"Well, it's a good thing you're not awake for this," Oleandra grunted, gripping the shaft of the golden spear buried deep in Wanderer's flank with both hands. "Sorry, Wanderer… we're in a bit of a pinch, so I'm going to have to be a bit indelicate."
After silently reciting the incantation to mend gaping wounds a few times in her head to prepare for the spray of blood that was to come, Oleandra pulled on the spear with all her strength. But to her surprise, it slid out without resistance, leaving no visible wound behind. As blood began to flow through his veins once more, colour returned to Wanderer's face.
"Repello Muggletum," said Oleandra, drawing her wand and waving it over her head.
She couldn't believe she hadn't thought of such a convenient spell the last time she'd tried approaching the hillfort— especially when the bulk of her opponents had been Muggles. She'd never had to use Muggle-Repelling Charms before, so the idea simply hadn't occurred to her until this very moment.
Upon hearing the body lying at her feet draw in a sharp breath, Oleandra glanced downwards.
"I finally saw them…" Wanderer rasped deliriously. "They're… beautiful… Now… I… understand…"
"Aguamenti," said Oleandra, waving her hand and Conjuring a bubble of water in her palm and shoving it down Wanderer's gullet. "Here, this will do you some good."
Having woken up with a case of very dry throat upon waking up from her longer-than-expected nine-day nap, Oleandra knew exactly what Wanderer was going through. At first, he refused to swallow, but she simply pinched his nose shut, forcing him to drink. As the cool and soothing liquid hit his parched throat, Wanderer gradually stopped resisting and started swallowing greedy gulps.
"Can you stand?" Oleandra asked. "We're about to be up to our elbows in enemies."
Wanderer shook his head.
Oleandra didn't know how he'd managed to survive the hanging— perhaps something like the Flame-Freezing Charm used by Witches in the Middle Ages— but whatever trick he'd pulled, it had clearly taken a toll on him.
"Can't you just… spirit us away?" he groaned. "I heard… no, never mind."
Unfortunately, since Oleandra was stuck thousands of years in the past, she naturally couldn't attend the Apparition lessons that were being taught to the other sixth years. She still had her Tree-Portation Spell, but after having been seen— for lack of a better word— by some eldritch entity while traveling along Yggdrasil in the sea of stars, right before Christmas in 1995, she had stopped using it out of fear.
"What were you going to say?" asked Oleandra, loath to use Tree-Portation.
"I…" said Wanderer hesitantly. "I'd rather not say."
Oleandra blinked.
Wanderer was telling the truth, but there was no time to wonder why he didn't want to explain why he thought she could teleport. Hundreds of owls were circling above the hill they stood on, and in broad daylight, no less— a tell-tale sign that magic users were nearby.
"Huginn, Muninn," grunted Wanderer, grimacing as he shifted into an upright position with Oleandra's assistance. "I need your help with those familiars."
"Those are yours, then?" asked Oleandra, glancing at the two large ravens perching on the branch Wanderer had just been hanging from moments ago. "It's a bit too late to run interference, they already know we're here."
Ravens, just like crows, instinctively hated owls with a passion— and the feeling was mutual. But unlike crows, ravens wouldn't band together to seek out owls… but if they happened upon a sleeping owl, then they wouldn't say no to a spot of harassment.
First, they'd caw loudly to keep it from sleeping. Then, they would chase it from their territory and subsequently try to knock it out of the sky. But by night, the owl would take its revenge, silently hunting its corvid nemeses and picking them off one by one under cover of darkness while they slumbered.
It was an inescapable cycle of hatred, born of a rivalry millions of years old.
"Yeah," Wanderer said after a moment. "My father must've sent them when I stopped writing back with updates on my quest's progress."
One of the ravens suddenly cawed, and Wanderer pricked up his ears, listening intently.
"The hill is surrounded," Wanderer said grimly. "We're trapped like rats."
"Don't move," said Oleandra, turning on her heel and running off.
Wanderer rolled his eyes— did it look like he could move yet?
Oleandra jogged down the hill towards the hillfort's battlements. She clambered up a nearby watchtower— the one that overlooked the entrance she'd used— and glanced out over the defensive walls: rough-hewn logs cut from the nearby forest, driven deep into the earth, their exposed ends sharpened into points.
About fifty cavalrymen surrounded the hillfort, equally distanced from each other. Behind them stood hundreds more infantrymen armed with swords, spears and bows. For this era, this was quite an impressive number of people!
"Not again!" snarled Oleandra, as vines whipped around her and bound her limbs without warning. "Relashio!"
The hillfort's outer wall— composed of seemingly dead logs— had sprung to life, sprouting green leaves and young, grasping branches that snagged at her clothes and coiled around her arms and legs.
Fortunately, this wasn't the first time a Druid had pulled this trick on her, so without hesitation, Oleandra fired off a Revulsion Jinx, forcing the animated plants to release their grip. Before she could be captured again, Oleandra leapt from the lookout tower, wincing as the shock of the twenty-foot drop rattled her bones.
Since slaying the Dusk-Elf, she had noticed her superhuman strength and speed slowly fading, giving way to the gradual return of her full magical power.
Though an Elven heart still beat in her breast, Elven blood no longer flowed through her veins—no longer draining her magic and converting it into physical strength. But it wasn't all bad: although Oleandra now merely possessed no more than the strength of two adult men and a half, she had retained her inhuman reflexes and supernatural grace.
"Druids," Oleandra swore.
Before jumping, she had caught sight of them— half a dozen men in brown robes surrounding an important-looking bloke clad in fancier armour than the rest. They were the real threat— unlike the Muggles, they would be able to penetrate her Muggle-Repelling Charm without any trouble, and they were much more troublesome than a bunch of magicless half-wits…