She allowed the bright rays to wash over her for a moment longer before opening her eyes and standing. Her body felt loose but settled as she turned to face her visitor. Gunnar's blonde hair cooled to a light silver in the moonlight, and the black veins that extended from his scar were stark compared to the rest of him.
Healing him had been one of the more difficult tasks she had ever experienced. By the time Liv had brought him to Nida, the belladonna had wreaked havoc on his body. Too close to death, she'd had to sedate him so she could cut out most of the rotting flesh that had begun to slough off. Dahlia had spent countless hours hunched over his cot in her office, back aching and stiff as she fought off the poison in his blood.
Eventually, Gunnar took a turn for the better around the same time that Maude woke from her stasis. But Maude was a mystery she was still trying to solve.
In the days leading up to her return to consciousness, Dahlia had worn down a path in the plush carpets between Maude's chambers and her office while tending to each of them. Brynna had been religious in administering the nutrition tonic to her sister, which helped keep up the Heir of Shadows' strength while she remained in stasis. Rather than waste away, the tonic helped Maude retain her good health while she recovered.
Unfortunately, the tonic needed to be adjusted every day based on what Maude's body needed more. Dahlia would check in every morning to assess her by placing herhands on Maude's fatemark and allowing her watergalderto flow with the Heir's blood. Typically, Dahlia would lose herself in the beat of someone's heart, the way their lungs would expand and deflate with each breath. In their blood, she could find the best ways to make them whole again. She loved her craft and took pride in her skill.
But with Maude, she had always felt uneasy. There was something familiar about her composition, there was also somethingotherthat lurked in the Heir's blood, something sinister that tinged her very cells. She was able to identify her needs easily enough, but often, after she finally withdrew herself from Maude's blood, Dahlia would feel that darkness for hours. The residual oiliness lay on her soul like a permanent stain until she moved on to her next patient.
Gunnar's nature had turned out to be just as wholesome as his blood had been. While healing him, Dahlia would pick up on the life that burst in his veins, the earthgalderthat reminded her of an open field in the highest point of summer. Though she'd lived in the mountains and cold her entire life, she knew immediately what it would feel like to run on the soft grass and smell the fresh wildflowers that grew in Veter without having stepped foot there.
Bringing her mind back to the present, Dahlia nodded in greeting toward Gunnar, who smiled widely at her.
"Are we not friends now, Matron?" he asked as he chuckled.
"My friends call me Dahlia," she responded her voice loud in her ears after hours of silence. "But you know this. You just wish to be irksome."
Gunnar smiled even wider. "You caught me."
Dahlia rolled her eyes and started heading down the path that led back to their cabin. After a late start this morning, her exhaustion was more palpable than she had realized. Dahlia had spent most of her waking hours at the highest peak above Odin's temple so she could spiral into hergalderand gather enough strength for Midsommar. She would need to be at her peak strength to assist in the removal of the General of Rivers's iron restraint.
Evil swirled beneath the metal, and its parasitic relationship with the General plagued Dahlia at each quiet moment of the day. During the entire trek up toHilgafell, she was absorbed by the task of removing the iron from his skin without causing any unknown damage. The band was feeding off of him, both hisgalderand his strength, but she was sure these things would remain when the band was finally removed.
What worried her was if that corruption would remain as well. There was no precedent for dealing with this sort of dark magic, and she hated that her first attempt would be on someone so important to the Heir of Shadows.
"What brings you this high up the mountain?" Dahlia asked as she and Gunnar walked in comfortable silence.
He hesitated for a moment before he spoke. All of the airiness left his voice now as he spoke.
"I was wondering if there was a way for you to help Hakon," he started slowly, the direction of his request already clear to her. "He's struggling. I've never seen him like this before, and Liv tells me that it's only getting worse. We don't know how to reach him, how to pull him from this decline he is in."
Dahlia was quiet for a long moment while she thought about how to respond. Those who did not heal withgalderdid not always understand the limitations of the practice.
"The way mygalderheals is through the physical manifestation in the blood," Dahlia began slowly. "I can hold poison in the blood long enough to withdraw it, I can pick up signs of infection, I can sense if the body requires certain nutrients, I can detect illness often days before it becomes known to a person. Mygaldertells me what the body needs, and I take that knowledge to create a treatment, whether it be a tonic, salve, or another type of therapy."
Gunnar nodded along, his focus on the ground beneath them as he processed each word carefully.
She continued, "With all this being said, I suspect I already know what Hakon needs without having to read it in his blood."
They slowed their pace as the golden roof of the temple glinted in the moonlight, the rollicking crowds of worshippers reaching them on the smoke and wind thatbreezed through the camps. Around them, however, there was a stillness that radiated from between the trees as Gunnar absorbed her words.
"How do I help him?" he asked her as he stared over the encampment stretching before them.
"He has to want your help first," she replied gently. "Unfortunately, the sorrow and hatred that consume him will continue to intensify until he reaches a breaking point. He'll have to decide if hewantsto be saved."
Gunnar nodded once before he continued down their path to the cabin. Already, those who had come to pay tribute to the gods for the longest day of the year were devolving into chaos. When the crowds grew rambunctious like this, it was in Dahlia's nature to join. The revelry surrounding the solar and lunar events of their world already brought Elven to their wilder natures, but they were here for a purpose that overruled base enjoyment.
Each Elven kingdom celebrated the summer and winter solstice in their own ways in the past: the Light Elven worshipping the sun on the summer solstice, or Midsommar, while the Shadow Elven worshipped the moon on the winter solstice, or Yule. With the merging of their kingdom's all those years ago, both festivals became the high point for most of the Elven. Now, they are each celebrated with doubled excitement from both Shadow and Light Elven. The solstices came to represent how the Elven persevered in a time where their fates became uncertain.
Back in Nida, festivals for the longest day of the year would be starting with bonfires and long tables of summer crops and berries ready for feasting. Crowns of wildflowers would be woven into braids, and strings of summer blueberries would stain mouths purple. Of course, being so far north, the berries will have been harvested from other kingdoms and traded under the guise of nomads in Finniskali, while the flowers will be the ones more often found in the moon gardens of Nida and not the wild fields of Veter or Ljosa.
While Dahlia enjoyed celebrating Midsommar, her favorite time of year was the winter solstice. The darkness of the winter nights wrapped around her heart with a warmth and comfort that was unmatched. But she was a Shadow Elven, after all.
The winter solstice was a grand affair in Nida. The fresh pine and evergreen wreaths and garland hanging from the arches of the Midnight Palace warming the moonstone halls as candles burned in every corner of the structure to light the longest night of the year was a sight that could not be replicated anywhere else. Shadow Elven are already drawn to the dark on a regular day of the year, but Yule brings them out in droves, which almost overwhelms the streets of Nida. The music and celebration during Yule always resulted in Dahlia losing herself to her more untamed character.
So, as they trekked through the hordes of worshippers celebrating the sun, Dahlia blocked the sound from her ears with her airgalder.The energy that bounded from the revelers was starting to make her heart pound in her chest. Her blood was thrumming along with every drum beat, her bones aching to dance with every step she took away from the campfires.
