Roseroot
Kelda rushes into the parlor not a moment later.
Dagfinn’s sprawled form at Euphemia’s feet would be impossible to miss, and she reacts to it immediately.
“Gods. What happened?” Before Euphemia can answer, Kelda shouts over her shoulder, “Asvald! He’s in here! Come quick!”
Kelda rushes to Dagfinn’s body and starts frantically inspecting him.
Shaking him.
Pulling his eyelids open.
Slapping the sides of his face.
Screaming his name.
Sobbing.
Roaring with the rage of a mother who had only just found hope again.
Only once Asvald arrives does Kelda finally settle.
She asks Euphemia what happened. Fortunately, she doesn’t have to make up much of a lie. She tells them he was standing there one moment, and then all of a sudden he collapsed like he had suddenly fallen back asleep.
The three of them carry Dagfinn’s body back to the tower where Kelda says he’ll be more comfortable. Truthfully, Euphemia thinks Kelda would simply rather have him in a secure chamber just in case something strange occurs again.
They spend the rest of the afternoon making sure Dagfinn is comfortable, bringing hm food and drink, and stoking the fire.
But mostly Euphemia is there to comfort Kelda.
Over the hours, she bursts into tears multiple times.
She asks the two of them if they think she did the ritual wrong, or if something might have broken it.
When they find the dream ward still tucked safely under his pillow, they’re finally able to convince Kelda that she did everything right. None of this is her fault.
Euphemia wants to tell her the truth.
But until Dagfinn is back home, she thinks it’s best to wait.
At least Kelda doesn’t have to wait much longer. None of them do.
As the evening winds down, they eventually leave Dagfinn in his chamber and head downstairs, Kelda leading the way.
Her arms are folded over herself, her head bowed.
Once they’re back on the upper landing, Kelda stops in the hall. She looks between both of them with a heaviness Euphemia hasn’t seen in her before. A weight she knows Kelda has been carrying, but she has been hiding it better than anyone else could.
Kelda opens her mouth as if she’s about to say something neither of them wants to hear.
Instead, she sighs. “Get some rest, the both of you.”
Then she retreats down the hall before, Asvald leaving as well, his footsteps matching the thunder outside.
The day has turned dark.
The storm outside is brutal.
But Euphemia still holds hope that there is something good to come from the day yet.
She heads to her bedchamber, only to pass the time inconspicuously. After Kelda’s announcement, it now feels more important than ever not to alert her of Euphemia’s and Dagfinn’s plan, not until he’s safely back in his own body.
A full hour passes before Euphemia risks leaving her bedchamber again.
When she does, though she’s loath to take any longer than necessary, she stops first in the kitchen, where she borrows a dinner fork. Since it is a root she was told to retrieve, having something to help gently dig it up could prove useful.
She tucks the fork into a small satchel she found in her bedchamber, leaves the kitchen, and heads out into the night.
Outside, the storm has become feral.
The wind whips through her.
The rain pelts her in the face.
Pinching her eyes shut, Euphemia tells herself just to get it done, and then she can come back inside to the warmth.
This is the final task before she can make the draught and Dagfinn can come home.
Being soaked to the bone is a small price to pay.
She hurries across the dismal cliffs, her face salt-slicked and aching.
Dagfinn’s instructions were straightforward enough: head to the cliffs east of the manor, peer over the ledge, and find the patch of roseroot.
But it’s once she reaches the jagged edge that her bluster ebbs.
The cliff ends in darkness, but Euphemia can hear the ocean beyond it, churning and deadly.
With the wind thrashing at her hair and skirts the way it is, she decides the safest thing to do will be to lower herself onto her belly.
The ground is cold and wet beneath her.
It’s difficult to see anything over the ledge.
The storm blocks most of the moonlight.
But she sees a small patch of something.
Euphemia grabs her fork and starts digging.
She’s lying there long enough that she has to spit out puddles of rain that keep pooling on her lips. Every part of her is drenched, her hair plastered to her face. Her garments weighing her down and rooting her to the earth.
But, Euphemia digs.
Fortunately, the rain has softened what little dirt there is here.
The texture crumbles like clay beneath her fork. She presses deeper into the grainy terrain, slowly chipping it away.
A roll of thunder directly overhead makes Euphemia jump.
The fork plummets into the waves below.
Euphemia curses under her breath. She cannot leave without the roseroot though.
So she slides herself over the ledge a little farther, digging her toes in the rocky terrain above.
Euphemia digs her fingers into the earth, mud clogging the underside of her nails, scraping to find purchase.
Then she feels it.
A tangled web of thick and coarse vine-like strands that must be the roots.
Euphemia digs around the entire base of one of the stalks of roseroot before gently, carefully, prying it up. The muddy thing feels more like a cluster of shriveled veins.
Before the wind can knock it out of her hand, she places it into the satchel.
She pulls a few more of the roseroot flowers up—stem, root, and all—and adds them with the rest.
When she’s finally satisfied she has what she needs, Euphemia unsticks herself from the ground like a sopping mop.
She has to walk bow-legged back to the manor because her sodden skirts are so heavy.
Her boots squelch with every step. She shields her eyes from the onslaught of rain, even though her attempts remain futile.
By the time Euphemia reaches the perron, she’s so slick with rainwater it’s gushing down her face like a stream. She can barely see more than shadows.
Careful to move slowly, she sloshes up the steps when a familiar voice greets her.
“There she is,” Kelda sings with mocking warmth from the threshold. “Gone for an evening stroll, have we?”