.

When Lynn moved to check the ventilator, she cast a glance toward the de Clermont matriarch—and saw something there she hadn’t expected: distance.

She would have understood anger or sorrow, but instead Lynn caught a glimpse of something severed, carefully hidden beneath millennia of practiced stillness. Lynn said nothing, and Ysabeau left before Baldwin returned. She did not linger, and she never once looked at Lynn, but the doctor felt the tension in the room long after she was gone.

As the horizon finally began to pale with the first touches of dawn, Lynn stood beside the bed, resting one hand on the rail as she watched Philippe breathe—slow, measured, steady. The healing would take months, building trust most likely longer. But Philippe had made it through the first night.

-------------

The kitchen was awash in the gold of mid-morning sun, the light slanting through tall windows and casting long stripes across the stone floor, and the warmth of the hearth lingered to ward off the first chill of early autumn nights.

Diana sat at the long wooden table, her tea growing cold beside a half-finished croissant. She wasn’t eating much and she didn’t need to explain why. Lynn, bleary-eyed but no longer dragging, leaned her elbows on the table and sipped from a massive mug of triple espresso with a dash of sweetened condensed milk, the scent of it cutting through the lingering fatigue. Another couple of hours of uninterrupted sleep had done her more good than she’d expected.

Matthew joined them a moment later, dressed in black, a silver cup of partridge blood in one hand. He moved with the quiet, controlled grace of someone who was used to weraing fatigue as armour. But even he looked heavier this morning—drawn around the grey-green eyes, voice low when he greeted them.

Diana gave him a soft, questioning glance. “You look worse than you did while the twins still kept us up at night. Any word from Ysabeau?”

Matthew’s lips twitched. “Never let it be said that Philippe isn’t high-maintenance.” He sighed while folding down gracefully into a chair. “And Maman went out to hunt. Before sunrise.”

There was a beat of silence. Lynn caught a flicker of unease in Diana’s gaze. Not fear, exactly, but worry. Ysabeau leaving, without a word, while her mate lay sedated and barely alive… It meant something. Lynn tucked that observation away but said nothing. Instead, she reached for another slice of toast and glanced at Matthew.

“Can I ask you something?”

He gave her a sidelong glance. “I think we’ve passed the point of formality.”

“It’s about 1945,” she said quietly. “Baldwin told me on the phone that Philippe’s condition—physically—wasn’t much different from what we’re seeing now. But back then, you didn’t have magic. Or even decent trauma medicine. So… how did he survive at all?”

Matthew took a slow sip of blood. When he set it down, the thick liquid left tear tracks on the inside of the silver cup.

“We forced him to,” he said at last. “That’s the truth of it.”

Diana’s eyes widened, that bit of information apparently new to her as well, but she let Matthew speak, knowing how hard it was for her husband to talk about what had happened after Philippe’s first rescue.

“I brought him back from Poland with Baldwin. He was… ruined. Just like now. Bones shattered, hands curled, starved. The worst of the wounds had already started healing wrong because of how long it took us to reach him.”

Lynn said nothing, her espresso forgotten.

“He couldn’t stand the sight of blood,” Matthew continued. “Would become frantic if we brought it near him, desperately tried to get away from it. But he needed it, so we forced it. It wasn’t pretty, wasn’t even humane—” He closed his eyes, remembering Philippe’s distress, his resistance, his fear. “But… he lived.”

“He tolerated vampire blood then?” After Philippe’s violent rejection of both Ysabeau and Matthew’s blood, Lynn could hardly believe that he’d tolerated more potent blood.

Diana’s husband nodded. “Barely, but yes. That was the only reason he made it through those first weeks.”

“And after?”

Matthew’s jaw worked. His eyes were dark, and suddenly, he looked older than Lynn had ever seen him.

“He never walked unassisted again. His hands were—” He stopped, flexing his own fingers unconsciously. “He could hardly hold a pen, couldn’t button a shirt. I remember helping him dress. And he… hated it. More than anything else.”

Diana reached over and placed her hand over Matthew’s. “But what broke him,” he said hoarsely, “wasn’t the injuries.”

Lynn watched him carefully. “Then what was it?”

Matthew looked down at the cup. His voice came so quiet, it was barely more than breath.

“He couldn’t see a future. Not even a shred of one. We tried—Baldwin, Gallowglass, Maman, me. Philippe would hear us out, but he didn’t believe us, not even Ysabeau. He thought he was a ghost in his own skin. Just… drifting.”

Lynn’s heart clenched.

And then Matthew said: “He tried to end it. A few weeks after we brought him back.”

Diana closed her eyes, having heard this story before and knowing how it ended.

“We were careless, and someone had left a small knife on his bedside table,” Matthew continued. “He tried to open his own vein. But his hands—” He shook his head, raking a hand through his dark hair. “He couldn’t grip it. Couldn’t apply the pressure. All he did was cut himself, and the more blood he shed, the wilder he became. He sobbed. I don’t think I’d ever seen him cry like that. Not in all my life.”

Lynn’s throat was tight. “And you found him?”

“Together with Ysabeau, yes,” Matthew whispered. “She took the knife from him and said she would help him end his life. But I knew that Maman would never have forgiven herself. And I—” He broke off, swallowing hard. “When Philippe said he was too tired to fight, that he wanted to sleep… I knew what that felt like, so I did what he asked.”

Lynn leaned back slightly, gripping her mug. She understood, in that moment, that Matthew wasn’t just worried about his father dying again.  He was terrified that he’d come back to the same darkness.