The Quirks of a Once Human

I couldn’t go back to the workshop yet, and I didn’t really want to. I’d brought a few materials to tinker with while I sat at Danny’s bedside so I wouldn’t go crazy as I waited for him to wake up.

“Da...d...”

Magic’s most common drawback was the sense of exhaustion one felt when trying to use too much too fast. We absorbed environmental magic constantly from the environment, so we’d never truly run out, but converting it took time and energy. Having little magic of your own affinity in your body could be tiring, but having none could be painful and leave someone in a fragile state. If they were introduced to an affinity their body couldn’t handle they could quickly die, as they’d have no magic of their own affinity to fight its presence. I could tell Danny had some, but he’d used up a lot of his healing magic on me and the others.

Healing magic.

Fridle told me what Danny had done when I woke up half the moon ago, and I could only keep staring back at the dark scar on my shoulder. I had a few, mostly from unfortunate experiments, but this was by far my largest, and the only one that had truly presented a threat to my life. A bit lower and my lungs could’ve been affected, a bit to the side and my neck would’ve been, and if I hadn’t been healed an unlucky infection could have still posed a major risk to me.

But... healing magic? He really has healing magic?

It was a fairytale. Danny had asked me about “clerics” and ways to heal with magic before, but I’d only been able to point to treatments made with medicine growing, burning techniques to close wounds, water magic to clean, and things like that. Healing flesh directly was something only a being who could affect life itself could do, and I only knew of two possible beings that could supposedly do such a thing. I hadn't had the chance to tell him about them, because I was so busy worrying about this or that device.

I'm so selfish.

The Weeping, as authorities on the religious source of magic, believe that magic in its environmental form constitutes the leftover building blocks that Xovod used when creating the Night Domain. Whether they left this magic behind purposefully or not, people’s affinities represent a portion of Xovod's powers that have been conferred time and again to the living beings in their realm, from people to monsters, which allow us to enact our will on the world.

While anyone can interact in limited ways with most forms of magic regardless of their affinities, they believe the magic one can create and absorb is entirely dependent on how their soul expresses the more creative aspect of Xovod’s passed on power. No one can explore or create all the forms of magic except for Xovod themself. This is one explanation they have for why no one is known to have all affinities, as the only person that should be capable of creating and completely balancing the chaotic demands of all of the different forms magic can take would be Xovod.

Xovod had several children, who could claim numerous or incredibly rare affinities and vast control over magic. Being a Wyrm, like Cyxeri of the Luminescent Domain, some of Xovod’s children were naturally the dragons, a few of which I knew by name because of the feats they were said to have accomplished or the havoc they wreaked.

Healing magic brought to mind a particular child of Xovod, however, not a dragon but instead a tree. The Gloam Tree. Its leaves, bark, branches, all of them were meant to be filled with its healing magic, and given freely to anyone who stumbled across it. The Weeping claimed that the Gloam Tree was the oldest child of Xovod, tasked by Xovod with protecting life of all forms at its own discretion. A scant few people could ever claim to have encountered it, maybe one a generation.

The Gloam Tree was supposed to be the brightest thing in the forest when it chose to be so. Everyone knew that if you were lost and injured in the forest, and a beacon of shifting orange and purple light filtered through the trees, that such a light would save you. Plenty of people still died in the woods, presumably never having seen the light, but those few that have were restored completely.

Itelber’s master told me when I asked him about healing items that some people tried to take parts of the Gloam Tree with them, but their own magic degraded the leaves and branches rapidly, and if someone happened to have a nullifying box with them they’d have to use the part as soon as they opened it. Healing magic could exist in anything, but was quickly overcome by magic of other kinds, he said. If it wasn’t, it would surely poison those people it was used on, especially since it was often used on those close to death and exhausted of their own magic. His theory was that healing magic was by its nature weak, so as to be as gentle on living things as possible, and that it easily let go of its nature when it left the Gloam Tree.

He believed it was for that very reason there were no people who possessed healing magic. The Gloam Tree had been able to protect itself from the moment of its creation, and had some means to conceal itself, but an infant with such weak magic would surely succumb to their own parent’s magic, or stray magic from anyone or anything, too easily.

Itelber, Fridle and I had all come to the same conclusion about Danny's fragility soon after we realized how exhausted Danny’s magic was and what the nature of it was. For the moment, only Fridle and I had the control over our magic necessary to safely touch him without a nullifying barrier; even Itelber couldn’t be entirely certain he could withhold his magic should Danny start to naturally absorb it, and Danny's potential susceptibility to all magic called for particular caution.

“M..m..omma...” Danny, time and again as he slept, let out cries for names I didn’t know, as well as his mom and dad, and each time my heart lurched, but I didn’t touch him.

He never talked about his family, and I had only asked a few times and received small bits and pieces. For a bit I had assumed that maybe he didn’t care that much for his family, but that little lingering doubt had been washed away by name after name and tear after tear.

I also heard my name, quite a few times, mixed with those of Illose and Itelber’s families.

I could feel his fear, and a few times I almost left the room, but I just kept working with the materials in front of me from a safe distance.

He shouldn’t be here. He should be home, in that safe world he described to me, with his family. I was born here, he wasn’t. This isn’t his fight... it’s supposed to be mine, isn’t it?

...And I screwed up.

Several hours passed, and a litany of thoughts moved through my mind as I kept listening to Danny.

I’m such a bad person. All I could think about was what he knew. I didn’t even realize how much he missed his family. I didn’t think about how dangerous everything here is for him, either.

I continued to tinker, glancing his way.

How much magic could he withstand if a monster attacked him? What if just one experiment went wrong and the stray magic killed him? I don’t want him to get hurt, and it isn’t safe for him here. I don’t want to see him go, but what would I do if he died?

His world would be a lot safer for him. There’s no magic there.

“Danny is recovering, and we’ve been careful to keep any sources of magic away from him.” Having already explained to them our theories regarding Danny's magic, Fridle relayed his condition to my parents, Itelber, Illose, and Zida just outside of Danny’s room. Biarn was sitting inside with him now, under strict orders to keep himself a few steps away at all times.

“Nearly everyone in the village knows he can heal now, but they all seem to understand the gravity of the situation and are focused on reinforcing the tunnels and workshop again.” Illose reassured.

“I have a lot of trust for the villagers of Kogen,” my mom began, “for all the time you sheltered my family, I have full faith that everyone will know not to say anything about Danny. Once he recovers, I will call a gathering so we can all figure out how we wish to proceed.”

From there we all agreed to reiterate to the rest of the villagers that no one could know about Danny, and spoke for a while longer about his condition.

As the others left, I asked Itelber to stay behind for a moment.

“What is it?”

“What do you know about the Mosaic Gates?”

“Hm. In what context?”

“What do you know about how they work?”