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Louis' reading was interrupted by a soft knock at his door. Glad for a little reprieve from all the complicated anatomical terms being slammed into his head as he tried to make some sort of sense of them, he got up to open it. His mother stood on the other side, looking a little frazzled and pulled thin - but she often did. Despite the small size of the village, there were always people in need of healing, and it was rare that either of his parents got a break.
"Louis, would you mind coming downstairs? There's an injured boy here - nothing too serious, but I have other more pressing matters to attend to. Would you mind tending to him and keeping an eye on him until I get back?"
"Of course. Just one moment," Louis said, popping back into his room to grab the book he'd been studying from, then returned to follow his mother. In truth, Louis would have much preferred to spend the day reading, alone in his room - as much as the technicalities of the body and magla and how they were weaved together confused him, there was nothing he loved more than the rush of understanding, when something he had been trying to brute force into his head suddenly clicked, and reaching for the right knowledge felt more like swimming through a gentle stream than wading through thick tar. There was something enticing about knowledge, about being able to discern at a glance how to fix someone - or, if necessary, how to break them. It was by far his greatest strength. His bedside manner, however, left much to be desired, and thus his mother dragged him out of his room as much as she could in order to get him more practice. While he never verbally complained, he always tried to make sure he looked annoyed enough for his mother to pick up on, so that she knew she was inconveniencing him.
"Thank you, sweetheart. You're a star."
Silently, Louis followed his mother into the dining room, where a young boy, no older than ten, sat at the table. His hair was silver and his skin tan, and he had his forearm outstretched on the table, which he prodded at with a finger.
"Careful now, we wouldn't want you irritating the wound," Louis' mother said and the child jumped, turning to face them.
"This is my son, Louis. He's going to take care of you today, alright?" Louis' mother said, kneeling down by the table to get on the child's level. She then turned back to Louis. "This is Will - he has a bit of a nasty scrape on his arm. It should be easy enough for you to handle."
Before Louis could reply, she'd stood up and was hurrying for the door, squeezing his shoulder and wishing him luck, then she was gone. Sighing, Louis set his book on the table, then pulled out a chair to sit in front of Will. He'd had an inkling from the moment he saw him, but looking up close, he was certain. This was the chieftess’ son. He'd never actually seen the boy before, but he was aware that he existed, and he knew what his parents looked like - the resemblance was evident. Few people other than the chieftess had skin like Will's, on account of how rarely the sun breached the dense canopy of leaves, and fewer still had silver hair like hers. This of course meant the boy would one day run the village - no, the entire country. The thought startled him - he had so much importance, and yet he was so... ordinary. Louis would have expected an heir to the throne to be spending time in far nicer places than the Charadrius house, to be draped in layers of finery, yet he wore only simple white shirt and dark trousers, swinging his legs with a smile that only one who did not yet know the weight on their shoulders could wear.
"Show me your arm." Louis commanded.
Will's smile widened a little, and he gave Louis his arm - the uninjured one. Louis glared at him. Did this kid really think he was so funny?
"The other one," Louis hissed. He really wasn't in the mood for such childish antics. But Will only giggled before showing Louis his injury.
"You didn't say which," Will said, in a sickeningly sweet voice. Typically, when Louis had to deal with children, they would find his stern expressions scary and would do as he asked without hesitation - but this one was unperturbed.
The wound was a little more gnarly than Louis had anticipated - a long scrape went down from near the base of Will's hand and almost reached the crook of his elbow - it looked as though it had been raked with considerable force over a rock or some similar material. It was covered in congealed blood - though thankfully seemed to have stopped bleeding - and there was some dirt in it. That being said, the wound didn't seem to be too deep - it would require nothing more than some bandages
Silently, Louis got to work, carefully cleaning off the dirt without agitating the wound further. Once that was done, he got a small pot which stored a healing salve, checking the consistency by stirring it with a brush, before returning to Will.
"This is going to sting," he said, giving Will only a moment to process the information before beginning to apply it. Will gasped as the brush hit his skin and reflexively tried to pull his arm back, but Louis held his wrist firm, ignoring his distress, and continuing on as though Will was not a participant in the process.
"That hurt," Will complained as Louis got up to get bandages.
"I did warn you it would."
"No, you grabbing my wrist so tight. You've made it go all red. I thought you were meant to heal people, not make them worse."
When Louis sat back at his seat, he saw that there was indeed a slight ring of redness around the boy's wrist.
"You'll live. Now stay still while I get these bandages on."
This time, Will did not squirm, though he winced a little from the tightness of the bandages.
"So, what happened?" Louis asked as he wrapped the wound, partially out of a slight curiosity, partially out of obligation.
"I was playing in the forest and I was climbing a tree, but then I slipped down the trunk and my arm got caught."
"Any other injuries?"
"My knees got a bit grazed, but Mama cleaned them already. She said they weren't serious."
"I see." Perhaps Louis should have checked, just to be sure, but considering who Will's mother was, he deemed it a waste of time.
"There, all done." Louis finished tying the bandage, then pulled back, admiring his handiwork.
"Thank you!" Will said, beaming.
It was then that it occurred to Louis that he had no idea when his mother would be back. Or if anyone was going to collect Will. It seemed he had been saddled with babysitting duty in addition to his usual responsibilities. He sighed. Fine. Hopefully his mother wouldn't take too long - he wasn't sure how long he would be able to bear this.
"...I suppose you'll just have to wait until my mother returns. I don't know how long she'll be," Louis said after a long pause, then started reading his book again. He was a healer, not an entertainer - Will could keep himself occupied, and Louis would just make sure he didn't die before he went home.
Having nothing to do, Will put his head on the table, tracing the patterns in the wood with his finger. Aside from Will's fidgeting and the occasional turn of a page from Louis, the house was silent, and he much preferred it that way. But it wasn't long before the blissful quiet was shattered by Will's voice.
"What are you reading?" While he didn't lift his head, he tilted his gaze upwards to look at Louis' face, his icy eyes brimming with curiosity.
"It's a book on anatomy. To learn how the body works." Louis did not look up from his reading.
"That sounds cool. Can I see?" Will asked, lifting his head from the table.
"It's far too advanced for you. You wouldn't understand it."
Will sighed, then planted his head back down. Louis got around thirty seconds of blissful silence before the boy piped up once more.
"I'm bored."
"Then find something to do."
Taking this as an invitation to look around as he pleased, Will got up from his chair and began investigating. It had been a long time since there was a boy Will's age living in the Charadrius house - nearly a decade in fact - and thus there was very little that interested him. The drawers were filled with odd knick knacks he didn't understand or care for, the cupboards held only plates and other dining ware, and on the shelves were wooden ornaments that he knew better than to touch. Things on display were not toys - a lesson Will had learned many times already, trying to play with any heirloom or relic he could reach since he learned how to walk. Many of the lower shelves in his home now lay empty. While he had taken a liking to Louis, despite his coldness, he was a little scared of what he would do if Will touched anything important - or worse, if his mother found out - and so he kept his hands to himself.
Will was beginning to think that there was nothing interesting at all in this house, when something caught his eye on the bookshelf. Most of the tomes were old, dusty and boring looking, with long names Will hardly understood, but on a higher shelf, he caught a glimpse of the book his father wrote, a utopia novel that hel was always reading and rereading. His mother often joked that the only way to keep him from causing mischief was to put that book in front of him. Gasping with excitement as he laid eyes on it, Will rushed to grab his chair, then moved it to the bookshelf, climbing it to reach the novel. What Will failed to notice, however, was the lit candle on the shelf below. Standing on his tiptoes, he reached for the book, but just as he grasped the spine, his other arm began to feel unusually warm.
And then it began to hurt.
Confused, Will looked down to see flames creeping up his sleeve, licking at his skin, and he shrieked, tumbling off the chair as he tried to jump away from the flames - but it was too late for that. He was already alight.
"What's the matter now?" Louis groaned, before looking over and catching sight of the fire. At once, his mind shifted gears from annoyance to focus, quickly grabbing a tea towel from the kitchen, then wrapping it around the burning sleeve to smother the flames, not losing composure for even a moment. Will's breathing was ragged and panicked, and Louis allowed him a moment to calm himself. Then, he unwrapped the teatowel and assessed the damage.
It wasn't too bad, thankfully. The flames had made it look worse than it actually was, and they hadn't reached much further than Will's wrist, although the shirt would need to have the sleeves cropped if it was going to be worn again.
"Come with me to the kitchen," Louis instructed, picking up the chair Will had used to reach the bookshelf. "Run your arm under the cold water from the tap, while I make an ointment for the burn."
He helped Will onto the chair so he could reach the sink before looking for the supplies he needed. As he crushed some of the necessary ingredients, Louis winced at the thought of the earful he was going to get from his mother when she got home. He should've been keeping a more careful watch over Will - as a result of his negligence, the boy would be going home with two injured arms, when he entered with only one. He could already picture the lecture - he needed to stop being so selfish and put the patients first, no matter what he wanted. It would not be the first time he would receive such a lecture. And it would not be the first time that he would wonder why he couldn't just do something else. He just wasn't cut out to be a healer - anyone with half a brain could see that - and yet his parents kept pushing for him to follow in their footsteps, forcing him into a mould that he did not fit, no matter how hard they tried.
Grinding the herbs faster as the anger bubbled up inside him, Louis gritted his teeth, hands beginning to shake. Healing was at its core a selfless duty, and it had become apparent to him that he was far from it. He'd tried to be, when he was younger, watched his parents and copied their body language, their words, but he could never get the tone of voice quite right, could never replicate the softness. His father sometimes said that he sounded like he ought to be in the military. Perhaps it was true. At the very least, it would suit him better than this, than trying to force himself to empathise with people that did nothing but inconvenience him, which only made him more frustrated with them. He'd felt guilty for feeling this way, once. But years of frustration at the box he'd been forced into had buried that guilt deep, and it was not going to be excavated any time soon.
His parents didn't get it. Didn't understand why he couldn't just do what they did. Selfless people have trouble conceptualising that not all people think the way they do, and as a result, Louis often found himself feeling that they did not see him as who he was, but as who they wanted him to be. But that Louis was not real, and never could be.
Blinking, as though snapping out of a trance, Louis looked down to see the herbs he'd been crushing were nothing more than dust, and he quickly added them to the other ingredients, then headed back to the kitchen, nearly tripping over the utopia novel which had been abandoned on the floor on his way. Pausing briefly to pick it up and put it on the table, Louis continued into the kitchen.
"How does it feel?" Louis asked, turning off the tap and carefully patting Will's arm dry.
"It hurts a bit, but it isn't too bad," Will said. All things considered, he didn't seem too upset by the whole incident. Good. Perhaps Louis' mother would let him off and spare him the lecture.
Looking at Will's arm, the burn seemed superficial, with his skin being redder in the affected area but that was all. Best to treat it anyway, just in case. Louis led him back to the table, then rubbed some of the ointment into the burn.
"Better?"
"Mm-hm!" Will nodded. "Thank you!"
Louis leaned back in his chair, wanting to go back to his studies, but was unwilling to risk taking his eyes off Will. His eyes slid over to the utopia book, which now lay on the table. In a rush as he was, he hadn't properly taken note of what book it had been - but of course, why would it have been anything else?
"This is the book your father wrote, isn't it?" Louis asked, knowing the answer already.
"Yeah! I read it all the time." Will said. Louis did too, though he would never admit it.
"...Could you read some to me?" Will asked, holding out the book with both hands, fixing Louis with his biggest, saddest eyes.
"What? Surely you can read it on your own. You just said as much." Louis was a little taken aback.
"Yeah, but I want to hear you read it. You have a nice voice."
Louis raised an eyebrow. "You... think I have a nice voice?"
Will nodded, still holding out the book.
Sighing, Louis pinched the bridge of his nose. The last thing he wanted to do was read to a child but... since it was a book he liked, he supposed it was doable. Begrudgingly, he took the book.
"Why don't we move into the living room? It'll be more comfortable."
Louis sat himself on an armchair, while Will lay down on the sofa, turned onto his side to face his storyteller, eyes shining with anticipation. Clearing his throat, Louis began to read, partially from the page, and partially from his mind, having read the book so many times as to have passages partially or wholly memorised. Although he held little affection for the author these days, Louis could not deny the beauty of his prose, the way he wove his words together to construct such an enchanting world that felt so real it was as though Louis could touch the page and his fingers would slip inside. While the author had proven himself incapable of such a task, perhaps someone else could one day forge this world into one like the one contained in this story. Perhaps that someone could be himself. A slight smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. That would be nice.
Before long, Will fell asleep listening to Louis read. While he could have gone back to read from his anatomy book again like he'd wanted to in the first place, Louis was no longer in the mood, and so he instead continued to read from the utopia novel in silence, keeping an eye on Will as he awaited his mother's return.
It was a while before Louis' mother got home, but when she did, and saw Louis watching over a sleeping Will, her face lit up.
"Looks like things went well, did they?" She said, leaning against the doorway.
Louis contemplated whether or not to tell her outright about the incident with the candle. If he appeared honest, would he be able to avoid punishment? It wasn't as though she wasn't going to find out - she would know as soon as she saw the sleeve, even if Will didn't say anything. Owning up to it meant he could control the narrative.
"Mostly, although Will did catch his sleeve on a candle. He got a minor burn on his arm - not the one that already had the gash, though. I took care of it."
His mother frowned slightly, and Louis wondered if she could see the guilt lurking beneath his calm fasçade. Though they frustrated him, his parents were two of the few people he respected enough to want to avoid upsetting them - partially because he didn't like to see them that way, and partially because their words and discipline would get to him, where others did not.
"And he's alright?" She asked.
"Yes. He said it wasn't too bad." Louis' palms began to sweat.
Then his mother's face softened, and Louis relaxed, unclenching his fists. "Alright. Just keep a closer eye on your patients next time, okay?"
"Yes, Mother," Louis said, and she reached over to ruffle his hair. Punishment successfully evaded.
"Well then, I supposed we had best wake our little prince. I'll walk him home, you've done enough for today."
"Prince..." Louis muttered. He hadn't really thought of Will that way, but of course that's what he was. "That boy can't be trusted to run the village, nevermind the country. He can't go five minutes without getting himself injured. Who knows what kind of disasters he'd unleash if he was in charge of anything."
"Come now, Louis, there's no need to be mean. When you were his age, I still had to make sure you didn't eat worms when you played in the garden. It's a little early for sweeping judgments, don't you think?"
Louis felt his face get hot, and he looked away, having no retort.
Gently, his mother shook Will's shoulder, drawing him back into the waking world. Bleary, he rubbed at his eyes, blinking away sleep.
"Hello again, Will," Louis' mother said, sitting next to him on the sofa, "How are you feeling now?"
Will looked at his arms, considering before he answered. "Better! They hurt less now."
"I'm glad to hear it. Did Louis do a good job taking care of you?"
"Yeah!" Will said, without hesitation, and Louis was so surprised he nearly jumped. Not only did he objectively not do a very good job - some of the fault for the candle incident did lie with him - but he'd never had a child so enthusiastic about being treated by him. Usually, they wanted to get away as soon as possible.
"He was nice," Will continued, "He read some of my favourite book to me."
"Is that so?" Louis' mother turned to him with a slight, teasing smile on her face, "Is it that book?" She asked, noticing the utopia novel balanced on the arm of Louis' chair.
"Yeah! It's the book my dad wrote!"
"That's your favourite book too, isn't it, Louis?" His mother said, her smile widening.
"No," Louis replied, a little too quickly, "I've read it, of course, but I'd hardly call it my favourite. It doesn't stand out to me, really." He was trying to make it sound like the book was beneath him, but this performance was not one that would fool his mother.
"Really? But you read it all the time, don't you? Sometimes I wonder if you don't have the whole thing memorised by now."
Will's eyes went wide with surprise, then sparkled with excitement. "It's your favourite too!?" He exclaimed, jumping up from his seat, unable to contain himself.
"I just said it wasn't!" Louis insisted, but his face had gone red, and he knew now he was fooling no-one, not even the child prince, who giggled at Louis' embarrassment.
"Enough!" Louis huffed, "Shouldn't you be taking him home now?"
"Yes, of course," His mother said, suppressing a laugh, "Let's get you home, Will."
Over the course of the next month or so, Will kept coming back, having new injuries. Scrapes, cuts, bruises - he came in with them all. Always mild enough to not need too much treatment, but bad enough that he needed to have a healer check on them. The boy was reckless, seemingly had no regard for his own wellbeing, and every single time he came in, Louis was the one that had to take care of him. His mother clearly thought Will was easy practice, always coming in with mild injuries, and he'd taken a liking to Louis, meaning he didn't seem to mind his appalling bedside manner. In all honesty, Louis was beginning to suspect that Will was injuring himself on purpose so that he would have to take care of him - but he was so accident prone that Louis couldn't tell for sure.
"My Mama says you can do healing magic," Will said, as Louis cleaned his latest wound - a cut on his cheek that was a little too deep to be taken care of at home.
"That's right," Louis said, trying to maintain focus.
"You've never used any for me."
"Stop talking. I can't take care of this properly if your cheek keeps moving." Louis was in no mood to accommodate Will's endless curiosity.
Will opened his mouth to say something, but before he could get any words out, Louis put a finger to his lips to quiet him.
"Shh."
The silence lasted until the bandage was affixed to Will's face.
"I bet you can't even do healing magic," he said, folding his arms.
"Of course I can."
"Then why have I never seen you do any?"
"Because we only use it when necessary. If we healed every little thing with magic, not only would we exhaust ourselves, but people would become overly dependent on it. They would think themselves invincible, if every time they got hurt it could be gone in a moment. And when people think that they are invincible, they get reckless, do things that no sane person would, with the expectation that if anything went wrong, we could fix them with a snap of a finger. But we can't heal everything. We can't heal death."
Will was quiet for a moment, almost sombre, and looked down at his feet. But then he raised his head, that mischievous smile he was so rarely seen without back on his face.
"Prove it then," he said, clearly either not having either heard or cared about Louis' warning.
"No," Louis said sharply, then leaned forwards, his face dark, "And if you continue insisting, then perhaps I will have to break your leg and make you heal it naturally, so that you can learn for yourself - you are not invincible."
Eyes widening, Will stared at Louis, utterly silent. Then his lip began to quiver, his breath hitched, and Louis sensed he'd made a mistake.
"Wait-" he started, but it was too late - Will began to cry. He'd always seemed to be a tough kid, had never flinched at anything that scared other children when he had to take care of them - it seemed to entertain him, if anything. Louis had almost forgotten how he usually came across to them, and now he'd pushed too far. This needed to be fixed - now. Before his mother got home. She would have his head if she found out what he'd done.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean it," Louis said quickly, flailing his arms around as he reached to pat Will on the back in an attempt to soothe him, only to second guess himself, wondering if it would be best not to touch him at all. He'd never been good with children, especially not when they cried. The noise was like a hammer to his skull, making it near impossible to think straight. How did people calm them? He hadn't a clue. Squashing the rising panic was becoming more difficult by the second, and Will's sobs were only getting louder.
Beneath it all, Louis heard the one thing he did not at all want to hear.
A key in the door.
His mother was home.
"Will, please!" Louis implored, getting desperate, but it was to no avail. If anything, he started crying harder.
"Louis? What's going on?" His mother asked as she entered, quickly walking over and crouching on the floor by Will's chair.
"I don't know how to get him to stop," Louis said, unable to conceal the stress in his voice. A sense of impending doom came over him.
Gently, his mother shushed Will, reassuring him in that sweet, soft, voice Louis could never replicate, telling him he would be alright, to just breathe, and slowly, the crying grew quiet, reduced to shaky, hiccupy breaths.
"Louis, why don't you get a box of tissues?" She asked, with a delicateness that Louis knew he would not be getting again for a long while. She didn't know it was his fault yet. What would she say when she did?
Nodding, Louis scampered off to find tissues, all too happy to escape the blast radius of the time bomb he'd set for at least a few moments.
"What happened, sweetheart?" She was asking Will as Louis returned. Staring intently at the floor, he placed the box of tissues on the table, and his mother took one to wipe Will's face.
"Louis said..." Will struggled to get the words out between breaths, "Louis said he would break my leg." He nearly burst back into sobs again, but managed to stop himself.
"Louis!" His mother whirled around, fixing him with a look of fury unlike any he'd ever seen her give, and his stomach dropped. He'd known he was in for the lecture of a lifetime, but he had never seen his mother look so livid. "Is this true?"
"...Yes." Lies and excuses would serve him no purpose, except to anger his mother further.
"Look at me," she commanded, and Louis slowly lifted his head, meeting her eyes, heart pounding as though it would burst out of his chest. "You thought it was appropriate to tell this boy you would break his leg?"
"He was pestering me about using healing magic on him, which I, of course, refused because you and father are strict about it. I tried telling him about how people need to experience being injured or they'll get overly dependent on us - I only meant it as an example of that. I didn't mean to upset him." Louis said exasperatedly, but his explanation was doing him no favours. His mother only shook her head in disappointment.
"I thought I'd raised you better than this, Louis Charadrius. In fact, I know I did." She took a deep breath, calming herself. "Apologise. At once."
"I'm sorry, Will." Louis said, looking the tearful prince in the eye. He wasn't sure he really was sorry, but refusing to apologise was not an option.
"Right. I'm going to walk Will home, so that I'll have a chance to calm down before I do something I regret. As soon as I get back, we're going to have a chat. Wait for me in the living room."
"Yes, Mother," Louis said, then disappeared into the other room, desperate to escape her withering gaze.
Waiting for his mother to return was agonising. Scenarios spun through his head, though he tried to ignore them. What had happened could not be changed, and the consequences would be what they would be. It was out of his hands now. No use worrying about what was beyond his control.
Thankfully, the small size of the Eldan Sanctum meant that it did not take too long for his mother to get home. When she did, the blazing fury in her eyes had faded to a cold, contained anger. Louis wasn't sure if that was better or worse.
"What happened, Louis?" She asked, perching on the arm of the sofa, while he sat at the opposite end.
"I already told you," he said, folding his arms.
"Really? That's all? I find that difficult to believe. Come on, tell me what this is really about."
Louis said nothing, looking away and biting the inside of his lip. He supposed she was right. It was about more than just tonight. But he couldn't bring himself to admit the truth. To disappoint her.
"I know you know better than to tell an eight year old you'll break his leg. There has to be something more to this."
"And what if there isn't?" Louis asked, still refusing to meet her gaze.
She laughed, though there was no joy in it. "Do you think I know so little about my own son?"
"Yes," Louis thought, but did not say.
"I can tell when something is bothering you. But I can't help you if you refuse to talk to me, and with how you acted tonight is any indication, you need that help. You can't be behaving like this. You know that." A tinge of desperation began to creep into her voice, and Louis broke. Fine. If she wanted the truth so badly, she could have it.
"What's bothering me," Louis said, trying to keep his words calm and measured, "To be quite frank, is everything. This house. This role you keep trying to push me into. This entire village. I have grown to loathe it all. I want nothing more than to be able to leave, to travel where I please without the shackles of this so-called family." Though he tried to keep himself composed, his voice began to rise, his hands began to shake, and as the energy of all the suppressed frustration began to erupt out of him like a volcano, he couldn't help but leap to his feet and start pacing the room.
"I am sick of this place, the same faces, the same buildings, day in, day out - every single day just feels like a loop of the last. I can't do this for the rest of my life! I try to tell you this, I try to get you to understand that I'm not cut out for this, any of this, not this place, nor this work, but you just don't get it!" Tears began to prick at the corners of Louis' eyes, and he tried to blink them away. He didn't think he cared this much, didn't think he'd get so emotional. And yet, here he was.
"I keep trying to tell you that I am not, and nor will I ever be, a healer. I'm not like you and father - I can't sympathise with people the way you do, comfort them like you do. I am not selfless the way you two are, and every time I try and communicate this to you, you brush me off and tell me I’ll grow into it, when all I've grown is more frustrated and angry that I cannot do what I want, or be seen for the person I am, but I never push because you and father are the only people I actually care about and I don't want to upset you!"
By the time Louis was done yelling, his voice had gone high pitched and squeaky, and despite his best efforts, tears were leaking from his eyes.
"Oh, Louis," his mother said, and approached him for a hug, but he batted her away, and she shrank back.
"Don't touch me!" Louis felt as though his throat was closing up. Hardly able to breathe, he looked into his mother's eyes, and saw that there were tears in hers, too. But he was in no mood to comfort her, and he pushed past.
"I'm going to bed. I'll see you in the morning."