PM to join A Cure for What Ales You (Caelum)

[Hirem]

When Caelum placed the final concoction before Hirem, the Benshira frankly didn't know what to say.

What could he possibly say, he wondered, when he had little knowledge of the philterer's art? What comment could he make that would not be colored by the foolishness of inexperience? It smells too strongly, it looks too disgusting, and I don't know what's inside of it... what can I do, but trust that Caelum is as good at his craft as he believes he is? And he did trust Caelum - the horselord exuded so much confidence that it was impossible not to place faith in him. But Hirem also had little tolerance for that which he did not understand, and that strange drink the healer produced was something that he couldn't even begin to comprehend. Half of the ingredients the Drykas used were completely foreign to him, and the rest only triggered a fleeting sense of recognition. He had spent more than his fair share of time among healers, but not enough to begin to understand the intricacies of the craft. He knew, deep down in his bones, that drinking from Caelum's draught would be the cure that he was so desperately searching for... but at the same time, he feared taking that most important gamble.

So Hirem just ended up staring quietly at the drink, gritting his teeth and working up his courage. By all the gods, of both hope and despair, it is just one petching sip from some swill. How bad could it truly be? But no matter how much he wanted to simply reach out, take the damned drink, and get it into his system, something deep and basic within him was preventing him from action. Not just fear of what might happen to him if he took the drink, but fear of what might happen next. What might occur after he was cured. It was a bizarre reason to feel dread, but Hirem was filled with it nonetheless. He was only dimly aware of the healer speaking in the background, referring directly to the Benshira and addressing his particular ailment. "Night terrors, paranoia, often uncontrollable emotions, debilitating headaches, and more are all symptoms of extreme stress. The state of the mind takes a toll on the body, Hirem." Taking a deep breath, Hirem flicked his bright eyes up to meet the healer's, a deep frustration buried in his gaze. So it is not even a problem with my physical form that I can lay the blame upon... only my own weak mind. If I were stronger, sterner, tougher... these worries that wouldn't befall a normal man would be nothing to me.

The next piece of information disturbed Hirem even more. Talking about the drink, Caelum said, "It will help for awhile, and we'll come up with a way to cure you." Upon hearing that the Drykas could only offer him a temporary solution, the man cast his eyes down and stared deeply into that dark, bitter beverage. He stared and stared, until his mind was entranced entirely by the utter darkness of the stinking draught. The words, It will help for awhile, kept racing through his mind. Awhile. Not permanently. Not forever. Awhile. You will be sane for awhile. The Benshira felt sickened, pursing his lips and trying to outlast the sudden headache that came upon him. This is it. This is what the rest of my life has become. Night terrors and head pains, paranoia and extreme emotion. I came to one of the best healers in Riverfall, this city blessed by the gods, and he doesn't even know how to properly fix me... he has to find a way. For a few moments, Hirem felt the same rising sense of despair that had plagued him after he had returned to Yahebah from Hai, that had eventually given him cause to leave the city and plunge himself fatally back into the desert. It would so easy to relent, he remarked to himself. Just close my eyes and let the madness overcome me yet again. But he didn't give in quite yet, for Caelum was still serving as a powerful reassuring force. "I promise." The Drykas swore, and the Benshira finally gazed back into the horselord's dark stare. The look in his own eyes said it all: he would hold Caelum to that oath.

He was just about to start his own drink, when Lyn'nice's bubbly attitude once again managed to distract him. The glass, clutched tightly in his hand, was set back on the table as his bemused look moved to settle on the pregnant Konti. Talvas? He wondered, his mind searching for where he had first heard that term. Nakivak? These are surely Tukant phrases, but what could they be in reference to? Hirem, faintly, remembered hearing about the Akalak breeding program, that took fertile women and paid them for the service of bearing children, but... he had always dismissed that as a mean-spirited jab at their culture, more than anything. That cannot actually be an aspect of their culture - it is too far-fetched. And yet, it made a surprising amount of sense when one considered the fact that Akalak females were nowhere to be seen. Deciding not to investigate too deeply into the matter, he instead focused on her introduction, of sorts: "I forgot to shake your hand, sir. I'm a Konti, one of the white seers of Mura... Ecept I'm not much good with seeing... I'm better with plants and healing, although I can read tea leaves." Frankly, Lyn'nice did not need to add the disclaimer that she failed to live up to Konti legend, for Hirem was nevertheless awed by the truth of her presence. A Konti? An actual Konti of the White Isle? He bowed his head respectfully. "I am honored, Lyn'nice, to meet you. It is a blessing to be in the presence of one touched by Mura."

Then, seeing that Lyn had already downed the drink that Caelum had prepared for her, Hirem realized that there was nothing for it. If the pregnant woman could trust the healer's work, then he had no reason not to. Taking a deep breath and closing his eyes, the Benshira reached out, snapped up the glass in his hand, brought it to his open mouth and poured the entire beverage in before he could allow himself a moment to rethink his plan. At first, he thought he could tolerate the foul taste of the draught, swallowing it down without much trouble. It was bitter and sour and suitably disgusting, but it wasn't anything Hirem hadn't put up with before. It was only when his stomach started to convulse in terrible pain - and he remembered the copious amounts of food he had shoveled down his throat just a few chimes ago - that the Benshira realized that he had made a terrible mistake. "Hik!" he choked, pushing himself to his feet... at least, he tried to. His balance, at the moment, decided to take a quick and unhelpful nap, leaving him swaying dangerously in the air. In the end, the momentum sent him careening forward onto his knees, letting his whole body crash onto the floor.

At that point, he was lost. Hirem opened his mouth and retched, long and painfully, onto the floor, and then retched again. His shoulders shook with agony, his face crumpled up into a tortured expression. His fingers scrabbled at the floorboards, his legs kicking in vain against the nearby table legs. "I'm good!" he finally breathed after many chimes of disgusting vomiting, wiping the last of the foul bile from his dried lips. "I- am good!" The energy drained out of him, the Benshira laid limp on the floor of the Alements kitchen, staring quietly at the ceiling and feeling every bone in his body resonate, tremors wracking his weakened limbs. So this is the road to a cure? I would rather take the nightmares.

[Caelum]

The news that his adopted daughter had been disturbed by a bad dream raised Caelum’s eyebrows. He was somewhat surprised as Lillian was, well, his daughter. Though she was not of his blood, he had loved her mother and over the course of spring he had fallen irrevocably in love with the shy little girl. He considered his own parenting skills to be highly questionable, but so far he had managed to keep her fed, healthy, and happy. That had to count for something, didn’t it? She was his now anyway. She had chosen him, and the gods have mercy on the person who tried to take her from him. His mouth twisted to one side and he made a mental note to take a walk through Lillian’s dreams and see what manner of nightmare dared haunt her steps. Lyn’nice received a grateful smile once he remembered to clear his expression. “Of course. Thanks for helping with her, Lyn’nice.” He turned his attention to their guest and watched him shore up the courage to down the drink. His smile deepened a little when the konti claimed that he was the best. It was shortly thereafter that Hirem was felled by Caelum’s concoction, toppling like a cypress whose roots still clutched with desperation at loosening ground. The healer stared at this travesty of a cure with eyes grown huge in his face. He was rendered into a statue with shock as Hirem retched on the floor, but he did not remain still long. He was a physician, after all, and physicians were accustomed to things most people would find revolting. The good ones were unhesitating doers, taking the lead with clear heads and steady hands in the midst of the most dire of emergences; and Caelum? Well, Caelum was a good healer. Or he thought he had been up until about twenty seconds ago. Grabbing a handful of kitchen towels and a pitcher of cool water from the table, Caelum stepped around the mess of bile on the floor and sank into a crouch by the Benshira, his face a mask of guilt. He matter of factly cast a towel over the mess to take it out of sight and dipped the corner of another into the water pitcher to offer Hirem. One hand closed over the man’s shoulder, intending to help him sit up right. The gnosis on the back of his hand flared with sudden light, Rak’keli’s winged serpents glimmering to pump healing power deep into the poor man. Caelum nudged it down the proper roads – settling Hirem’s stomach, soothing his throat, and generally just trying to right all that he had wronged. “I’m so sorry,” he said. “Let me help you up, yeah? That.. Well. I wasn’t expecting that to happen. I’m sorry.” He said it again, genuinely distressed. Compassion welled in dark eyes even as Hirem’s desperation for a cure wormed its way deep inside of him.

[Hirem]

The whole world was spinning.

Hirem, helped up by Caelum, could barely make sense of the swirling roof above his head. Colors and shapes twisted themselves into curled knots before his very eyes, further perplexing his already addled mind. He hadn't felt this awful when he started to vomit, but the more that he retched and, thus, the more that he strained himself, the foggier his thoughts grew until his mind was a confusing mess. His whole body felt sickened from head to toe, and he felt like melting into the cold floor underneath and becoming one with the Alement's kitchen, disappeared forever from the physical world. The healer's presence was a relief - strangely so, as Hirem felt like he was swiftly recovering thanks to the Drykas just being close at hand - but the Benshira still struggled to make sense of why he had reacted the way he had. The horselord had promised me that the drink would be strong, and I ate quite a bit before sampling. All in all, it would have been a wonder if I had not reacted the way I did. But something still bugged him about the way his body had been unsettled by the cure, something that defied such simple explanation. What could it be?

Deciding to distract himself while he gave the matter some thought, the Benshira pushed himself onto his knees, accepted the proffered towel from Caelum, and wiped his filthy lips clean of bile. "Sorry?" He said quietly, casting his gaze over to the horselord. He truly is a masterful healer, for his first instinct in any situation is to the rush to the aid of those in need. What he might have accomplished at the House of Mercy, I am unsure... but it would have been wondrous. Though he was aware that looked an awful mess, Hirem still gave the man a smile and tried to look comforting for the sake of the Drykas. "You have nothing to be sorry about. This is a failing of mine, especially my stomach. I should be apologizing to you for dirtying your floors!'" Spreading the towel out between his hands, Hirem bent down and applied it to the ground, wiping up the mess that was still festering on the kitchen floor. I'll have to buy Caelum a new set of towels for this travesty, as well as repayment for the cure. "Please, do not worry for my sake," he then added as he worked to clean up the spill, brushing aside the healer's attempts to help him. He didn't want to seem ungrateful - the man had done him a great favor in brewing a cure and feeding him without talk of payment - but at the same time he didn't want to burden the healer after he had gone and done something so foolish as retch upon his floors.

Once the incident was all cleaned up, Hirem moved to stand, but the weakness that had settled into his body prevented him from rising. Gritting his teeth firmly, the Benshira tried to push himself yo his feet, paused as his knees wobbled dangerously underneath him, and then reluctantly sat back down on the ground. Resting his back against the kitchen wall, Hirem took a deep breath and tried to sort through the disquiet that had arisen with his stomach, heart, and mind. "You must not think that this outburst was your fault Caelum," he murmured, turning his gaze to the Drykas. "I am not a healthy man. I have troubled nights and fitful days, and their legacy persists with me through all bells of the day. It is not surprising that this has happened, my friend." The words were meant to reassure, but they felt hollow in his mouth and he declined to fall silent after he had spoken. As he sat there, staring quietly at the far wall, glancing over to the healer and Lyn'nice, the Benshira realized that he had no idea if Caelum's cure had even worked or not. I feel worse than before, but that was due to the retching. Have my waking nightmares fled me? To see if Caelum's draught had done its duty, he closed his eyes and did something that he never thought he would have to do: voluntarily trigger one of his panic attacks.

Unsure of where to begin, Hirem tried to start by conjuring up one of his troubled memories. He thought about the first few chimes he had spent in Hai, after the mage had been struck by the arrow and everything had turned into chaos. I remember walking down the path, unsure of what to make of this twisted city... then the arrow struck... and more came flying from the darkness around. The old man fell into my arms, and then he whispered... he whispered... Focusing on that moment when he had strained to hear the mage, who spoke despite the arrow embedded in his throat and the blood gushing from the wound, was the key, Hirem realized. He was speaking of nonsense, this man that was our key to understanding what was occurring in the underground. We had placed ourselves in his trust and had prayed for deliverance from the hell that was Hai, and instead he was the first among us to perish. Affixing every part of his being to that moment of singular hopelessness, of complete and total despair, Hirem sat and waited for the panic to begin in his body. He knew the symptoms well enough by now to guess where it would start; first his vision would grow fuzzy and a headache would come on, then a cold sweat would break on his arms and legs. And then...

And then...

Hirem started. "Nothing." He breathed, a bright look coming into his shining eyes. "I feel nothing! No panic, no... anything!" The memory brought him dismay, and his mind was still troubled by the incident, but his body felt oddly calm despite this fact. Could it b that I have been cured, and only had to retch once to do it? That bright look on the Benshira's face blossomed into a delightful smile, and he started to laugh a happy laugh that echoed in the space of the Alements kitchen. Impulsively Hirem reached out, planted his hand on the back of Caelum's head, and hauled himself up roughly to give the healer a kiss on the forehead. Relief coursed through every bone in his body, and the Benshira couldn't help but to continue to chuckle merrily at the thought of his waking nightmares, once so vibrant and terrifying, fading away from him like an open wound that leaves behind only a scar. It can't be this easy, he knew, deep down in the baser part of his soul. No single drink will fix me of my problems. They will come again and again and again. But Hirem pushed these thoughts away and embraced his delight fully, glad to have a clear mind for the first in over four years.

[Lyn'nice]

Lyn'nice at the first sight of vomiting had gone running looking for a bucket, no two buckets. She could only guess how insane she looked going from place to place mumbling, "Buckets, buckets, buckets..." Her craziness payed off when she had found her quarry. She placed one of the buckets near Hirem, in case he starting feeling queasy again. The second bucket was filled with water as Lyn'nice began to clean up the upchucked medicine. She had gone around asking Caelum if he minded her cleaning knowing his answer. Lyn didn't work here nor did she get paid for the sweeping and other menial tasks she did quite often. She hummed as she cleaned the floor, the task unfazing to her. After all there were worse things to have to clean up. "Well that one didn't work... I guess even you have things to learn Caelum." She sighed. "But that's life just when you think you've got it all down.. you realize that you don't... Shall I take our friend back to the Sanctuary so he can be monitored or will you have him return home?"

[Caelum]

The proprietor unraveled to his feet when Hirem and Lyn'nice both bustled and bent themselves towards cleaning his floor. He looked on, somewhat bemused, and rubbed the back of his head for a moment before turning toward the kitchen island and gathering up the used dishes. Food debris was scraped into the compost pail and the dishes themselves were rinsed individually and then stacked beside the sink to be washed and sterilized later. He returned to the table with a damp cloth and wiped it down while they finished up and then began to push pieces of cork back into the bottle tops on the tray. As Caelum worked, he considered what Hirem was saying regarding his illness. Night terrors, piercing headaches, and fitful days were only a few of the many symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder that Caelum himself had suffered at several points in his life. He was altogether too familiar with the legacy that suffering could leave for a person and had built the Benshiran's potion up with the intimacy of understanding. While Caelum was more than capable of fostering compassion for people whose circumstances he had no direct relation to, this situation was different. As he finished arranging the bottles of herbs and tonics on his tray, he decided that a little research deeper into the psychology of man wouldn't go amiss. He made a mental note to pursue such a thing in the near future. "Hirem," he began, but cut off with a startled chuckle when Hirem caught the back of his head and planted a kiss to his brow. He gripped the taller man's shoulder and squeezed reassuringly. He was not overwhelmed by Hirem's needs and desires despite the physical contact because Caelum had spent the past bell or so sifting through them. They were his now, and he knew them by name. "No? No panic?" He tilted his head and shrewd eyes made a careful study of his patient's face, seeking any telltale signs that Hirem was lying or, perhaps, stretching the truth for his sake. A physician could not function if their patient was more concerned with their feelings than they were with a remedy. When he found nothing but truth in Hirem's face, Caelum smile slow and wide. Relief momentarily sagged his shoulders and he leaned forward to deliver a pounding sort of hug, perhaps almost as excited as his patient. When it broke, he stepped back to share his smile with Lyn'nice as well. "No, I think I would rather Hirem stay in the infirmary here tonight." And he gave Hirem a look that said he would brook no argument. "I'll be staying too and it's perfectly comfortable, I assure you. I have no over night patients at this time so you will have your privacy. I want to be certain that your sleep is truly free of nightmares." And, as one of Nysel's own, he had more than one way to accomplish it. "Thank you, Lyn'nice, for your help. You're a gem." In short order Caelum showed Hirem the infirmary and walked Lyn'nice out to bid goodnight. OOCI went ahead and wrapped it up for us and I'll submit it in for a grade. Thank you for the thread!

[Mayhem1]

You're an excited PC roaming around a thread.

You're not paying attention that the story's over.

Then...BAM! You're hit with a Grade.

I'm Mayhem, the ever-present Junior ST of Cyphrus. If you have any questions or concerns regarding this grade, please don't hesitate to shoot me a PM! And please, please remove or edit your grading request once you see this. Thank you!

 

Hirem

XP

• Socialization - 3
• Storytelling - 1

LORES

• Location: Alements
• Comfort in a Traditional Greeting
• Caelum: Earthbound Form is Drykas
• Caelum's Hospitality
• Finding Comfort in Caelum
• Caelum: Knows of Hai
• Lyn'nice: A Voluntary Nakivak
• Being Afflicted with PTSD
• Lyn'nice: Caelum's Apprentice
• Caelum: A Father
• Lyn'nice: A Konti
• Nakivak: An Actual Thing
• Uncertainty About Your Future
• Grateful for Caelum's Help

 

Caelum

XP

• Socialization - 2
• Cooking - 1
• Herbalism - 2
• Investigation - 3
• Philtering - 2

LORES

• Hirem: A Benshira
• Hirem: In Mental Anguish
• Hirem: Once a Prisoner
• Hirem: Keeper of a Secret
• There Exists a Way Out of Hai
• Hirem: Afflicted with PTSD
• Healing Tonic for Hirem
• Hirem is Grateful

 

Lyn nice

XP

• Socialization - 2
• Housekeeping - 1

LORES

• Hirem: Afflicted with PTSD
• Hirem: Caelum's New Friend

Notes: A lovely thread. Lyn'nice's cuteness contrasted nicely with the dark emotions coming from Hirem and the comfort from Caelum. I also loved the happy ending for Hirem.

With Regards,
- Mayhem