A Home Like Ours by Fiona Lowe (feel good books .txt) 📕

about to land on my hand that it would burn me, but it didn’t. And now, the pain in my hand is gone somehow. Ow!” Marken screams suddenly.

We all look down at his palm, and my Elemental leaves his hand and floats away. Instead, what is in the middle of his palm makes us all stare in amazement.

Marken has tears running down his face, but he is grinning at the same time. He looks at me and says, “It worked!”

Without warning, his eyes roll into his head and he falls back, his own Fire Elemental fading. His father, thank God, is there to catch him. Lahana is there as well. I am about to rush over to help him, but Leeha puts her hand on my arm.

“My brother is good,” she says, and there are tears of joy in her eyes. “This happens to everyone who is given the magic ability. Once the pain subsides and the Elemental comes through, we all pass out.”

Chapter Twenty-Three

“So what happens now?” I ask, looking over to the area where Marken is sleeping.

Once he passed out, Maxil lifted him and brought him over to the normally curtained side of the tent. Lahana had pulled out a sleeping mat of some sort and placed it down, and Maxil had gently placed his son on it, making sure his hand was hanging over the side. Lahana had then pulled the curtain down, hiding him from us. But I still saw his hand. And it was an issue. Marken’s hand looked burned and blistered, like he had placed his palm into a vat of oil.

Maxil takes a sip of his coffee. It seems even the Elves out here have it! Lahana had opened a wooden cover that was over a hole in the ground and reached in, bringing out a clay pot and offering it to me. I had looked at it oddly ‘til she laughed and said it was milk. However, when I put it into my coffee, it was more like cream; it was thick! I take a sip, and enjoy its rich, bold taste.

“Once he comes to, we will begin his training,” Lahana says, looking over at her son fondly. “Thank you, Alex, for this gift. Marken always felt alone in our family because he was the only one who did not have magic. We never treated him differently, but he felt different all the same. He hated the fact that the five Gods did not feel he was deserving of magic.”

“Then it was my pleasure. Though, I am worried about Marken’s hand. From the way it looks, it will be disfigured. On my world, I would know what to do, or at least what ointments and such to use to ease the pain, or at least I’d be able to bring him to a doctor to help him,” I say with a sigh that is partly guilt-ridden. I do feel responsible since I did this to him by offering him magic.

“You are not responsible for this, Alex,” Lahana says, looking at me crossly. I look back at her, and can’t get over how hot she is, even for an older Elf. If this is what Leeha will look like as she ages? Fucking hell, I am a lucky man.

“My mother is right,” Leeha says from next to me, her head leaning on my arm. “What you did for him is nothing short of a miracle. He knew going in there might be risks. He will need to learn to live with his hand being like that. What he gained, I am sure he would say, was worth it.”

“I just wish I could do something about it,” I tell her with a sigh.

“And what is a dock tour?” Leeha asks me.

“On my world we have these people, who, while they don’t use magic to heal, they can use science. We call them doctors in my language. There are lotions, creams, and ointments we have that would help him. Sometimes if a burn is severe, we would, well, do other things,” I say, deciding not to get into skin graphs and such.

“We do have some creams, but they are expensive and only available in the human cities,” Maxil says bitterly. “But they would never use them on us ‘animals’ or even allow us to buy any.”

“So these myths of yours about healing? Do they say how it was done?” I ask Leeha, Maxil, and Lahana. “I assume they used magic? But what Elemental?”

“We aren’t sure. We do know the stories talk about magic being used, but that’s all. Not which one, or how,” Lahana says, once again looking over at the sleeping area where Marken is. Turning back to me, she asks, “Are you hungry?”

“I am good—” I start to say, but then my stomach decides to call me a liar.

“Ah,” Lahana says with a light laugh. “Let us make you supper, and we can eat.”

Once the meal was done, it had already gotten dark outside. Leeha and I are lying down on the opposite side of the yurt, as I am calling it. Her parents are on the other side, with Marken. He moans in pain every now and then, but he never wakes up. I feel so fucking shitty for him. I know we are all adults, and he agreed to do this, but still. I just caused someone major pain.

Leeha is already asleep next to me, snoring lightly. She keeps telling me she doesn’t snore but when I tell her that her snoring is quite cute, she looks at me all offended, and I can’t help but laugh at her. I sit up slowly, so as not to wake her up, and I lean against a pole that is part of the structure of the yurt.

So they used to have the power to heal with magic, but they lost it. Not just the Elves, but from what it sounds like, all of Boromour. But which Elemental would it be?