Taking a deep breath, FeiWan stretched his aching back and arms and wiped his sweaty forehead on his sleeve. He never wanted to have to carry the noble CalDai anywhere ever again!, he decided. But then he couldn’t help staring down at his heavy charge.
It was almost … sinful, he thought. The way CalRimRan’s clothes were disheveled from FeiWan grabbing him wherever he could. Or the way his hair was spread over the bed in such a disorderly way. Not to mention the fact that his body had obviously remained the same way it had fallen on the mattress, one leg still pending over the bed’s edge. Even in his sleep, CalRimRan had never looked anything but meticulously tidy.
Sighing, FeiWan pulled his leg up on the bed, again grunting from the effort. Then he more or less straightened his clothes as best as he could. Lastly, he arranged his arms, placing them beside his body, until he looked a bit more … like himself.
Taking a deep breath, he finally sat down on the edge of the bed. He felt really tired. His body was aching as if he’d just finished one of his intense training sessions. And, worst of all, he didn’t know what to do.
CalRimRan didn’t have a fever, that much was obvious. In fact, his temperature was clearly below what could be considered a healthy temperature. He didn’t seem to be in pain. He clearly wasn’t injured anywhere. He also didn’t present any of the symptoms of a common illness, like coughing or a stuffy nose.
FeiWan couldn’t say what lead him to do it, but he suddenly reached out for CalRimRan’s hand, more specifically for his wrist, and pressed two fingers against his smooth skin. Closing his eyes, he tried to sense CalRimRan’s energy flow.
Sure, there was no guarantee that he would even have one. Although the Demon Clan were able to clearly use their own energy to manipulate the world around them the same way a daitai bearer would do, everyone knew that they had no daitai imprinted on their backs. Which made their power look all the more dangerous and unnatural. As such, there was a high probability that their bodies would simply work … differently.
Even so, FeiWan emptied his mind and tried to feel for that buzzing current of life that inhabit every men and women blessed with at least one daitai. And, sure enough, it didn’t take long before he could clearly feel it. It also immediately made him snap his eyes wide open, his heart beating so hard against his chest that it hurt.
It was … wrong! He didn’t know exactly how he knew that. But he was certain that the energy he had felt wasn’t in sync with what he knew about CalRimRan. But, worst of all, it was slowly but surely fading away. Which was impossible!, unless he had been mortally wounded.
One’s energy didn’t simply … disappear! It could become tainted, yes. It could become corrupted. Its nature could change. It could become impossible to control. Its flow could suddenly stopped or be stopped by another person. It could even turn against its own bearer, driving them insane or outright killing them where they stood. But it could never simply disappear! Unless the body itself had suffered a mortal injury and was also dying. In those situations, in a desperate attempt to sustain life for as long as possible, a lot of energy was instinctively spent. Energy that a dying body had no way to replenish. Which obviously wasn’t CalRimRan’s present situation. So … how come something that was supposedly impossible was happening right in front of his eyes? It was as if CalRimRan was unable to store the energy naturally produced by the mere fact that he was alive. In fact, he was losing more energy than he could produce. Which meant that he was, undoubtedly and inevitably … dying.
When FeiWan realized what he was doing, he was squeezing CalRimRan’s wrist so hard that he feared it might leave a bruise on his pale skin.
Focus!, he immediately chastised himself. No use panicking! No use dwelling on the scary fact that the one in front of him would probably only have a few days left to live. As far as he was concerned, there were only two things he could do. One, pretend he didn’t know anything about it, since it was obvious that CalRimRan didn’t want him to know. Which, of course, meant watching in silence as he slowly died, a bit every day.
If he did that, how long would he have to live? A month? Two? FeiWan had no idea of how different CalRimRan’s energy flow would be, when compared to his own. But, if it were him lying there, FeiWan was sure he wouldn’t live past the next month.
His only other option was to try and save him. Well, not save him. He was no miracle worker. But he could … buy him some more time. That or kill him even faster, trying to accomplish that.
If he remembered correctly, even though different from his, CalRimRan also had a strong affinity with fire. Sure, he had seen him control other elements as well, like thunder and very heavy storms, which meant wind and rain. But the element he had obviously felt more at ease with had been fire. Which, back then, had greatly annoyed him! Because CalRimRan’s fire, although … different, had been almost as powerful as his! And if there was one thing he was proud of, was of having been born with the strongest fire daitai amongst all the El’Gin and El’Lin. Only the El’Dur’s fire could burn hotter than his.
In any case, the fact that CalRimRan also had a fire affinity would definitely work to his advantage. The problem was that, unlike FeiWan, fire energy probably wasn’t the only one circling inside his body. And, in trying to save him, FeiWan could very well end up destroying his other energy channels, leading to an even bigger unbalance. So … what to do?
He could wait until CalRimRan woke up, he considered. It wasn’t as if he was going to drop dead in the next few hours. Unless he did something stupid, like trying to use one of his powers. Which, now that FeiWan had a clearer understanding of what was going on, he would never allow. So, he could wait until he woke up and ask him what him to wanted to do. The problem was that, knowing him like FeiWan knew him, CalRimRan was sure to politely decline his offer. Which led to another question. Would he be able to simply sit back and watch him die if CalRimRan refused his help?
He didn’t need to think long to know the answer to that! As if he would allow him to die such a stupid, senseless death! And so, that having been decided, there was no advantage whatsoever in waiting until he woke up. Quite the contrary. The fact that CalRimRan had lost consciousness was actually the only advantage he had, at the moment.
Firmly holding CalRimRan’s wrist, FeiWan closed his eyes and took a deep breath, clearing his mind. He could only hope that doing what he was about to do wouldn’t outright kill him. He had no idea of how he would explain it, if something were to happen to the distinguished CalDai because he had been stupid and hadn’t called the Palace’s Hennin to have a look at him.
Directing his own energy flow was easy enough. The difficult part was passing it into CalRimRan’s body as softly as possible. Not that FeiWan was lacking in ability to control it. But, forcing his energy flow to slow down and transfer it in small quantities at a time was just … against its fiery nature. And so, even though he was trying his best to soften his raging fire, the moment he started passing it into CalRimRan’s body, CalRimRan immediately grew tense, his smooth expression distorting into a deep scowl, more of that incomprehensible gibberish escaping his pale lips.
Yeah, FeiWan had no doubt that what he was doing must hurt a lot. But, as he had previously concluded, there was no other way. And so he persisted, even when small droplets of sweat started gathering on the pearly surface of CalRimRan’s forehead. His fingers tightly wrapped around CalRimRan’s wrist, it was all he could do to resist CalRimRan’s persistent attempts to get his hand free. And then he just … stilled, his expression smooth and tranquil again.
FeiWan’s heart inevitably jumped urgently at that, his gaze focused on the man lying before him, searching for any signs that his initial discomfort had turned into something a lot worse. But, the more he looked, the more CalRimRan seemed to have simply fallen asleep. He was clearly still breathing, and he looked at peace, all signs of pain gone from his beautiful face. With some luck this was a sign that his body had finally gotten used to FeiWan’s energy, FeiWan could only hope. And so he proceeded, trying his best to make up for what had been incomprehensibly lost.
Language:
[1] . FeiWan: Literally fei (raging / furious) + wan (fire)
[2] . CalDai: Literally cal (bright) + dai (light). Unlike the Empires, the Dragon Clan has no royalty. They have a Leader. CalDai is a personal title (not inherited), and it refers to the youngest son of the Leader, reason why ZaiWin and the others sometimes refer to him as a prince (which he is not).
[3] . CalRimRan: Literally cal (bright) + rim (cold) + ran (moon)
[4] . Daitai: Literally dai (light) + tai (mark), or holy Markings, considered Heavenly Blessings. They’re the source of power.
[5] . El’Gin: Literally el (supreme) + gin (gold). Name given to the male children of the Emperor. Could be translated into prince in the common language.
[6] . El’Lin: Literally el (supreme) + lin (silver). Name given to the female children of the Emperor. Could be translated into princess in the common language.
[7] . El’Dur: Literally el (supreme) + dur (ruler). Name given to the Emperor.
[8] . Hennin: Literally hen (heal / medicine) + nin (person / human).
