'It doesn't bother you that the arm has been cut off. It bothers you that it is growing back. That it is magic.' There was scorn in her voice, scorn bordering on hate. She still loved Jonathan, but she was beginning to detest his narrow-mindedness.
Jonathan stared at her. His expression was unreadable.
'You're afraid of it,' she said.
'What do you want of me, Elaine?' His voice was suddenly tired.
She suddenly realized what she wanted. She wanted him to be someone else. To be fair. Elaine was beginning to realize that he might not be able to be fair, might not be able to move beyond his vision of evil. Her eyes stung with unshed tears.
'I need to finish healing Fredric's and Randwulf's wounds,' Silvanus said.
Jonathan and Elaine looked at him as if he had just appeared before them. They had been intent on each other. The elf's voice was an intrusion. Whether a welcome one or not, Elaine wasn't sure.
'I had planned to heal them out here in the open, but if it will make you ill, we can retire to a tent.'
Jonathan shook his head abruptly. 'No, heal them. It was unfair to protest just a moment ago. I am unaccustomed to such strange magic. It is … uncomfortable for me.'
Silvanus looked at him, his face thoughtful. 'Thank you, Jonathan. I will heal them here by the fire. It is warmer here than in most of the tents.'
Jonathan gave a curt nod. He took his sandwich from Thordin and sat down on the opposite side of the fire, his back to them so he could not see. But Elaine could see his face. That one look was enough to know what it had cost him to let the elf heal by the fire. He was trying. Maybe he was sorry about last night, too?
He glanced up and caught her eye. They stared at each other. Elaine gave a small smile, and Jonathan answered it. The first stirrings of 'magic' tickled over her skin. She turned from Jonathan's smile to the cleric, the healing. She wanted to see the wounds close, instant healing. It was the stuff of legends. Hopeful stories told round winter fires when the wolves howled at the door.
Elaine stood and took a few steps toward the cleric. She did not glance back at Jonathan. She was afraid he'd be frowning. She didn't want to lose what good will they had gained, but she didn't want to miss seeing this miracle, either.
Silvanus clasped Fredric's bandaged arm in his one good hand. He did not throw his head back, as he had to raise the dead. It was a simpler task he set himself. He merely touched the wound and drew power.
Elaine felt the power breathing along her body, but something was wrong. She wasn't sure what, but it felt different. Incomplete.
Silvanus hunched his shoulders. She could see the tension in his body. The effort shuddered along his collarbones. His hand trembled. He lifted his palm from the bandaged area.
'Take off the bandage,' he said.
'What's wrong, Silvanus?' Fredric asked.
'Please, just take off the bandage.'
Fredric didn't argue again, but did as he was told. When the bloody bandages came away, the wound was still there. It had not healed.
Fredric's eyes widened. 'Silvanus, what has happened?'
The elf shook his head. 'Randwulf, bare one of your wrists wounds for me, please.'
The younger man had no teasing words, he simply unwrapped his right wrist. The wound no longer bled, but it was still an open bite, nasty to look at and painful. Without a word, Randwulf offered his arm to the cleric.
Silvanus touched the wound, delicately, fingertips alone. He traced the laceration as if exploring it. Randwulf winced, but made no sound.
The elf closed his hand over the wound and bowed his head, concentrating. Again the soft, growing magic built, fluttering in the air like a trapped bird, a bird that had no where to fly. Something was very wrong. Elaine had no words for exactly what, but she knew it shouldn't happen like this. Even without the ability to sense the healing, the looks on the two fighters faces was enough. They were shocked, frightened.
Averil knelt by her father. He was still shuddering, struggling to heal. She touched his shoulders, gently. 'Father, Father, please.'
He shook her hands off and half fell to the ground. His cloak trailed into the fire. Elaine knelt and rescued the cloth. It hadn't begun to burn yet.
He turned to Elaine. 'I cannot do it. I cannot heal them.' His face was raw with anguish.
'Of course you can,' she said. It was a lie, even as she said it, she knew that, but she said it anyway.
'Wizard,' Silvanus said, eyes searching for Gersal-ius.
Gersalius came to stand in front of the elf. 'Yes, my friend.' His voice was full of a deep pity.
'You said I should not be able to heal here in Kar-takass. Why was that?'
'I do not know why, Silvanus, but I know that it is so.' He turned to Thordin, who was kneeling by the fire, stirring his stew but watching the cleric. 'You had a cleric friend who came over. Did she know why she could no longer heal?'
'Kilsendra said she could no longer reach her god, that she was somehow cut off from her deity.' Thordin's voice was heavy; he didn't like saying it.
Silvanus shook his head. 'That is not possible. Bertog cannot be separated from his clerics. No, that is not it.'
Thordin shrugged. 'I can tell you only what Kilsendra told me. I was never a healer.'
Silvanus turned to Elaine. His glittering eyes searched her face. 'Elaine …' He let the sentence trail off. He did not look to where Jonathan still sat. He did not have to. Konrad had explained some of Elaine's plight, and the cleric had promised not to reveal that she, too, knew some magic.
Elaine glanced back. Jonathan was watching. His squeamishness forgotten in the novelty of it all. His face was watchful, curious. If he hadn't been so terribly afraid, he might have been nearly as curious as she was, as he was curious about everything else. But his fear stood like an unbreakable wall.
If Jonathan knew what she had done, she would be even less human to him. She turned back to Silvanus. He watched her with quiet eyes. He would not berate her if she refused. She knew that. If he had argued, or threatened, Elaine could have said no, but those quietly patient eyes. . she could not say no to them. More than that, she didn't want to say no. She wanted to know if she could do it, if she could close a wound with a touch.
She nodded. 'Show me how.'
Silvanus flashed her a smile that warmed her like the glow of the sun itself. 'Touch Fredric's wound.'
'What are you saying?' Thordin asked. 'Elaine is no healer.'
'Oh, but she is,' Silvanus said. 'She helped heal me yesterday.'
'Elaine,' Gersalius said, 'that is wonderful.'
'Why didn't you tell us,' Thordin said.
Elaine glanced at Jonathan.
Thordin said, 'Oh.'
They all turned back to the cleric, determined as far as possible to ignore the mage-finder-if one could ignore a storm that might break any minute.
'Touch the wound, Elaine, explore it. Memorize the feel of it in your fingertips,' Silvanus said.
Elaine hesitated, hands just above Fredric's bare flesh. Her skin ached to touch the wound, to explore it, but… 'Won't it hurt him?'
'A little, but you are new at healing. You must understand the nature of the injury before you can heal it. You must be free to touch the wound as much as necessary.' He glanced up at the big warrior's face. 'Fredric takes pain well. He won't hold it against you.'
'If you can heal me, girl, I will have only praise for your name.'
Still she hesitated. 'And if I can't?'
'Then you will have tried, and I will sing your praises for that.' A smile peeked from behind his mustache.
Elaine gave a nervous smile in return and let her fingers touch the wound. The skin folded back on itself where the teeth had torn it. She ran fingertips over the gash, over bumps in the skin with slick holes underneath.
She glanced at Fredric's face, but it was blank, unreadable. 'If I hurt you, tell me, and I'll stop.'
