Indenuel wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. It shook, but he couldn’t stop healing the Oraminians. Any time he thought about it, someone would bring in a sickly brother or aunt who needed to be healed because they were turned away by the High Elders. Indenuel tried to numb himself to the anger he felt toward the men who were supposed to be his mentors. If he felt anger, it would take longer to heal.
The sun was beginning to dip in the sky and there was no end in sight to the people who needed healing. Indenuel did not have the heart to turn them away. They had already been turned away once. He couldn’t do that to them again.
“Indenuel,” Tolomon whispered as a brother helped his sister get off the makeshift blankets the Oraminian had created for Indenuel as a healing table. The brother and sister hugged, speaking in Oraminian with relieved, happy voices.
“Hmm?” he asked, too tired to even form a sentence.
“You haven’t had dinner. Or lunch. You are exhausted, and you can’t expend yourself in this way. Remember what happened last week when you were pushed to your limits?” Tolomon asked.
“Hmm.” He did not have the strength to say everything on his mind. He simply took another baby in his arms, touched the boy’s temples with the thumb and pinky of one hand, closed his eyes, and reached out with his power to heal his lungs. The baby gasped, then screamed in hunger. The mother sobbed as she thanked Indenuel. Shrbriadi. It was the one word from the Oraminian language he would know forever after today. Indenuel nodded and waited for the next person.
Baleeah had gone home. He didn’t remember when, but he sent her home well before dinner. After all, he didn’t need anyone to tell him what was wrong. He could figure it out by touching their temples. Tolomon still kept a hand on the hilt of his sword, always prepared for anything.
“You cannot heal the entire city in a day,” Tolomon said.
“Mmm,” Indenuel said. The truth was, he needed someone to force him to stop. At this point he couldn’t stop himself. He was already set in a system. When Lucia would have him work with farmers during harvesting, he would get into a routine where he did the rote work until someone told him to stop. He’d never stop until they told him to. He had been in this routine for half a day, and he simply couldn’t stop. Touch temples, find the illness, cure it, release, next. Touch temples, find the illness, cure it, release, next. Over and over. Don’t stop until it's done. The refugees kept coming. Ignore emotion, the anger at the farmer for “forgetting” to give him dinner. The anger at the High Elders for leaving him to do all this healing. It didn’t help. He just had to do without. So what Lucia sacrificed everything for the town that shunned her. So what the High Elders couldn’t see these people in pain. He must act like a good man. He needed to wait for Lucia to stop him.
“Indenuel!”
He looked up to see Martin, who had a hand on his shoulder. He blinked, almost positive this was a hallucination brought about by giving too much of himself. What was Martin doing here? He was a High Elder. Indenuel being forced to heal all the Oraminians was proof enough that a High Elder wouldn’t dare dirty his white robes in a place like this. Martin was gasping for air, looking like he ran here, even though there was a second carriage. Two fine, beautiful carriages right in the middle of the poorest part of the city.
“Indenuel, what are you doing here?” Martin asked.
He said nothing, simply stared at Martin. Was Martin going to stop him? Was all this going to be over for today? A man spoke in Oraminian, and Martin answered back. His Oraminian had a more Santollian accent, but it was Oraminian. Indenuel sat with his hands in his lap, staring out into the distance, not seeing anyone, not feeling anything. He was more than spent. He had pushed himself way too far. But how could he say no to these people?
Martin and the Oraminian man kept talking. Tolomon knelt next to Indenuel. “Can you stand?”
He paused before lifting his hand into the air. Tolomon grabbed it and helped him to his feet. His legs stopped working and his bodyguard wrapped his arm around his waist to keep him standing. Even in Oraminian, he recognized the hushed worry traveling through the group. He couldn’t look at the people who were still waiting to be healed. If they asked, he would still say yes, so he looked away instead. He knew what it was like to be rejected.
Indenuel didn’t notice Tolomon still had a hold of him until Martin came and grabbed his head to keep it steady. “You can’t expend yourself like this. You can’t be doing any of this,” Martin hissed as he placed his fingers to Indenuel’s temples.
“I had to,” he managed to get out.
“You will stay in your quarters while the High Elders and myself discuss what you just did,” Martin said, opening his eyes.
Little strength returned to his limbs, though enough to be able to stand without Tolomon needing to hold him up. He had no energy to fight. Little energy to do much else but let Tolomon lead him toward the carriage. He stared off in the distance when a pressure grabbed him around the waist. He looked down to see a little Oraminian boy hugging him. He paused before shaking off Tolomon and Martin to hug him back. Another boy, his brother, was hugging him too. Soon another and another, and Indenuel closed his eyes, feeling an entire crowd trying to touch him. Mountain Pass taught him to hate crowds, but this was different. The crowds before mocked and belittled him, and he had to keep himself covered in case he got a punch to the face. This crowd, however, he never experienced anything like this before. They loved him. They wanted to touch him, they were singing songs, and though he couldn’t understand what they were singing, he knew they were praises. Indenuel closed his eyes, feeling every touch on his body. Feeling the yearning of the others to show their gratitude. He couldn’t understand Oraminian, but he understood this.
Tears flowed from his eyes as his power bubbled inside of him. This wasn’t a dark power. It was far more rejuvenating than the dark powers. His strength returned. He wasn’t healing himself. It was the crowd, with their gratitude and love, trying to give back what he had given them. Martin said there were no healers in this race, but he felt them, dormant as they were. He lifted his arms, touching anyone he could, closing his eyes as his strength came back. He was in one giant web, feeling the healing power ebbing away in others and entering those in need. He realized what this was. Together, they were healing the rest of the refugees who Indenuel couldn’t heal on his own. His power embraced them, healed them all, every illness, bruise, torn muscle, twisted ankle, all of it. The High Elder’s called the Sabbath day the holy day, but this feeling, right here in this crowd in the poorest part of the city, was far holier than anything he had felt in that Cathedral.
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“Get them away. Indenuel can’t use his powers like this,” he heard Martin say.
Indenuel’s eyes opened, and the power rushed back to him. He gasped; his cheeks wet with tears. The crowd was still there, still wanting to touch him. They whispered Eskmenmar like it was the name of God, and for the first time he began to worry. They shouldn’t be worshiping him like this. Martin’s warning about making sure their praises turned to God and not to him echoed in his ears.
Tolomon grabbed Indenuel’s shoulder and pulled him out of the crowd. “Stay close,” he said, keeping an arm around him. As soon as Indenuel was out of the center of the circle, the Oraminians parted, letting them through. The crowd dropped to their knees at Indenuel’s feet in the custom of Oraminian. They touched their noses to the ground, their hands outstretched.
“What did you do here,” Martin hissed again.
Tolomon was about ready to lift Indenuel into the carriage when he shook him off. “I’m fine.”
“Get in there quick.” Martin’s tone turned dangerous. Indenuel didn’t react, he was simply shoved into his own carriage by Tolomon. Martin said something more to the crowd. It sounded diplomatic enough, even if he was mostly in the carriage when he said it, blocking himself with the door in case the crowd turned on him.
Martin finished what he had to say before ordering his own carriage to follow. He sat down across from Indenuel and Tolomon. He rubbed his face, looking completely exhausted before turning toward Indenuel. “I must stress that what you did was wrong.”
Indenuel accepted a glass of water from Tolomon and drained the entire thing. “A little girl asked me to heal her grandmother. What was I supposed to say? No?”
“There is a special order to things like this. We must ask the questions to gauge their faith,” Martin said.
“Why?”
Martin looked surprised, as though no one had questioned him about it before. “Because that’s how it’s always been done. They must be worthy before God before they receive their healing.”
“If God is that worried about worthiness, He would have stopped me.”
“That’s not how His gifts work. Through their worthiness, coupled with the power of the healer, they are able to overcome their illnesses. If it’s only based on the healer’s ability alone, it will never work,” Martin said.
“Well…” Indenuel said, allowing Tolomon to fill his glass again. “I do believe I just proved you’re wrong about that.”
Martin’s eyes narrowed as Indenuel drained the glass again. Tolomon gave Martin a nervous glance. “You are to remain in your home for the time being.”
Indenuel cocked his head to one side. “Are you arresting me?”
“No. But you must stay there. We must see the damage of what you’ve done among the Oraminians. You cannot run away like that without some warning, and you especially cannot go into the enemy’s part of the-”
“Enemy?” Indenuel’s voice was far sharper than he intended. “Kiam is our enemy. Not Oramin.”
Martin’s sigh reflected his annoyance before he dropped his voice. “There are rumors they might join Kiam in their fight against us.”
“I can absolutely see that,” Indenuel said, dropping his voice as well. “If you keep denying them chances of healing, telling them they’ve got to do what you expect of them, force them to live in the dirtiest part of the city, what do you expect?” In the enclosed space of the carriage, Indenuel was starting to smell himself. Being among the Oraminians most of the day, the smells and grimes of the poor leeched onto him. It was a different smell than in his own town, but still brought about the judging eyes of the rich all the same.
“Stay away from them, do you understand? They are dangerous,” Martin said.
“They have worth. Without them we will never have the mother of the-”
Martin gave Indenuel a sharp look, and he froze. He couldn’t reveal the Divine Ages with Tolomon sitting next to them. He shook his head, turning toward the window and tried again. “I am the son of Lucia, a woman accused of being a witch and a murderer. No one showed me mercy. If it wasn’t for some mysterious prophet who foresaw that my life had value, no one ever would.”
Martin’s face softened. He looked down at his hands as the carriage took them down streets that were far nicer and cleaner than the ones they were leaving. “You need to rest. I will gather what information I can to give to the High Elders. We are going to decide what to do from here.”
“What is there to do from here?” Indenuel asked.
“See if you need to have a trial,” Martin asked.
“What the hell for?” Indenuel asked.
“You cannot go as your title of Warrior and just heal whoever you want,” Martin asked.
Indenuel buried his head in his hands, muttering curses he didn’t dare say much louder.
They approached Indenuel’s home. Martin leaned back. “We are doing everything we can for them. We have set up free schools to help them learn what they need to have a good life here in Santollia City.”
“And it won’t matter, because everyone will take one look at their blue eyes and turn them away. Because you and the other High Elders are leading by example,” Indenuel said.
Martin said nothing, a troubled look on his face. Once the carriage came to a stop, Indenuel climbed out, not waiting for Tolomon.
“We will send you a letter once we’ve come to a decision. Stay in your house until then. I will warn Captain Luiz of this development. You might not practice the sword tomorrow,” Martin called as he got into his own carriage.
Indenuel gave a wave to acknowledge he understood but continued toward his house without another word. Pablo opened the door and gave a bow. “Good evening, sir. Shall I get dinner for you?” Indenuel walked past Pablo into the house. “Or a bath?”
“Both,” Indenuel said. “I’ll have both.”
Pablo nodded as Indenuel headed for his room. Tolomon followed. “I’m to stay by your side to make sure you don’t leave your house.”
“Perfect,” he said, rolling his sleeves back down.
“Don’t be angry at the High Elders. They’re just looking out for you,” Tolomon said.
“I cannot believe anything you say about the High Elders,” Indenuel said. “So don’t try to tell me I did something wrong.”
“You didn’t. That I believe. The longer I stayed there, the more I saw it,” Tolomon said. “But you also must understand what this means. You showed yourself to the Oraminians, showed your power. There have long been rumors of Oraminian spies in the city feeding information to the Kiam armies.”
“They were just people with illnesses who had been denied healing,” Indenuel said.
Tolomon shook his head. “That’s what you saw. I saw mostly that, but I also saw a group of men watching you way too closely, whispering to each other. They were gathering information.” Tolomon’s eyes shot to the window, watching something before slowly trailing back to Indenuel. “We just need to be careful for a while.”
Indenuel frowned, uncomfortable with the quiet urgency in Tolomon’s voice. Of course he trusted Tolomon, and he hated it. Hated that he couldn’t do a nice thing for a group of people who needed it without thinking about the political side effects of what it would mean.
Servants walked in with platters of food, bowing low as they moved to prepare his bath, pouring warm water into it. Indenuel stared at the huge meal before him as Tolomon took tiny bites of it all before giving his approval. He remembered how thin everyone was in the Oraminian part of the city.
“When I’m done, does this food go to the Santollian poor, or the Oraminian poor?” Indenuel asked a servant.
A servant frowned. “The Santollian poor, of course.”
“Why not to the Oraminians?” Indenuel asked.
“Because they don’t take it. They’re afraid we’ve poisoned it,” the servant said.
Indenuel frowned, watching the servants bustle around to get things ready. He sat down at the huge table full of food, his stomach reminding him he never had any lunch and had pushed himself beyond his limits. The entire situation felt tricky, but in Indenuel’s mind, it came down to the fact that there were desperately poor people in this city, and they were being ignored.