( The nights where sleep comes are rare and tinged with nightmares. Flashes of swords, trees, blood. Francis gasping his last breath and Delphine's healing touch.

Her visions have too many faces to be this, and the crunch of dirt underfoot feels all too real for the horrors she's been reliving. Mary's hands run over the loose fabric of her nightdress, stained with soil instead of her husband's blood, swallowing air in desperate gulps as the uncertainty clings to her lungs, a tight devil's claw restricting her breathing.

A kidnapping attempt? As she forces air down into her lungs, her head starts to clear a little. Abducting a mourning monarch would be a wildly unpopular move, yet there's been nary a time where her own personal guard would be down more. The security at the castle, however. It seems unlikely, but so many things do.

So many things, just like the skeletons shambling their way towards her, their rattling bones and cracked skulls like something from a nightmare, some sort of heathen magic.

Is this her punishment, for demanding those extra days with Francis? Was losing him not enough? )

Leave me be!

( But they don't. They've no ears to hear with. Only a thirst for blood. )

( For all the things that have sought to ruin her life - and believe her, there have been many - Mary can take solace in several things. Her faith, and the good people she has met during her life. Her ladies in waiting, despite all the trials which have befallen them in French court, Francis - God may his soul find the peace it deserves - and his brother Bash. All these relationships which have fluctuated and changed, but been filled with a special kind of love and devotion, if only for a short time.

And now here, in this Godless city with its horrors and skeletons, she's managed to find a small piece of that comfort with others trapped in that same situation. Mary finds a space in the park to sit, skirts flaring out underneath her as she offers the first smile she has managed in quite a while, patting the ground next to her. )

Come! ( Her voice rings with happiness, as infectious as the expression on her face. ) You must tell me all about it!