13th March, 1891 — Padmore Park

The remaining vestige of sense that Ailsa possessed was clamouring to the surface as she observed the sun beginning to diminish through the firs and evergreen trees that made up the forest. She was not especially far down the wooded path, nor was she even out of shouting distance of the lingering spectators - though she might have to magically increase her natural volume - but that didn't really count. Either way she was not going back until she was quite sure that Ewart was safe and if heading into the woods was where he had last been spotted then she would follow his trail diligently.

She did not feel the need to follow him as a nearby spectator had put it: "completely out of bloody control with that thing" though she did wonder whether being erratic might help her search. But what if she zigged where Ewart had zagged and ended up back at home instead?

"Ewart!" She called out - sans magical amplification - and without too much thought to what else might be dwelling even this far into the woods. "Darling, it's getting dark, we really ought to be heading home for tea."

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Ewart Fraser | Elias Grimstone

  

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The race had been going splendidly until somewhere in the forest - if this was the forest at all, for he had been sunk into pitch darkness and blinding light and at some point in between he had managed to lose all sense of where he was. The last thing he recalled was his teapot - which he had been riding in for a time, and had planned to later turn into a Viking-esque flying ship for the last leg over the lake - had, in the profusion and confusion of spellcasting, sprouted ostrich legs and sprinted off into the distance without him, and then Ewart had accidentally Vanished himself.

Or perhaps he had just hit his head, because when he regained consciousness or reappeared into Existence, he had somehow been thrown into the cradling branches of a tree, and was bleeding profusely from his forehead. The blood would be getting in his eyes but, fortunately, for the moment he was hanging upside down. And yet: no sign of the race.

And his head really was a jumble, from the vanishing. He had hoped to pull himself up to a more horizontal situation on the branch, but even if he had heard all the distant calling, he was not certain he would have recognised a familiar voice, nor indeed his own name. What he did hear, however, was - 

“Tea?” Ewart echoed, considering hauling himself up now and potentially even navigating a way down from the tree. His next exclamation was rather louder. “Did someone say tea?”

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The sound of her husband’s voice was music to Ailsa’s ears and she immediately felt as though everything was perfectly fine, or would be in a very short space of time. Locating him was still proving troublesome though, so she pulled out her wand and created a few balls of light to help her eyesight (which, she insisted, was not failing but simply testing her from time to time) and tried to recall where the sound had come from.

“Ewart, are you close-by?” She nudged the side of a bush with her shoe but only a squirrel ran out and across the path. Ailsa might have ignored it completely except one of her little balls of light trailed after the creature and she saw in it’s glow, quite briefly as both squirrel and ball of light took a detour to the right, her husband’s illuminated face.

“Oh my darling,” she said in as close a tone of panic as Ailsa ever achieved, hurrying towards where he hang out of the tree and upside down. She pressed a hand to his forehead, as though checking his temperature was of paramount importance at the moment, and came away with a bloody hand. “Were you attacked by a wild animal? Or another racer?” She asked, quite indignant about the latter option and cradling his head in her arms carefully.

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   Ewart Fraser

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“Oh, Ailsa!” Ewart exclaimed when she swam into upside-down view, trailed after by a cluster of lights like a brood of ducklings. Her name had come back to him, then, without him having to wrack his brains; that was rather hopeful.

He might have attempted to embrace her, if he were not clinging so tightly to the branches, but as it were broke into a smile. “Fancy seeing you here,” he returned, and could not quite work out why she was ambling through the forest at this point - where were the other contestants? was the race over? - but before he could inquire Ewart finally digested her question. “Oh, no, I don’t think so. I haven’t the faintest idea. Perhaps it was that squirrel of yours,” he joked, his eyes darting over to where he had briefly spotted the creature.

Now he did feel a little woozy, though. Perhaps it was the head-wound. First things first, then. “I think I may have to get out of this tree somehow.”

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   Elladora Black

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Pressing kisses to his head – and avoiding the blood as best she could – Ailsa glanced around their surroundings, trying to find something, anything that might be of use.

The squirrel? Doubtful, unless it was a person is disguise. A nearby bush rustled but soon went quiet and Ailsa doubted whatever was in there would help anyway. The other spectators were too far away to be of much use and she certainly couldn’t lift him down herself!

Fortunately she had her wand and had the perspicacity to remember that she was a witch, after all, so gravity and her husband’s weight were not the awkward prospect they might have been for a muggle woman.

“Keep still darling,” she cooed, stroking his face as she levitated him up gently and out of the way of the branches before lovingly depositing him on the softest bit of ground she could see. (Which, with it being dark and all, was not saying much.) Very quickly she swept towards him, robe flowing with pleasing drama as she crouched at his side and cradled his head again.

“There we are. Keep still my love, I don’t want you to get a headrush and fall over, I think your poor body has suffered enough for one day.”

  

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He hadn’t the foggiest how she had found him – how she had ended up in the forest instead of the stands at all – but how could he question her now, when she was as deft as any magical-catastrophe-Ministry-grunt and far more generous a nurse?

Being on the ground felt a great deal steadier than in the tree or whatever tossing-turning-tumult he had been caught up before, but the toothy grin he gave her was maybe proof of the bloodrush about which she was worried.

So he kept still. But on the matter of his poor body, well – “I suspect I may have gotten old along the way without noticing,” Ewart confessed a little mournfully. Which was not to say he had ever been particularly athletic, and his mind (usually, when not so addled by rogue vanishments) was surely as sharp as ever, but he felt about twenty-three inside. Hopefully Ailsa had not noticed this decline.

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“You will always be the handsome, dashing boy that stole my heart,” Ailsa cooed affectionately, unconcerned by the dirt her robes were no doubt picking up or that the sky, once darkening, seemed to have become full dark in a matter of moments. Such was the way of the forest, she supposed, and under happier circumstances she would be the first to suggest they create a fire and make the most of the great outdoors.

Today was not one of those sorts of days however. (And truthfully she had never really thought Ewart would be especially successful in the race, despite her encouragement.)

“I could apparate us home?” Ailsa offered tentatively, being famously terrible at it to the extent that she had failed the exam on five separate occasions. She could manage it but technically speaking she shouldn’t and if Ewart was injured now then the last thing he needed was to be splinched!

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   Ewart Fraser

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A burst of warmth surfaced in him at that. He was not certain he had ever been especially handsome or dashing, but Ailsa’s kind words and good looks had proved unabating, and if anything the affection he felt for her had grown in all these years. And, in the interests of accuracy, Ewart might protest that she had stolen his heart first.

Still... “Oh, no, better that we – take our time, I think,” Ewart protested loosely, never about to admit that he was utterly, chronically terrified of having to apparate alongside his wife, – and not steady enough himself at present to trust he could manage it for them both, either.

“Perhaps I could transfigure something else –” he began (...because the teacup had gone so well), scanning the woods with a sharp eye and spotting little else than a few tree roots in the dense darkness. Hm. “Or I suppose we could just meander.” Walking was safest for them both, probably. Ailsa had found her way this far in to the woods, after all, so Ewart had every faith that she could find her way out. Preferably before the vampires were intoxicated by the smell of his head-wound?

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   Marlena Scamander

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Apparating was firmly off the table – and bless Ewart’s heart that he still tried to be magnanimous about it despite the time she had nearly taken his foot off – so Ailsa instead did the next best thing and wove herself underneath his arm to help prop him up. She could be a crutch, even if she wasn’t much of a navigator. (Or a lander. Or vanisher. Or concentrator, to be quite honest.)

Helping her husband to his feet Ailsa lit her wand and held it aloft in her spare hand.

“The forest is so pretty a night isn’t it?” Ailsa mused idly. Somewhere in the distance there was a howl…

Oh well, if need be she could apparate them away. Better to lose a leg then have to miss the full moon for the rest of one’s life!

“Come on darling, I think you deserve a cold drink and a warm bed,” she grinned as they began to walk. “And I shall need warming up too by then but I'm sure we'll think of something...”

  

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