SaDiablo Hall, Dhemlan, Kaeleer

[wwiii]

Training. Studying in Kaeleeran Court protocols, poring over any information that he could get his hands on regarding sanitary setups for new settlements in untamed territories, digging around for maps that could help Warren get a better idea as to where they were, and where they were trying to get... It was fairly safe to say that, when Warren wasn't busy running himself ragged in Kaeleer, trying to get budgets to balance and to work out supply options that weren't going to explode in his face, he was spending practically every waking hour training.

His teeth ground together as a stick whipped around, smacking him in the ribs with an audible crack.

Some types of training were easier than others, especially when he was running himself to the ground. He was tired, and it was starting to show. That wouldn't be so bad, if the person that was seeing it at the moment wasn't a sadistic Eyrien with a stick.

With a wince and a ruffle of feathers as he gasped to get his breath back, Warren straightened up and raised his stick again.

[For them what are in Kaeleer!]

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[wwiii]

Warren spit out his mouthful of dirt and nodded, heaving himself back up to his feet again and getting back into his stance as though nothing had smacked him in the shin in the first place.

Okay. Lucivar was starting to feint on him, now. That just meant that he had to be more aware. Or that he should have been more aware to begin with. He frowned at that thought, chiding himself for being such an easy target.

Against someone who had several thousand years of experience on him, but all the same...

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Lucivar's training had started in childhood and had a Warlord Prince's temper and arrogance behind it, even if both were muted right now while he was training.

This time his feint was a feint and the stick went hurtling at Warren left high.

What? Warren hadn't expected more of the same, had he?

[wwiii]

... Dammit. Warren had lunged in completely the wrong direction with the stick, and his swing was taking it in the wrong direction with too much force for him to right himself to block. It was his left wing that swung up to block instead, protecting his head, at least.

He swallowed, hard, at the snap. And then he was taking a few deep breaths and folding it gingerly at his back again.

New lesson learned: Don't block a sturdy stick being swung by an Eyrien Warlord Prince with your own body parts. Especially not a wing swinging in the opposite direction with just as much force. Sticks versus hollow bones meant that the odds weren't exactly stacked in his favor.

"I could have handled that better," he gasped, still reeling a bit.

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"Oh, shit," Lucivar said, actually going to far as to drop his stick. If there had been any witnesses to the event, a collective gasp would have gone up from the crowd. "We need to get you to one of the Healers, Jaenelle or Raven or Gabrielle, maybe."

Not Karla. Karla would beat the shit out of him for breaking one of Warren's wings. And the way he felt right now, he'd let her.

[wwiii]

Warren's gaze travelled from Lucivar to the stick, and then back again. And then he shook his head a bit. Great. This was... great.

"Relax. Just help me set it," he ground out, holding up a hand and taking a seat right there on the ground. Or, kind of just buckling at the knees. Same thing. "I can reach, but I don't think I can do it myself."

And there wasn't enough time to go looking for somebody before the bones started to knit themselves together as they were. He'd let his bones heal strangely before. It always took them weeks to reorient themselves properly, afterwards.

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"Relax?!" Lucivar spat. "This is your Darkness bedamned wing we're talking about. If we don't get that taken care of, it could cause you pain every time you try to fly!"

Especially since the break was right before the heaviest part of the wing. The weight could pull it down and cause further damage.

Which was the only reason he was reaching out to set it like Warren had suggested. He needed to keep the weight off. "C'mon, boyo," he said, his touch gentle compared to the bite in his voice. "No reason to pretend to be cool for me. Or if you have to, put it towards standing up so we can get you to a Healer."

He wanted to call for Cat, but she was still sparring with Karla. No reason to draw the witchling's eyes this way. Yet.

[wwiii]

"I've had worse," Warren breathed, stubbornly. "Do you want Karla to find out about this?"

Even Warren didn't particularly want Karla to find out about this. Because if she went and killed Lucivar, who would be left to teach him sticks?

"Just..." He raised his hand to his mouth, shaking just a little. He could already feel the bone fragments beginning to stitch themselves together, all wrong. Much longer, and properly setting the bone was going to require re-breaking it, first. "Quickly, please."

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Lucivar was disposed to argue--Lucivar was always disposed to argue--but the desperation in Warren's voice stopped him. He moved the bones in place, wincing a bit as he ground the edges together before finding the right angle. "Mother Night, Warren, I'm sorry."

There was real concern and apology in Lucivar's voice. Losing his wings was his worst nightmare.

"She's going to find out," he decided. "Unless we can get Raven out here, I need to get Jaenelle. She's the best Healer we have. If you want to fly--"

He broke off. What the Hell...?

[wwiii]

Warren's hand was now bloody, too, because he'd bitten down on the meat at the base of the thumb while Lucivar had fiddled with his bones. It was the other hand that he reached up with to stubbornly wipe at his eyes. His thumb was better already, but there was a little trail of blood running the length of his arm to his elbow, by that point.

"Just hold it," he murmured, staring down at the ground while the pain in his wing dulled somewhat. "Just for a couple of minutes. Please? It's okay. This was my fault, I moved into it stupidly, I know better..."

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Lucivar was staring in disbelief at the the wing under his hand. The skin was so thin there, he could feel the the bones shifting, smoothing out beneath his fingers. "What?"

His eyes flickered down to the spreading scarlet stain on Warren's forearm. Blood, from no visible wound.

Warren never had visible wounds. Or bruises, even when Lucivar whacked him hard enough to make one blossom. Or even red marks. Hell's fire, Saetan had taken him aside and asked if maybe he wasn't going too lightly on the lad.

"Talk to me," he said. "Why aren't we yelling for the Healers, boyo?"

[wwiii]

"Because there's no point in wasting their time." He wiped his hand off on his pant leg, not looking up just yet. Talking about this sort of thing was... awkward, at best. "By the time someone gets here, it won't be an issue anymore."

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That pretty much lined up with what Lucivar was feeling here. And if it took just a few minutes for a snapped wing strut to mend, bruises and muscle strain would Heal in what...seconds?

"You're a Healer," Lucivar said flatly.

[wwiii]

"I'm a mutant," Warren replied, glancing over his shoulder for a moment. "This isn't craft or anything. I don't even have control over it. It just... It just kind of is."

He didn't seem so thrilled about that, for whatever reason.

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Lucivar's gaze turned thoughtful. "So you can't Heal anyone else?" he asked.

[wwiii]

"I... I don't..." Warren's gaze dropped to the ground as he remembered Karla's back, crisscrossed with claw marks. And then healed clean, as though there hadn't been an injury there at all.

His voice was very quiet as he replied, this time.

"I might be able to. Something in my blood. But I haven't really tested it to be sure."

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Lucivar finally took his hand away, bringing it up to stroke his chin. "That puts an interesting spin on things, doesn't it?" he mused. "Do you know how much you can Heal from? Is there an upper limit?"

Morbid questions, sure, but important.

[wwiii]

Very important, indeed. Warren stretched his wing, gingerly, testing to be certain that everything had healed straight. So far, so good.

"A hook to the guts, I've healed from. And a fall from a pretty crazy height that broke... most of my bones, actually. There was one thing that I wasn't sure I was going to make it through, but Raven stepped in and healed me before I could find out either way."

He was not in any hurry to revisit the whole evisceration ordeal, Lucivar.

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"So you can take almost-fatal injuries and walk them off eventually, you're saying." Lucivar finally noticed his stick on the ground and picked it up, leaning on it slightly at he regarded Warren. "Do you know about how long it takes you to recover?"

Let's be clear. Lucivar had no intention of murdering you in your sleep, Warren.

...Helene would bitch about the damage to the sheets.

[wwiii]

"It depends on the injury," Warren replied, not looking up just yet. "Tissue damage is easy. Bones take a bit longer. It's okay to fly on, but it's still going to be sore for a bit."

He was probably going to have to stand up again eventually. But this grilling alone was taking more out of him than being smacked half to death with a stick would have. Wings, he'd gotten used to. He lived with them for every waking moment of the day. His healing factor, on the other hand, he could generally just forget about. It didn't stare him down, so he didn't have to acknowledge it all of the time.

"I've grown limbs back, too."

That part was very quiet.

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"Mother Night!" Surprised Lucivar was surprised. "How do you--"

He looked at Warren and shut his mouth, leaving the rest of the question unasked.

"You know it's possible that you'll have to do so again?" he asked instead, voice just as quiet. "People might not target you because they'll underestimate you...but you're just as likely to have people after you because they don't think you'll put up much of a fight. In either scenario, by the laws of our land, your first duty is to get back up and protect her."

[wwiii]

"I know," Warren replied, furrowing his brow a little. That was one of the things in a long, long list of duties and protocols that Saetan had already covered with him. And yet... "Even if it wasn't a law, I would. She's everything to me. I wasn't just saying that because Saetan was threatening to burn a hole through me with his eyes, you know."

Though, in all fairness, he had been pretty scared.

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"It's just--" Lucivar rubbed his face, trying to figure out how to explain this without alienating Warren further. "It's not about not trusting you or something. We're raised from the cradle with the idea that we serve and protect. It's bred into us, blood and bone. There's a bond between a Blood male and a Queen that you can't feel--just like I can't feel the bond between you and Karla. Does that make sense? We stress this because we know we're alien to you."

[wwiii]

"It makes sense," Warren sighed, lifting his hand and turning it over in inspect the blood smears along his arm. He was going to have to make a mad dash to the shower, if he wanted to get there before Karla spotted him looking like he'd stuck his hand under a lawnmower. "It's new to me, but I don't think it's about as impossible to explain as trying to get a blind person to understand the color blue. Blood males have a need to protect their Queen. I'd just do the same because she's Karla. The ends are the same, even if the means aren't quite, Lucivar. Honest."

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"We're getting that," Lucivar said, running a hand through his hair. "I think we've been focusing a lot more on all the ways you're different instead of seeing the ways you're not." He shrugged. "This is new on both sides. This is the first time in fifty thousand years Saetan's had to teach someone who doesn't know anything about Blood culture, history, and Protocol."

Even landens had picked up the basics, after living under Blood rule for millennia.

"It's not you, is all I'm trying to say. Or any lack of faith in you."

[wwiii]

"That... that's reassuring," Warren admitted, after a moment's silence, mulling that over. "Would it help to just think of it as a blank slate, or something? I mean, I have my own cultural biases, I'll admit that. But for the most part, I'm not so great at being from where I'm from, either."

He looked up, finally, letting his hand fall to his side before he started to pull himself to his feet.

"How do Blood children learn? Is it just something they're constantly immersed in, so it becomes intuitive?"