skill: none

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Euphemia listened – and she didn’t know exactly what she had expected, but it certainly wasn’t that. The Maiden, who was already quite an empathetic soul, felt her heart break in two at such an idea. A newborn baby, harmed because of adults’ gross infatuation with ruining anything that was ever good.

She knew, right then, that this was a perfect example of the worst, the most evil, manifestation of the universe’s many eyes.

Euphemia didn’t know what to say. She just sat there, in solemn silence, and the young Ca’an let her. Then, eventually, she reminded herself that she must speak – but when she opened her mouth to do so, her stomach lurched like she had undergone a wave of nausea.

That… might be the worst thing I've ever heard. She sighed, finally looking at him, unsure of the right thing to say. This was an issue that, Euphemia would bargain, there existed no real remedy for.

And, trust me, Euphemia had been looking for this type of solution. Abandoned by their father, Mother long dead, Euphemia had felt the lack of her own parents keenly. It was far easier to accept the passing of her Mother than the quiet disdain of their father.

Her experience, she reckoned, was fairly common amongst a land of predator and prey. Souls died, sometimes they were reborn, and everyone suffered for it. Very few were made better for it. The loss of her parents was a daily sort of pain, though sometimes she was able to ignore it – though she reckoned this was only possible because she didn’t have a chronic injury that forced her remembrance.

Oh, what to say, what to say, what to say?

Your physical pain can be alleviated a small amount, most likely. It was simple, and she tried not to dismiss the mountains of emotional layers he must also be suffering from. That, however, was not her expertise.

All she could do was offer her partnership in a world that threatened to eat alive those who did not stick together.

She breathed. I wouldn’t… give up, the maiden said, aware that she was sounding awkward, but she spoke slowly because she didn’t want to misspeak.

There are so many things we can try. One of them has gotta work.

And that was it – the basis of her medical theory, about his leg. That amongst the thousand and one plants she knew, literally one had to do something. and when combined with physical therapy? It was certain to do something more.

I’ll find it. Euphemia confirmed, with a curt nod, and a sense of hippocratic servitude driving her. She felt confident in this. If he had presented her with a rare form of blood cancer, her skills might have been too elementary, but his long, mishealed fracture she could handle.

Then the greyscale woman glanced to Iglux, her heart beating, as if she had a wriggly fish on the line and could use someone to hold the big net.

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