Theo had never expected how terrifying it would feel to have to trust someone you couldn’t see. She could be readying herself to stick a knife in his chest and it would be entirely indecipherable to him. Not that she sounded like she was going to – she had squeezed his hand reassuringly, after all, and she had to be a mediwitch, talking him through precisely what she was going to do before she did it.

So he jerked his chin down in a slight nod, okay, and sucked in a breath before he felt her hands, a soft pressure on his cheeks. He could feel the faint rush of air when she spoke; he didn’t dare move, in case she was too close for comfort. Instead, he tried to stop himself from imagining what he couldn’t see, and take himself back to pre-knockout to help explain his state to her. “Uh – there was a Stunning spell coming at me,” he said, “and I – I’d cast a conjunctivitis curse, but they collided and – I think I got both. I went down, and –” Madam Sykes had sneezed. Cash had been talking to him, or about him. “I’m not sure, after that. I was – dizzy, and I –” he tried to blink to demonstrate that it made no difference to him now whether his eyes were open or closed.

“And I assume I lost the duel,” he added wryly, trying for humour to distract himself from the simmering panic.

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