Grandpa stared at her over the wobbling cup of tea he held in his hands. His face was a topographical map of valleys and crevasses, and just like a map, she had to study it. He didn’t look at all like she imagined with his wire-frame pair of glasses, his comb over and drooping eyes.

Nor did she expect the nimbus that surrounded him. Despite his advanced age, he oozed vitality. He wasn’t a bonfire or even a forgefire of life, he was a wild forest fire. She had a pretty strong feeling that he had a talent similar, but opposite to hers to somehow.

Sadness panged her as she noticed the way he drummed his fingers against the sides of his cup exactly how the ghost of her mom tapped her fingers and hands against her legs.

“You look exactly like her,” Grandpa sighed morosely as he finally took a sip of his tea. It was about time, she’d drained her own bitter cup almost an hour ago. Her heart panged at the quivering tone of his voice though. “It’s criminal that slime rat bastard hasn’t taken you to meet me and I haven’t seen your brother since your father took that loan from me for one of his horses.”

“Dad took a loan from you?”

“To buy a baby horse or something. I don’t know, he claimed it would make all of the difference.” Grandpa took another sip. “Not like I believed him, but I didn’t have the heart to deny him again. When he stole your mother away with his dreams of horses that’d have horseKings pissing themselves with envy, I didn’t support either of them. Maybe if I had I could have saved her when… ahem.”

“When she gave birth to us.” Modran said evenly split with accusation and acceptance. She’d killed her mother. No point in mincing words.

“Yes…” He swallowed with a sharp click in his throat. “I’ve been a physician and a surgeon in both the occupational and archetypal sense. I’m a [Healer], [Doctor], [Surgeon], even a [Priest of Aleyr], Modran. All of that combines to [Savior]. And now, now, you tell me that you and your brother inherited your father’s greed, foolishness, and stubbornness? Why throw your lives away for entertainment in these festivities?”

She shifted self-consciously as she hunched her shoulders at his angry tone.

“Look, I’m not angry at you. I get it.” He set his cup of tea down with a clink of pottery. “It’s a possible route to get ahead here, and you chose an okay one. Logic would’ve been preferable, but well… Fremr is in the middle of nowhere. That’s fine. But Theodran? Why in all of the Unholy Wastes would he choose Horse?”

“He’s raised and rode horses all of his life.” She shrugged then bit her lip with a wince as she realized—

“He’s raised and rode horses? What about you? What have you done on a horse farm if you never raised or rode a horse?”

“Well, I…” She paused as words fell out of her reach, failing her.

“Does this perhaps have something to do with your talent?” He slipped his glasses off his face to wipe the lenses clean with his shirt. “I see your nimbus.”

Modran wrapped her arms around herself as she struggled to keep her heaving breaths under control. She felt overly self-aware of her tight gloves, and the confines of her dress with her pinned trousers underneath. Her lifethread twanged as she fought to keep her panic contained.

“Ah. I see.” Grandpa stood up in a single spry motion. He had more grace than her father and uncle combined despite his advanced age. “Come with me, child.”

Modran gaped as he walked out of the kitchen then turned to gesture for her to follow him again. She trembled as she stood and walked behind him through his humble mansion. He had a dark sitting room, a full kitchen with a dining room off to the side, a walk in pantry, and finally, a library with a cozy fireplace which he pointed at and muttered under his breath.

“Ignite. Now sit.” Grandpa pointed at the fireplace; a twig-sized beam of fire shot out of his finger that crackled once it struck the prepared logs. She stared at the fire uncertainly, but decided to listen. She’d never seen anyone with any [Mage] skills before, they were beyond rare in Aethel. He hadn’t used a wand or staff either, which was a common fixture in all the stories she had heard.

“Sit, please.” He waved her over to the small cushioned bench that faced the fireplace, but she didn’t trust it. It looked plush and soft, like something Alanna or her bitch of a sister would lounge around in. Modran wondered if she’d have a mansion like this some day if she won the tradePage competition.

“What are you looking for?” She sat down as close to the fireplace as she could get without catching fire. It wouldn’t do to burn her grandpa’s house down the day she met him. Or ever really.

“My father kept a treatise on the different types of talents that had popped up in our family lineage. He was obsessed with how they manifested over the generations or could be changed. You seem to be ashamed of yours for some reason, so I can only guess why, but it belongs in the family’s records, don’t you think?” He smiled kindly as he walked over then sat beside her with a thick leather-bound book that’s cover was cracked along the spine.

“A treatise?” She eyed the book with a mix of fear, distaste and awful longing. Talents were usually rather similar to one another in a family, so maybe she wasn’t alone with her curse. But if she was the only one… then wouldn’t that be worse?

Theo could fucking heal and while that was incredible she couldn’t help but be bitter about what that might mean some day. Even if it had been beyond terrifying to watch him lurch awake. His bones had snapped back in place one by one. His skin had rippled, then stitched itself back together before it smoothed. Not to mention his unnatural strength afterwards.

Her brother had shattered a wooden mug with the childlike ease of a toddler smushing a bug.

“Yes, it was a little side project of his. Our family has been [Doctors] for a few generations, but when he retired he became a bit of a talent tutor as well as a researcher. He had a few theories about how to shape talents before they manifested, but none of them were proven.”

“And what’s yours?” She asked with a tad too much challenge in her tone, but she couldn’t help it. She’d been condescended to her whole life, and here was another adult that would treat her with horror and control the moment he found out what she could do. Well, couldn’t do, she supposed since she couldn’t die.

“Mine is more of a trait than a talent, but well, the term still isn’t very decisive. I’m exceedingly healthy, so I can sense if and how other people are or aren’t healthy, and make them healthier or sicker. I usually use my talent to make them healthier, but there are instances where sickness is beneficial.”

“Oh.” She frowned. That was more like Theo’s than her own. “Why would you make people sicker?”

“Bah, you can’t wave people’s problems away. Healing skills have a hard time with sickness and disease, so it’s easier to gently nudge people along instead. Anyways.

“My father had near endless stamina. He never tired which helped him through several surgeries, especially since he could sedate patients with his talent then perk them back up.” He said then winked conspiratively, “He also made a killing in chips from the Order and wealthy patrons who wanted a pick-me-up.”

“Did my mom have a talent?” Modran asked as she leaned forward. Mom’s ghost floated along the ceiling, presumably so she could look down at the book too. Modran had no clue what she was doing, ghosts rarely made sense unless she fed them some of her life.

“She did, actually. It’s part of why your dad’s dream appealed to her so much. She could alter physicality. Make herself stronger, faster, or other people. The alterations were permanent too and cumulative. It was a hard talent to use, though. She tried to make a name for herself here in the clinic, but it was a very slow talent to work on other people. It would take weeks upon weeks and countless green chips for her to alter someone in any meaningful way.”

“Dad never mentioned any of that.” She frowned.

“Why would he?” He scoffed. “They’d only managed to successfully alter a few horses as far as I understood it. I took back my investment after his insistence killed her. Neither of them would come here and they refused my services. Then she died.”

Silence, except for the crackle of the fireplace. He rubbed his nose then turned to her with an apologetic smile. “That was unkind of me. He probably didn’t say anything because they barely got started. I’m sure they hoped to have generations of horses to use her talent on instead of what happened. Why mention what ended before it started?”

Modran nodded even as her mind whirled with thoughts and ideas. Her heart ached at the comments about her parents, but she refused to acknowledge it. Theo’s talent seemed similar to both mom’s as well as their grandpa’s, but she wasn’t sure either. She always felt beyond invigorated after she stole life from something.

“Do talents improve generation after generation?”

“Sometimes.” He shrugged as he opened the book and pointed at a description of his great-great grandmother who had a talent for gardening. “The first relative that we understand that has a direct link to us, could change how plants grew, grew more abundant plants, and all kinds of other things. She started an apothecary. Lodra was a huge part of the reason why our family practices medicine. Father suspected that there was a link between the environment one is born in and the genetics of the individual in determining talents, but it’s hearsay at best.”

“Genetics?”

“Traits that are passed down from parent to child.” He explained offhandedly before continuing. “I don’t know if you’ve seen many talents in that village of yours, but this theory is as correct as it isn’t when it comes to Lordships and those that use and sell their talents like our family. We’ve built a trade in medicine and as such, our talents have further improved to help us accomplish that goal, but talents in Lordship families wildly differ.”

“Mine is nothing like yours or Theo’s,” She pointed out with a scoff.

“Let me be the judge of that. Tell me what it is.”

“I…” She hesitated. Would he change towards her? He’d welcomed her into his home despite the obvious rift between him and her father for the death of her mom. But she was the one that had killed her, wasn’t she? How would she explain that?

“I already know, Modran.” Grandpa’s eyes twinkled sadly through the firelight glare in his glasses. He flipped through the open tome in his lap until he came to a page with a letter from her father copied into it. “Your father sent me a letter the first time you died and came back.”

He flipped forward a page showing another letter. “Then the second. After that I hired a carriage. All I could do was determine that it was your talent and figure out that you wouldn’t die as long as you had some life to absorb. I tried to take you and your brother back here, but they refused.”

Modran wrapped her arms around her knees as she hid her face. Sobs wracked her whole body until she trembled like a mouse in a cat’s jaws. He wrapped his arm around hers, even though she fought to free herself.

“You won’t hurt me. It’s okay, child. I’m immune to sickness, infection, and disease from my archetypes. Your adolescent talent won’t do anything to me.”

“Then why did mom die?” She threw herself out of his hug to glare at him through the downpour of tears that veiled her eyes. “I killed her.”

“No. You didn’t.” Grandpa sighed as he cleaned his glasses again. “Not to be crass, but your family knows nothing about the medical archetypes. They’re [Farmers] and [Ranchers], maybe [Breeders] at best. Your mother just died. It happens.”

Modran shook as her mom’s ghost formed from the faint wisps of smoke out of the fireplace to smile at her before vanishing. “But…”

“It’s okay. It really is.” He repeated as he slipped one of her gloves off so he could pat her hand. “See? It’s okay. You don’t have to be afraid anymore.”

A resounding knock rattled the front door before it opened and she heard Theo’s slurred voice. “Grandpa? Modran?”

“Looks like your brother is drunk.” Grandpa sighed with bitter disapproval. He patted her hand again before pushing the treatsie towards her as he hurried towards the sounds of Theo tripping down throughout the foyer.

*

*

*

Theo’s head pounded with a dull burn as if his aunt had scoured the insides of his skull clean. Bile coated his tongue and throat. He’d thrown up a handful of times since he’d left the bar with a notably lighter purse.

He’d been so angry about everything that had happened. The ambushes. Bitter failure after bitter failure. Losing Nightfire. Discovering his talent. All of it hounded him even as he drank his purse dry and been run out of the bar.

Theo barely remembered the walk to his grandpa’s house. Fuck, he might’ve even gone to a few wrong houses first. His vision swam and bucked with every step. He tried to heal himself again, but his talent ran in fits and spurts that did almost nothing.

His head and muscles soothed momentarily, but the sheer weight of acrid alcohol remained in his gut, liver, and kidneys. It showed up as a dark stain to his healing senses.

Aleyr, Treassi, and Muna he was fucking tired of it all. All he wanted was to show off Nightfire, prove that he was capable and worthy of marrying Alanna, and maybe show his sister some of the world.

And he kept getting beaten down.

Again.

And again.

His fists squeezed at his sides until blood seeped from perpetually healing gashes in his palms. Vemon and Isidora had him pledge up and down everything he could as collateral to the [Adjudicator]. If he failed to show up for any reason then bam! Nightfire would be forfeit. He’d be forced into either Vemon’s or Isidora’s services for a minimum of five years as an indentured servant.

If he failed, but they won, then they owed him nothing.

But.

But! If they failed and he won, or if he was determined to be the reason why they failed then he owed every member of the group an exact share of his winnings plus everything he was worth.

Which would apparently be a fuckton come just a few fucking weeks when he turned twenty. Access to skills and archetypes would multiply his healing talents exponentially for both himself and others, once he figured it all out. Not to mention that he wasn’t even sure healing was his exact talent, but rather a side product of it!

“Theodran!” Grandpa clicked his fingers under Theo’s nose. “Please stop. You’re making a mess of my house.”

“What? Where’d you come from?” He blinked confusedly as Grandpa Odran’s face doubled then tripled in front of him. He giggled to himself as he thought about how he was both of their namesakes.

“Is he okay?” Modran asked as she walked in the room. He frowned at the redness of her eyes and the lines of sparkling tears down her face. He hoped she wasn’t upset because of him. He hadn’t meant to keep her waiting or to upset her, but he really just needed a drink. Garret had pushed him to drink more than a little for a long while now. So what that he finally listened, even if his cousin wasn’t here?

“He’s fine. Just drunk.” Grandpa snorted as he tried to heal him with some of his doctorly skills. Theo chortled with laughter again. Doctorly skills. That was hilarious. He had to remember to share that with Alanna or Garret. “His talent keeps interfering though. Are you sure it’s healing? I can’t take control of anything in his body to fix it or purge the poison from his system.”

“Come on, we’ll talk in the morning. I won’t be able to heal him, but well, I can put him to sleep.” Grandpa’s voice resonated before everything went dark and it felt like the world shook on its axis.

He slipped into a dreamless sleep before he could protest that he wasn’t tired.