A/N: This may or may not break your heart. It broke mine, and I'm devising this plot. Please pray for my brain to figure out how this will all work out. :'(

Tam. 

He was alive. 

Not well, but alive was all that mattered right now. 

"Call Elwin."

"He's always on speed dial for Sophie."

They were saying something in the back, but the words were fuzzy. I was focused on my brother, who was in my arms for the first time in what felt like hours. 

His silver bangs were swept off to the side, and his head lolled in my hands. 

Hot tears streamed down my face. 

He doesn't deserve this. 

He's my family. 

The one who stood by me when everyone else turned their backs on me. 

After I left, he would have become the favored child. 

But he didn't. 

Oh, Elwin, please come soon. 

My eyes ran up and down his body, looking for anymore injuries, and then I saw his feet. 

A gasp fled from my throat. 

His feet. 

Edaline looked over at me and Tam, and saw it too. 

Silent tears, steaming rivulets escaped her eyes, and Edaline reached out to me. 

She snapped her fingers, and a cloak appeared, drifting down and covering Tam's feet. 

"Thank you," I whispered.

A small smile creased her face. 

"No one needs to see a loved one suffer."

I tried to smile back, and I think she saw it, for Edaline blinked at me, and turned back to Sophie.

Her hand reached out to me, and grasped mine. I smiled through my tears, a real one. 

Even through the pain, Edaline was still there for me. 

She was there for all of us. 

I felt something being placed over my shoulders. 

It was Della's cloak, and when I turned to look at her, I saw that she had Alden's cloak around her. 

"But....the blood. It'll stain."

I tried to hand the scarlet cloak embroidered with gold back to Della, fingering the threads. 

She shook her head, inclining it in such a regal and yet motherly fashion. 

Her chocolate tresses, they swayed with her movements as she blinked towards me. 

"A life is more important than something that can be replaced."

"My pride, reputation, money, all that can be replaced, but Tam's life? We only get one of him. He needs every chance of survival. And if fashion can save lives," she winked. "Then saving lives it is."

My cheeks tinted, and I knew where Biana got it from.

Looking past Della, I saw my friend, who was staring a little ways away. 

Her head was turned towards me, but her body was turned towards Fitz, who was curled up in a ball a little ways away. 

I caught her eye, and and she rushed over to me. 

Throwing her arms around me, she whispered. 

"I'm so sorry Linh. But Elwin has seen worse. Sophie's been in all sorts of mishaps. It'll be okay. Not  fine, but okay."

I wrapped my arms around my friend, squeezing her tight. 

"Thank you," I whispered. 

"Now go check on Fitz. He's not looking okay."

Biana smiled, and it reached her eyes. 

"That's my girl. Always looking out for everyone."

I blushed, and she squeezed me tighter, before letting go and rushing away to her brother, who was laying on his side now. 

Dex moved over to Sophie's side, next to his aunt, and she put her arm around him, squeezing him. He didn't make a sound, just stared at his cousin, pain, horror, sorrow, and something I couldn't place were slashed across his face, and my heart bled for him. 

The Council was far removed from the sorrow and pain, standing by the ruins of the castle, but I saw the fear, shock, worry, and hurt on all of their faces from where I was with Tam. Except for Councillor Alina. Something else was mixed in there. 

Something like disappointment. 

I turned to my brother, ignoring everything else now. 

The look of frozen shock and pain on his face was seered into my brain, but I pulled the water from the lake to me, and made a cold compress for his burns. 

After a few moments, the pain eased from his face, and all that remained was a tension unlike something I wished to never see again. 

"Tam," I whispered. 

"Please. I'm worried about you."

"If Elwin doesn't get here soon, I don't know what I'll do."

"I don't know how this happened to you."

"I don't know if I should be afraid for all of us."

"I don't know if I should be optimistic for everyone, because you and Sophie were heroes."

"I don't know Tam."

"Only you and Sophie know."

"So please, please be okay, so that I can be okay."

"I don't know how I would carry on if you-"

"If you don't fight on."

With that, I collasped into tears, turning away from Tam, laying down beside him, and I cried myself to an exhausted, terrified, lonely sleep, much like my first ones in Exile. 

A/N: Oh, Linh. Sweetie, I don't know how to tell you this, but you will be alright. I'll make it so that you'll be alright. We're all rooting for you. ):)