Page 44 of Rogue Familiar

“Some. You know, before Asa arrived, we didn’t have magical healing in Meresin. We didn’t even know it was real and not something made up for stories. We just had regular healers, and home remedies that used herbs. Everyone had a kitchen garden like the one here, with standard herbs for cooking and addressing the usual ailments. I figured the people here had a stock of dried herbs, and they do. Nice little hot water elemental, too. The herbs were all well-labeled,” she added, before he thought of that potential problem. “Besides, I recognize them from back when I learned how to harvest and use them. I promise the tea will make you feel better.”

“That’s presuming you know what’s wrong with me. I doubt Nic’s crash-course in the care and feeding of wizards covered this.”

“No, but I recognize shit-losing when I see it,” she replied without judgment. “Having been there. Whatever you remembered can wait until you’re calmer, then you can tell me about it. I feel I should point out that I’m very much alive, so whatever it is you think you do to familiars isn’t true.”

If only. Deciding he’d get no peace until he drank her probably vile concoction, he sipped, finding the stuff tasted pretty much like dried flowers—big surprise there—but otherwise more pleasant than it smelled. Or looked. Drinking a bit more, he found the twisted knots of his innards relaxing, and the sky no longer seemed to loom so low. The day had flown by, sinking toward mid-afternoon somehow. They should have gotten on their way long before this. Though that begged the question of where they’d go. Besides away from this little house with its accusatory happiness.

“I wasn’t exaggerating when I said I drained you to death,” he found himself saying, lulled by the easy companionship and the slanting golden light. “It’s part of what my magic does. Just as I heal myself unconsciously, I can drain a familiar without being aware of it. I have no control.”

She nodded in his peripheral vision, unperturbed. “You’ve taken magic from me before in small doses. Very small doses. And from Nic and the others. Clearly you have control.”

“I thought I had it under control. I worked hard at it and Maman—well, it was the one of the few useful skills she managed to teach me. But you… You easily figured out how to circumvent that control. You guessed and were able to do it.”

She was quiet a moment. “To be fair,” she finally said, “it didn’t take a lot of guesswork. I could feel your magic reaching for mine through the bond, and I knew we needed skin to skin contact—that’s a given—and I have experience with how you behave when you’re coming out of that healing state. I don’t know if you recall, but you’d been refusing to take any magic from me after I found you at the cliff.”

“Oh, I recall.” He’d at least had enough presence of mind then to refuse her, knowing that once whatever lived in him latched onto her, he wouldn’t be able to stop. “Because I knew what would happen, even though I didn’t consciously remember until now. It’s happened before, over and over. I murdered countless familiars back in those labs. I remember their faces now. I can see their corpses being carried away.” He tossed the empty mug aside with a clatter and pressed his fingertips to his eyes again. “How could I forget?”

Seliah slid slender fingers around his wrist. “Don’t,” she commanded softly.

“It could’ve been you,” he continued. “It was you. If I hadn’t figured out a way to heal you…”

“How did you do that anyway?” she asked. “Heal me. I kind of had it in my head that once you recovered fully, you’d either take me to a Refoel healer or go find one and bring them back. I told you I had a plan,” she added into his stunned silence.

Her belief that he’d save her staggered him. “That was an extraordinarily stupid plan,” he ground out.

“I feel compelled to point out that it worked.”

Jadren didn’t know which was worse: the idea of her martyring herself for him—sacrificing her own life to save his—or her blithely trusting that he’d somehow wave his magic wand and fix everything.

She nudged his arm with her shoulder. “So, spill,” she said in a light, teasing tone. “How did you do it? I’m guessing it’s some kind of breakthrough, right? Because you’ve always said you couldn’t heal anyone but yourself.”

“I used one of Maman’s dread devices,” he admitted, pointing at the table beside the bed where he’d set it when undressing. He hadn’t wanted to take it off, but he also hadn’t wanted the thing clunking between them. Having it at hand had seemed to be a good compromise.

Seliah uncoiled gracefully, rising and going to fetch the thing, and returning to sit cross-legged in front of him, turning the tube over in her slender fingers, the chain dangling in snakelike brass links. “This is the one you told me to keep as a souvenir. That I could string it on a chain as a memento of you.”

“Which you clearly did.” He took it from her and looped the chain over his head. “It’s good you did keep it. Turns out I could use it to focus my healing magic into you.”

Seliah cocked her head thoughtfully, considering him. “So, she did have some method behind her mad experiments.”

“She’s sadistic and insane, not stupid,” he replied drily. Though he had to admit it surprised even him that one of those devices had actually worked, his mother had tried and failed for so long.

“And it worked outside your body,” Seliah mused.

“It would be a distinct advantage to have it implanted in me.” He plucked at the thing, letting it dangle from the chain. “Then I wouldn’t risk losing it or having it taken.”

“Did any of them stay?” Seliah asked. “The devices she tried to implant in you—are there any still in you?”

He shook his head. So strange to be having this conversation with another human being. The only other person in the world who’d known about what his maman had tried to do to him was his father, her familiar and necessary assistant to her magical workings. And now Seliah, his own familiar and… necessary? He hoped not. “Not so far as I know. My body forces them all out.”

“Would you know?” Seliah persisted. “I mean, if one or more had taken and stayed implanted, it doesn’t seem like she would’ve told you about them.”

“True. But she was always so frustrated that I doubt it. Also, if she’d found a way to get some of them to take, wouldn’t she have replicated that success?”

“Logical,” Seliah agreed. “So what are you going to do now?”

He scrubbed his hands through his hair. “No fucking clue.” He met her thoughtful gaze. “I suppose you want us to go back to House Phel.”

“Not necessarily. Gabriel sent plenty of supplies with me. We can continue with whatever purpose you had in mind.”

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