The Autumn Prince

61. Heir of Affliction

"You're a genuine wizard," Katherine said, eying the plate of pizza rolls Rachel held out to her, but refusing to take any.

Becca shook her head, "Please don't say that. I still have a long way to go, and I'm making a lot of guesses."

"Your guessing kicks the shit out of anything the rest of us have done." Rachel didn't look at me, but I knew who she meant. "Pretty soon we'll be able to tell doctors to fuck right off."

"No we won't," Becca said. "I'm not that scared of messing up with plants and little cuts aren't too risky, but I don't think I'm brave enough to try anything big on a person unless it's an emergency."

She waved her hand and another flower stood taller, spreading its leaves wide. "I mean when you think about it, Juhan is amazing for lots of reasons, not just because of his powers. He can't just go 'boop' and heal you, he's got to make it just the right amount in just the right spots and that means he has to know as much as he can about what's broken and all the other parts that aren't. I think he must know more about anatomy than most doctors. I can't be that specific, and that makes it more dangerous because it affects everything."

Rachel paused with a pizza roll half way to her mouth. "Okay, two things. First, what do you mean it affects everything? When you fixed my finger, did that speed up my whole body? Am I a few days older now?"

"It doesn't make you older. It doesn't affect time at all, it only borrows from the healthy parts to give the broken parts enough energy to work faster. And it won't stop you from getting sick or anything, that's totally different, but you can fix most of that with some of the teas..." she stopped herself and paused to recover her train of thought. "What was the second thing?"

"Did you really just use 'boop' to describe a magic spell?"

Becca glared at her, but it came off more cute than stern. I chuckled at their exchange and reached for one of Rachel's snacks but she turned, pretending not to notice, and moved it out of my reach.

"Can you use that as a weapon?" I asked.

"What do you mean?"

"Over heal someone on purpose."

Becca looked horrified, "Oh gosh, that would be awful. Why would you want to do that?"

"Our enemies are more powerful than we are, we need every advantage we can get." Discussing the clinical murder of another living being didn't sit well with me either, but I wanted the others to know I was being proactive.

"Spells do the job they're made to do," Becca explained cautiously. "I don't think a healing spell can stick at all if there's no damage."

"And what if there is?"

"Then it'll fix it. Will shapes the Veil, Tom, and that means your intentions matter. I only know how to heal and I didn't write the original spell so I can't just change part of it to do something different."

"But if the spell's design won't let it cause harm, why do the plants sometimes die? It seems like it should be one or the other."

Becca sighed, "Because it's not the spell that's killing them. This magic only changes a few things and the body does the rest. The better I get at it the more flexible I can make it, but that's all."

I nodded, disappointed that we couldn't leverage it in our fight against my father. The mirror had been a bust as well, throwing out nothing but confusing visions and nothing about Caratacos's location at all.

"What you've done here is wonderful, Becca," Katherine drew her into a hug. "We're proud of you."

"I'm pretty proud of me too," she smiled back.