Chapter Text
Advising a King, Ianthe found, did not work so well when said King was one's friend. It was one thing to begin as an Advisor and end as a friend; another to start as a friend and end as friends with official paperwork in the midst.
"Listen, Majesty—"
"'Caspian' to you, madam."
Ianthe stared at him. "I cannot call you by your name in official capacity."
"I'm granting you permission."
"You can't— you gave me this job, Cas, let me damn well do it."
He grinned. "There it is."
"Infuriating boy."
"How easily you turn to insults."
It had been a long day. A long week— a long month, if the both of them were being honest.
Since Ianthe had returned with Caspian from Mossbridge Wharf and taken up her position as his Advisor, they had both faced their fair share of questioning, doubting, and outright refusal of some sailor's daughter being raised to such a position. Even when the logic of an Advisor actually being a demotion for a former lady-in-waiting was raised it was not enough for the naysayers. Ianthe had to prove herself. Caspian, too, through her— for their troubles were as mutual as their joys.
These existing difficulties had collided with a new campaign. Armies from Calormen threatened at their borders with the desert. War had yet to break— but it was brewing. Everyone was doing all they could, Caspian most of all, but the country was in a fit of worries.
Tension built. Uneven footing was its cause; new rules, new regulations, new restrictions placed upon them by propriety. Friends could barely be as close as they were. A King and his Advisor even less so.
With war brushing at their horizons, Caspian and Ianthe had a deeper desire for one another's company— a desire that could not yet be fulfilled.
Quibbling like this gave them some sense of normality.
"You won't be hearing just insults from me soon, Majesty."
"Is that a threat, my Lady Advisor?"
"A promise."
Caspian laughed. Ianthe smiled.
Tucking the sheaf of paper closer into her arms, Ianthe turned her voice to something gentler. Advisor became friend once again.
"Seriously, Cas. You need to delegate. I'm getting worried."
Such was the topic of contention between them.
Caspian grimaced. "I'm not that bad, surely?"
"No. You're tired. You'll make yourself ill."
It was a softening of the truth; Ianthe had been watching him closely. He swayed when he supposed when no one could see him. His eyes became half-closed in lulls in the conversation. He took a fraction of a moment longer to answer questions that he would usually anticipate before they were even asked. Caspian was off. Blatantly so, if one knew where to look.
If anyone else noticed, Ianthe neither knew nor cared. No one had spoken up.
Caspian shifted under her sharp eyes. "I'm fine, Annie."
"So you say. So the other members of the council believe, hence they do not press when you insist upon not giving them their rightful duties."
"I am determined to be a good King. Not one like— like him."
"A good King understands that not everything needs his attention all the time."
He gave her a sidelong glance. "Since when do you know so much about being a good King?"
"Since I met two of them. Since my best friend became one." She curled the papers into a cylinder and tapped his arm with them. "I do my research."
"That you do. Which book are those a copy of?"
Ianthe read the title. "From Rags, to Redemption, to Royalty: the Writings of Archenland's Lost Prince. King Cor's autobiography."
"Where did you unearth that?"
"I pulled some advisory strings." She shrugged. "The Archenlandian Royal Librarian appreciated Royal Narnian correspondence."
Caspian laughed. "You're a little devious with some power, hm?"
"Don't give it to me, then."
The corridor they had been pacing along together turned into a fork. On one side, Ianthe's bedchambers waited. On the other, Caspian's royal rooms laid ready for him. They stopped at that fork. The parting it promised destabilised them. Gathering themselves took longer than it ought to have done.
Ianthe was the first to speak. She always was.
"Goodnight, Cas," she said quietly, turning to kiss his cheek in farewell.
"Until tomorrow," he said.
Each prayed silently that peace would remain until then.
Tomorrow came. Peace remained with it.
Ianthe rose early, as she always did, and started her usual routine.
Wash, dress, and eat a small breakfast. Then it was to her office to gather the previous day's notes and the current day's tasks; a quick comparison narrowed it down to the essentials and intimidates, and a further winnowing separated out the things she thought Caspian ought to know— namely, that one of their Talking Beast spies reported a lull in Calormen activity at the border. Messages and missives— of which there were thankfully none that day— were then read through and noted. Finally, it was to Caspian's office, wherein each morning she and Cornelius, his other Primary Advisor, held a short meeting with the King before the day's first council was called.
"Lion be with you," greeted Cornelius as she approached where he stood outside Caspian's door.
"And with you. Any sign yet?"
Cornelius chuckled. "Our night owl is… well, a night owl."
"He's usually on time, though." Ianthe's gut prickled; frowning, she turned to the guard stationed at Caspian's door. "You wouldn't mind if I checked on him?"
The guard— a dryad named Sylvatica— shook her leafy head with a hint of a smile. The Narnians, in comparison to the Telmarines, were fond of the friendship between Ianthe and Caspian, and actively encouraged it.
"Better you than I," Sylvatica said in her soft, low voice.
"Thank you."
Sylvatica stepped aside to let Ianthe in. Slipping into Caspian's office, she approached the door that led to his private rooms. She knocked.
"Cas?"
No reply. The prickling in her stomach grew into a bed of thorns.
"Caspian?" She knocked again. "Can you hear me?"
Even if he was a heavy sleeper, he always woke for her. He once joked that her voice could rouse him from the dead.
The thought soured the fond memory.
She tried again. "Caspian? I hope you're dressed, because I'm coming in."
Beneath her hand, the doorknob turned and clicked, and the door swung open. Behind it was a familiar sight; a grand four-poster bed, an open wardrobe and chest of clothing, a desk overflowing with charts and maps, and a hawk's roost. Before that desk was a view that had Ianthe's breath seizing.
Caspian was sat on the chair, dressed in his clothes and boots from the day before. He was slumped over the papers, unmoving. Not asleep, Ianthe knew his sleeping face, but in a deep faint. His eyes, closed, fluttered. Skin tainted with a sickly pallor, a red flush had risen to his cheeks, and sweat beaded upon his brow. His shoulders juddered with the force of his heaving breaths.
Ianthe's heart near stopped.
The juxtaposition between the Caspian of the night before— tired, but still teasing— and the Caspian before her was sickening. She had seen him crumple before, but it never became easier.
Allowing herself but a breath to feel such things, for if she did not they would fester in her until she herself was incapacitated, Ianthe hurried to Caspian's side.
"Cornelius!" She cried out as she ran. "Come, quick!"
Scooping Caspian up from his seat, she carried him over to his bed and laid him upon it before busying herself with ridding him of his boots.
Footsteps behind her indicated the Doctor's presence.
"Oh, great heavens," Cornelius said.
"I told him. I told him he'd have himself sick with it all."
Ianthe's frustrated muttering held no smugness— only a deep care, and frustration at herself for not being more proactive.
Sylvatica, a step behind Cornelius, said, "My sisters are about the castle. A physician shall be informed shortly."
Ianthe nodded. "In the meantime, fetch me warm water and cloths. Not cold, it will shock him."
Throwing propriety out of the window, she stripped him of his outermost layers, leaving him in just his shirt and breeches.
He stirred at the jostling, eyes flitting open. "Annie?"
She hushed him. "Stay down, dearest. You're fevered."
"But the—"
"The campaign can be taken on by others. You are in no fit state. Rest." She took his hand and kissed his knuckles. "For me, if not for yourself."
Swallowing dryly, Caspian nodded; he had little choice in the matter, for the next moment the fever took him again, and he was in a fitful sleep.
Sylvatica then appeared with the water and cloths. Ianthe thanked her, then began to gently sponge at Caspian's skin. The damp touch had him whimpering. The sound broke her heart. She steeled herself.
Fever had run through her family many times. Ianthe herself had been through many as a child. Treating it was nothing foreign. Fever from stress, however, was unfamiliar territory to her; for now, she would treat it as she would illness, and hope that the physicians could do better.
Cornelius had taken it upon himself to open the windows— letting the cool, fresh air in to chill the room without the temperature dropping too quickly. He did not let it show, but he was unnerved. Never had he seen Caspian unwell, even in all his years as his tutor.
To fall into fever at such a crucial point in his reign was disturbing at best.
"Trumpkin is regent, isn't he?" Ianthe asked.
Cornelius looked at her. She was not looking at him; her eyes were fixed on the man in her care. Part of his nerves settled.
"Indeed."
She nodded. "Have him come to the office. Call an emergency meeting. Glenstorm, too, and Lord Leonidas, and Lady Amalia if she is about. We'll put together a plan."
Cornelius smiled. "One would think you were regent, my dear."
Ianthe glanced up at him. She almost had been— but considering the backlash to her being appointed Advisor, Caspian and herself had decided against it before the notion could even be put to a vote. Trumpkin, in the end, turned out to be the best choice; Old Narnian through and through, he had no time for Telmarine politics and thus was best for when emergencies arose.
A small smile, pale and wan, curled her lips, "That would set a fire going in the court, wouldn't it?"
The Telmarines could appreciate a war hero. Trumpkin was one; Ianthe was not.
"Not all fires destroy."
Ianthe shook her head and returned her attention to Caspian— to the fire scorching through him. She laid her hand across his brow. He keened through cracked lips. A mumble of a word each recognised as 'Father' broke through his seizing throat.
How Ianthe wished she had tamed her magic before now. Perhaps she could do something other than watch as her friend twisted and wrung himself out.
"I pray dearly this one does not."
The physician arrived quickly. Flavia— a no-nonsense Satyr who had inherited the position after Master Artaz was encouraged into retirement with a generous pension and land by the sea, and was already making far better a mark than her predecessor. She cared nothing for title or position and treated everyone with a fair, stern care that had all warming to her within days.
Bustling into the room, Flavia gently pushed herself between Ianthe and Caspian so she could take an exam of her patient. Pressing her fingers to Caspian's wrist, she timed his pulse whilst pulling his eyelids back to examine the whites— all while sniffing deep, her extra olfactory senses cluing her in to a world no human had access too. She muttered a great deal to herself through this process; nodding, shaking her head, humming, asking herself questions and answering them a moment later. Ianthe watched in tense silence. Sylvatica stood guard in the doorway, her own anxiety betrayed by the rustling of her leaves.
"Your instincts were right, my girl. There is no illness. No infection. This is collapse. Too much work and not enough rest." Flavia shook her head. "Our young King still has many a lesson to learn, it seems."
Ianthe sighed. "Can we fault him?"
"No. No, we can't. Here's my cure: sleep, plenty of it, all the while we must do our best to keep the fever down and keep him fed. I shall make a few tinctures to stop the tremors."
"Any idea of time?"
"None."
"Trumpkin will not like that."
"He'll have to. I will have nothing else."
"Neither will I." Ianthe nodded. "Thank you, Flavia."
"Don't thank me yet. Wait until he's out of the thick of it, at the very least. Right," she clapped her hands together, "to work, then?"
"To work."
The emergency meeting was called. Ianthe drifted in and out, splitting her time between passing comments and ensuring Caspian's brow never heated beyond her ability to dab away.
"You saw nothing of this, then?" Trumpkin asked at one point after she returned from stoking the fire.
"No. It disquiets me, but also relieves me, for my visions' silence usually indicates that there will be no fatality."
Trumpkin nodded. "Should that change…"
"I shall inform you."
A stirring in the other room caught her attention. She stood and bowed her head to the meeting.
"Excuse me, all."
The gathering watched as she slipped into the chambers and greeted Flavia, shutting the door behind her to retain Caspian's privacy— he hated others to see him vulnerable, especially in such a manner as illness. Only once before had he been ill enough to be indisposed, and then he refused any and all visitors or tenders apart from Ianthe. He was fifteen, and stubborn enough to get his own will, so Ianthe had run back and forth between his rooms and Prunaprismia's. It would have been a thorn but for how he doted upon her when her courses struck her down.
No care, in their relationship, had ever been left un-reciprocated; not out of any conscious effort, either.
"That girl," Lady Amalia said, "has a devotion that far outstrips us all."
Trumpkin agreed. "Aslan help us."
In truth, the next few days were uneventful. Harrowing, worrying, and tiring, but though Caspian's condition did not get better it did not worsen. He slept— and slept— and slept. All the while he was haunted by febrile visions; ones that had him muttering half-discernible nonsense and trying to move limbs sodden with aching exhaustion to defend himself from his hallucinated opponents.
Flavia did not always stay, but she was there for most of the time; only when she slept did one of her healers take over.
Ianthe remained. Snatching sleep in bursts, she did all she could: bathing Caspian's heated skin, stoking the fire to keep the room at a level heat, interpreting his handwriting for Trumpkin and Cornelius, feeding him broth and the medicines Flavia made.
When she was not active, she was reading. Poetry and tales from the same book that Caspian had made for her; his personal favourites from the selection, marked out by her in advance so she could find them with ease. If not those, then she took her pick of his personal library; its dominant collection was a serious of nautical volumes detailing all the official Narnian voyages undertaken from King Frank and Queen Helen's time to when the Kings and Queens of Old left. Ianthe found them dull, but she knew that Caspian, awake or asleep, loved them.
She was reading one of these volumes when a fit took Caspian. Trembling came over him, a quaking from his very bones.
"'The following day, the crew and I'— Flavia!"
Flavia hurried over. She looked over Caspian.
"I'll fetch a chamomile tincture. It'll relax him, help him sleep and ease the tremors."
Ianthe nodded. Leaning over Caspian, she did her best to keep him from hurting himself.
Flavia rifled through her box of bottles. She retrieved what was needed and a glass cup to mix it in. All the while, her eyes darted back and forth between her work and the bed— it would not do for the King to injure himself on her watch.
Caspian suddenly shot upright, then fell back onto his elbows, eyes wide and seeing something neither of the others in the room could. Words spilled from him. Panicked, sharp, interrupted by heaving breaths. Flavia frowned; they sounded strange, but familiar, like Old Narnian in an accent or dialect she did not know. She then watched as, without hesitation, Ianthe reached out and smoothed the hair back from his forehead, replying in kind, that same language flowing from her like it was their shared tongue. Flavia's hackles rose. Caspian settled, murmuring something back before lying down again with his eyes closed.
Calming herself, Flavia carried the cup over to the bedside, setting it down near Ianthe's hand.
"What language were you speaking?" she asked.
"What?"
"It sounded familiar."
"It should." Ianthe gave her a brief, confused look. "We spoke as normal."
It was not Flavia's battle to fight.
"Of course." She nodded with a smile. "My apologies, it must have been something on the wind. Here, have him drink this."
Ianthe nodded. Shifting closer to Caspian on the bed, she lifted him with one arm and rested his head against her shoulder. With her other hand, she raised the glass to his lips.
"Drink," she prompted.
He frowned but swallowed the tincture whole. His face pinched at the bitter taste. Burrowing his head into her shoulder, he tucked his nose into the cloth of Ianthe's shift, looking for a second like the boy who would do the same when the nights became cold on top of the astronomy tower. Ianthe held him as his breathing slowed to a gentle rise and fall.
"That should keep him under for a while," Flavia said, taking the glass to clean, "try and rest whilst he does."
Ianthe laughed.
"What?"
"I, um… I heard someone once give advice like that to my mum, when she was nursing the youngest of us." She shook her head. "Just made me laugh."
Flavia chuckled. "Doesn't quite work that way, does it? For babes or for friends."
"No."
There was something about watching a loved one sleep. Seeing their face go slack. Watching their chest rise and fall. Listening to the room go quiet and still about them. Whether it was family, friend or lover, it was the same— the honour of vulnerability.
Ianthe laid Caspian down. She curled herself into the chair beside his bed, and watched.
When she next woke, it was bright daylight. Sitting up, a blanket— courtesy of Flavia, who had left and returned whilst Ianthe slept— fell about her hips. She immediately looked to her charge.
Flavia had moved Ianthe, chair and all, away from the bed so that she might sit and convince Caspian to eat. Her task was as of yet unsuccessful.
Whatever his burning dreams whispered to him had Caspian in his addled state convinced that food was not food but poison to be refused. None but Ianthe herself could manage him. At her voice, he would eat, and with the greatest reluctance; to force him to take it from anyone else's hands was beyond all who cared for him, but that did not stop them from trying— if only to grant Ianthe rest.
Flavia raised a steaming spoon to his lips.
"Highness, please," she said as gently as she could, but could not disguise the frustration in her voice.
Caspian shook his head.
"You must eat, your Highness."
Ianthe scrubbed a hand across her eyes. Sighing, she stretched and stood from the chair.
"Let me, Flavia."
Flavia's shoulders dropped a tad. She nodded, thankful, and handed over the bowl and spoon to Ianthe as she approached.
Forsaking the chair that Flavia had used, Ianthe perched on the side of Caspian's bed. She touched the spoon to his lips. He, as he had done each time Flavia had attempted the same, refused it.
"Cas," Ianthe said.
Eyes opening at the sound of her voice, a fraction of lucidity returned to him. He smiled a soporific smile.
"Annie."
She smiled, trying not to let her worry bleed into her face. "Eat. Or is your stubbornness going to force our hands?"
"I'd like to see you try."
It was said slowly, burdened by rasped breathing and a heavy chest, but with a glimmer of his usual self behind the veil of sickness.
Ianthe laughed quietly. "In this state? Even you have limits."
"What is it?" He jutted his chin towards the bowl.
"Broth, vegetables and beef bones, very restorative. Trufflehunter's been terrorising the kitchens for you." She nodded towards the spoon. "Don't let it go to waste. He still hasn't forgiven you for the first time."
A quip bubbled up in Caspian's eyes, but a wave of exhaustion drowned it. He leaned towards the spoon. Ianthe gently tipped it up. Caspian swallowed, relief passing across his face as the nourishment reinvigorated his body; even just that mouthful had him feeling like a new person.
It carried on that way. The spoon passed back and forth between the bowl and Caspian's lips, Ianthe patiently minding his trembling and feverish shudders until all that was left of the broth was a few drops that could not be collected.
When it was done, Ianthe set the bowl and spoon aside. Leaning forward, she laid a hand across Caspian's brow; it was still warm, still perspiring, but cooler than it had been when she first came upon him in a faint. Caspian closed his eyes and reclined into her touch. Her skin was hot but it was still of great comfort to him; it was a dry heat, not a sickly one, and thus served to set a doze upon him.
"Thank you, dearest," Ianthe whispered.
"Thank you," he said, soft and hoarse.
"Sleep now." She bent and pressed a kiss to his forehead. "I daresay you've barely scratched the surface of the sleep you missed."
Obedient, Caspian settled into his pillow and slipped into rest.
"He's nearing the end of it, I'd say," Flavia said.
"Yes. His eyes were clearer."
"Perhaps you should retire?"
Ianthe shook her head. "Not until the very end. Not until the danger has passed."
Flavia smiled. She expected nothing less.
When Caspian's eyes next opened, they were cloudless and bright. He sighed that deep sigh people made when they had slept well for a long, long time. Sitting up in bed, he noticed a weight at his side pressing the covers down. When he looked, he saw red hair sprawled across his leg and broad shoulders lifting and falling beneath that hair.
"Annie," he said, and touched her shoulder.
Ianthe jolted awake. Scrunching her face up, she tried to summon more energy than she truly had— her sleep had been shallow, and in short bursts.
"You're awake," she said, blinking at Caspian.
"I am."
Her eyes brightened. "You're awake! Thank the Lion, Cas. Oh, look at you."
She took his face in her hands and turned it side to side, then took Caspian's hand in both her own.
"That awful flush has gone. And your eyes… clear at last." She heaved a deep sigh and closed her eyes, muttering a prayer of thanks under her breath. "Oh, Cas. It has been dreadful."
"How long has it been?"
"Um…"
Flavia, entering with clean rags, answered where Ianthe could not. "Five days."
"Lion's Mane. The work—"
"Is done." Ianthe smiled. "The Calormenes have withdrawn. A treaty waits to be signed with your approval. There is no rush."
A weight sloughed from him. He sat back against the headboard and breathed deep.
"Maybe I should sleep for a week more often."
“Someone has barely moved from your bedside,” Flavia said slyly.
A tired smile stretched across Caspian's face. He reached out to Ianthe with his free hand, cupping the round of her shoulder in his palm and pressing down gently in the closest thing to a hug he could give at that moment. Ianthe smiled back and leaned down to the hand that she had clasped between her own, brushing a kiss to his knuckles that spoke of more than affection; that singular gesture relayed all her worry, all her work, all her relief, as fleeting and as light as it was.
“Let me guess,” Caspian mumbled, “I was doomed to die if you did not.”
Ianthe shook her head.
“No,” she said, just as quietly, “the choice was my own.”
Caspian’s smile widened.
“Now,” Flavia said in a businesslike manner, “you’ve broken the fever, but you're not well yet. You need rest. No excitement, no duties, nothing.”
Ianthe held back a laugh as Caspian's eyes lit up. Aslan knows he was far from lazy, serving his people was his greatest joy, but Caspian made no secret to her about his love of a holiday.
Perhaps, she thought, when he was a little better she could have him taken to Cair Paravel to see the sea.
“And I'm moments away from putting you on bed rest, too,” Flavia said to Ianthe.
“I am perfectly well, Flavia.”
“That is what your mouth says, yes, but those darkened eyes and gaunt cheeks say otherwise. Not to mention you haven't seen the sun in days. If you won't listen to doctor's orders, how about royal orders?”
Ianthe looked desperately at Caspian. A devious glint came into his eye.
“Ianthe, I order you—”
“Caspian."
“I order you to obey whatever our skilled apothecary commands.”
Bending to hit her forehead against the bed sheets, Ianthe groaned. Caspian laughed, the sound tainted by exhaustion but a delightful change from his fevered mumbling.
“Please, Annie. Do this for me?” he whispered.
Ianthe raised her head. She nodded with a smile. “I'll be back to see you when I can, dearest.”
“And not a moment before you're truly rested.”
Caspian's eyes dropped. Over the course of their conversation his voice had been steadily growing weaker. The fever had left him weary, his body frail compared to its usual hale state. Conversation was the most he could manage, and it appeared that he was beginning to reach the end of his meagre resources.
“Sleep, Cas,” Ianthe said gently.
“Mm-mm,” he shook his head with a stubborn wrinkle to his nose, “you first.”
“I cannot sleep here, silly. I promise I will once I know you are settled.”
That seemed to satisfy Caspian, for a moment later he slipped into his first truly peaceful sleep in a week. Ianthe sighed. A weight fell from her shoulders.
“You going to keep your promise?” Flavia said, motioning towards the door.
Ianthe nodded. Standing, she stretched. Her skin felt sticky, she noted, and was likely covered in a layer of grime. Perhaps a bath first would be best.
“Thank you, Flavia.”
“No, thank you. You've been a great help, so help yourself. Trust me, I've seen far too many loved ones burn themselves out.”
“You too. I'll let the staff know to attend to you, and the stables should have a horse ready for you should you wish to return home now that the danger is over. I've sent on an apology to your family for keeping you away so long.”
Flavia smiled; knowing Ianthe, that apology was likely a basket of both pleasant and practical comforts. Caspian sometimes joked that he should never have given Ianthe access to the royal purse, eager to please as she was, but it was well known that whatever Ianthe did had his wholehearted approval and involvement.
It was never mentioned aloud, but all the Old Narnians thought she would make a good Queen; best not to meddle, though— at least, not directly.
“Thank you, Ianthe. Now go, and do not find anything else to busy yourself with or I shall send Trufflehunter after you.”
A week later, and Caspian and Ianthe were sat beside one another at the beach that sat nestled underneath Cair Paravel.
The Cair was well underway with its restoration, and was already looking something like its former glory. Caspian was glad to, as part of his recovery holiday, take a tour around the safe parts of the castle and talk to its architects and workers after not having the time for them since they first drew up the blueprints together. An addition was made without his say— and when he saw it, he named it perfect. Stained glass windows; all depicting various scenes from across the ages in bright, spirited colours. The Kings and Queens were immortalised above the replicas of their thrones with Aslan at their centre.
Caspian, a little gaunt and quite weary, but happy, sat on the dais' steps for a long while bathed in the golden rays that streamed through the Lion's depiction. When Ianthe found him he seemed more well-rested than he had done after sleeping for that week. She took him down to the beach afterwards, steadying him on one arm and carrying a picnic basket— courtesy of Trufflehunter— in the other.
They sat nestled between two great rocks. From there, it was as if there were nothing in the world but them and the tide curling in front of them.
"Promise me that you'll never let it get that bad again." Ianthe looked across at him. "You frightened me."
Caspian nodded, staring at the sea. He always became a little distant around the ocean; not in a malicious way, but Ianthe knew that look— she grew up around it, saw it in the men and women of her home. A longing for the horizon.
She nudged him with a smile. "Patience, dearest. Your ship is not yet built."
He laughed, sheepish. "Sorry, Annie."
"No need. It's good to see you smile again. I was worried for a bit."
"You knew I would not die."
"I can never be certain."
Caspian reached out and wrapped his arm around her shoulders. She sighed and tucked her head against his shoulder, furling her own arm about his waist to draw him tight against her.
"We have survived much, dearest," he said quietly, "and shall survive more. Rest in that."