Lucifer stood next to a distraught Asha. A light rain had started on their way to Ashas home and gray clouds began to move towards the orc city, carried by strong winds from within the wastelands.

In front of them laid a smoldering heap of debris that had once been a wooden wagon, similar in size to an RV. Asha stood trembling, barely keeping an angry outburst in check while simultaneously, thick tears ran down her face.

A quick peek with soulsight showed the deep red haze bubbling and frothing just barely inside Ashas control.

At the edge of her vision, Lucifer noticed another soul, seemingly trapped beneath the rubble.

With a few sure steps, she approached and buried her hand inside the smoldering pile of wood. After barely a moment of digging, she pulled her hand backwards and out from the rubble emerged the battered and bruised form of Ashas brother.

He looked bad. The entire right side of his body was scorched black, showing pink flesh where the charred surface had broken. His face was even worse. The fires had scorched the right side of his head, burning away flesh until the side of his skull was visible. His jaw was hanging by a few muscle strands, as a heavy piece of wood had seemingly smashed into its right side, almost separating it entirely.

The parts of his body that were not scorched black, were not in much better condition. His left shoulder was impaled on a piece of metal that, to Lucifer, looked suspiciously like rebar.

“Fuck! Gromm!” Asha came to a stop besides her brother's form, kneeling on the slowly softening ground. She cradled his head in her lap, and Lucifer could see the red haze slowly seep out of her soul, suffusing her body.

Lucifer was astonished, she hadn't seen a body this disfigured by fire in ages. Usually when she burnt someone, it was until there was nothing left but ash.

Equally astonishing, Ashas brother was seemingly still alive. His left eye was closed, and he no longer had a nose, but Lucifer could just barely make out the sound of soft and strained breathing escaping his destroyed mouth.

A quick look around showed a bleak picture. The other dwellings that had been in close proximity to the siblings’ wagon were in similar states, half burnt and smoldering. Though the surroundings were suspiciously devoid of people.

The orc city was large, with a population of close to a million inhabitants. Yet despite a fire and by grommash’s injuries, an explosion, there were no gawkers. Not a single person was in sight.

Already Lucifer could feel a headache coming. Mortal politics.

As to not arouse any suspicion, Lucifer opened dozens of small eyes hidden along her back and sides, as to not alert any would-be observers. Not seeing anyone, Lucifer knelt beside Asha.

“I can try something. Though I've always used it on my own body, never on a mortal.”

It took Asha a moment to understand that she was being addressed. Her Furious gaze turned to Lucifer, the edges of her sclera already showing the encroaching tendrils of the red haze.

“What?” Asha squeezed between clenched teeth. Lucifer repeated herself.

A resigned look crossed Ashas face and a deluge of red smoke left her lips with a resigned sigh.

“What is there to try? The best healer we have is Daranturn and even he can't repair something like this. The best he can do is reattach a few fingers and even that is strenuous for him. If my parents were still around they could have done something, but that's no longer an option.” Lucifer could see the anger physically leaving Ashas body. The red haze had calmed and was slowly pouring back out of her soul.

“His soul is still clinging to his body.” Lucifer stated. She shuffled around, until she was directly next to Grommash’s left side. “Again, i've never tried this on a mortal, i don't know how this will work.”

Lucifer closed her eyes, taking a calming breath. In her outstretched right hand, a crimson flame ignited. It was tiny, barely larger than a candle flame and did not flicker in the wind as a normal flame should have.

Opening her soul sight, Lucifer located the spot inside Grommash’s body, where his soul and his body connected, the center of his chest. Lucifer lowered her hand, laying it on his sternum. The Red flame phased through his flesh as if it was not there.

Lucifer controlled her flame until it touched the spot where body and soul connected. Once the flame was in place, she began to pump heat into Gromm’s body.

To Asha it looked like her brother's body had jumped as if he'd been startled. Lucifer saw something else entirely.

Now that she knew that the flame was doing something, she opened a myriad of eyes all over her face. Every one of them saw something else. One saw only skeletons, another muscles and tendons, another hearts, until Lucifer had a comprehensive image of Grommash’s body. To focus her sight to such an extent was always straining, but right now it helped.

The moment the flame touched his heart, a weak heartbeat pumped liquid fire through his body, along his bloodstream.

Similar to a liquid, the heat was pumped through his body. Not only did it help his soul stay anchored to his physical form, it also began to knit the body back together. Wherever the fire passed, it burnt cells into their base particles, before using the residue to help the body construct new cells.

Lucifer grimaced. When she used this technique on herself, it reconstructed her body from the very energy of fire itself. This looked like a cheap imitation in comparison.

At this rate the fire would not be enough, no matter how hard Grommash’s soul clung to his body. As a last gambit, Lucifer began to spin her core, funneling the scorching mixture of her mana through the tiny red flame. Instantly, a bright light shone through Grommash’s chest as the tiny flame intensified. To Asha it looked like something was finally happening, but Lucifer had to suppress a curse so as to not worry her little student.

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She had forgotten that the mana her core produced was a mix of heat and kinetic energy. The heat had helped tremendously inside Grommash’s body. The influx of fire mana seeming to pull the entire concept together, making the process smoother for his body. The part of her mana that represented kinetic energy on the other hand, almost killed him. Luckily only Lucifer saw what she had done to his body. The influx of kinetic energy aspected mana, had almost torn Grommash’s heart to shreds.

Taking another deep breath to steady herself, Lucifer began to take control of her mana beyond just pouring it into the tiny red flame. Like unwinding two strands of fabric from each other, she separated the two parts of her mana. As soon as the mana left her core it was split in two, the red mana with the aspect of heat flowed down her arm and into the tiny red flame, while the silvery white strand of kinetic mana looped back around into her core.

As soon as only pure fire mana flowed into the flame, a pulse flowed through Grommash’s body.

The first pulse was barely perceptible, but the next was a little stronger.

Following his heartbeat, visible pulses of fire mana flowed through his body. Slowly but surely the pulses grew stronger as his heartbeat strengthened as well.

Once Lucifer deemed his heart strong enough to not immediately give out, she removed her hand from his chest. A quick application of fire to cleanse her hands of any germs and she moved on to his face.

With one hand she picked up the barely connected jaw bone and held it to his face in an approximation of its usual spot. On the other hand the crimson flame reignited which Lucifer held to the mess of Grommash’s jaw.

Slowly but surely the charred mess of flesh sinew and bone grew back together, connecting with the severed jaw.

Lucifer blinked a bit of moisture out of her eyes. Was she sweating? No, the rain was just intensifying. Her body was not capable of proper sweating. But this continued use of her fire mana was extremely arduous. Not the hardest thing she'd ever done, but it was getting there.

As Grommash’s lower jaw slowly knitted itself back together, his remaining eye slowly fluttered open.

His gaze slowly focused on Lucifer who had both hands on his face, trying to keep his jaw in place so that it could continue growing back into its place. She saw a minute twitch of the muscles along his lower jaw, before his face contorted into a grimace.

“Don't try to speak.” She whispered to him. At Lucifer's words, Ashas gaze snapped to her brothers now open eye. Just as she was about to open her mouth, Lucifer shushed her.

“Don't speak! We are being watched.”

It took Asha a moment to understand what Lucifer was saying, before her gaze hardened. The red haze was slowly returning, bubbling inside her soul.

“It will take a moment until your jaw is back in place, then we return to my tent.”

Just as Grommash was about to respond, Lucifer interrupted him. “Blink once if you understand, twice if you don't. Don't speak!”

Slowly he blinked once.

“Good. I'm going to pick you up now. I need you to relax your body. Totally limp, no matter how much it hurts. You look like a corpse right now, and you need to act the part understood?”

One blink.

“Good. Your heart is in good condition now and the flames cauterized your wounds. Your right lung is in bad condition, but for now you are okay, the rest we will take care of once we have privacy okay?”

Another single blink.

“Asha.”

The young woman looked at Lucifer, her eyes full with a burning rage.

“I need you to look at the ground as we walk. No eye contact with anyone.”

The young woman nodded once, before looking at her brother. “It's going to be okay.” She whispered to him.

After a few moments of keeping his jaw in place it was finally connected enough so it wouldn't fall off his face as soon as Lucifer removed her hands.

With one hand behind his knees and another behind his arms, similar to how she had carried his sister yesterday, Lucifer picked Grommash up. Despite a few tiny grunts of pain he stayed completely limp. Even when the blackened flesh of his right side split to expose the pink muscle beneath, he did not twitch.

Lucifer began to walk in the direction of her tent, using her bond with Aindaeth as a guide.

The rain was slowly intensifying, turning the ground of packed dirt to viscous mud. Though the walk to her tent took barely five minutes, they encountered not a single soul. Even under the rain, the orc city should have at least some inhabitants active right now.

Yet they encountered not a single person on their way to Lucifer's tent. Except the group of mortals that Lucifer had spotted when she was still healing grommash. They kept a considerable distance from her, always staying out of sight. They slunk around tents and behind wagons, but never came close enough to be seen.

As soon as Lucifer arrived in front of her tent, a large part of the group broke away, leaving behind just two observers. Lucifer was too far away to see them properly, especially without using her main eyes, but the fact that they kept considerable distance was comforting.

Once inside the tent, Lucifer laid Grommash down on one of the piles of blankets. Seeing him hold back a groan of pain, she chuckled.

“Don't worry, we're safe. You can make as much noise as you want now.”

A relieved sound escaped his lips, somewhere between a gurgle and a groan.

Asha sank into the pile next to him with a relieved sigh. “He’s going to be okay, right?” She asked.

With a grimace Lucifer answered “He’s going to live, that i can promise you. But again, I've never used this method with someone other than myself. I can't tell you how he will heal. His heart is strong, and his lungs will heal with a bit of work, but they will probably never be the same again. I cant remake his eye from scratch and the right side of his body will probably be heavily damaged for the rest of his life.”

While she continued to speak, Lucifer began to remove the rod of steel that had impaled his left shoulder. Once it was fully removed, Lucifer plunged her fingers into the wound.

As a pained groan escaped his lips, Lucifer remembered that not everyone could deal with such pain. “Asha, look through the pile over there and give your brother something to bite down on. I'm going to be digging through his shoulder for quite a while.”

Once Grommash had a piece of leather pants in his mouth, Lucifer continued her ministrations. Digging through his body, she removed small pieces of wooden shrapnel. Once the wound was clean she removed pieces of shattered bone, then stuck the most intact pieces back together. Once the wound was clean and free of loose shards of bone, Lucifer reignited the crimson flame in her palm, laying it on the open wound. The edges of the wound began to burn, before the skin slowly began to grow back together.

Lucifer sat back with a tired sigh. That had been more exhausting than she thought was possible. Now that the worst was dealt with, Lucifer returned the flame to Grommash’s heart, so that his body could do the rest by itself. She continued to pour heat into the flame, watching as the rhythmic pulses returned. Small scrapes across the good parts of his skin began to close.

“Okay the worst is over.”

“Good then we can talk about what happened.”

Daranturns voice startled Lucifer. Noone had snuck up on her in millennia. The old man stood at the entrance of Lucifer's tent, staff in hand. Somehow he must have entered her tent while she was concentrating on Grommash.

Aindaeth had managed to enter the tent as well, but she was already lazing on a pile of blankets, looking like she was about to doze off.

The old orc walked over to the prone form Grommash. As soon as he looked at the extensive damage to his body, he winced. He lowered himself to the floor, kneeling beside Lucifer, and laid his hands on Grommash’s head.

A light green glow emanated from his hands, and Grommash’s non burnt skin began to regain a bit of color.

“I think this may be my fault.” The old orc whispered. Under normal circumstances his words would have been too quiet for anyone to hear, but the only sound inside the tent was that of Grommash’s heavy breathing.

Instantly Asha’s head snapped to the old shaman, a seething hatred burning in her eyes.

Seeing the pure animosity held in the young woman's gaze, Daranturn raised his hands in a placating gesture. “At the Clan meeting yesterday, I told the chiefs that you will be considered an adult as of now. It has been less than twenty years since the Stoneskin tribe last had a chief, meaning that you will be named chieftess on the next day of ancestors. If you cross the first leap by then.”

“What has that to do with anything? Especially what happened to my brother?” Asha asked.

Daranturns gaze turned to pity. “I should have been more involved in your upbringing.” He sighed, his gaze turning downwards to Grommash, who had grown completely still.

A tired smile crossed Daranturns lips as he noticed the slow understanding built behind Grommash’s remaining eye. “Your brother understands, sadly. I would have liked to keep you two away from clan politics for a while longer. But sadly you both are too exceptional. If you had been like any ordinary child, and been granted your status as an adult somewhere between your 22snd or 25th year, nothing would have happened. But now you are almost an adult in your 19th year and the Stoneskin tribe will have a new chieftess.”

Suddenly grommash spoke, his voice raspy and wet. He was usually a quiet one, his voice was something he barely used, but now it sounded like he would cough up his lungs with every word.

“Betrayal.”

Asha looked at her brother, uncomprehending.

“Betrayal.”

He continued to murmur, his voice barely above a whisper.

Suddenly a strong pulse traveled through his body. Similar to the way it had when Lucifer healed his heart, yet magnitudes more intense. An orange glow began to travel along his circulatory system. The charred right side of his body began to smolder below the skin, tiny wafts of smoke coming off him.

Lucifer continued to pour heat into his chest, while the pulsing inside grommash’s body grew more intense. She did not want his heart to suddenly give out, after all the effort she put into healing him.

The embers burning along Grommash’s right side intensified, pulsing rhythmically with his heart beat. All the while he repeated that one word over and over. “Betrayal. Betrayal.”

Lucifer saw the red haze creep along Grommash’s sclera similar to his sister, until suddenly a spark appeared in his hollow eye socket.

At first it was just a spark, until with a sudden pulse an orange flame ignited inside his empty socket. Simultaneously the charred right side of his body burst into flames as a guttural shout escaped his lips.

“BETRAYAL!”