Fyre Fly: Chapter 39 – Better Living Through Pharmaceuticals

No one aboard the Fortress knows of any spells to help with anxiety, though they do seem to believe something like that exists within the field of Life arcana. We have a couple healers in the city, but our most competent and knowledgeable one is retired.

I hope she won’t mind being pulled back into the workforce for this one task.

“Anxiety?” Beryl asks, hobbling about her room to prepare me and Sandro some tea, despite my protests that it really wasn’t necessary. She’s living in a communal housing network just outside the palace; most of the houses out here are connected, or have been made connected since the Fyrethians moved in. I’m glad she has others around.

“Aye, I could make a potion for that,” she says. Sandro’s hunched shoulders slump in relief. “It’s only temporary, though. Should last about two hours, but one brew is enough for six potions.”

Then the entire brew would only give Sandro twelve hours of relief. And it’s not reasonable to ask Beryl to make this every day—assuming we even have all the ingredients to make it indefinitely.

“You might need to ration them,” I tell him. “We could try to find something else in the long term, but this will have to do for now.”

Beryl tosses some mushrooms into a pot, and I’m unsure if that’s for the potion or our tea. “Mind magic would be better,” she muses. “Healing magic will do in a pinch, but it’s not as strong for this sort of application.”

“Another thing to look into when we get to the next city,” I think aloud.

Beryl scoffs. “Why get someone else? You need to practice.”

I pause. “Me? I don’t…”

I trail off while Beryl gives me a pointed look.

Okay. So I do have two spells that let me speak mind-to-mind. Which is obviously mind magic. I just hadn’t spared much thought about trying to learn any other types of mind-related magic. The entire field feels ripe for abuse. And given my Role…

“I’m not sure how I would learn other mind spells,” I say cautiously. “Or even if I want to.”

Beryl sets two mugs before us, then goes back to her cabinet, pulling out more ingredients for her potion. The cauldron of water over the fireplace has started to boil. I can make out a heating spell circle carved into the hearth beneath the crackling fire and kindling, but it’s clear Beryl has opted to use the more traditional approach.

“Sometimes you have to do things you don’t want to do,” Beryl says.

I wrap my hands around the mug, letting the warmth radiate through me. “Yes. That’s what it means to be a leader.”

“Hmph.” Beryl tosses some herbs into the cauldron. “That’s what it means to be alive.”

I smile wryly. She got me there. But I’m still a bit nervous to explore mind magic too deeply. I fear venturing in that direction might open Pandora's box. What if I use an ability that violates someone’s autonomy?

What if I become reliant on it?

Then again, perhaps it’s something I’ve been neglecting for far too long. When I break my Role Requirement, my Sanity stat begins to decrease. But it’s a stat like anything else. If Health can be reinforced, if my Mana can be trained up—is there any reason why I wouldn’t be able to stabilize my Sanity and slow its degradation as well?

I eye Sandro warily, who in turn manages to shrink into his seat even further, the Shroud hunched around his shoulders.

“Do you have any advice?” I ask Beryl. Theoretically, I know from experience that spells can be learned simply through applying already-known spells in new ways. But mind magic sounds more dangerous to experiment with than fire, even. “I’d rather not make anything worse.”

Beryl snorts, her back still to both of us as she works. “Mind magic is all about will. You want to hurt him?”

“No!” I quickly object.

“Then you won’t.”

I suppose that’s a bit reassuring, though Sandro certainly doesn’t appear to be. I think back to how I’d been able to help him the previous day, with simply willing the Cloak’s influence back. I wonder if that’s something I can repeat—and something I could turn into an intentional ability.

“What do you think?” I ask him. “We can wait until Beryl is done with the potion. Or we can try something else in the meantime.”

Sandro’s gaze darts between the cauldron, me, and (inexplicably) our tea. His jaw works for a moment before he speaks, still looking down at his drink.

“Could you do the thing you did yesterday?” he asks. “That… that helped.”

“Of course,” I say, holding out my hand. He pauses for a moment before taking it.

[Psionic Touch activated.]

This time, I’ve braced for the Shroud’s mental onslaught, and though it still causes me to suck in a startled breath, I’m able to resist the impulse to pull away. I don’t know what Shirasil was talking about; the Shroud doesn’t seem weak to me.

Then again, we probably have vastly different definitions of ‘weak.’

I start to press back against the Cloak’s presence, then stop.

Sandro’s hand trembles in my grasp. “What are you doing?”

“Thinking,” I mentally reply, reminding him to do the same. “You need to be able to resist its influence without my help, or the moment I let go, you’ll be back to square one.”

“But how?” he asks, desperate.

The Shroud can sense that I’m here. It’s alarmed at my presence—there shouldn’t be another mind in our mind!—and its fearful ripples lash out in my direction in an attempt to kick me out. It’s not the worst instinct, really. If I was a malicious entity, it would be protecting Sandro. But it doesn’t seem to be able to tell the difference between friend and foe. Not that Sandro is particularly trying to convince it otherwise; if anything, he’s trying to keep his distance.

Mentally, I move closer to him. I’m able to feel his emotions and thoughts more strongly, and I’m sure he can sense the same from me. I try to imagine myself as a stable force. A laminar island in the turbulence of his mind. Something steady to latch onto.

Which is precisely what he does. I’m not pushing away the Shroud’s anxious attempts to repel me, but I’m also not letting it overwhelm me. As Sandro moves closer to me, I provide a small reprieve from intrusive thoughts.

“Thank you,” he thinks, huddling against my presence. “Can you stop it completely? Like you did before?”

“I could,” I admit. “But maybe you should try to do that.”

Physically, he frowns. “I don’t know how.”

“Why don’t you give it a try, anyway?” I suggest. “Right now, its fear is feeding your reluctance to push back; you’re afraid to try. But you’re going to need to stand up to it if you want to do this on your own.”

His mind shudders. “It’s just so strong. How can I beat a force like that?”

“Maybe you don’t have to,” I think. “Instead of fighting it, have you tried talking to it?”

Sandro blinks, looking up at me. “Talk to it?”

“I think I’ve heard you trying to speak to it before,” I say. “You were trying to stop it from attacking us. But that had been more desperate cries and objections.”

Sandro feels a bit embarrassed at hearing this.

“However,” I continue, “you might be more persuasive if you tried reasoning, first.”

“I suppose,” he says, sounding dubious. “It’s just so… so alien. It doesn’t think like a human—or, a person, I guess.”

“I know what you mean,” I assure him. “I’m connected to the Dungeon Core in a similar way. Sometimes its power can be frightening. And its priorities are very different from mine. But I’ve found a way to work with it. When you know what it wants, it can be easier to channel its energy into something that benefits you. So what is it that your Shroud wants?”

“It wants to be safe,” he immediately replies. “That’s why it’s terrified of everything.”

That’s a good start. “Do you think you can help direct that?” I ask. “Maybe if you tried talking to it, you could tell it what things are and aren’t worth worrying about. Maybe you can help nudge its general anxiety into a general alertness, instead.”

I can feel that Sandro is afraid to try talking to it, and not all of that fear is from the Shroud itself. I catch brief flickers of memories as Sandro recalls them: his first moments in this world and the disorientation he’d felt. Coming upon the cloak soon after, and the panic he’d felt when it had wrapped itself around his neck. The new voices in his head he’s done everything in his power to try to ignore.

It’s interesting that he stumbled upon the Shroud soon after arriving here in much the same way I’d also stumbled upon the Dungeon Core. Both were close to where we woke up. I wonder if there’s some significance to this—but it’s not something I have time to dwell on now.

“I’m not sure how to direct it,” Sandro says. “Will it even listen?”

I shrug. “I suppose you won’t know until you try. Here.” Now I do push back against the Shroud’s influence, creating a small sphere of calm that encompasses both myself and Sandro. His grasp relaxes in my hand, and the lines of worry carved into his face smooth out.

“I’ll maintain this while you try talking to it,” I tell him. “Hopefully this will make it easier.”

“It does,” he says, confidence returning to his tone. I just hope he’ll be able to do this without me here to hold his hand, too.

Sandro’s attention shifts from me to the Shroud while I continue to focus on maintaining my sphere of calming influence. I don’t attempt to eavesdrop while Sandro addresses his cloak—more specifically, I don’t want to get in the practice of overhearing thoughts that aren’t meant for me. My gaze wanders over Beryl, who’s hard at work with the potion. With my free hand, I take a sip of the cooling tea.

I jump and nearly spill it all down my front when Echo abruptly speaks up.

[New Spell Obtained,] she says. [Emotional Radiance: a spell which creates a spherical area in which the user is able to impress desired emotions upon the occupants. Mana cost: 3 per 10 cubic meters per second.]

Well, Beryl was right about that. All I had to do was try a new application and keep it up for a bit of time; pretty much exactly how I discovered all my other spells I didn’t receive by default. On the plus side, this is something I could use to help Sandro. But I don’t like that it can be used for blanket emotional manipulation. Not to mention, it’s not targeted, it’s a spherical field; this could be used against enemies as well as allies, if they all get caught in its range.

I activate Emotional Radiance anyway, keeping the area small enough just to encompass Sandro and I, then deactivate Psionic Touch. Radiance is more mana efficient, and this way Sandro can have his privacy.

I sip at my tea—which doesn’t have mushrooms in it, I’m pretty sure—while I wait. Sandro is silent, but his eyes are open. He’s squeezing his own mug, still untouched, as he frowns at a spot on the table. Every once in a while, his cloak flutters on its own.

As the silence stretches, I watch Beryl work. The old woman holds her hand over the cauldron, and a light blooms from her palm before descending into the pot. The water hisses and illuminates as it’s infused with magic.

“What do you think about staying aloft indefinitely?” I finally ask Beryl. “Settling in the sky, instead of finding somewhere stationary to land?”

Beryl pauses to give me a skeptical look. “Why ask me?”

“Because you were their leader before Mirzayael and me,” I say. “I don’t want to know if this is the most optimal choice, but if it’s one you would have wanted.”

“It doesn’t matter what I want.” Beryl turns back to her brew. “It matters what everyone wants.”

She’d said as much before when I’d spoken with her about launching the Fortress in the first place. We had put it to a city-wide vote, and the response had been overwhelming.

But raising the Fortress and leaving Jorria was the obvious solution. If we now choose to remain in the sky rather than land, that’s subverting the original promise—and I worry it might make us more of a target than if we were to land.

“What does Mirzayael think?” Beryl asks. “And all the other council members. You already have their answer, no?”

I smile. Of course she knows I’ve already spoken with them. “They all want to do it. Dizzi I think just finds the idea exciting. Torim and Nek see the trade appeal. Mirzayael…” I think back to last night when I’d gathered everyone to sanity-test my idea. “...I think she likes it because she sees it as another way to defy the gods. Not only has the city risen once more, but to forever fly above the ground would be like declaring ‘we will never be buried again.’ I just worry this might draw their ire.”

Beryl grunts as she begins ladling the potion into a handful of flasks. “The gods will do what the gods will do. We can’t live our lives catering to their whims.”

I worry that’s too simplistic. Blair specifically warned me that drawing attention like we are is dangerous. Then again, what I have in mind might just get us to safety faster. If it works, then even if the Dungeon Core is removed from the Fortress, the city will no longer be at risk of falling from the sky. That safety—the ability of the city to not be reliant on the Dungeon Core—is the best possible protection I could buy for the Fyrethians.

Sandro finally stirs, blinking and looking around the room.

“How did it go?” I ask him.

“I’m not sure,” he admits with a frown. “It doesn’t trust me. I don’t think it trusts anything. I tried to tell it what things it should and shouldn’t worry about, but that didn’t seem to help much. After a while I got a bit angry and snapped at it, telling it to stop pushing its feelings on me. And it cowered, like it was afraid of me.” He smiles wearily. “As if it hasn’t been terrorizing me all this time.”

A work in progress, then. But it sounds like a bit of progress, nonetheless.

“I’m going to stop my spell now,” I warn him. “Maybe see if you can push some of its influence back on your own?”

“I’ll try,” he sighs, clearly disappointed that the reprieve is about to end.

[Emotional Radiance ended.]

Sandro tenses up, and I watch him carefully. Wrinkles return to his forehead, but he doesn’t hunch quite as much as he did before.

“I think…” He speaks haltingly. “I think that helped. I think I can push back against it. A little.”

“Keep working at it,” I encourage him. “I’m sure it will get better in time.”

“And in the meantime, use these,” Beryl says, setting the flasks down on the table.”

“Thank you,” Sandro says, looking between the two of us. “Both of you. Really.”

His earnest gratitude warms my heart. “That’s what we’re here for.”

Beryl curtly nods. “It wouldn’t be Fyreneth’s Fortress if we turned away those in need.”

Sandro smiles, and abruptly, I realize I feel a hint of affection for him. Like Ollie, he’s just another lost soul in need of family and support as he adapts to this new life.

It also probably doesn’t help that he’s the same age as my daughter.

Mirzayael’s mind stirs at the edge of my conscience. “Why do I feel like you’re about to adopt someone else?”

I cover my mouth as I turn away to grin.