Elemental Thief Part I : Child of Calamity

Lessons

Treasa sat outside the sprawling school complex that the Rulin called an orphanage. And if she was being fair, there was an orphanage there. But it was far different from what she had seen in Clairval, with a library, eating hall, school rooms, gardens and a forest, all surrounded by trees and high, wrought iron fencing.

You couldn't even tell that you were in the Rulin city, as nothing could be seen from the steps of the place and along with the children without homes or families, there were well-off children, whose parents were high-ranking courtiers and officials, who paid the school to educate their children.

Apparently, this was where all the Royal children had been schooled. The best teachers worked here, within these walls and gates. The fact that they didn't separate them by class, or even the fact that they had families, was only one of the many strange changes that she'd learned about since arriving in the capital.

There was still disparity. How could their not be when there were nobles but everyone had enough to survive and everyone was given education and help to allow them to achieve as much as they wanted. And because of that, crime was considerably lower than that of Clairval.

Treasa sat on a bench in the little forest, staring up at the trees and breathing in the fresh air and near silence of the area, feeling her head spin slowly as she tried to take in and settle all the information she was learning during her training today.

And every day she had spent in Rulin was the same. She went to bed thinking she couldn't fit another ounce of information into her brain, only to find more being shoved in the next morning.

Beside her sat her teacher, a human healer who had been living in Rulin for a long while, and after giving Treasa more than enough time to digest what they had been speaking about, she murmured. "So you understand the difference between injuries, sicknesses, and poisons?"

"And a minor sickness, compared to an infection or a serious disease, yeah." Treasa nodded, yawning just slightly. "They react differently in the body, and it's all different. How to heal them."

"Most people have a niche, Treasa." Her teacher smiled at her. "I'm better with injuries and infections than the other stuff, but you seem to possess the ability to deal with all of it."

Treasa blushed at the compliment, offering a careful shrug. "I didn't know I could. I didn't know it was possible. I just knew that when someone was injured, it would pull me to do something. I would just let my power do what was needed."

Feia frowned then, giving her head a firm shake. "Always stay in control. And always be weary of that. If it is a fatal wound, if it is so serious that you can not possibly heal it with the energy you have, and you're not keeping control of it, you could be pulled under, almost as surely as a drowning person will pull you under when you try to save them. The body will look for anything to keep it alive, and it is beyond the control of the rational mind to deal with it."

Treasa remembered the exhaustion from healing Draisa and Kaiyal, nodding carefully as she slotted that into her mind. "But how do you know, before you're already at the point where it's too much?"

"You'll get to know your limits. The more you heal, the more you're asked to do. You'll know what an injury is and what it means power wise. You'll learn to see it." Feia frowned thoughtfully. "And you'll have to learn to know when you can't do anything. When you have to step away. That is the hardest part. We are not cheaters of death, we are healers of the living."

"That's why you're making me read all the books about the body, about how it works and what everything does, so I understand more than just its injured, and I'm able to tell if what's injured is more than I can handle." Treasa sighed softly. "Healing those sick kids... I wonder if I could have saved my mother."

Feia was silent for a long while, reaching over to squeeze her shoulder gently. "No. Our powers don't start coming to us until we are getting into puberty. You had no abilities to save anyone then. Even now, your powers are just coming to fruition. What you have now, your limits now, will change as you mature. Knowledge and practice will help you push your limits while you're capable of expanding them."

"Alright." Treasa murmured and glanced back up at the trees again, feeling herself relax in this little oasis.

Feia fell silent for a long while, then inclined her head. "There is something else you need to keep in mind that you won't find in any healing textbook, because of how unique your power is."

Treasa turned to look at her teacher, waiting for the woman to continue.

"The Vayans mentioned it, and we've researched everywhere we could think. But not everyone with power can heal. It takes a certain type of power to do so, like we were talking about earlier. Humans naturally come to that, and become good at niches. And non-healers, they can tell the difference between human power, Vayan power, Feyshan power, and your power."

"But I can do other things..."

"Yes. Your other abilities are connected to the source of your power, just like your healing is. You somehow get your power to heal, to work through the wounds or sicknesses as needed. I can't see power like Vayans can, but apparently when you work, they see you actively changing your power into something similar to life force for whomever you are healing. And when you utilise other people's powers to help you, you convert the power in the same way. Apparently, it doesn't look similar when I or other healers do it."

Treasa frowned softly, glancing at the trees and letting out a slow breath. "Am I doing it wrong?"

"No. You heal. You have an incredible talent for healing, I would just caution you to become more aware of your process as you do it so that if you are in a situation where you're afraid, or upset, or in a rush, you know what you have to force yourself to do. Because I don't know what would happen if you forced non-healing power that wasn't converted. Power is connected to our life forces. It's wrapped in our very beings."

Nodding, Treasa turned back to her teacher. "I will attempt to do that, then. I wouldn't want to hurt anyone."

Feia gave her a gentle smile and inclined her head. "I know you don't."

They fell into comfortable silence then, watching the forest, while Treasa tried to categorise everything she already knew with what she had just learned. As she went back through the conversation, she realized that she had missed something that Feia had said. But before she could ask about it, her teacher stirred and looked at the school clock.

"Come, its time for you to be getting back and onto your other lessons" Feia stood, and once Treasa did as well, they turned and walked along a rough path towards the main walkway and gate out of the property, sharing an easy, thoughtful silence.

Treasa followed, mulling the thought with a swirling confusion within her. If her power differed from a human's, what did that make her? Though Feia didn't seem concerned by it, and no one else had brought it up, Treasa tried to reach back into the fog of her memories as a child. Hints of a woman's voice murmuring to her floated just out of reach, though it left her with a vague sense of calm.

Whatever it was, Treasa was Rulin now. It didn't matter what her past said about her.