Dragons, Dystopians, and Denial

"Yeah," Jerica agreed. She wouldn't know -- she'd never had a sister to miss. But she missed Rek as much as she missed Ranofer, so it was probably about the same. "Does she have your powers too?

Elias shook his head. "No. Well, kind of."

He sighed. It wasn't like it was a secret anymore. Jerica somehow figured it out immediately, which shocked him since he had spent so many years trying to hide it when he realized what he could do.

"I heal myself. She heals others. That's the main difference, really. She's striving to be a doctor since she can help others with her powers."

"I see," Jerica answered thoughtfully. "And the healing has to come from someone else? So, you hurt someone to heal you, and she hurts someone to heal someone else?"

"Close," Elias said, glancing over at her. He thought about explaining it by cellular regeneration theory, but even he didn't quite understand the science, and he wasn't sure she would either since he wasn't sure science existed in a magical medieval world.

"In simple terms, I hurt someone to heal myself, and she would have to hurt herself to heal someone else."

"Ohhh," Jerica answered. "That sounds like it'd suck worse. You could at least just kill an enemy or something... or do you not get to control who you take it from?"

She gave him a sidewards glance before looking back up at the sky. The stars always seemed to calm her somehow. And it was nice that Elias was actually talking to her for once. She just needed to make sure he wasn't... volatile. She didn't know how to fight off that kind of magic, and she sure didn't want to be the source of his healing.

Elias shook his head again, his gaze still staring ahead. Despite this nerving conversation topic, it was nice to talk to someone for once. It was also nice to be under the stars in the fresh air, and on top of a horse who seemed to understand that he didn't know how to ride. He wished he expressed this gratitude of the word to Jerica instead of talking about Ellie, which of course, inevitably led to the topic of his powers.

"It doesn't suck worse," he said. "I'd give anything to have her powers instead."

I thought I did have her powers. Everyone did.

But I didn't.

"Okay." Jerica shrugged, she wasn't going to argue with something he clearly felt so strongly about. Nothing annoyed her quite so fast as someone explaining to her exactly what her life was like. It still didn't answer her question. "So can you, like, pick who you take it from?"

Elias was too lost in his thoughts at this point.

"But it not like we don't heal," he said, almost cutting off her question since his thoughts were starting to spill over with no filter.

"If it's something small, I could heal myself just fine, and so could my sister if she tried to heal a small injury for someone else. But it's kind of like going into a negative balance, if that makes sense."

"Right, yeah," Jerica answered. She... vaguely... understood how healing magic worked. "When Aerik healed me he had to use his own energy to do it. I get it has to come from somewhere. But, like, if some random soldier stabbed you and he was there and I was there and you healed yourself, would you get to pick if you took it from him or from me? Or would it be luck of the draw?"

Elias was about to agree and say yes, that was exactly right concept for healing powers, but then Jerica kept on going with this scary hypothetical situation.

He broke his concentration to look at her, but then tore his gaze away as he thought about his answer. He felt himself gripping the reins a little tighter, but he still stayed on Mellie okay.

He couldn't help but feel like Jerica was only asking because she was scared of him. Scared of what he could do.

"Not random," he said quietly. "Just... whoever is closest to me."

Her question upset him. I did ask you three times before this, she thought dryly. Still, he was talking now. Which was an improvement. So she needed to not ruin that.

No matter how huffy he was getting.

Her annoyance dissipated a bit when he finally answered. He's scared of himself. Well, that certainly made sense to her. She still had moments when it became painfully clear that she was nothing but a weapon. It didn't feel great.

"Oh!" she said brightly. "Well, we can work with that!"

She thought for a moment about how that would work. Usually, if her companions got injured, she would fight until it was safe to take a break -- then kneel down and see if she could provide aid to rescue them. She'd just have to do the opposite with him -- get away instead of going closer.

"So, like, if we're fighting." She could feel how tense he was. But couldn't make herself shut up. "And you get hurt. Then I should just stab someone and throw them into you?"

It kind of freaked Elias out how cheerful Jerica sounded after he said that, but he decided not to linger on it. Instead, he lingered on the fact that she seemed to talk about stabbing and killing people so nonchalantly.

Yes, the others in the military were like this too. But it still bothered him. It still bothered him that he was beginning to let Jerica get to know him, and she had the same frame of mind as his comrades. At least, that was what he figured. He only just met her today.

"I mean..." he began, trying to think through this absurd hypothetical situation. "That would work, but I don't approve of it. It's not right to just do that to people."

He knew she was going to complain about that, so he kept on going.

"Let's just hope it doesn't come to that, and we get to wherever we're going with no problems."

"I mean, duh."

He really seemed to have a penchant for stating the obvious. And for missing the obvious, too. It was almost adorable how naive he could be, thinking they were going to make it to Crevon without a fight. She'd be pleasantly surprised if they even made it to the coast without one. They weren't going to make it all the way through Crevon unscathed. But he didn't seem interested in knowing that just now.

"It's not like anyone wants to go around stabbing people, obviously." She resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Barely. "But if you get hurt, it'll be because someone stabbed you. And they can pay for that choice."

"Unless, of course, you get hurt when we're traveling or something... how far is your range?" Her mind couldn't seem to stop thinking about hypotheticals. And her mouth couldn't stop running. "Like. Okay, let's say, you're bathing in the river and trip and hit your head on a stone. Like, obviously if I was right there, the energy would come from me -- but what if out searching for food or something? Would your reach keep looking until it found the nearest human? Or take an animal? Or could you take it from a plant... a really big plant?"

There was a lot of mixed emotions that swirled in Elias's chest, and as Jerica kept talking and talking, it was only getting worse. He felt his walls come up, and he wanted to feel small, but that was hard to do on top of a moving horse.

"I..." he began when she finished.

He let the words pierce his skin at first, but the walls eventually came up and shielded them for him.

"I don't know," he croaked.

Jerica really had no concept of personal boundaries, did she?

What do you mean you don't know? Didn't you ever--? Jerica cut her own thoughts off as she looked over at him. He looked like a kicked puppy. Like Akeno looked when she forgot to transition from "General Ainsley" to "Jerica" when they were spending time together away from work.

"I've upset you." It was more an acknowledgment than anything. A fact. He hadn't done anything to earn him the respect he'd need for her to extend an apology. But, she wanted to continue the conversation. "We can talk about something else. Do you have questions for me?"