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Fandom: FFXIV
Summary: Snowballed Headcanon!
Chapter Summary: Y'shtola ends up with a lot of work; Thancred finally accepts that he's been adopted. Also metaphysics over medical procedures.
Warnings: Triage ward injuries, some of this was written at 3 am and could use a once-over, sharp objects and a little body-horror ick
When he woke again, he felt frail, and oddly hollow and light-headed, and like the air in the room was thinner than it should've been. He managed a bleary blink and getting some view of the room; it was still busy, triage cases getting brought in and occasionally moved out to another room. Y'shtola was overseeing more than casting, but was returning to near his bed in between; he probably hadn't been moved to keep under observation more easily.
He managed to shift a little to see better, which got Y'shtola's attention on him fast; she'd apparently kept some kind of mug of heavily sweetened tea on a warmer nearby waiting, and met his shift to sit up a little with helping propping him up and not really giving him the option of NOT being helped with the mug.
It took a couple seconds after that to process that Yda was perched on the chair next to the bed, hovering. She practically bounced with a sudden smile at him moving, but she was doing an almost unnerving job of not making any sound and restricting it to a lot of chaotic little waving hand-gestures.
“Do you feel up to speaking?”
He scrunched his nose. “How long?” It was wobbly and weak, but he managed.
“It's just after dark; we managed to clear out the rest of the tunnels and get some people out. There's still skirmishing going on with the guard; it looks like most of the cultists tried to scatter just before we arrived.”
He almost asked another question, but he already knew the answer; there wasn't a way to save an Ascian's host. Y'shtola's ears lowered, expression falling into concern. “It was him, wasn't it?”
He nodded. “How...long did you know?”
“When you said that Gib had warned you to not look for him. I think Louisoix had figured out well before that.”
Yda looked between them in confusion; she'd gone to worry mirroring Y'shtola, and even that died down into worse dismay. “Oh god, that was him?” She almost leaned over to where he was, then pulled her hand back, shrinking on the chair. “I'm so sorry...”
Yda had been darting past while he was being pulled out; he'd noticed whatever the spell of Louisoix's was hot to be near, but nothing like being near a thaumaturge's fire, which meant... “It – there wasn't anything else you could've done.”
Y'shtola nudged more of the tea at him, still keeping a steadying hand to help him drink; Yda slipped down to sitting on the chair, wilted.
He wanted to try to say something, but it was a little hard with a healer very insistent on getting fluids and something into him; it was further interrupted by another arrival in the triage room with the surrounding noise of “emergency case”.
He shifted to try to look around, and blinked; it took a second to recognize the Inspector with his coat half burned off and the side of his face blackened. He was limping, being carried over shoulder by the younger of the two Ala Mhigan monks.
Y'shtola handed off the tea to Yda, who managed to take over smoothly in spite of a decent amount of visible panic at the idea – or, took over for a few seconds, distracted herself by whatever was going on.
The other conjurer on duty had also converged, a tall Elezen man; he didn't recognize him, but the voice registered as familiar, a faint accent he couldn't place as the man carefully went to move the Inspector to one of the beds.
“He was caught off guard by a caster.” The monk nodded over at the Inspector's condition. “...And he has a broken leg.”
That addendum had a mildly garbled grumble where Thancred caught something about Ala Mhigans and insanity; Y'shtola was going for bandages and jars of salve first, letting the other conjurer start on curative magic. The Elezen looked between the inspector, and the monk, raised an eyebrow at the inspector, and nodded to the monk. “Thank you for seeing him to us.”
The monk gave a short, formal bow in return; but scanning the triage wing was met with a frown; he stripped off the gloves, leaving them on a small rack by the door, and moved to one of the washbasins, cleaning his hands.
There were a few others that filtered in after the inspector with similar burns; Thancred settled for trying to work on holding the tea himself and watching, the monk backing up the two conjurers with little to no verbal prompting, finding the more mundane supplies for tending it. A couple of timesB on the worse he'd leaned over to do something while one of them was casting; whatever it was, he caught Y'shtola's eyes widening for a moment after the spell had taken effect, and then seeming more than happy to have the man present.
Yda was staying subdued, but after a little while distracted, seemed to make a pointed effort to try to guess at anything he might've tried to get. It was a little off, and he managed to get a blanket to the face while trying to move the pillow, and some attempts at tea that were not toxic, but generally the less said, the better. He stayed quiet, just taking it on sentiment; she seemed like she'd been worried enough even without the undertone of “sorry I killed your friend”.
Louisoix trailed in; it seemed like he started to go to Thancred, then gave a scan of the infirmary and motioned to Thancred for a delay, taking over the triage rotation on some of the worse injuries that weren't immediately critical. Abylghota came in with some burns just enough to be noticeable; Y'shtola and Chas converged on her to protests that she wasn't that bad off and she was just checking on people and going to be on her way.
Y'shtola gave Chas a somewhat terrifying considering look with a very faint smile, which got a nod from the monk, and Abylghota suddenly changed her mind and sat on a bench to the side until they had an opening to tend to her.
Once things had died down and mostly settled from immediate and life-threatening, the other conjurer made a move to take over; Louisoix and Y'shtola went to the side of Thancred's bed, Chas trailing behind.
“How are you faring?” Louisoix seemed to be checking him over, brushing a few longer strands of hair out of his face.
“...I feel like something turned me inside out, scraped me out, and then shoved me right side out again.”
Louisoix looked concerned, but there was some odd tinge of relief to it; he nodded to Y'shtola. “You need rest; I will take over from here and make sure he's settled for the night.”
Y'shtola almost said something, then nodded, looking back with concern as she left.
Thancred settled back against the pillow, eyes half-closed; Louisoix moved the blanket, frowning.
“I have never seen an injury like that...” The monk's tone was awed, worried, and had Thancred fairly sure he didn't want to look down to know what it looked like.
“It's the work of a powerful void being; it looks like it's already been much healed from when we found him.” Louisoix's hand on his staff shifted, moving it more in front of him.
“May I?” The monk took a step to be by the side of the bed, hand raised, looking to Louisoix.
“It would be welcome.”
Whatever energy the monk was working with, it was barely visible, a hand almost resting on his forehead for a moment and over the injury; it prickled, and whatever it'd done, he was pretty sure he could feel the blood in his veins if he paid any attention at all. Louisoix's cure spell following right after was almost disorienting; as it cleared, he was gasping for air, suddenly feeling sore all over, and it sank in that the gasping was the air suddenly feeling a hell of a lot less thin, like being drug up for air after being underwater.
It did not really do much for feeling light headed; in fact, half-sitting up got a spike of vertigo that left him flat on the bed shortly after.
“Gods, I can breathe again...”
“Y'shtola did the bulk of the work; she simply didn't quite have the reserves for the last of it in between that and the triage.... and the augment helped as well. Your help is much appreciated.”
He sort of caught the monk shaking his head. “Your people have taken us in and have offered to help us help our homeland; we will not leave you to your problems unaided in our presence. …. I – will take leave to help the other healer, if he will be well?”
“There is little more than time; thank you for your help.” Louisoix bowed, a gesture returned by the monk before he left the side of the bed.
Louisoix pulled the blankets back up close.
“...Do I want to know how bad it looks?”
“It's not nearly as bad as it was.”
“...I don't want to know.” He could feel the cloth resting over it, and shifted uncomfortably now that he'd gone and made himself aware of the matching spot on his back; the skin where it'd hit him felt clammy, loose, and oversensitive.
“A good day's rest and some further tending, and it'll be indistinguishable from a normal bruise.” Louisoix ruffled a hand in his hair. “What happened? I'd heard you were separated in an ambush, but it is unclear between that and when we were following your trail.”
“...I jumped on something that tried to ambush Papalymo; it flew off trying to get at me. It changed its mind when I managed to wound it in the eye, and took off screeching; I thought it would lead to something we'd need, and that I'd lose it if I didn't follow it then, so I left the trail and chased. It – went right to him,battered a door down to get in; when it got into the room, I managed to catch it and killed it somehow.”
Louisoix was rubbing the bridge of his nose. “It retreated to its master.”
“I... didn't know that – Ives seemed just as surprised as I was. At first I was thrilled, he was there and whole; it was dark, so I pulled out the light orb... And – he didn't have a shadow.”
Louisoix's hands had gone to fold on his staff in front of him; he gave a brief glance around the room, where there was little else – the two others at work had gone to move the last of the emergency cases out.
“He... realized I knew, and he was angry. I asked him why, and he-” He shifted, sinking into the blanket more. “He said it'd given him a chance to do something; that the people it'd killed were better off, that if things had gone on I was just going to leave and forget him anyway, and – other things.”
Another kid like you.
“I think it got frustrated; it – cut him off on something he was about to say, and took over. It wanted me to go with it; said it'd wanted to meet me when it wasn't a fight, but I'd – a talent for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. It did something so I couldn't leave the room, so – I tried to keep it talking, to buy time. It said that they'd give me concessions, that people I named would be protected, and that I was valuable. I think it...knew that you were coming, it cut off me trying to drag things out and told me to choose.”
“...That's when you broke the light and screamed?” Yda was still staying small in the chair.
“Yes. It – while I was on the ground, it said I had one last chance, and held a hand out to me; I pulled back, and – that's when you showed up.” The door opened to the other two coming back, cleaning up; the conjurer was herding Chas off, apparently to settle in for the night shift. “Yda? It's – alright. ...I... he hated me. It said it was jealousy that would pass, but...there's – a lot of little things lately I didn't pay attention to, he'd lashed out hard not long before – I got caught; he stopped funny, and – before it'd always been a few days before he apologized, and he never said much... I think – it made him apologize so it could lure me closer....that it – used him going bitter at me and a lot of other things to get to him.”
“...He was still your friend... before he got too hurt and went all hate on you. You were so happy talking about how he'd taught you things and helped you save that other girl, and going out watching fireworks...”
“...I know.” he curled into the blanket, another layer added to the dull ache from the injury. “And it's worse because – even if we could've gotten it out of him...he wanted it.”
Louisoix sighed. “We should move you to an empty room for the night; there was one left open nearby for you.” He offered a hand down, to help Thancred sit up; Yda was right there on the other side, a knee on the bed so she could help support him. Louisoix draped a robe over his shoulders once he was sitting, Yda fussing to make sure it was hanging right before they helped him out of the bed. The vertigo returned with a vengeance as soon as he tried to stand, almost collapsing against Louisoix, clinging to the man's robe; Louisoix had a hand down to shift for support, but Yda was already there on the other side, tugging an arm over her shoulder with a small, “I've got him.”, carrying him the same as she had two days ago.
It was becoming a bad habit.
Yda was careful settling him into the bed in the long-term room; she hovered for a few minutes, fidgeting, and ducked out after an odd glance from Louisoix. Louisoix pulled the one upholstered chair over by the bed, resting his staff against the wall next to it, and settled himself.
Thancred almost opened his mouth to say something; the intent of staying for at least a while was clear, but the protest that he'd be fine didn't quite make it. He curled on his side, getting the odd itch of the wound a little less pressed into the fabric, shifting the pillow to half curl around it.
“...There was something....when it was trying to talk me into joining it.”
“Mmm?”
“It – said so much about how it'd been trying to get close... I – asked it if that's why it'd taken Ives... why our district was targeted.”
Lousioix leaned closer, chin resting on a hand; he could barely see the shape in the dim lighting.
“It ...said that it had other work here, but – that I was part of its choice of hosts; the opportunity, that I had potential... and all I could think of was something Y'shtola had said, and the way Yda reacted when she first saw me...”
He saw a quiet, listening nod.
“When it struck me, it said that – my true father was too weak to protect me. And it called me 'Wanderer's Child'. …...What – did it mean? Was I really that valuable to be worth – all of this to it?”
“That... is a harder subject. What had Y'shtola said?”
“I asked her what they wanted, why they were doing this. She said there was a seventh verse of the Divine Chronicles, and that you were finding people to try to prevent a Seventh Umbral Era from falling; that you couldn't tell everything, but you would act on prophecy, go looking for things to – fill holes or what would be needed. She told me they wanted to stop you and the others before you could start...that you must've seen something I could do, and if I refused, you'd be looking for someone else. I didn't...even think I was more than collateral to it....”
“And what is your guess?”
He traced circles on the pillow. “People call you an Archon.... that you're an incarnation of Thaliak himself. Is … it looking for others? Did it think I was -?”
Louisoix shifted, hands folded over each other on the arm of the chair.
“You know the ballads and stories of the Archons.”
He nodded into the pillow.
“Across all the stories, what would you think of them? Of the saga of their battles and Ahldbhar's betrayal?”
“...I – it all sounded so far away, but … sometimes it didn't sound any different than either bunch of heroes from ballads... Ahldbhar was proud, looking for fights, he chafed at the others trying to rein in his temper, and when they suffered a defeat, he lost faith... he saw that the dark mages had power past even theirs, and decided that was more important than what they fought for. They tried to get him back, he nearly killed another who went to sway him... they didn't want to kill him, when they finally had to face him, they came out of it grievously wounded because they'd sought to avoid it so strongly.”
“And?”
“....They were people. The Twelve squabble sometimes and have disagreements or trysts, even as distant as they are, and when they were reborn as mortals... they had the power, but they were mortals, and they acted like any other mortal 'heroes'.”
It was quiet enough, for a few moments, that he almost drowsed.
“The Ascians... they can, rarely, manifest something solid, but it is a puppet; bits of energy woven together and pushed into our world – it takes a great deal of power, and is difficult for them. In their natural state, they are formless; living parts of the void. Sight and sound as we know it is something they gain from a mortal body borrowed; their true awareness is the flow of aether from, and through, everything. They are difficult to fool.”
“...Are you sure? That it could be right? I don't – I was abandoned, unwanted; as best I can guess, my mother was a whore, before I got good enough to earn coin by singing on street corners I picked pockets and stole from shops.... I'm – a street con, not some bard of eld forged on a battlefield.”
“How many others, when the murders happened, had 'go towards it to do something' as their first instinct?” Louisoix almost sounded faintly amused.
“...You know that habit – there's a hundred times I did something like that and only lived because of Ives, or Gib, or someone else.”
“But you've done things – the children you brought back from the slavers, what would they call you?”
He buried his face in the pillow, mumbling about “not fair”.
“I spoke to the Inspector's men about you, as I could catch them off-duty, those first few days. Was there any particular reason to gravitate towards the plaza with the Nymian harp?”
“...I was homeless. A vagrant. Oschon watches over vagrants. I used to go pray out there, and – tie offerings on the arms of it, because we all needed all the help we could get.”
“They've found you sleeping under it when the winds are higher.”
“It's sort of soothing and there's not many that bother someone asleep at a shrine, particularly a very loud shrine.”
“Were you the one that left an offering on the highest point?”
He choke-laughed into the pillow. “That's what pissed Ives off so bad – he was furious, that I'd do something like that with people looking for us...” How much of that had been genuine worry, anymore, and how much was old habit and prodding? So much of it had turned ugly so fast...
“Do you think the skills of knowing the back streets, the poor, and the thieves and lost can't be used to save others?”
He almost answered, stopped, and slumped against the pillow. “That sounds like bait, and I'm not a fish.”
“I'm quite serious. How long do you think it would have taken us to find the lair without your knowledge of how to navigate that part of the city?”
“So you've got someone who can hunt like a coeurl as long as it's in the bad part of town.”
“How much do you know of recent events in the world?”
He raised his head from the pillow, mouth open in protest; there was bait again, but Louisoix was doing the calm thing where he was waiting for an answer. Thancred met it with a scowl.
“Well, people have been fleeing Ala Mhigo for a few years now, some of them running with nothing more than the shirt on their backs. The Empire's locked out all trade from Ilsabard, and some people say you could bribe anyone with a bottle of wine from the old country to the south of it, since no-one can get it anymore – some of the merchants say the silence is an ill omen, that they've heard tales of horrible things from those shores. The pirate fleets that range more east have been banding together more and bringing back stories themselves, so there's smugglers with horror stories about the Empire where it's hard to tell what's real and what's a mummer's farce. The Dravanians have been getting more aggressive, and the Ishgardians are digging in against them. Do you want me to get into Sharlayan politics? I know who on the councils has sold out, who buys from the smugglers, and who's got reputations with the ladies of the night they don't want getting out. Oh, and there's rumors there's a Garlean spy, but that one changes every week and is probably paranoia and old monger's gossip; the less mad stories about the Garleans hold that they, themselves, are lousy at blending in with anyone else, too little respect for the 'savages' to learn how. If it gets consistent I'll worry someone sold out to them.”
“Perhaps keep the politics to yourself unless there is a relevance to needed affairs.” Louisoix chuckled, shaking his head slowly. “You have the instincts of an intelligence agent, gathering information like that.”
“It's hard not to overhear things, or catch bits from getting people talking, even without putting forth effort like bribing merchants.”
“And how many people find half of that to be new information because they don't listen as often?”
He sulked over the pillow. “I learned to do that to run cons. Figure out what people wanted and what they would believe, if you're too fanciful they catch on, too mundane and they keep walking, too out of touch and they listen but don't care to spend any coin.”
“Would you come with us? We could use a sharp set of eyes and ears that know how to work with people.”
“...Y'shtola said it was afraid … of Gib when he tried to warn me, of me because I could help corner it....”
“Those who wish to abuse power will most vehemently pursue that which could be a threat to their power.”
It had been after him; Ives, the other people he knew, Gib, Mattye … “...-Mattye, Gib, Ives, some of the others dead – it … was taking away everything I had, to get to me.”
“Someone with nothing left to lose is easier to push to desperation and despair, and easier to use.”
It hurt – yet somehow, all that came out of it was anger; people he cared about, good people, dead because it wanted to break him. “...It about succeeded.... I have nothing left to go back to almost, and - …. I don't want their world.” He closed his eyes, unclenching the hand he hadn't realized he'd dug into the pillow, sinking into it. “....If I did – try to go back... they'd just come after me again, wouldn't they? Maybe Edine next time?”
Louisoix bowed his head. “Would that I could tell you that they would respect your choice and leave you be....”
“...If they're that afraid of me going with you, then – it's worth it to spite them.... I didn't – they killed too many people to give them what they want, at all.”
“It is good to have you.”
He was starting to drowse off, even as the tiny spike of anger faded out; something else nagged. “... When did you guess it was using Ives?”
Louisoix frowned, looking away. “You trusted him, but when you spoke of why you believed he couldn't, it was full of gaps and faith; even your own description of him was someone whose weapon could mean life or death if things went badly. If his main blade had been lost or stolen, it would have been a disaster the moment it went missing, yet you said you'd both gone about routines as normal, with him going off on risky work half-armed and that unnoticed.”
“...I - ….why didn't you tell me?”
“Would you have believed me if I had?” There was an odd sort of sorrow under the question.
He thought long; there was a list of things that seemed like they should have been obvious, and yet...if he hadn't paid attention to things that close to him himself - “....No.”
“Your faith in him spoke much of your own character... he was important to you, and you wished the best of him to be what he chose.”
He mumbled into the pillow; he felt tired, he hurt from more aches than sore muscles, residual battering, and the Ascian's blow, and there was an increasing feeling that parts of it just wouldn't neatly wear themselves into words.
He managed a vertigo-laden wobble to the washroom without help, even if it did end up including walls for support several times. The loose robe and the mirror made it hard to not notice some sort of odd dark, black pattern webbing upward, like some kind of diseased leaf-veins. Morbid curiosity finally took over, and he tugged it open enough to get a good look at the injury.
The central part of it was mottled a mildly unnatural black and purple; he could cover it with a hand, but there were definite patterns to the spread-out patterning where he could trace out the past edges of it where it'd receded as the mages had seen to it; it'd apparently been a large spread initially, and he wasn't sure he wanted to ponder how far the webbing-out patterns had originally gone. As it was, there were a few stray threads that went up past his collarbone a little. The solid central part was still faintly sunken in, barely noticeable on touch, sensitive-sore, and clammy in a way that made him not really want to poke at it much; it was all the more unsettling to notice that it did, apparently, mean some kind of darker fluid on his hand, a faint greyish stain.
He'd vaguely noticed the sounds of movement in the hallway, faint voices going by about daily business; then there was much faster footsteps, agitated, that got his attention on the door, wondering if he should try to open it to check and if he could manage that fast enough without ending up propped on the door. The debate was decided as he was having it, the door swinging open; in a matter of short moments, Y'shtola went from a worried panic, to incredulity, to exasperated irritation, tail puffed out straight behind her.
“Why are you up on your own?!”
He made a helpless, confused explanatory gesture at the latrine and plumbing.
Y'shtola buried her face in one hand with an unintelligible grumble.
“Well. One of the trainees was changing the sheets in your room; you should be getting back to it, you are not well enough to be up and about.”
He almost paused for her to leave the doorway; she gave him a narrow look, catching his elbow to serve as support for his balance and escort him back. She was watching him closely the entire way, seeming to take note of every time his balance gave out worse.
There was food waiting – or, well, plain fish, soup, fruit, water, and tea; the girl was just finishing up dealing with the bedding, and now that he was more awake and aware, he winced a little at the sheets she was carrying out in a basin, catching enough of a glimpse to see a few dark stains on it.
Y'shtola herded him to sit on the newly cleaned bed, setting the tray down in front of him. “You'll need to eat before we can risk doing anything more about that.”
Remembering how well some things had managed, he drank the tea first, glancing over it with a questioning look at her.
“Healing magics repair damage, but they can only take the edge off of strain and fatigue; moreover, there is a mild strain on the body itself from the rapidity of it. Your vertigo comes from that more than the wound by now – you've been brought back from the brink of death, and your body is still struggling to catch up. Urianger mentioned bringing books down, but honestly, you should spend most of the day eating and sleeping to recover.” An ear flicked. “And if you do try to push your luck, I am not above a sleep spell to enforce that.”
Whatever the tea did to settle things, he hadn't really felt hungry, but picking at food seemed like a reminder, and it very quickly went from “unsure” to “not enough”, Y'shtola staying quietly by the bed with a faint smile. She ducked out with the empty tray when he was done, coming back with more of the same; all of it light and bland, but food, at least.
When he had slowed down and hit that strange and unfamiliar point of there being more than he could eat around, she pulled the tray aside, catching his shoulder in a clear signal to stay sitting up. The robe was tugged down to the tie, and she took her time studying the wound on his chest and his back; she didn't touch it, but there were moments of fingertip pressure around the edges, sometimes almost uncomfortably tugging it. “What was that, anyway?”
“Well, they're beings of living void energy; it essentially drew upon that purely in a state that does not easily exist in our realm. It doesn't quite exist in the physical plane very well; the majority of the damage is disrupting the ties between the flesh and the aetheric body, although concentrated and focused enough, it has a sort of necrotic warping effect.... trying to make the living body conform to it.”
It wasn't exactly a comforting narration, but it explained a lot. “I suspect its plan was to get as far as it could and then cut and run when we caught up; it left bits and scraps in the wound to fester, probably hoping it would kill you if you were left to our care. It nearly succeeded.” She was studying the entry point on his chest, one pointed tooth chewing on a lip quietly. “We've been needing to interweave more straightforward curative spells with cleansing magics; it's slow work, voidal energy is something of the background fabric of existence, which makes it difficult for most of our schools to get a grip on. If Louisoix weren't here with some White Magic to better address that, I would be packing you up for a trip to Gridania to throw ourselves on the mercy of the Padjali.”
“Would this have to do with why White and Black magics were deemed so dangerous in the Fifth Era?”
“Indeed; thaumaturgy, conjury, and arcanistry all draw upon surface aetheric flows. Black and White magic reach deeper, to the background energy that forms the deeper lifeblood of the world; they are more difficult to control, and even seemingly benign white magic can have a dire impact on the environment if overused. The Black has been mostly proscribed, and the White, restricted to only three individuals at any given time, with a few occasional special cases here and there.” She was speaking distractedly, a rote lecture while she examined the wound; she gave an experimental poke with a claw, then turned to a small box-kit setting on the side table, retrieving a narrow, sharp-looking blade. “This will only take a moment; I will need to draw blood to check something, if you could kindly hold still?”
He was good at freezing in place; it was a good way to avoid drawing attention if you were out of line of sight and there were distractions. She kept a few fingers outlining a patch of skin right beside the indented part of the wound, pricking the blade into a clear spot in between some of the spiderweb patterns; it stung, a little more for his attention being on it, but he kept still through it. A few drops of red ran down the small blade, and she pulled back to clean it with a smile, swabbing at the pinprick cut and closing it over with a small flicker of magic. “It looks like you're recovering enough for your own system to start fighting back properly, although if my suspicions are correct, I may need to send our Ala Mhigan guests with a nice parting gift.”
“One of them did help Louisoix last night; what was that power he used?” He'd been struck with curiosity since; it wasn't any magic he recognized.
“Something subtle; the Fists of Rhalgr gain power by honing and training their own energy systems, to both augment their physical abilities beyond the realms of nature and for some other uses. The more skilled ones discovered a technique that could be used on others temporarily, to induce a state where the aetheric system is heightened and has a strengthened interaction with the body; it can dramatically boost the effect of healing magic, and in this case, allow the system to better respond to aetheric toxins.”
She took a moment doing further examination, checking over the darker spiderwebs; she paused with a frown, switching to another sharp tool that was narrow, barely wider than a quill pen, and seemed to be similarly built, with the pointed, bladed edge curved around a groove that ran into the shaft. He was getting poked at with her mouthing something to herself, finding overlap between the pattern and veins. “I'm going to need to draw blood again; this may take a few moments longer.”
It sank in a little deeper than the last one, although she was careful to keep it to just the point, held down so that the blood from the cut was dripping into the metal reservoir. She gave it what felt like a long time to drain that way before pulling the tool out and doing another small spell to close up the cut, tapping some of the blood from the reservoir into a glass dish.
Bits of it looked almost brackish-brown, although from Y'shtola's expression, it wasn't as bad as she was expecting. Her gaze flickered enough to notice his attention on it. “It's an after-effect; discoloration of the skin and some other things as the energetic toxin recedes.” She pulled a vial that he recognized as the translucent blue of a healing potion, tapping a couple drops into the glass tray and tipping it; the potion evaporated with a flicker as it came into contact with the blood drops, which returned to a more normal shade of red. “And it looks like it is just residue; it should fade soon.”
“How bad is-?” He twisted around, in a known futile effort to check his back.
“...Not nearly as bad; there's much less of the discoloration and mostly just a small actual wound; the whole mess currently looks worse than it actually is, since the chain-casting yesterday ended up absorbed into internal damage more.”
“Well, that's a relief.”
“Considering the nature of it, Louisoix should be back soon to take care of the rest of this; I still have a good amount of work elsewhere, but there will be people by to bring food and I'll try to check in as I can.” She was packing up the kit carefully, but clearly in a bit of a hurry; he settled back into the bed, trying not to think too much about the black stains on the sheets they'd carried out earlier.
Summary: Snowballed Headcanon!
Chapter Summary: Y'shtola ends up with a lot of work; Thancred finally accepts that he's been adopted. Also metaphysics over medical procedures.
Warnings: Triage ward injuries, some of this was written at 3 am and could use a once-over, sharp objects and a little body-horror ick
When he woke again, he felt frail, and oddly hollow and light-headed, and like the air in the room was thinner than it should've been. He managed a bleary blink and getting some view of the room; it was still busy, triage cases getting brought in and occasionally moved out to another room. Y'shtola was overseeing more than casting, but was returning to near his bed in between; he probably hadn't been moved to keep under observation more easily.
He managed to shift a little to see better, which got Y'shtola's attention on him fast; she'd apparently kept some kind of mug of heavily sweetened tea on a warmer nearby waiting, and met his shift to sit up a little with helping propping him up and not really giving him the option of NOT being helped with the mug.
It took a couple seconds after that to process that Yda was perched on the chair next to the bed, hovering. She practically bounced with a sudden smile at him moving, but she was doing an almost unnerving job of not making any sound and restricting it to a lot of chaotic little waving hand-gestures.
“Do you feel up to speaking?”
He scrunched his nose. “How long?” It was wobbly and weak, but he managed.
“It's just after dark; we managed to clear out the rest of the tunnels and get some people out. There's still skirmishing going on with the guard; it looks like most of the cultists tried to scatter just before we arrived.”
He almost asked another question, but he already knew the answer; there wasn't a way to save an Ascian's host. Y'shtola's ears lowered, expression falling into concern. “It was him, wasn't it?”
He nodded. “How...long did you know?”
“When you said that Gib had warned you to not look for him. I think Louisoix had figured out well before that.”
Yda looked between them in confusion; she'd gone to worry mirroring Y'shtola, and even that died down into worse dismay. “Oh god, that was him?” She almost leaned over to where he was, then pulled her hand back, shrinking on the chair. “I'm so sorry...”
Yda had been darting past while he was being pulled out; he'd noticed whatever the spell of Louisoix's was hot to be near, but nothing like being near a thaumaturge's fire, which meant... “It – there wasn't anything else you could've done.”
Y'shtola nudged more of the tea at him, still keeping a steadying hand to help him drink; Yda slipped down to sitting on the chair, wilted.
He wanted to try to say something, but it was a little hard with a healer very insistent on getting fluids and something into him; it was further interrupted by another arrival in the triage room with the surrounding noise of “emergency case”.
He shifted to try to look around, and blinked; it took a second to recognize the Inspector with his coat half burned off and the side of his face blackened. He was limping, being carried over shoulder by the younger of the two Ala Mhigan monks.
Y'shtola handed off the tea to Yda, who managed to take over smoothly in spite of a decent amount of visible panic at the idea – or, took over for a few seconds, distracted herself by whatever was going on.
The other conjurer on duty had also converged, a tall Elezen man; he didn't recognize him, but the voice registered as familiar, a faint accent he couldn't place as the man carefully went to move the Inspector to one of the beds.
“He was caught off guard by a caster.” The monk nodded over at the Inspector's condition. “...And he has a broken leg.”
That addendum had a mildly garbled grumble where Thancred caught something about Ala Mhigans and insanity; Y'shtola was going for bandages and jars of salve first, letting the other conjurer start on curative magic. The Elezen looked between the inspector, and the monk, raised an eyebrow at the inspector, and nodded to the monk. “Thank you for seeing him to us.”
The monk gave a short, formal bow in return; but scanning the triage wing was met with a frown; he stripped off the gloves, leaving them on a small rack by the door, and moved to one of the washbasins, cleaning his hands.
There were a few others that filtered in after the inspector with similar burns; Thancred settled for trying to work on holding the tea himself and watching, the monk backing up the two conjurers with little to no verbal prompting, finding the more mundane supplies for tending it. A couple of timesB on the worse he'd leaned over to do something while one of them was casting; whatever it was, he caught Y'shtola's eyes widening for a moment after the spell had taken effect, and then seeming more than happy to have the man present.
Yda was staying subdued, but after a little while distracted, seemed to make a pointed effort to try to guess at anything he might've tried to get. It was a little off, and he managed to get a blanket to the face while trying to move the pillow, and some attempts at tea that were not toxic, but generally the less said, the better. He stayed quiet, just taking it on sentiment; she seemed like she'd been worried enough even without the undertone of “sorry I killed your friend”.
Louisoix trailed in; it seemed like he started to go to Thancred, then gave a scan of the infirmary and motioned to Thancred for a delay, taking over the triage rotation on some of the worse injuries that weren't immediately critical. Abylghota came in with some burns just enough to be noticeable; Y'shtola and Chas converged on her to protests that she wasn't that bad off and she was just checking on people and going to be on her way.
Y'shtola gave Chas a somewhat terrifying considering look with a very faint smile, which got a nod from the monk, and Abylghota suddenly changed her mind and sat on a bench to the side until they had an opening to tend to her.
Once things had died down and mostly settled from immediate and life-threatening, the other conjurer made a move to take over; Louisoix and Y'shtola went to the side of Thancred's bed, Chas trailing behind.
“How are you faring?” Louisoix seemed to be checking him over, brushing a few longer strands of hair out of his face.
“...I feel like something turned me inside out, scraped me out, and then shoved me right side out again.”
Louisoix looked concerned, but there was some odd tinge of relief to it; he nodded to Y'shtola. “You need rest; I will take over from here and make sure he's settled for the night.”
Y'shtola almost said something, then nodded, looking back with concern as she left.
Thancred settled back against the pillow, eyes half-closed; Louisoix moved the blanket, frowning.
“I have never seen an injury like that...” The monk's tone was awed, worried, and had Thancred fairly sure he didn't want to look down to know what it looked like.
“It's the work of a powerful void being; it looks like it's already been much healed from when we found him.” Louisoix's hand on his staff shifted, moving it more in front of him.
“May I?” The monk took a step to be by the side of the bed, hand raised, looking to Louisoix.
“It would be welcome.”
Whatever energy the monk was working with, it was barely visible, a hand almost resting on his forehead for a moment and over the injury; it prickled, and whatever it'd done, he was pretty sure he could feel the blood in his veins if he paid any attention at all. Louisoix's cure spell following right after was almost disorienting; as it cleared, he was gasping for air, suddenly feeling sore all over, and it sank in that the gasping was the air suddenly feeling a hell of a lot less thin, like being drug up for air after being underwater.
It did not really do much for feeling light headed; in fact, half-sitting up got a spike of vertigo that left him flat on the bed shortly after.
“Gods, I can breathe again...”
“Y'shtola did the bulk of the work; she simply didn't quite have the reserves for the last of it in between that and the triage.... and the augment helped as well. Your help is much appreciated.”
He sort of caught the monk shaking his head. “Your people have taken us in and have offered to help us help our homeland; we will not leave you to your problems unaided in our presence. …. I – will take leave to help the other healer, if he will be well?”
“There is little more than time; thank you for your help.” Louisoix bowed, a gesture returned by the monk before he left the side of the bed.
Louisoix pulled the blankets back up close.
“...Do I want to know how bad it looks?”
“It's not nearly as bad as it was.”
“...I don't want to know.” He could feel the cloth resting over it, and shifted uncomfortably now that he'd gone and made himself aware of the matching spot on his back; the skin where it'd hit him felt clammy, loose, and oversensitive.
“A good day's rest and some further tending, and it'll be indistinguishable from a normal bruise.” Louisoix ruffled a hand in his hair. “What happened? I'd heard you were separated in an ambush, but it is unclear between that and when we were following your trail.”
“...I jumped on something that tried to ambush Papalymo; it flew off trying to get at me. It changed its mind when I managed to wound it in the eye, and took off screeching; I thought it would lead to something we'd need, and that I'd lose it if I didn't follow it then, so I left the trail and chased. It – went right to him,battered a door down to get in; when it got into the room, I managed to catch it and killed it somehow.”
Louisoix was rubbing the bridge of his nose. “It retreated to its master.”
“I... didn't know that – Ives seemed just as surprised as I was. At first I was thrilled, he was there and whole; it was dark, so I pulled out the light orb... And – he didn't have a shadow.”
Louisoix's hands had gone to fold on his staff in front of him; he gave a brief glance around the room, where there was little else – the two others at work had gone to move the last of the emergency cases out.
“He... realized I knew, and he was angry. I asked him why, and he-” He shifted, sinking into the blanket more. “He said it'd given him a chance to do something; that the people it'd killed were better off, that if things had gone on I was just going to leave and forget him anyway, and – other things.”
Another kid like you.
“I think it got frustrated; it – cut him off on something he was about to say, and took over. It wanted me to go with it; said it'd wanted to meet me when it wasn't a fight, but I'd – a talent for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. It did something so I couldn't leave the room, so – I tried to keep it talking, to buy time. It said that they'd give me concessions, that people I named would be protected, and that I was valuable. I think it...knew that you were coming, it cut off me trying to drag things out and told me to choose.”
“...That's when you broke the light and screamed?” Yda was still staying small in the chair.
“Yes. It – while I was on the ground, it said I had one last chance, and held a hand out to me; I pulled back, and – that's when you showed up.” The door opened to the other two coming back, cleaning up; the conjurer was herding Chas off, apparently to settle in for the night shift. “Yda? It's – alright. ...I... he hated me. It said it was jealousy that would pass, but...there's – a lot of little things lately I didn't pay attention to, he'd lashed out hard not long before – I got caught; he stopped funny, and – before it'd always been a few days before he apologized, and he never said much... I think – it made him apologize so it could lure me closer....that it – used him going bitter at me and a lot of other things to get to him.”
“...He was still your friend... before he got too hurt and went all hate on you. You were so happy talking about how he'd taught you things and helped you save that other girl, and going out watching fireworks...”
“...I know.” he curled into the blanket, another layer added to the dull ache from the injury. “And it's worse because – even if we could've gotten it out of him...he wanted it.”
Louisoix sighed. “We should move you to an empty room for the night; there was one left open nearby for you.” He offered a hand down, to help Thancred sit up; Yda was right there on the other side, a knee on the bed so she could help support him. Louisoix draped a robe over his shoulders once he was sitting, Yda fussing to make sure it was hanging right before they helped him out of the bed. The vertigo returned with a vengeance as soon as he tried to stand, almost collapsing against Louisoix, clinging to the man's robe; Louisoix had a hand down to shift for support, but Yda was already there on the other side, tugging an arm over her shoulder with a small, “I've got him.”, carrying him the same as she had two days ago.
It was becoming a bad habit.
Yda was careful settling him into the bed in the long-term room; she hovered for a few minutes, fidgeting, and ducked out after an odd glance from Louisoix. Louisoix pulled the one upholstered chair over by the bed, resting his staff against the wall next to it, and settled himself.
Thancred almost opened his mouth to say something; the intent of staying for at least a while was clear, but the protest that he'd be fine didn't quite make it. He curled on his side, getting the odd itch of the wound a little less pressed into the fabric, shifting the pillow to half curl around it.
“...There was something....when it was trying to talk me into joining it.”
“Mmm?”
“It – said so much about how it'd been trying to get close... I – asked it if that's why it'd taken Ives... why our district was targeted.”
Lousioix leaned closer, chin resting on a hand; he could barely see the shape in the dim lighting.
“It ...said that it had other work here, but – that I was part of its choice of hosts; the opportunity, that I had potential... and all I could think of was something Y'shtola had said, and the way Yda reacted when she first saw me...”
He saw a quiet, listening nod.
“When it struck me, it said that – my true father was too weak to protect me. And it called me 'Wanderer's Child'. …...What – did it mean? Was I really that valuable to be worth – all of this to it?”
“That... is a harder subject. What had Y'shtola said?”
“I asked her what they wanted, why they were doing this. She said there was a seventh verse of the Divine Chronicles, and that you were finding people to try to prevent a Seventh Umbral Era from falling; that you couldn't tell everything, but you would act on prophecy, go looking for things to – fill holes or what would be needed. She told me they wanted to stop you and the others before you could start...that you must've seen something I could do, and if I refused, you'd be looking for someone else. I didn't...even think I was more than collateral to it....”
“And what is your guess?”
He traced circles on the pillow. “People call you an Archon.... that you're an incarnation of Thaliak himself. Is … it looking for others? Did it think I was -?”
Louisoix shifted, hands folded over each other on the arm of the chair.
“You know the ballads and stories of the Archons.”
He nodded into the pillow.
“Across all the stories, what would you think of them? Of the saga of their battles and Ahldbhar's betrayal?”
“...I – it all sounded so far away, but … sometimes it didn't sound any different than either bunch of heroes from ballads... Ahldbhar was proud, looking for fights, he chafed at the others trying to rein in his temper, and when they suffered a defeat, he lost faith... he saw that the dark mages had power past even theirs, and decided that was more important than what they fought for. They tried to get him back, he nearly killed another who went to sway him... they didn't want to kill him, when they finally had to face him, they came out of it grievously wounded because they'd sought to avoid it so strongly.”
“And?”
“....They were people. The Twelve squabble sometimes and have disagreements or trysts, even as distant as they are, and when they were reborn as mortals... they had the power, but they were mortals, and they acted like any other mortal 'heroes'.”
It was quiet enough, for a few moments, that he almost drowsed.
“The Ascians... they can, rarely, manifest something solid, but it is a puppet; bits of energy woven together and pushed into our world – it takes a great deal of power, and is difficult for them. In their natural state, they are formless; living parts of the void. Sight and sound as we know it is something they gain from a mortal body borrowed; their true awareness is the flow of aether from, and through, everything. They are difficult to fool.”
“...Are you sure? That it could be right? I don't – I was abandoned, unwanted; as best I can guess, my mother was a whore, before I got good enough to earn coin by singing on street corners I picked pockets and stole from shops.... I'm – a street con, not some bard of eld forged on a battlefield.”
“How many others, when the murders happened, had 'go towards it to do something' as their first instinct?” Louisoix almost sounded faintly amused.
“...You know that habit – there's a hundred times I did something like that and only lived because of Ives, or Gib, or someone else.”
“But you've done things – the children you brought back from the slavers, what would they call you?”
He buried his face in the pillow, mumbling about “not fair”.
“I spoke to the Inspector's men about you, as I could catch them off-duty, those first few days. Was there any particular reason to gravitate towards the plaza with the Nymian harp?”
“...I was homeless. A vagrant. Oschon watches over vagrants. I used to go pray out there, and – tie offerings on the arms of it, because we all needed all the help we could get.”
“They've found you sleeping under it when the winds are higher.”
“It's sort of soothing and there's not many that bother someone asleep at a shrine, particularly a very loud shrine.”
“Were you the one that left an offering on the highest point?”
He choke-laughed into the pillow. “That's what pissed Ives off so bad – he was furious, that I'd do something like that with people looking for us...” How much of that had been genuine worry, anymore, and how much was old habit and prodding? So much of it had turned ugly so fast...
“Do you think the skills of knowing the back streets, the poor, and the thieves and lost can't be used to save others?”
He almost answered, stopped, and slumped against the pillow. “That sounds like bait, and I'm not a fish.”
“I'm quite serious. How long do you think it would have taken us to find the lair without your knowledge of how to navigate that part of the city?”
“So you've got someone who can hunt like a coeurl as long as it's in the bad part of town.”
“How much do you know of recent events in the world?”
He raised his head from the pillow, mouth open in protest; there was bait again, but Louisoix was doing the calm thing where he was waiting for an answer. Thancred met it with a scowl.
“Well, people have been fleeing Ala Mhigo for a few years now, some of them running with nothing more than the shirt on their backs. The Empire's locked out all trade from Ilsabard, and some people say you could bribe anyone with a bottle of wine from the old country to the south of it, since no-one can get it anymore – some of the merchants say the silence is an ill omen, that they've heard tales of horrible things from those shores. The pirate fleets that range more east have been banding together more and bringing back stories themselves, so there's smugglers with horror stories about the Empire where it's hard to tell what's real and what's a mummer's farce. The Dravanians have been getting more aggressive, and the Ishgardians are digging in against them. Do you want me to get into Sharlayan politics? I know who on the councils has sold out, who buys from the smugglers, and who's got reputations with the ladies of the night they don't want getting out. Oh, and there's rumors there's a Garlean spy, but that one changes every week and is probably paranoia and old monger's gossip; the less mad stories about the Garleans hold that they, themselves, are lousy at blending in with anyone else, too little respect for the 'savages' to learn how. If it gets consistent I'll worry someone sold out to them.”
“Perhaps keep the politics to yourself unless there is a relevance to needed affairs.” Louisoix chuckled, shaking his head slowly. “You have the instincts of an intelligence agent, gathering information like that.”
“It's hard not to overhear things, or catch bits from getting people talking, even without putting forth effort like bribing merchants.”
“And how many people find half of that to be new information because they don't listen as often?”
He sulked over the pillow. “I learned to do that to run cons. Figure out what people wanted and what they would believe, if you're too fanciful they catch on, too mundane and they keep walking, too out of touch and they listen but don't care to spend any coin.”
“Would you come with us? We could use a sharp set of eyes and ears that know how to work with people.”
“...Y'shtola said it was afraid … of Gib when he tried to warn me, of me because I could help corner it....”
“Those who wish to abuse power will most vehemently pursue that which could be a threat to their power.”
It had been after him; Ives, the other people he knew, Gib, Mattye … “...-Mattye, Gib, Ives, some of the others dead – it … was taking away everything I had, to get to me.”
“Someone with nothing left to lose is easier to push to desperation and despair, and easier to use.”
It hurt – yet somehow, all that came out of it was anger; people he cared about, good people, dead because it wanted to break him. “...It about succeeded.... I have nothing left to go back to almost, and - …. I don't want their world.” He closed his eyes, unclenching the hand he hadn't realized he'd dug into the pillow, sinking into it. “....If I did – try to go back... they'd just come after me again, wouldn't they? Maybe Edine next time?”
Louisoix bowed his head. “Would that I could tell you that they would respect your choice and leave you be....”
“...If they're that afraid of me going with you, then – it's worth it to spite them.... I didn't – they killed too many people to give them what they want, at all.”
“It is good to have you.”
He was starting to drowse off, even as the tiny spike of anger faded out; something else nagged. “... When did you guess it was using Ives?”
Louisoix frowned, looking away. “You trusted him, but when you spoke of why you believed he couldn't, it was full of gaps and faith; even your own description of him was someone whose weapon could mean life or death if things went badly. If his main blade had been lost or stolen, it would have been a disaster the moment it went missing, yet you said you'd both gone about routines as normal, with him going off on risky work half-armed and that unnoticed.”
“...I - ….why didn't you tell me?”
“Would you have believed me if I had?” There was an odd sort of sorrow under the question.
He thought long; there was a list of things that seemed like they should have been obvious, and yet...if he hadn't paid attention to things that close to him himself - “....No.”
“Your faith in him spoke much of your own character... he was important to you, and you wished the best of him to be what he chose.”
He mumbled into the pillow; he felt tired, he hurt from more aches than sore muscles, residual battering, and the Ascian's blow, and there was an increasing feeling that parts of it just wouldn't neatly wear themselves into words.
He managed a vertigo-laden wobble to the washroom without help, even if it did end up including walls for support several times. The loose robe and the mirror made it hard to not notice some sort of odd dark, black pattern webbing upward, like some kind of diseased leaf-veins. Morbid curiosity finally took over, and he tugged it open enough to get a good look at the injury.
The central part of it was mottled a mildly unnatural black and purple; he could cover it with a hand, but there were definite patterns to the spread-out patterning where he could trace out the past edges of it where it'd receded as the mages had seen to it; it'd apparently been a large spread initially, and he wasn't sure he wanted to ponder how far the webbing-out patterns had originally gone. As it was, there were a few stray threads that went up past his collarbone a little. The solid central part was still faintly sunken in, barely noticeable on touch, sensitive-sore, and clammy in a way that made him not really want to poke at it much; it was all the more unsettling to notice that it did, apparently, mean some kind of darker fluid on his hand, a faint greyish stain.
He'd vaguely noticed the sounds of movement in the hallway, faint voices going by about daily business; then there was much faster footsteps, agitated, that got his attention on the door, wondering if he should try to open it to check and if he could manage that fast enough without ending up propped on the door. The debate was decided as he was having it, the door swinging open; in a matter of short moments, Y'shtola went from a worried panic, to incredulity, to exasperated irritation, tail puffed out straight behind her.
“Why are you up on your own?!”
He made a helpless, confused explanatory gesture at the latrine and plumbing.
Y'shtola buried her face in one hand with an unintelligible grumble.
“Well. One of the trainees was changing the sheets in your room; you should be getting back to it, you are not well enough to be up and about.”
He almost paused for her to leave the doorway; she gave him a narrow look, catching his elbow to serve as support for his balance and escort him back. She was watching him closely the entire way, seeming to take note of every time his balance gave out worse.
There was food waiting – or, well, plain fish, soup, fruit, water, and tea; the girl was just finishing up dealing with the bedding, and now that he was more awake and aware, he winced a little at the sheets she was carrying out in a basin, catching enough of a glimpse to see a few dark stains on it.
Y'shtola herded him to sit on the newly cleaned bed, setting the tray down in front of him. “You'll need to eat before we can risk doing anything more about that.”
Remembering how well some things had managed, he drank the tea first, glancing over it with a questioning look at her.
“Healing magics repair damage, but they can only take the edge off of strain and fatigue; moreover, there is a mild strain on the body itself from the rapidity of it. Your vertigo comes from that more than the wound by now – you've been brought back from the brink of death, and your body is still struggling to catch up. Urianger mentioned bringing books down, but honestly, you should spend most of the day eating and sleeping to recover.” An ear flicked. “And if you do try to push your luck, I am not above a sleep spell to enforce that.”
Whatever the tea did to settle things, he hadn't really felt hungry, but picking at food seemed like a reminder, and it very quickly went from “unsure” to “not enough”, Y'shtola staying quietly by the bed with a faint smile. She ducked out with the empty tray when he was done, coming back with more of the same; all of it light and bland, but food, at least.
When he had slowed down and hit that strange and unfamiliar point of there being more than he could eat around, she pulled the tray aside, catching his shoulder in a clear signal to stay sitting up. The robe was tugged down to the tie, and she took her time studying the wound on his chest and his back; she didn't touch it, but there were moments of fingertip pressure around the edges, sometimes almost uncomfortably tugging it. “What was that, anyway?”
“Well, they're beings of living void energy; it essentially drew upon that purely in a state that does not easily exist in our realm. It doesn't quite exist in the physical plane very well; the majority of the damage is disrupting the ties between the flesh and the aetheric body, although concentrated and focused enough, it has a sort of necrotic warping effect.... trying to make the living body conform to it.”
It wasn't exactly a comforting narration, but it explained a lot. “I suspect its plan was to get as far as it could and then cut and run when we caught up; it left bits and scraps in the wound to fester, probably hoping it would kill you if you were left to our care. It nearly succeeded.” She was studying the entry point on his chest, one pointed tooth chewing on a lip quietly. “We've been needing to interweave more straightforward curative spells with cleansing magics; it's slow work, voidal energy is something of the background fabric of existence, which makes it difficult for most of our schools to get a grip on. If Louisoix weren't here with some White Magic to better address that, I would be packing you up for a trip to Gridania to throw ourselves on the mercy of the Padjali.”
“Would this have to do with why White and Black magics were deemed so dangerous in the Fifth Era?”
“Indeed; thaumaturgy, conjury, and arcanistry all draw upon surface aetheric flows. Black and White magic reach deeper, to the background energy that forms the deeper lifeblood of the world; they are more difficult to control, and even seemingly benign white magic can have a dire impact on the environment if overused. The Black has been mostly proscribed, and the White, restricted to only three individuals at any given time, with a few occasional special cases here and there.” She was speaking distractedly, a rote lecture while she examined the wound; she gave an experimental poke with a claw, then turned to a small box-kit setting on the side table, retrieving a narrow, sharp-looking blade. “This will only take a moment; I will need to draw blood to check something, if you could kindly hold still?”
He was good at freezing in place; it was a good way to avoid drawing attention if you were out of line of sight and there were distractions. She kept a few fingers outlining a patch of skin right beside the indented part of the wound, pricking the blade into a clear spot in between some of the spiderweb patterns; it stung, a little more for his attention being on it, but he kept still through it. A few drops of red ran down the small blade, and she pulled back to clean it with a smile, swabbing at the pinprick cut and closing it over with a small flicker of magic. “It looks like you're recovering enough for your own system to start fighting back properly, although if my suspicions are correct, I may need to send our Ala Mhigan guests with a nice parting gift.”
“One of them did help Louisoix last night; what was that power he used?” He'd been struck with curiosity since; it wasn't any magic he recognized.
“Something subtle; the Fists of Rhalgr gain power by honing and training their own energy systems, to both augment their physical abilities beyond the realms of nature and for some other uses. The more skilled ones discovered a technique that could be used on others temporarily, to induce a state where the aetheric system is heightened and has a strengthened interaction with the body; it can dramatically boost the effect of healing magic, and in this case, allow the system to better respond to aetheric toxins.”
She took a moment doing further examination, checking over the darker spiderwebs; she paused with a frown, switching to another sharp tool that was narrow, barely wider than a quill pen, and seemed to be similarly built, with the pointed, bladed edge curved around a groove that ran into the shaft. He was getting poked at with her mouthing something to herself, finding overlap between the pattern and veins. “I'm going to need to draw blood again; this may take a few moments longer.”
It sank in a little deeper than the last one, although she was careful to keep it to just the point, held down so that the blood from the cut was dripping into the metal reservoir. She gave it what felt like a long time to drain that way before pulling the tool out and doing another small spell to close up the cut, tapping some of the blood from the reservoir into a glass dish.
Bits of it looked almost brackish-brown, although from Y'shtola's expression, it wasn't as bad as she was expecting. Her gaze flickered enough to notice his attention on it. “It's an after-effect; discoloration of the skin and some other things as the energetic toxin recedes.” She pulled a vial that he recognized as the translucent blue of a healing potion, tapping a couple drops into the glass tray and tipping it; the potion evaporated with a flicker as it came into contact with the blood drops, which returned to a more normal shade of red. “And it looks like it is just residue; it should fade soon.”
“How bad is-?” He twisted around, in a known futile effort to check his back.
“...Not nearly as bad; there's much less of the discoloration and mostly just a small actual wound; the whole mess currently looks worse than it actually is, since the chain-casting yesterday ended up absorbed into internal damage more.”
“Well, that's a relief.”
“Considering the nature of it, Louisoix should be back soon to take care of the rest of this; I still have a good amount of work elsewhere, but there will be people by to bring food and I'll try to check in as I can.” She was packing up the kit carefully, but clearly in a bit of a hurry; he settled back into the bed, trying not to think too much about the black stains on the sheets they'd carried out earlier.
