“Would you like to meet Nyssa and her daughter?”
He nodded.
“Okay.Gimme a second.”Mik turned and zipped off to find Nyssa.
* * * *
Helen smiled.“She’sone of the most generous souls that I have ever met.She wants everyone to find their own path to peace.If you send her someone, she needs an assistant at her workplace.Preferably one who can project a sweet and harmless appearance, no matter what they truly look like.”
“Why?”
“She’s a therapist.She helps people get through pain and panic and the terror that strikes in the middle of the most mundane tasks.She teaches them to breathe, to control the rage and fear, to embrace the sorrow.She’s a genuinely good person who needs someone who respects that because she spends a lot of time working and being called away from dinners and parties.”
He exhaled.“That explains so much.Her self-control is astonishing.”
“Her resting face is blank and terrifying, but her soul bubbles with laughter.That’s how she gets you.Lulls you into a false sense of security and then bam!She does something so generous that it makes you want to cry.Like tonight.”
“She gave you power.”
“No.She refocused ambient energy and routed it through the crystal so it would slowly seep into my system.She got the others together and shattered her soul into all those people so that their dance powered the focus, and she could simply power the energy of each step and the light and the stars into me.No one was drained.No one was exhausted, and the joy she gave me was incredible.”
“How do you know the mechanism?”
“I analyze things, and the crystal told me.”She held it up.“It gave me the how and the why.”Helen laughed.“She gave me the manual, and that let me accept it.”
“You are sick?”
“Dying.Now, I can feel my body changing course.This time next year, I will be whole and strong and looking for my own life.”
He looked at her.“What are you looking for in a mate?”
“Slow -moving and doesn’t like to crush things.Right now, my body is extremely brittle.It’s why she gave me this chair, so no one bumped into me.”
“What was killing you?”
“My own body.Tumours in places that can not be cut and extracted.In the past, I have had them removed, and they return, over and over.Genetically predisposed to grow them.”
“I am sorry.”
“I have prepared to die; now I need to get ready to live.It is quite the switch, which is why she didn’t make things instant.Instant would have broken me.This way, I can resume living and decide what I want to become.”
“She is very wise.”
“Yes.I was going to call her character a wizard, but there is a wizard on one of the other teams.I didn’t want to conflict.”
“I see.”
Helen looked as two dark elves and what appeared to be a very pretty male djinn came toward them.“I am so going to get those guys designed and into a game.Hey, Myro.Breen.Other guy.”
Myro grinned and then sobered and bowed to the djinn next to her.“Emperor Vaayu, what brings you here?”
“Ryo ran to Avor and tattled that he had seen earth-born djinn.Then an imperial djinn, and after that, I found a blood djinn and a wild mage.This world is giving up her secrets fast.”
Helen added, “Well, we knew about Nyssa, and after all, one really wants an option with all these freaking dragons around.”
The imperial djinn asked quietly, “Who iswe?”
“Oh, we gossip when we are getting cancer treatment.You know.Just the girls gabbing away.”
