#wheeeeeeeeee!

This time she sat bolt upright with a gasp.  Where?  Where was he...?  But even as the thoughts assembled in her mind, there was motion next to her.  She turned and stared.  Like her, he’d been tucked into bed up to his shoulders.  A thin undershirt had been put on him.  His grey hair, shaggy as it had always been, fell over his brow and eyes.  He murmured softly.

She stared at him wide-eyed, mouth working silently.  Then she fairly pounced on him, grabbing him by the shoulders and shaking.  “Haurchefant!  Haurchefant!”

He came to in a confused scattering of limbs, hair flying as he shook himself wait.  “What?  What is?  What?” he asked confusedly, staring up at her.  He blinked his beautiful blue eyes, momentarily stunned as he looked up at her.  Then, like her, he jolted upright, pushing down the linens and scrabbling at his shirt, pulling it up and palming at his stomach - at the place where there should have been a gaping hole but was, in fact, nothing more than than what should have been: pristine flesh and the sculpting of his abdominal muscles

He looked up at her once more and laughed suddenly, the shaky laugh of a man who has just realized everything is alright after all.  “More fool me,” he said, his humor self-recriminating.  “I thought myself even beyond your power to heal.”

“You were,” she said, voice breaking as tears flowed from her eyes.  “I lost you for so long...”

He pulled her to him and she threw her arms around his shoulders.  “I’m here now, love,” he murmured in her ear, and the dam burst as she shuddered.  “I’m here,” he soothed as she sobbed.  “I’m here.”

He only stopped when she pressed her lips to his.

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Someone had taken her stained robes.  She was half-inclined to let them keep them - they bore too many scars for her to wear easily once more.  She’d been left to her underclothing, but there were house clothes provided in the closet.  The first to find them as they left the room were the staff, all of whom came forth to touch Haurchefant’s hands and face to reassure themselves that the man was no illusion.

Then there was a bark, and both of them turned to see Count Edmont hastening towards them, stumbling slightly as he struggled briefly with his cane.  Haurchefant wasted no time in hurrying to his father’s side, and the pair were caught up in an embrace of such emotion that the Count’s cane clattered to the floor forgotten.  “Oh, my son,” he cried aloud.  “My son.  My son.”

“I know not how you did,” he said later, when he had collected himself.  “Only that you have done.  I cannot voice thanks enough for returning my son to me.”  His voice hitched, and Malori bit her lip.

“I couldn’t have lived with myself otherwise,” she said, and the words were true enough.

Artoirel and Emmanelain were hardly less outspoken than their father, and all was joyous until a set of footsteps, lighter than those of the three Ishgardians, came to join them.

“Master Alphinaud!” Haurchefant crowed, his face lit with his customary unguarded smile.

Alphinaud, however, looked at the man through the fringe of his white hair, and made no move to come close, but rather reached for the device at his shoulder, holding the lenses over his eyes like a pair of binoculars.  There was a soft whine as he activated it and peered through the visor at Haurchefant, whose smile began to wilt.  Malori felt her heart jump into her chest.  She couldn’t have.  No.  Could she...?

After a long moment, Alphinaud lowered his visor once more and clicked it off, his face drooping.

“...welcome home, Lord Commander,” he murmured, in a voice choked with emotion.  Then he coughed as Haurchefant caught him up and squeezed him momentarily before setting him back down on his feet.

“Yes, that reminds me,” Haurchefant said then, turning to his father once more.  “Malori has...filled me in on how long I have been gone,” he said, his face sobering.  “I understand that others have begun the task of taking the reins left slack by my absence at Camp Dragonhead.”  He glanced briefly towards Emmanelain, who blushed and ducked his head slightly.  “And so I think it meet that I permit that process continue.  I, Haurchefant de Fortemps, do tender my resignation as Commadner of Camp Dragonhead.”

Count Edmont lifted his hand to his chin and considered.  “What will you do instead?”

Haurchefant had no poker face at all; he glanced towards Malori and smiled.  Edmont snorted, and did not wait for his son’s reply.  “Well.  ‘Tis high time that an Ishgardian joined the Scions of the Seventh Dawn, I suppose.”

Laughter echoed the pronouncement.

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“I threw it into the abyss,” Alphinaud said later, when Malori’s memory finally caught up to her sufficiently to ask after Nidhogg’s eye.  “It was what Ser Aymeric wanted, and when it rolled from you I seized it.”

“Thank you,” Malori said, adjusting her coat.  She suspected a certain lalafell had been busy of late - she had been provided a whole new outfit, including a long, gloriously white double-breasted coat that came all the way down to her calves.

“Hraesvelgr was quite distraught when you absconded with it.  Not to mention his own,” Alphinaud added reproachfully.  He held out the golden orb, and Malori took it from him.

“I’ll take it back to him,” she promised.

“We will,” Haurchefant corrected, coming forth to join them, radiant in a new set of armor.  “I am looking forward to seeing if the heights of Dravania are as glorious as my father’s memoirs describe them.”

“More,” Malori said with a smile.

“I will be waiting for you when you return,” Alphinaud said with a bow, and left them.

“Ready?” Malori asked, and felt a gloved hand squeeze her own.

“Lead on,” Haurchefant assured her with a smile, and she could hardly help but return it, color flowing into her cheeks.  Then she stepped forth, heading for the door.  Haurchefant moved to follow, and hesitated only momentarily, glancing over his shoulder before hurrying after.

At the edge of his hearing, the knight of Ishgard thought he hard heard a woman’s voice speaking.  He thought he’d even made out a few words...