( Elara Pov)
Two days had passed, and Eri had not yet opened her eyes.
At first, I told myself it was normal—that the body needed time after what we had endured, that rest was part of healing. But time in that place did not move the way I was used to. There were no court schedules, no structured hours, no servants marking the passing of the day. Only light and shadow, the quiet shifting of the forest, and the constant awareness that she remained still.
It unsettled me more than I expected.
The man who had taken us in did not seem concerned. He moved through each day with the same quiet rhythm, as though tending to someone on the edge of life and death was no different from any other task. That alone told me enough.
He was used to this.
On the second morning, I stepped outside and found him already at work. He stood near the edge of the clearing, splitting wood with measured strikes, each movement controlled and efficient. The axe rose and fell in a steady rhythm, not rushed, not strained—just practiced.
He looked older than he probably was—not because of age, but because of the way he carried himself. His beard was long and untrimmed, his hair tied back loosely, his skin darkened by sun and time. There was nothing polished about him, nothing that resembled the refinement of palace life. And yet there was no carelessness in him either. Everything about the way he moved suggested control—strength shaped by habit rather than display.
He did not look like a man who guessed.
He looked like a man who knew.
Inside, the house told the same story. Shelves lined the walls, filled with jars, bundles, and containers, each holding something dried, crushed, or preserved. Some herbs I recognized immediately—common medicinal leaves, basic remedies taught even in Vesperian study halls. Others were not. Some I had only seen in texts. Some I had never seen at all.
They hung from beams above, tied in careful clusters, drying slowly in the filtered light. Others were laid out near the windows, arranged not for display, but for use. Nothing in the room existed without purpose. Even the air carried it—the scent of layered medicine, of knowledge gathered not from instruction, but from repetition and survival.
He had not said much.
Only his name.
Dyion.
And that he had once been a healer in Kolin.
Once.
The word lingered, but he offered nothing more, and I did not ask. It did not feel like something he would answer, even if I did.
By midday, he placed a bowl in front of me without a word.
I looked at it.
Vegetables. Boiled. Unseasoned.
"I'm not hungry," I said.
"That is not relevant."
He did not even look at me when he replied.
I exhaled quietly and sat down. The first bite confirmed what I had already expected—it was not meant to be enjoyed. Only to be consumed. I finished it anyway. There were things more important than preference.
When I looked up again, he was watching—not closely, not with interest, but with quiet awareness, as though noting something and deciding it required no comment.
"You have training," he said.
It was not a question.
"Basic," I replied.
A lie.
But he did not challenge it. He simply nodded once and turned away, as though that was enough.
The silence that followed settled easily. Not empty—just present.
It broke only when I noticed movement from the far end of the room.
Eri.
It was slight—barely a shift—but enough.
Something in my chest tightened before I could stop it.
Dyion had already moved.
He reached for his tools without hesitation, selecting herbs with practiced certainty. His hands worked quickly, crushing leaves, measuring liquid, combining everything into a dark mixture that released its scent before it was even finished.
Bitter.
Sharp.
Too concentrated.
I stepped closer, watching the proportions, the way he crushed the root, the amount he added, the thickness of the mixture as it formed. It would work. There was no doubt about that.
But—
I reached for one of the hanging bundles, breaking off a small piece between my fingers.
"You're using too much," I said.
He did not stop.
"It will work."
"I didn't say it wouldn't."
That slowed him, if only slightly.
I held the herb up. "If you add this, it will soften the initial taste. The effect stays the same, but the body won't react as strongly."
He looked at me then—not surprised, not dismissive, but measuring.
Then he turned back.
And continued exactly as before.
The same mixture.
The same proportions.
Nothing changed.
I lowered my hand slowly.
Understood.
This was not a mistake.
This was a choice.
A moment later, he carried the medicine to Eri.
She had already pushed herself up slightly, her posture steady despite the weakness beneath it. There was no hesitation when he held the cup out to her.
"Drink."
She took it.
And drank.
I watched her.
The reaction came quickly, though most would have missed it—a slight tightening at the edge of her expression, a brief narrowing of her eyes before everything settled again.
Gone in an instant.
As if it had never been there.
Dyion turned away, already returning to his work.
Unbothered.
I glanced once at the table behind him—at the herbs he had chosen, and at the one I had not used—before looking back at him again.
He was already working.
And for reasons I could not fully explain, that quiet refusal stayed with me longer than anything else.
Not because he was wrong.
But because he had never needed to prove that he was right.