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“Abronaxus, Tanarah, you will be the death of me yet…”

Tanarah, sitting cross-legged on her bed as her father wrapped up the finishing touches of cleaning and cleansing her face after healing, opened her mouth, fully ready to point out that she was far more likely to be the death of herself at the rate she was going. Then, deciding that she had likely already given her father enough metaphorical — or literal — gray hairs for the evening, she held her tongue, letting him work instead and laying her fingers gingerly over the fresh-wrapped bandages around her gut. His rag was cool and the sweep of his magic soothing. By the time he finished, she knew her ailments were not gone in their entirety, but it no longer hurt to move.

She had not dared face a mirror yet in regards to her hair. When he pulled away though, sighing and looking her over one more time, she felt she was out of biding time. “How bad is it?”

Lithian blinked. “Which? Your stomach should heal in a few days with the aid of magic. The left side of your face, shoulder, and down your arm were burned, but I think they were shallow enough and new enough that the scarring will be minimal, if noticeable at all. Yo—”

“My hair,” Tanarah grunted, frowning. “I don’t suppose it matters a great lot, but…if I look really ridiculous…” She glanced to her papa, and then her sister, silently seeking out anyone to give her some clue in before she looked herself, no matter how she told herself it mattered little in the end.

However much was gone, it would grow back, at least…?

Perhaps she could pass it off as something of a battle scar.

Tanarah blinked, and then shot her papa a grin at his commentary. He was right, in the end. She’d made it out with her life and with her clan chosen. Surely that wasn’t so bad, and she hadn’t lost all of her hair or burnt up her face. It hurt, but she could handle the pain until it ebbed. “Maybe,” she suggested after a moment, “if it’s real bad on one side…we could cut it like yours a bit. That way it’d be balanced out and not look ridiculous, anyhow.”

When her sister moved in to sit beside her, her smile became guilty, but still there, pleased at the show of affection, even if it did come paired with irritation. Whatever frustration her sister bore over the event was likely merited, in any case.

“I don’t suppose I’m likely to ever do something exactly like that again…” she said. “And it isn’t as though I did it on purpose.” After a moment, though, she conceded, “I will try to be careful, though. Mostly.” Then, her expression warmed another fraction. “But what do you think of my clan? And think of how I can tell the story later…”

Lithian smiled back, looping an arm loosely out around his mate’s waist and leaning over to press a kiss to his cheek. “Whatever you want, Tana, we can help you style it I’m sure. It is your hair to do with as you please.”

“Even if I wanted to chop it all off?” Tanarah asked, testing the limits of the assertion, and Lithian raised his eyebrows a fraction.

“I suppose, yes,” he said. “Even if you wanted that.”

Tanarah didn’t want to chop all of it off. That seemed unnecessary. A bit, though, seemed merited, and so, several days later after she was well on her way to healing, they prepared to do just that.

“Papa,” she asked as Lithian prepared what he would need to make the cuts, “when after this will we be able to progress? Will we go up to the Plane and turn in to Lord Ysaride, or off to Soudul? I’m ready to speak with someone…now that we have our clans and our weapons, surely we’re strong enough.”

“I think, though,” Lithian said, “it would benefit you to work with your element some before we took you…”

Tanarah frowned. “I’ve worked some—”

“A little more yet,” Lithian said. “You’ve only just attained it. Perhaps you could work with your sister some. Or your papa or I, you know we’d be happy to practice with you.”

Tanarah groaned, and almost flopped back, except that then her father was holding her still and beginning to cut. She settled for a dissatisfied pout in the meantime, eyeing her reflection out of her peripheral vision as her dark hair fell in loose clumps and waves down from her head to her shoulders and lap. “In a week, maybe…?”

All of it seemed like too much waiting.

When her father finished, removing his cutting tools and saying that she could move, Tana shut her eyes and shook her head like a canine, tossling the loose hair everywhere before reaching up and dusting her fingers along the sides of her head to work free any remaining itchy stray strands. After, she glanced to the mirror, and then to her sister, grinning.

“I think so.”

And that, as they say, was that.