Welcome to Gaia! ::

Raemos waitied for Vona at the inn as the sun came down. He had stowed and packed and re-packed all of their belongings, including the new things. He had already checked on the Kargoth that Sonia had sent ahead for them - it was resting and would be ready when they left tomorrow. It was Old Betty, too, well trained, older, and able to handle herself in a fight.

He'd even reread the letter a dozen times, its creases now built into the paper itself. He had done everything he possibly could to stave off his fear, but it had been an hour now since the sun had gone down, and his sister was nowhere in sight. No sign of her, even as the port city began to quiet for the night. Anxiously, he flipped the now sweat-stained and tightly folded letter around and around in his hands as his summoned familiar watched him, cooing in an unsuccessful attempt to soothe him.

Where was Vona? Why wasn't she here? He could only imagine that something horribly dreadful had happened to her, to prevent her from reaching him in time. A rational, sane part of his brain retorted that she was probably carrying a lot of stuff. Something normal, it insisted, must have held her up. That was all.

Of course, he wasn't exactly rational at the moment. His mother was upset, his father was seriously hurt, there were rock monsters hurting people he loved and cared about, and his sister. Was. Missing.

Finally, he could take it no longer. He stood up, about to scour the market for her, his summoned familiar springing into the air eagerly, when he caught sight of her familiar shape running towards him.

"Vona!" he called out, feeling a potent cocktail of emotions, not the least of which was relief. He rushed down to greet her.

"Raemos come quickly! I think I found a healer for dad!" she said quickly as he ran up, her voice shaking with excitement. A healer was good. Raemos could not heal, and he knew that Vona and his mother could only do a little healing magic themselves. But all the healers were busy with the Mara attacks... "But you gotta come quickly!" she grabbed his gloved hand, and they were soon hurtling through the quieting market, his summoned familiar fluttering cheerfully at his back.

Vona dragged him through a network of dark streets and side alleys, and he hoped, as they neared a building at a dead end, that Vona not only knew where she was going, but could lead him back to the inn.

The building was not bad inside. It smelled of medicine and spices and water and, faintly, sickness. It was, he realized as he heard afflicted coughing from behind a wall, a healer building. She pulled him, gentler now, into a room that smelled so strongly of herbs and medications and heat that he recoiled slightly, sneezing.

"Oh! you're back!" a tall, lanky orderite with shadows under his eyes and a white healer's frock approached, then blinked. "This... is your brother?" he said incredulously, "Sonia's son?"

"Yep!" said Vona. Her voice was excited and, Raemos thought hopeful.

"Oh... Adopted. I see... Not surprised..." mumbled the healer, "Well, this makes things more complicated... your... sister... tells me that you are a mage?"

"Yes..." said Raemos, looking at his sister and not at all happy about the situation.

"So you know how to do very basic infusions at least?"

"Yes." Which was true.

"Good. You two will help me prepare basic medicinal infusions for my patients. My apprentices you see..." he explained, "are all treating patients. If you finish all of these, I will go personally to your home and treat your father." he gestured to a worktable, stocked with magic flames, vials, herb grinding kits and lots and lots of herbs. "The basic recipe of what I need is there, in case you need a reference. Just make a lot of it..." he frowned at Raemos, before handing him a bottle of glowing substance, "Infuse them with this. Do you understand?"

Raemos nodded. "Yes sir." he said.

"I told you he'd agree!" said Vona, giving her brother a little kiss on the cheek before sitting down at the table. Raemos followed suit, still a bit dazed from the run and more than a little hopeful. A healer was exactly what they needed.

The infusions were easy enough, especially with the glowing bottle - liquified, concentrated light magic. He could handle it well enough, and it was certainly better used for the purpose of infusing healing medicines than the evil, cunning dark energies that came naturally.

He made them almost mechanically, creating his own simple pattern of production, eventually making whole large batches of several at a time. Crush herbs, set to boil, set to cool, set the next to boil, set that to cool, set the next to boil, take the first, infuse it, bottle it, and so on...

Vona had a little more trouble – she was a tailor, not a mage and her magic wasn't nearly as strong as his own. So, he helped her too. Soon, she was doing the same as him, with enough control over what magic she had to manage the infusions on her own.

Eventually, they ran out of materials. It was late and Raemos could feel exhaustion creeping slowly into his mind and limbs. Vona had fallen asleep, and he finished her last batch, gently moving her aside as he set it with the other completed batches.

"Oh! You're done!" Raemos looked up at the healer.

"Yes... is there more?" he asked. He could still keep going if he needed to.

"Oh. No. We have enough now that I would be comfortable leaving in a few days..."

"Oh..." Raemos felt suddenly very tired.

"You two can go and..." the healer handed Raemos a package, "An additional token of my thanks." he tapped Vona on the shoulder gently, "You should get rest while you can. It is very dangerous out there."

Sleepily, Vona nodded. "That was what I was doing..." she mumbled, leaning on her brother as they left the hospital.

Surprisingly, it wasn't as hard to navigate back as Raemos had thought: when not being dragged along, the streets followed logical patterns. Plus, his familiar remembered the way.

Finally, closer to dawn than midnight, he and Vona reached the inn. She was half asleep as it was, and he set her in her bed.

He put the package in with the other things and settled into his own bed to catch what little sleep he could before morning.