Chapter 8 — Misgivings

The branch gave way and gravity ripped the other out of Ness’s hand, and then there was nothing but disorientation and tumbling. Her first thought was that she should’ve accepted her friends’ offer to teach her to rock climb. Her second thought, when she felt the back of her head hit a tree limb, was that the headache was going to be wicked. Before that idea could even fully crystallize, she was no longer thinking thoughts.

Mira jumped back reflexively as Ness crashed through the tree branches and landed between her and Mictlan with a heavy thump; a motionless tangle of limbs. Her next instinct, to rush forward again and — irrationally — try to protect the already-fallen girl was stopped by the sinewy iron of Mictlan’s outstretched hand. He shoved her back with force, and she stumbled backward.

Her anger flared- in that moment, her only thought was her responsibility to Ness, and the pull of her magically-enhanced promise to keep the girl safe.

Mictlan clapped his hands together brusquely, to get her attention, and then signed forcefully at her once he had her attention.

((Can’t. Touch.))

She knew he was right- with her emotions so wildly dysregulated, the flood of magic from Ness would bend itself into grotesque and unpredictable shapes, and do nothing but make the situation worse. When she was calm, she could vent the magic — more or less harmlessly — out into the world.

“Fuck, yes, I know. Okay. Help her!”

She stepped back, and ran hand across her face. She was trembling, adrenaline coursing through her veins and nothing to do with it. She knew part of this was the magically-charged promise she had made influencing her emotions, but nevertheless she felt a deep sense of responsibility for Ness.

Mictlan knelt beside Ness and began checking her over. There were no visible, significant injuries; no dislocations and no major broken bones. Her arms and torso were covered with scratches, some of which were bleeding freely, none of them were big enough to be problematic.

The larger issue was that she was unconscious, and Mictlan’s hand came away from the back of her head sticky with blood.

((Bad.)) He showed the bloody hand to Mira.

It wasn’t a lot of blood, but they had both heard the crack when Ness’s head bounced off of a stout limb on the way down. If she didn’t wake up on her own soon, it was an extremely bad sign, indeed.

((Heal? Magic?))

“I can’t. I can’t.” Mira was starting to hyperventilate. She was panicking. She knew she was panicking, and she couldn’t stop herself; which made her panic even more.

Healing magic was the most delicate and subtle of all of the kinds of magic she knew about. She wasn’t a healer, but she knew basic spells to knit wounds; or for more dire cases, she knew spells that could freeze a person in state, for a time, until a proper healer could be found.

There were different sorts of healing magic; the most skilled healers could simply re-build parts of the body, even making them better than before. Mira had no aptitude for or interest in this sort of healing; instead, she knew two sorts of spells for healing— one was a kind of mending spell, that could return a part of the body to the state it had been in before it was damaged. The other borrowed from time magic, to speed up the body’s own healing processes. Both were very limited types of healing, but simpler than true healing and especially useful after fights, which she had a knack for finding herself in, or at least near.

Even so, they were still extremely precise sorts of magic, and even small fluctuations in her focus or the amount of power she applied could have unpleasant side effects.

The spell she had cast in the thornshrub had ended up wildly more powerful than she intended; it has been incredible luck that the amplified and twisted effect remained useful to them. If the same thing happened with one of her healing spells, it was more likely that she would rewind Ness’s body to before she was born, or fast-forward it until she died from dehydration, malnourishment, or old age.

“She said there was a village. We have to get her there.”

((Forest village.)) Mictlan signed to her.

The forest villages were notoriously unwelcoming of outsiders. They weren’t particularly evil or violent, generally; but they made their homes in the forest on purpose, of their own volition, to practice their own strange ways. Their reasons and purposes generally made no sense to civilized folk.

“She’s crossed-spirit, she’s not just any outsider. They respect Goddess Fox..”

((Stupid, stupid.))

“I made a promise as part of the Tunneling; I have to try.”

She looked around the small patch of forest, panic starting to become something even more frantic.

“I have to try. You don’t have to.. You can go. I release you. I’ll figure something out.”

She had a pocket knife— she might be able to fashion a litter, and drag it to the village without touching Ness—

Mictlan slapped her. It wasn’t hard enough to bruise, but it was a shock, and it wasn’t painless. The pain helped focus her.

((We go. Forest village. Favor.))

She nodded.

“Favor. Yes, okay. I agree.” A favor was small. Not a big deal.. She owed many people favors, and many people owed them to her. She could live with that.

Mictlan picked Ness up, careful not to jostle her too much, and draped her over his shoulders. He stared at Mira for a moment, before gesturing with his head in the direction that Ness had pointed, before the fall.

They set out, moving as quickly as they could, even jogging when the forest opened enough, or they found a deer trail headed in the right direction. Time mattered— the longer an injury persisted, the harder it would be for any sort of magic to repair it. If Ness died before they could have her wounds tended, there would be no bringing her back. There was magic that could do it, but dragging a person back across the veil of death always ended in tragedy, or worse.

They only skidded to a halt when, with a woody thunk, an arrow appeared in a tree trunk about a foot in front of Mira’s face.

“No visitors granted welcome,” an unseen voice spoke. A man’s. He had the precise, clipped language of the insular forest dwellers; a sort of fanatically studied adherence to an outmoded way of using the language.

“We need..” she wracked her brain to remember what little she knew of their dialect. She had met with a forest villager only once before, very early in her training, when she had accompanied her mentor; and they had been invited, not unannounced interlopers.

“We do not visit,” she remembered that this was a sort of formal exchange. Their unfriendly version of state your business. “We come for trade, our gold and work for your aid.”

There was silence for several minutes after that; Mira glanced toward Mictlan nervously, who shrugged as much as he could without shifting the still-unconscious Ness. He set the girl down gently, leaning her against a broad tree trunk.

A rustling of leaves, still unseen, preceded a new voice- a woman’s voice. This was a good sign; the forest villages were typically matriarchal.

“What aid would you have of us, little merchant, with offerings of profit?”

Mira opened her mouth to respond, but Mictlan’s hand on her shoulder stopped her.

((Forest village hates profit,)) he signed. Mira felt for the first time on this misadventure that Mictlan’s inability to speak — or refusal; it was had never been clear which — was an advantage.

She had forgotten that detail; she had, indeed, been about to promise them immense wealth should they offer but the smallest amount of help; but it was a trick question. Assurances of profit would’ve been a grave insult, and they’d be lucky to escape with their own lives, much less with help for Ness.

She swallowed nervously, feeling like she was treading a fire swamp, and any misstep would immolate them all.

“Trade,” she clarified, “Neither commerce nor profit. We need healing, from one with such ability.”

Her voice cracked, and she bit back a sob.

“She’s crossed-spirit and she’s dying and she’s here because of me and it’s my fault.”

The voice was silent for a few moments, and then the woman spoke again.

“We count no healers amongst our number, little merchant.” She sounded sad.