“Do you think he’s hurt?”

“No, the queen said he was just tired!”

“Do… Should we wake him up? I’m kind of scared to.”

“Don’t be such a coward, he’s-”

Andrew shot upright, his eyes flying open and locking onto the door to see who the sudden voices belonged to.

Two maids jumped back away from him, fumbling over each other to get to the doorway.

“You just called me a coward! Now you’re running?” the taller one of the two scoffed.

The other shoved her lightly and looked back at Andrew, who could only stare at them with confusion. “We came here to tell him that Prince Elias has requested his presence, so we must get at least that done!” She offered him a careful smile, laughing dryly. “Our deepest apologies, Sir Andrew! The prince just wanted us to tell you… Well, what I just said! He’s awake and wants to see you in his room.”

His eyes barely stayed open, but Andrew still nodded. “Uh, okay, sure. Give me a minute and I’ll go find him myself.”

Both maids nodded then bolted from the room, closing the door a bit harshly as they left.

Andrew yawned and closed his eyes, forcing his body to stay sitting up. If he laid back down, he would only fall back asleep.

“Where…?” He rubbed the side of his head, trying to piece together where he had ended up and why he had fallen asleep in the first place.

The last thing he remembered was talking to the queen, and then he dragged himself to his room and… promptly passed out. Using the magic must have worn him down more than he thought it did. Andrew wondered for a moment about how Sebastian found a way around that, but the thought quickly went away when he remembered what the maids had said.

Elias.

He had been hurt and instead of going to sit with him, Andrew ran away because of what the queen said. The doctor had needed time and space to work on him, though. Maybe it had been for the best that Andrew ran to his room and got some sleep. What use could he provide if he had been sitting around like some zombie? He probably would have fallen asleep in some chair anyway if he had gone.

Andrew dragged himself out of bed and out the door, his brain waking up more and more with each step. From the windows, he could see that the sun was still out, though it had grown much darker than he remembered it being when they got back to the castle.

After a moment of staring at a few wrong doors, Andrew eventually made it to Elias’, knocking lightly.

“Come in!”

The prince’s voice rang through the door, much cheerier than Andrew expected him to sound.

He opened the door and was met with the sight of Elias in his large bed, wrapped up from his waist to his armpits in bandages. The prince’s comforting smile welcomed him in, Andrew closing the door softly behind himself.

“Hey there, seems like you’re feeling better.” Andrew came closer to the bed, awkwardly standing next to it. “Are you feeling better? Or did they give you some nice painkillers, and you’re just happy because you can’t feel anything?”

Elias laughed, the sound strained. “No, unfortunately, I can still feel the pain. But, it’s not as bad as it was yesterday. Doctor Rhythe has helped me a lot.” He patted the edge of the bed. “Come, sit down. I hope that waking you up so early wasn’t a problem. My mother said you went to bed quite some time ago, so I figured you would be rested enough by now.”

“Wait, I slept through the whole day and the night? Wow, the magic really took a lot out of me.” Andrew dropped himself onto Elias’ bed with a huff. “I don’t feel like I even did all that much with it, and it wiped me out. I wonder how Sebastian is doing all that without hurting himself.”

“He might be hurting himself, we don’t know that.”

A new voice came from behind him, and Andrew yelped, falling back onto the bed. He nearly fell over Elias, but he managed to catch himself. When he looked up to see who had spoken, he was met with two, massive, turquoise, glowing eyes.

“I don’t know anything about the anatomy of the people of your world, but I assume if it tired you out, then it’s tiring him out.” The eyes moved away, and Andrew was able to see a dragon woman standing at the end of the bed. Most of her stayed hidden under a blue robe, but Andrew could see her face clearly. Dark Green scales covered every inch of it, and they had intricate, black designs painted on around her eyes. “You didn’t get hurt by him as well, did you? If you did, I can make an attempt at patching you up. I assume it won’t be that different, but you never know! We could discover that you have seven hearts and stomachs!”

“Doctor Rhythe, careful not to overwhelm him,” Elias hummed. “Andrew is still coming to terms with the fact that he’s in such a new and different place.” The prince leaned against the headboard, his wings stretching and flattening out so they didn’t get squished. “If he is fine, then I think I would like to have some time alone with him now.”

Andrew sat up, running his hand through his hair to keep it out of his face. “Yeah, I’m okay. I think I slept most of it off.”

“Alright, alright, I suppose his majesty is well enough now that I can leave him in your hands.” Rhythe hobbled to the door, Andrew realizing only then that she was probably a lot older than she looked. “Do be careful with our prince, though, Andrew. He’s tough, but he’s not invincible. Even though he likes to act as though he is.”

Elias rolled his eyes as the doctor left. “I really am fine now, Andrew. You don’t need to worry about me. How are you feeling? Are you actually okay?”

“I’m fine,” Andrew said as he crawled into the spot next to Elias. “Sleep did help. I don’t think I want to do any more adventures for at least a week, though.”

The prince laughed. “I don’t think another adventure would do either of us any favors for a while. Though… There is still the matter of getting you home. Our trip didn’t tell us anything new.”

Andrew shrugged. “I think… I think now that this is more real, I’ve started to accept that I’m stuck here. I don’t want to go out and have you get hurt over sending me home, and I see that it’s going to be a lot harder than I thought, so there’s no point in worrying so much about it right now. We can just work with what information we do have, and if new things come, then great. But, if not, well… I’m alright staying here until something comes up.”

“If you’re sure about that, Andrew. You’re more than welcome to stay here for as long as you need, but I want to be sure that it’s not too upsetting for you.”

“Well…” Andrew sighed and brought his legs up to his chest so that he could rest his arms on his knees. “There’s not a lot for me to get back to anyway,” he whispered. He cleared his throat, speaking louder as he continued. “And like I said, there’s not a lot we can do about it now. I’ll stay here with you, and we can work towards that goal whenever it’s safe and convenient to do so. Otherwise, we can just… Keep doing the stuff we’ve been doing. Like hanging out in the hot springs or whatever. And now that I’m pretty sure that I believe this is all real, you can teach me a lot more about this place.”

Elias draped his arm over Andrew’s shoulders and pulled him against his side. “I think hanging out with you and showing you this world sounds like a wonderful adventure of its own, so I will be glad to do that with you, Andrew.”

“Y-yeah, it’ll be fun. Just like I said before, it’ll be like a vacation. Just a longer one than initially planned.” Andrew squeezed his eyes shut, leaning his head against Elias. “Y’know, I’m still kind of tired, and walking to my room sounds like too much of a chore. Is it cool if I just nap in here with you? Then we can do breakfast or whatever food time it is when I wake up.”

The prince chuckled and gently laid his head on Andrew’s. “That’s perfectly fine with me. Take all the time you need to rest. We’ll talk more about what sort of things we can do when you wake up.”

Andrew chose not to respond, instead letting exhaustion take hold of him again. The magic making him so tired would be something he would have to look into. Later, though. After his nap spent cuddled up to Elias’ warm, big chest.