The floor wasn't all that bad, and having the oddly warm confines of a wall and roof was a welcome change in environment. I sat cross legged on the opposite side of the room to where Ard's bed, if the box could be called a bed, was. She had sat down, having already leaned her spear on the wall and took off her belt, placing it on a slot within the cabinet. She placed her hands on her lap and looked at me, looked at the roof, and nodded.
"You'll probably be sleeping either in here or outside, whichever you personally prefer. I've seen how your kind sleeps, and unfortunately my bed is too small to fit you, it was made for someone of my size to use alone." I nodded. I hadn't expected to sleep in the same place as Ard was, so that fact didn't bother me.
"However, to be blunt, you have a terrible stench on you. If you're going to sleep in here then go to the river and clean yourself." I nodded, again, hoping a blush wasn't coming to my cheeks.
"We'll figure that out when night comes. But first, let's get you washed. Walk, or crawl, outside with me." Why'd she bring me in here if she was going to have me leave the next moment? Did she want to figure out if I could fit in her home? Figuring that out before anything else might've been her motive.
I nodded and got up, slouching heavily so that my head doesn't hit the roof. I did the same when I walked out of the odd entrance, opening the moveable wall and stepping out, finally stretching my back to its full height. The sight of a full canopy of leaves hasn't yet lost its sense of mystery, on how it could be spring and yet still be fall. Me being in a different dimension entirely is the only explanation I can think of.
Waiting outsid for Ard to leave her home, I looked around to see if there were any other strange buildings I could gawk at. The two small sisters weren't here, so I don't think I had to worry about them getting offended over me looking. Not that I think they were offended, but I felt safe knowing they weren't around to possibly turn me into ash. I should hold that same sort of fear for Ard as well, shouldn't I?
Ard walked out, ignoring my presence and instead maneuvering herself towards the back of her house. She continued to walk, not waiting for me to follow. I of course followed.
A trail, the extension of the one in front of Ard's home, was what Ard looked to be following. I imagine a river was somewhere at the end of this trail.
"Your kind cleans themselves, don't they? I wonder how." A foreboding sense of dread washed over me at that. She's not going to ask me to show her how I clean myself, is she? Her ears weren't moving so I doubt she was excited over that prospect, so perhaps it was just an off hand comment.
The trail gave way to a clearing, a riverbed that looked to have been artificially cleared and a flowing river. A small dark stone box, for the lack of a better concept, was positioned on a pedestal near the riverbed's edge. Ard walked over and tipped her fingers into the water, then beckoned me over to it.
"Inside that container is soap. Do your kind know how to produce soap?" I nodded? Ard's ears wiggled at that. "Really? Would've thought you hadn't. Anyway, strip yourself and wash yourself, I've never gotten a good look at your body and now's as best a time as any."
Oh. I guess she was going to watch. Ard began to walk away, towards a rock that she was probably planning on sitting on, but I stopped her by grabbing her shoulder. She looked over at me, her ears moving downward. "Yes?"
How do I express the concept that I didn't want to be seen. I pointed at her eyes, one finger for each eye, and with a single finger pointed at myself. I shook my head. Was that too vague? Ard's ears kept themselves down, but would occasionally wiggle. She's a lot more expressive when her hood is down. She tilted her head. "My eyes?" I nodded. Her ears raised a little. "You don't want me to watch?"
I nodded.
Her ears immediately went down once again. She made a low whining noise, something I hadn't heard her do before. If I could guess, it sounded like a noise of displeasure rather than sadness. Irritation, maybe? I hope not. She shook her head. "There won't be room for argument. You fathachs are so similar to us láchs, yes also so different. Your kind are a valuable potential resource for our tribe, it's natural for me to want to get to know you."
That sounded more sinister than she probably intended. However, I shook my head once again. Ard straightened out her posture and lifted up her chin slightly, as if trying to look down on me. "Enough talking back. You're my property, if I wanted to watch you clean yourself then I will regardless of your permission. Go clean yourself." Ard pointed at the river and stopped moving, her hand staying in the position of pointing. This was a hard predicament. On one hand, I had said I'd be her 'property,' something that humans can't be made into normally. On the other, I wasn't used to being watched. And I didn't plan on getting used to it, either.
"Attie. I'm not going to repeat myself." I looked down at her and scratched my head. What is she going to do if I don't? Maybe she sensed my internal reluctance, since she extended her hand and touched my stomach.
In that instant I had thought I blacked out. Or died. I don't know, but all I could feel was darkness. Feel itself was the wrong word, the immovable, all destroying pressure of nothing crushed me. What even is me? The next moment, or was it a moment? The next instant, the screaming of wolves overtook my senses. I tried to look around, but couldn't. I tried to move, but couldn't. The sensation, rather than the sight, of the vision of teeth, maligned, pearly, but gruesomely sharp resounded in me. All my senses could only feel one thing, and everything told me to run. But I couldn't. So instead I felt fear.
But in the next true moment, I was back. Ard was looking at me, her ears still down. I dropped to my knees and stayed there for a long, long moment, taking in deep gulps of breaths. Cold sweat was forming on my face, and my limbs tingled as my blood froze within it. But realizing where I was, or had been, I stood back up and quickly took in my surroundings. The river was there, no animals populated it. The ground was still gravel, and the trees still wooden. The sky itself was still made of whatever the sky was made of. I turned back to Ard.
"Wash yourself." I nodded. Taking off my clothes and throwing them to the ground, I walked over to the river. The river itself wasn't all that large, not as large as the one my village used and not as deep either. I could comfortably stand in the center and not get washed away, probably. It wasn't fast moving either, it was a very good river to wash yourself in all considering. I splashed water all over myself, then dunked my head into the water. I could've done that at first, but my thinking isn't straight.
However, I didn't have any soap. I looked over to the riverbed, and at Ard who was standing next to the box, opening it up using one of those moveable walls that her house also had, but smaller. Also made of stone. She took out a white bar of soap, its edges smoothed out most likely from use. She walked over to the river, and I walked out of the river as well to retrieve the bar.
Meeting at the edge, Ard's feet without shoes and within the water, she looked me up and down before giving me the soap. I tried to cover my manhood with my hands, but she made another whine at that. The memory of whatever she had done to me crept up, and I positioned myself in a neutral position, extending my hand out in order for her to give me the bar of soap. I didn't look at her.
"Do your kind not like being seen naked?" Normally it's not much of a problem, it's not uncommon for families to bathe together. But it certainly is never about watching the other people clean themselves, that's creepy. And humiliating. I didn't respond, both out of fear of answering with the wrong answer and out of the question not having an easy answer. "Is it too complicated to answer?" I nodded. Finally the bar of soap was handed to me, and I could hear the slight splashing of sound as Ard made her way out.
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The splashes stopped, but I could tell she was still in the water. "Would you feel more comfortable if I cleaned myself with you? My kind prefer to bathe with each other."
Sort of. It's one thing to be creeped on by someone who is both fully clothed and only there because he wants to watch me, for whatever reason, and it's another thing entirely to be creeped on by someone who's washing with you. At least there the potential embarrassment is not one sided, the comedy of it is more apparent. Or, more accurately, there's nothing comedic about being forced to bathe myself in front of someone else. I nodded.
"Well?" Splashes of water alerted me that Ard wasn't looking behind her. I nodded again, this time staring at her face. Her ears wiggled a tiny bit. "Good."
Ard walked off into the riverbed once again, and I with my soap headed deeper into the water, trying my best to lather my hands up. My right hand was, after all, still crippled. I couldn't hold it correctly, on my right hand it would slip as I couldn't tell how much pressure I was holding it with. I had to lather myself using the scarred hand, otherwise the soap would fly out and never be seen again. It didn't have the greatest dexterity, but a gross washing would be enough.
The water momentarily browned with dirt, before quickly washing away. Scrubbing my arms to the best of my ability, eventually it turned back to the natural paleness that I had grown to expect from my arms. I was very dirty, and I don't think anyone else would've tolerated my presence considering that. I tried to cover my hair with soap as well, but the process is proving itself to be slow and tedious. Lather it on my head, cover my hands with soap again, repeat.
Splashes could be heard near me. I turned around to see Ard, naked as you would expect someone bathing to be, walking deeper into the water. I noted three things almost immediately. She was extremely pale, which I knew from seeing her face and hands but seeing it all around is something else. The second, she was much more muscular than I thought she was. Her small frame and the cloak that covered it gave the illusion of being thin and almost lanky. She wasn't the most muscular person I've seen, and she was very small in terms of height even if she was, but it was more than I had expected.
The third, she had no nipples. Both very flat, and without nipples. I knew she wasn't well endowed, she's essentially a slightly oddly proportioned kid, but this was pushing it. I stared at her as she walked closer, before stopping when the water reached her hips. She looked at me, sort of awkwardly.
"What?" I shook my head and continued to try to lather up my scalp as best as I could. I could sort of see my reflection in the water and was using that as my guide on whether or not I had enough on my hair. Once I reached that point I dunked my head into the water, scrubbed everything off and then lifted my head out of the water, breathing in air again. I opened my eyes and noticed Ard, still hip height in water, staring. I stared back.
"Mind coming closer?" Oh. She was about the level where it's most convenient to wash. I walked over and gave her the soap, which she took and started using herself. She scrubbed the bar directly on to her skin. How uncivilized.
"Sit down next to me." She said, while I tried to find a different thing to look at until she was done with her own cleaning. Why? Regardless, I walked closer to her and sat down in the water. The water reached to about my shoulder once I fully sat down, which wasn't that uncomfortable. Ard kept cleaning herself, and I waited for whatever it is she wanted to do.
After a while, while I was blanking out staring into the water, I felt hands on my head. I looked up to see Ard, massaging soap into my hair. I didn't gesture anything, and stared back into the water until she was done. She didn't say anything before she forced my head into the water, washing off the dirt as she did so. She repeated this three times.
"There. We're done here. Let's get dressed and head back." I nodded.
Standing back up, I made my way back to my clothes and unfortunately had to put it back on again. Almost making the entire point of cleaning myself mute, but it was better to be clean in body if nothing else.
"Should've had the Móráns make new clothes for you," Ard's voice came behind me. She was walking back to the pile of clothes she had left on the riverbed, after placing the bar of soap back into the stone box. I nodded, having two sets of clothes is desirable.
We headed back towards her home, the trip back awkward. At least for me, I couldn't tell Ard's mood as she was walking behind me. Her voice broke through my brooding, a tone a bit softer than I was use to spoke. "You should listen to me when I tell you to do things, Attie. Oath breaking is a serious evil, you know. I do not mind hearing, or speculating, on why you don't want to do something, but my word is still law. Do you understand?" I didn't answer. "Attie."
I nodded. The fear of whatever she had done to me was still in memory, I don't think I could forget that anytime soon.
"Good. Would you mind answering a few questions?" I shook my head, I wouldn't mind. "What are those things on your chest?"
On my chest? Probably nipples. "We láchs don't have them. Do they do anything?" I shook my head. On men, at least, they don't. She hummed at that. "How about the hair on your crotch?"
I stopped and stared at Ard. Shaking my head, both as an answer and in exasperation, we continued on the walk in silence. She hummed at that again.
Eventually we made it back to her home. It wasn't a long walk, barely five minutes, but it felt like an eternity for me. Ard went back inside, telling me to wait while she gets something.
"Sit down, next to the door," Ard walked outside, a knife in her hand. I could guess she's going to do restart her lesson. And, the what? Where's that? What's a door?
Ard walked outside sat next to the entrance, leaning on her home and patting the ground next to her. She wanted me to sit on the right of her, although there was no sign of any peculiarity on that side. A wooden board, as the rest of the wall was equally made of this same material, was all that was presented. The grass and the dirt, of course, were also there. Was the door the thing to her left? The pseudo wall, the moveable one? I'll assume it is.
I sat down next to Ard and waited and gave out my hand in anticipation of the cut. Two times has she done this and two times did she want me to give out my hand, doing it before she could ask for it would be the proper thing to do. Ard looked at me, then placed her hand under mine and made a quick cut on the same spot as before. I didn't wait for her command and immediately started to collect the fire magic within my marrow, collecting my essence, and went towards the cut.
"You're getting better at this, good job. I remember both of your attempts, one was a good intuitive guess and would've been fine if I were teaching you how to heal naturally, but I'm not. Visualizing it, and only visualizing it, also doesn't work. Healing is more complicated than that. And obviously, trying to imbue the wound with your essence does nothing."
I nodded at all that.
"I had only wanted to show my sisters that you weren't a threat, and even though they know you are tied to my word they still aren't trusting. Forgive them for that." I nodded once again, from what it sounds like they don't know much about my kind. Although I do think the fear is a bit overboard.
"Because of that I didn't want to seriously teach you. But now I can, and so prepare yourself. The lesson won't be long, despite the complexity the steps are simple, it's actually only two steps. The first is knowing the essence of what you're healing, and the second is knowing how to apply the spell of healing. The only difficult part is quickly figuring out the essence. Each creature has a different essence, and if you want to heal as fast as I do you'd need to spend one or two decades practicing. As I have."
Looks like I was following the right lead in focusing on the essence, then.
"So, pay as close attention to what I'm going to do to the essence you've gathered as possible." I nodded.
Ard began to move the magic, injecting a small portion of her own in order to pull it out of my own grasp. Then she moved another small part of her own magic, this time specifically fire and wind, and placed it centrally within the clump of essence. All of the movements were slow, not painfully slow but enough for me to watch if I paid enough attention. I didn't know what she did with the clump of fire and wind magic, but she overlaid the tiny amount over the wound.
With that, the cut had begun to heal. I've seen it twice now, or rather three times if counting the burn wound on both hands, but I don't think I'll be getting used to seeing my flesh mend and close itself seemingly by its own volition.
"Catch all that?" Not really, no, but I nodded. I'll need to figure out several things in order to replicate what she just did. Both what was the spell, was it the small amount of magic she had injected into the essence? And the other is the fundamental question of what was my essence to begin with. I hadn't figured that out, and when I had tried I received a mass of information that I didn't know how to decipher.
"Good, then try it out yourself. I'll give you instructions as you go,"