Elara woke, not gently, but again to the sound of knocking on her door. She opened her cobalt eyes at the disruption and they flicked once to her guest, seeing that he was still there and in one piece before she slipped out of her bedcovers and strode to the door, opening it an inch and finding a familiar face there. "Caldwyn..." She opened the door wider to admit the old mage who was being supported, rather than escorted, by two of his company who had gone with him to the portal. "What's wrong? Did everything go alright? Is there a problem with the portal - "<br/><br/>The elder half-mage, half-vampire held up a hand to forestall questions, sitting down at the little table where Elara's maid had done her silent duty of being sure that breakfast was hot and waiting for her mistress and her guest before they ever woke up. "Yes, Queen Elara. The... portal, it is disabled. Destroyed, no. But it is now unusable from our side." He gave her a meaningful look that meant to say, but from the other side we might have problems. Elara looked up at the vampire guards with Caldwyn and took them each by the elbow.<br/><br/>"Thank-you both for your service to queen and realm. You have done an excellent job in bringing Caldwyn straight away to me. He looks so famished and exhausted from his hard work, I fear he may make no sense in his speech until we have gotten some food in him. You both are dismissed." Elara said smoothly, leading her guards to the door and shoving them out the door of her bedroom before shutting it again. Then the vampire queen returned to the little table and served Caldwyn herself, being sure he got enough in his mouth; his hands were shaking terribly and almost shook the slice of ham right off his fork. "This work has seemed to drain you, Caldwyn. Shall I send for maids to escort you to bed when you've gotten enough to eat."<br/><br/>"My Queen, did you not understand? The portal is not destroyed. I could only disable it from this side. With enough mages working together, the mortals could eventually re-open it again." Caldwyn protested, before the vampire queen started feeding him herself.<br/><br/>"I heard you, Caldwyn. But we have upheld our end. None of our people can go through and declare war on the mortal realm again."