Fern woke some time ter; she wasn't sure how long it had been. She wasn't sure of a lot of things, actually; her mind still felt a little fuzzy. Fragmented, in a way, like a piece of pottery that had been dropped and o be properly pieced back together.

  She hoped it wasn't quite that perma.

  "Well that's a little ironic," she heard Ember's voie from one side, blinking a few times and seeing the smear old resolve into wavy hair, draped over a charcoal longcoat. "All that waiting and she doesn't eveo see you wake up."

  With a soft noise of effort, Fern lifted her head to see the pile of white hair down by her thigh. Ravenna must have fallen asleep at some point. "How long..." she murmured, wing a little, "how long was I asleep? Still not quite... together, I think. Head doesn't feel right."

  "Not surprising." Ember stood up and stepped around the sleeping dark mage, leaning over to slip one hand under Fern's head and give her a gss of water. "Ten, twelve hours at least since your first brief awakening. But before that, well - you were under food two and a half days, I'm pretty sure. And fighting desperately."

  She drank, slowly - not that she had much of a choice, the healer reguting the room-temperature water for her until the gss was pletely empty. "Urgh... No wonder I feel so messed up. Thanks," she added, "I mean - for everything. I barely even know your name and I owe you my life, apparently."

  The redhead smiled wryly. "Not the first time, probably not the st. And besides, you did half the work yourself, from what I uand."

  The fusion must have shown on her face, as Ember tinued. "I took care of your body, because that's... my specialty. Body work. But the poison in you was something particurly vile; it's desigo attack body and mind at the same time. To ralize you pletely, to keep you from eveing a final word in. If it was just me at work... holy? You wouldn't have made it to the first m." Her gaze was thoughtful, analytical; two golden irises trained on the womaing in bed. "A you did. You survived long enough for me to do my part - and I am at a loss as to the expnation for it."

  "Ah." Fern pondered. "So I oisoned..."

  "Still don't remember?"

  She shook her head. "Not... entirely. It's ing back piece by piece, but - I remember ing here, and sleeping in the forest, and... after that it just doesn't seem to e together."

  "Mm. Maybe we should wake up your lover then, for a better expnation," Ember suggested, eyes glittering with a bit of mischief.

  "Lover?" Fern squinted. "We don't- I mean, she's never really... said it quite like that, but - artners I guess, so if that's what you mean..."

  The healer just shook her head and sighed. "Both of you are just... I don't even know what to say." She reached over and lightly shook Ravenna by the shoulder. "Hey, sleepiy's awake already."

  The dark mage lifted her head, and once again Fern was treated to the adorable sight of her groggy, half-awake expression for several moments before her eyes fully opened and she gasped. "Fern!"

  She winced a little. "M-maybe not so loud..."

  "Oh..." Ravenna sheepishly levered herself away from the bed a over to the bedside chair to be closer, reag over to gently rest a hand on Fern's head. "I'm sorry. I mean - for everything."

  Ember smirked ever so slightly, but refrained from enting this time.

  "So... I guess I oisoned? Something really bad?"

  "You don't remember?" the dark mage wohe evident on her face.

  Fern shook her head - very slowly, it still didn't feel particurly good to do so. "My memory's still a little fuzzy. I was just telling Ember that I remember camping out in the forest with you, but after that... nothing really."

  Ravenna frowned a little. "I see..." She hesitated for a moment. "I don't kly how, but - you were wounded by a poisoned bde; o specifically for you, I think. Meant to kill you, and... to make me suffer. I just don't know the why of it yet, though I have at least one person to ask, now that you're doing... well, somewhat better, anyway. How are you feeling, now that I think of it?"

  Her mouth curled downward slightly. "Not particurly great. Weak. Head's still fuzzy. Light and sound are painful if they get to be too much." It evened back out, then curled up just a little. "Other than that, not too bad. I've even got two beautiful women tending to me. Just a little thirsty again, that's all."

  Ember snorted quietly, Ravenna a gss of water. "Well, you've certainly got a sense of humor about you, at the very least. None of what you're feeling es as a surprise to me - you've been asleep for so long your body's chewing on itself just to stay funal. Once you get some food in your belly you should start feelier pretty quickly, so we should take care of that as soon as we ."

  The dark mage took the gss and held it to Fern's lips, without quite the same precision that the healer had. But it was fine; she was more alert and awake now, able to pace herself more properly, and so she did, drinking the entire gss dry once more. "What sort of food would be best, do you think?"

  "Nothing too hard or difficult to break down. Oatmeal would be perfect," Ember suggested, "maybe with a dash of honey for taste if it's too bnd by itself. I don't want to test her internal ans any more than that just yet."

  Fern smiled faintly. "That sounds pretty good, holy. Nid warm."

  Ravenna stood, empty gss in hand. "I'll go down a for you, then, along with something else to drink. Do you think some fruit juice would help?" The healer just nodded; and so off she went, opening and closing the door almost as noiselessly as st time, but in a bit more of a hurry.

  "You're really something else," Ember murmured softly, sinking bato her chair with a little sigh, one hand rising aing against the side of her head.

  The fallen hero blinked. "Oh? How so?"

  "Fern, I'm from the western ti," she began, darkly. "I just got here, hoping to escape that life. Do you have any idea hoeople I've seen die from poisons just like this? And how few of them have recovered, even partially?"

  "From the way you say it, um... I'm gonna guess 'not a lot'."

  "They're lucky if they speak, let alone walk," Ember hissed, leaning forward. There was a sudden iy ihat boiled to the surfa an instant. "I've had friends reduced to- to dolls by shit like this. pletely unresponsive; you have to move them yourself if you want them to do anything - like puppeteering them. I've had to see all sorts of things meant to harm the survivors, the caretakers, as much as they do to the victims. A you-" She paused, and the fury started to cool. "You... just seem to be fih it. Without any sort of augmentations to you, no hardware - I thought people on this side of the world would crumple up like paper when faced with something like this. But all you needed was just some bodywork, and to be perfectly ho, not even anything difficult." She shook her head, leaning back again. "I just - I don't uand you at all. Either of you."

  Fern smiled faintly. "Well... I don't uaher, at this point. There's not much written about the west in the books I've read, at least not iail. But I'd love to learn - maybe we help each other out?"

  The healer looked over at her, uo keep the incredulity off her fabsp; "You don't know anything about it?"

  "I'd have to say no."

  "Huh." Ember pondered over this for a long moment. "Well, I guess if the west is ing to you, yoing to learn one way or another. Better you hear it from a friendly face than on a bde, or... something worse."

  Carefully, Fern lowered her head and shoulders to the pillow. Sitting up wasn't too bad, but it was still a little draining for now. "It really doesn't sound like the sort of pce to take a vacation, at least, to hear you speak of it."

  The healer shook her head. "It's not. There are... well, there are some nice pces, certainly. Little havens and bright spots here and there; the ports, like this one, are... usually det pces, if you pay your own way. But the ti itself has been in a stant state of war and violence since - well, as long as anyone remember. Anyone I ever talked with, at least. There's too much of value to just let it go without a fight, I guess."

  Ravenna came ba just then, holding a rge bowl and two gsses with every bit as much bance as her maids. "Not tiring her out already, I hope?" she quipped lightly, though there was a gee of in it.

  "Ember was just starting to tell me about the western ti. I don't know anything about it - do you?"

  The question didn't break her stride, but Fern's senses were sharp enough to detect the fluctuation of aether around her partner in respoo the words. "I suppose I know a few things, yes," the dark mage hedged, a little more cautiously than normal, "but my knowledge is a little dated; you're better off hearing from an expert like her, no doubt."

  "Mm." The healer didn't react, simply waiting for Ravenna to deliver the food and drink, helping Fern sit up properly, before she tinued. "Tell me - do you all have gods in this nd? Deities you worship, that sort of thing?"

  She took a spoonful of the oatmeal before answering. It wasn't bad, and the honey definitely improved matters - was that a dash of... amon, too? Some sort of spibsp; "I don't do any worship, personally; never had much use for the gods myself. But yes, there's a whole lineup of them. Part of the ceremony for making a ant involves one of them, though you never say her name; she just watches the whole thing. Always struck me as a little odd, personally, but it got me the sigil and that's all I care about."

  Ember arched an eyebrow. "A... sigil, you say?"

  "Yeah, this thing." Fern ed her hands around the bowl to steady it and poi the back of her right hand with the fingers of her left. "It shows you, um... generally what someone does with their aether, I guess, is the best way of putting it. Mine's a fallen hero sigil, so I use dark aether, but I'm not specialized to the physiagical sides; I do a bit of both. And Ravenna..."

  "I'm a dark mage," she tinued when her partrailed off, showing her ht hand. "Dark aether, but heavily focused on magic."

  "Huh. Guess every pce has its own thing going on."

  Fern looked over at the healer. "I suppose you don't have ohen?"

  "Me? Certainly not. Whatever you've got going on, I've got no part of it. No one in the west does, I'd expect, uhey came from here. That's the thing," Ember added, "about gods, and why I asked. The west has no gods, no oo make such a ant with."

  "You used to have them, though," Ravenna murmured softly. "Until a few turies ago."

  The room was suddenly very quiet.

  "That's-" Ember's expression was unreadable. "Yes. That is certainly a true statement, as far as I know. How you know it is another questioirely."

  Fern looked bad forth betweewo of them; then she shrugged, and took another spoonful of oatmeal. Everything was easier to handle when you were properly fed, after all.