I'm the same as I ever was, same as I ever will be
Goddamn canonical me
I've been around the bend I've been
Taking any way to weigh myself down

16th September, 1893 — St. Mungo’s, London, after this thread

It didn’t look like morning when he awoke. Something too bright about the light filtering in through the window – why hadn’t the blinds been closed? Evander blinked blearily and tried to turn onto his side away from it – and gasped in pain.

His whole abdomen hurt. Vehemently. He felt like there’d been a tearing sensation as he moved, like he was barely being held together. If he had been able to shift his head and look down at himself, all he would have been able to see was extensive bandaging about his midriff. (Under it, the bite, where the Vipertooth had snatched him up into its teeth; Evander didn’t remember this, but he could feel the wound still pulsing slightly from the lingering venom.)

Evander, in fact, couldn’t presently remember anything that had happened since the debate. He felt hot and sweaty, and clammy in this bed, and with an immense groan he tried to push himself up to a sitting position, when someone put a hand on him to prevent it.

“Caroline?” He asked groggily, trying to get his vision to focus. What time was it? Why was she in here? Merlin forbid – “Am I late?”

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Caroline Darrow/Sisse Thompsett

  

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In the past months Caroline could no longer ignore what was happening in her marriage, could no longer hold at bay the doubts that perhaps she had made the wrong choice. But regardless of what she had begun to realize, Caroline's heart still beat for Evander. if there had been any doubt of the depth of her devotion it had disappeared two days ago. Who would have thought all she needed to be reminded was dragons?

As Caroline sat rigid with tension in a chair pulled right up to the bedside, Evander's limp hand in her's, Caroline thought of the chaos of the last few days. What had been a surprise visit to her brother, with the intention of surprising Evander at the debate had turned into a nightmare. Shawn and Tony had wanted a lunch before the debate and the new cook that Tony had hired had managed to undercook the entire meal. It was an argument for why Tony should never be in charge of a household, Caroline had decided firmly, solidifying her quest to find her older brother a wife. They'd had to wait for lunch to be returned to the kitchens and then brought back out. By that point she had been late to the debate and had decided simply to return home. But then the roaring began.

The hours that had passed after that first sound blurred in Caroline's mind. A panic as she tried to make her way to debate to find Evander, being pushed back beyond the barrier to the triage location. Her desperate attempts through out the evening to locate Evander. It had taken her until midday the following day to find Evander, her heart thumping rapidly in panic, but at last she found him in much the same state as he was now.

The healers said that his body needed rest to heal, she suspected they did not tell her the extent of the horrors he had been brought in with, but what they had told her (facts, not feelings, and certainly not nearly what Caroline had wanted to know) had not been reassuring. Caroline hadn't slept as she sat vigil over his body, words of the prayers her mother taught her murmuring in a waterfall over her lips for hours on end.

Had he just moved? Caroline's tired eyes sprung to his face, looking for any signs of sternness in his face, so peaceful in rest. An unnerving peaceful in this situation, but one she had loved to watch when they were in bed together. It was a look of surrender on his face, that spoke of the kindness and peace of spirit she had fallen in love with. His brow crinkled slightly, the set of his mouth tightening. Relief surged through Caroline's body. No sooner had his eyes opened then he was trying to sit up. Terrified for his wounds Caroline's hand free hand gently pushed on his shoulder encouraging him to lay back down.

Evander was looking at her, but it felt as if he didn't truly see her. Perhaps for the best as tears of relief were blurring her own vision. But his words made no sense. "Late?" She echoed, forgetting in her relief to hide her confusion. "Whatever would you be late for my dear?" She swallowed, her voice tightening as she tried to lighten it. Her hand squeezed his own as she let his shoulder go. All she wanted to do was throw herself at Evander and cry, to feel his blessed embrace around her - but that was selfish and would hurt him. More than that it would hurt his pride.

  

He managed to concentrate on Caroline eventually, though he didn’t quite trust the sight of her – there were tears in her eyes. What was that for?

And she seemed peculiarly confused about his question of lateness. “...for work,” Evander put in, just as perplexed, because that was where he was always going when he got up – although what day was it? And where – he could turn his head, for all that his neck ached, because it was nothing compared to the other pain – was he? This wasn’t his own bedroom; he wasn’t at home.

And the way she was squeezing his hand... It was odd, and too tight, and rather uncomfortable, and if Evander’s mouth hadn’t felt so dry and hoarse from disuse he might have said so. As it was, he managed instead, “What happened?”

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Work, of course it was work. It was always work with Evander. Not Lillian, not her, not even trying for a new job. No. Just work. Had it been under normal circumstances, had she not just sat at his hospital bedside, her frustration wouldn't have been tampered. But as it were, she was lucky he was alive, lucky to have such love in her life in the first place.

Caroline was just about to explain that he didn't need to be at work when it appeared that for the first time Evander realized something was amiss. Her annoyance evaporated. He hadn't know. It wasn't that he just wanted to get back to work, it was that he thought this was a normal morning. Or something akin to it. Gently she broached the subject, "You were attacked by a dragon."

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   Evander Darrow

He heard her, but Evander was sure his ears could not be working properly, because that was as good as gibberish. “What?” he said, submitting to his wooziness enough to rest his head back down on the pillow, but still furrowing his brow at Caroline. “No, that can’t be right,” he argued. “You’re thinking of my father.” Where would Evander have bumped into a dragon?

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Evander's confusion was clear on his face, his head coming back to rest on the pillow. It reminded Caroline of Shawn in those days when he'd first been returned to them. Caroline's heart ached at the thought, especially at Evander's next words. No, she knew her husband from his late father well enough, but it was dawning on her that the trickle of anger she felt at his denial was because of her own fear. She hadn't felt that way when she had stayed by Shawn's side, helped him remember who he was. Well, she certainly wasn't going to let it rule her now with the man she loved.

Steeling herself, willing calmness into her very being Caroline gently explained, "London was beset by dragons yesterday." She would not show her fear, she reminded herself, only her steadfast calm. It was what he'd need and right now, now that her initial relief had had a chance to flow through her, now he needed to be the priority. "You were caught in the attack." As she had every time she had told Shawn something her entire being hoped this would be what would trigger his memories. She had felt that hope, tingling and precious, so many times before, and felt it dashed so many times before. But Caroline was nothing if not tenacious. She could do this. She could do this again.

  

“London?” Evander echoed, slow and sluggish and sure that was impossible. But he trusted Caroline, and from all he could tell of her at his side she seemed deathly serious. She would not be cruel enough to make a joke of dragons. “Was I? And you – were you?”

She was here, but sitting in a chair, so perhaps not so badly caught in said attack as he. If he decided to believe her – if he took this as an exercise in logic – then he had survived said encounter with a dragon, but had landed himself in the hospital. Which meant he was not supposed to be going to work today, probably; which meant the pain he was feeling must be linked. Evander resolved to do some further investigation, and looked down at his midriff, placing a hand wonderingly on the bandaged section: the first he had seen of it.

The wound beneath it pulsed out, newly aggravated – and he cried out in spite of himself, biting down on his tongue and tasting blood, because it had flooded back to him now. The dragon’s maw. Its teeth, swimming too close in his vision. The weight of it crushing his ribs together. “But I’m alive?” he asked, weakly.

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It took a great deal of will to keep her face neutral, to watch him form the questions, but she did. "No." She shook her head, almost surprised at the worry that seemed to be in his words at his question about her. She'd seen Evander worry over her before, but it had been so long. And, her stomach tightened at the thought, the last time he had it had been more of a fight. "I was at the townhouse." The one Evander had visited so many times when they were courting, the one the Delaneys had let for originally only a year and now had bought. It was the base of Darrow operations here in England, and Evander would, alright should know where she meant. "With Shawn and Tony." She added, just to ensure there was no more worry about it.

She was silent then, watching his features, looking at him as he considered this information. She could only hope his mind was knitting the words together into memories. Without realizing it she found she was holding her breathe and had to remind herself to breathe, careful not to let a sigh escape her lips.

And then her husband did a foolish thing and touched his wounds. Caroline was moving forward as soon as she watched that hand drifting toward the bandages, but she was too late and his cry brought the past twenty four hours crashing down on her again. She had to be strong, she reminded herself, strong. "No, darling. Not dead." She assured him, grabbing his hand away so it wouldn't do anything else so foolish, and holding it in her own small palm. "Which is good as Lillian and I would -" Her voice choked up, the words caught in the reminder that she did love Evander. No matter how uptight and foolish he might be, no matter how he seemed the opposite of her. And she had never told him that. She had never said she loved him because she had been waiting for this stubborn, stern, handsome man to say it first.

Her resolve cracked open, her collected features melting into the pain she felt. That cry, it had hurt her to her soul. Those long hours looking for him, sitting by him, praying to a God she so often didn't even remember to turn to. She wanted to throw her arms around him and sob into his shoulder, something he would hate terribly, and something which she couldn't do given that she did not actually wish to cause him more pain. Damn the British and their lack of emotions, Caroline was a creature of emotion. She'd been wrapped to tight in the layers of who Evander wanted her to be she had forgotten to be the wife he had fallen in love with. "Oh Evander! It's quite a good thing because I couldn't lose you. Not when I love you so dearly."

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   Evander Darrow

“Thank God,” Evander said fervently, though he imagined God had had little to do with it – it sounded sheer coincidence that she and Lillian had been indoors, and safe, and otherwise spared from the catastrophe.

Although, he wondered (made woozy, delirious still from the concoction of pain potions he must be on), was the pain he was suffering now his fated punishment for blaming her for her actions and the miscarriage in the Sanditon storm? He had not run headlong into danger here – well, not intentionally, not really – but he wasn’t sure he had been terribly forgiving towards Caroline then, after. Hadn’t it been September, too? Two years ago?

His throat had closed up thinking about it, and the wave of guilt (– regret or sorrow or shame –) shook itself free, passing quietly across his face in furrowed lines. And that was before she had broken him with sorrow all over again, in the present – she had grasped his hand and sounded overcome with choked-up emotion and been so glad not to lose him. Him. She loved him, she said. Loved him dearly.

It turned out to be too much for him – she was too much for him, her honest feelings strangely bright and blinding in the hospital room. Evander didn’t pull his hand out of hers, but his other palm came up shakily to cover his own face, hiding his eyes to fight the sudden, overwhelming urge to bawl. “You shouldn’t,” he gasped out, voice thick with emotion and head swimming with attempted comprehension of it. Agitated, he added – “I don’t know why you would.” He hadn’t ever been good for her, and although she had married him she couldn’t possibly love him, because it didn’t make any sense. He didn’t deserve her, and she oughtn’t have settled for him. He was – he was going to have a panic attack about it, maybe, because his chest had seized up, everything tight and twisted on itself.

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"Evander." Caroline whispered as she let one of her hands release his and float up to his jaw, landing gently there as he hid from her. His words bit at her, tugging tight and pulling. She couldn't understand why she shouldn't love him. Beyond the fact that they were complete oppisites and always had been. Her love for him was unexpected, irrational, and nothing that she had planned. But she did love him. She wouldn't have settled into this life, given away her freedom (albeit foolishly), if she had felt for him anything less than love.

She needed him to see her, to see her earnestness, so she pulled his hand aside and tilted his face so she was forced to look into her gaze. "Love doesn't have to make sense." She told him, hardly realizing that for the first time in two years she felt like herself. "Whether I should or shouldn't, I do love you. And there is no possible reason why I shouldn't." Her words were fierce, protective, an angry love, passionate and strong. She may have felt as if everything had shackled her down, as if she had chosen the wrong path, but she had chosen it for a reason. And that reason was the inexplicable love that had bloomed between them. She may not have known how mismatched they were then, but she did now, and yet, even after it all, she still loved him. Still wanted to throw her arms around him and hold him tight. To watch him cuddle their daughter to his chest, to guard his emotion, to watch him blush when she teased him. She wanted him. And it didn't make sense. But it didn't have to. Because she was a creature of feeling not of logic and that, she was quite convinced, was why Evander had fallen in love with her in the first place.

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   Evander Darrow

He wanted to fight her on it when she removed his hand from his face, and he wanted to argue with her as well, but he was too overwrought and his body was too weak to manage an effective counter. So he found himself looking at her, her gaze fierce, those blue-green eyes that reminded him so strongly of the ocean but that he loved so well in spite of it.

And she said she loved him, and Evander understood the threatening panic attack now, because – he never felt so overwhelmed and nervous and frantic as when faced by the thought of losing her. And he was afraid he was going to lose her – not to death by dragons or by drowning on a cruise ship, or even by another storm like the Sanditon, but by having her right here and letting her slip through his fingers anyway, just by not daring to hold on.

Or this was the deliriousness talking, knee-jerk reactions Evander couldn’t control. The pain potions they had him on, probably. That made things more logical.

“I suppose you must,” he said faintly, because he still couldn’t fathom why but she felt evidently angry enough about it that she must mean what she said. “And I – well, I – well, you know that I love you.” He always had, he supposed. But it felt so grossly inadequate coming from him – to her – that he felt resoundingly embarrassed about voicing it, high on the pain potions or no.

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   Caroline Darrow

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She would have given anything to have heard those words before now, in a way she supposed she had given anything - she'd given her husband an opportunity to die before he'd uttered them. These past months, truly years now, she had been drowning without them, had wanted nothing more than for the ship to creak and Evander's fissure to crack. She'd reminded herself time and again that he must love her, that they were too different for him not to have married her without love, but her resolve had faded more each day until she'd felt grey and limp like a photograph whose enchantment had worn off and had stilled in its frame.

But now, hearing them, now, they made her angry and happy at the same time. She could cry, she could laugh, she could rage. "I know." She told him, a smile on her lips, for it was the truth, no matter her doubt - doubt which crept unbidden into her tone, cross and scolding. "It wouldn't have hurt to tell me before you were almost eaten by a dragon though." Caroline found herself scolding him, full of contradictions and emotions, a sea of which she had bottled up and now spilled about them.

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   Evander Darrow

He could almost feel the world turning with them on it, in this hospital room. There was certainly far too much swirling emotion in here, for any one room, to be reasonable. Evander felt seasick, in fact.

He certainly could not decipher Caroline’s crowd of emotions, one from the next; he wasn’t sure he would have been able to even without his abdomen and his temples pulsing in pain. She seemed to be talking very loudly. “Well, if you knew, there was very little sense in me telling you, was there?” Evander tried to argue – although it came out rather more feeble and mumbling than he had intended.

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The logic had her jaw faltering open in surprise, faulty logic of the type her husband so rarely employed. "There was a great deal of sense in telling me!" Caroline scolded before she could think better of it. "Evander," Her voice softened, "Women need to be told from time to time. I need to know. Else, I make up stories in my mind." Her voice was barely a whisper and she suddenly couldn't meet his gaze, a blush blooming on her cheeks. That was the crux of it, truly. She had doubted everything that she had known when she had married him. Told herself that it all had been a mistake, a misunderstanding. But the truth was right here in front of her, spreading its wings and stretching between them once again as it had years ago when they had first fallen for each other. Now she knew, sure heartedly that she wasn't just trophy wife, that he did actually love her.

  

A small, petulant part of him protested to her scolding him like this, when he was abed in the hospital, half-mauled by a dragon, and he was the sort of person who found lectures just as painful as any near-death injury.

But by the time she was blushing his expression had softened too, and – in spite of the effort he had to afford to the motion, and the wince he held back – Evander lifted his hand to glide it along her arm in comfort, half-wishing she would just look at him again, because he was too tired to say all the things she wanted him to. Women, he would have tutted, if he had the energy, and their fickle imaginations. But Evander fancied he was afraid to know what stories she had made up about him and them. “I love you, Caroline,” he said plainly this time, sighing. “And I’m rather glad to not be dead.”

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His hand was warm on her sleeve, seeping to her arm below. She almost did weep at the simple gesture, but instead his words had her eyes slowly moving back to meet his gaze. "I'm rather glad as well." She said echoed back, leaning down to kiss him gently on the lips. What an understatement to be uttered.

"Now, you ought to rest. I will see if the healer can come in and check on you." She bustled back into business, determined that Evander would have the best care possible. Soon he would be home. Home. She couldn't stand to consider the shift in her emotions, in all that had had happened in the last twenty four hours. There would be time for that later.