There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,

Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

- Hamlet (Act I, Scene 5, Lines 168-169, Hamlet to Horatio)

“I know you went to school, but we didn’t make you take some of the civilitate lectures, since you didn’t have an interest. We need to remedy that oversight.” Dad spoke quietly, making me lean in to hear.

“Our home state of Blawenwold is a part of the Federation of Sovereign States, which you should remember. What you clearly didn’t hear or learn, is that the FSS is among the last polity that still bothers with magical training for all citizens, and supports continuing research into magic. As such, we’re probably the last place in the world where just about everyone can do magic, or psionics, or whatever it is we do. Based on the best information I have, the rest of the world has pretty much completely abandoned magic or outright moved on to focus on the physical sciences. But, it’s possible that there might be some completely private organizations doing work in this area outside the FSS. There’s been some moves by member states here to follow that course as well. But if you’ve managed to discover something as useful as actual healing, well the consequences are far beyond what we can imagine. I mean imagine how that impacts population health, longevity, injury recovery, food consumption, there’s a huge list in my head, and I don’t think I’ve gotten it all.”

He paused for thought.

“I’d say it all comes to two questions, Grint. Can you prove this works and can you teach other people? Everything else follows on from those two, even if we need help to see all the ways this can go, both good and bad. If you are the only one who can do this, then we need to keep this to ourselves. If you aren’t, then we need to spread it as far and wide as we can, so that it can’t be kept quiet.”

I didn’t know what to say to that. It seemed like some old conspiracy movie. If I go public, I need to go loud. Otherwise, I need to hide.

“Well, proving it is simple, you just cut me and I’ll fix it. I have no idea on the rest. I haven’t tried to teach anyone, I only figured this stuff out since I got home. I don’t think I’m unique, but it’s possible that this only works for me. Or maybe for a small group of people? I think magic is considered useless because of the nature of the way our power actually works isn’t in line with the legends, and nobody questioned those legends, we just tried to match them.”

I forced myself to stop talking. I’d love to expound on all my theories and questions, but ultimately dad was right, those were all irrelevant details if this wasn’t something I could teach.

“We should start with proof. How do you want to do this, dad?” I knew my mom wasn’t in for the cutting part, she doesn’t like to see blood if she can avoid it.

“Probably in the garden, no sense making a mess in the house.”

“That’s a good call.”

My dad led the way to the garden, grabbing one of the sharp paring knives from the wooden block in the kitchen as we went past. I wasn’t looking forward to this, but at least I’d have more than just my own counsel for planning the path ahead.

I held out my hand, my father gripped it firmly, laid the blade on my skin, and looked me in the eye.

“You sure about this, son?”

“If you guys need proof, this is the simplest way. Otherwise, we wait until I lose a fight with the floor again.”

“We believe you believe, son, but this is big enough we need to see it, too.”

“I get thaaaaaaat.” He sliced open my palm in the middle of my response. Blood began to well up and drip onto the grass.

“OK, if you’ll hold tight around my wrist, it will slow the bleeding so you can see better.” I held my hand sideways to let the blood drip off, then began my healing focus. Closing my eyes, I chanted to myself a meditation mantra, “What was whole, be whole again. What was whole, be whole again.”

After the second iteration I could feel the drain start and the itching, crawling, burning sensation of my flesh knitting itself back together.

“What was whole, be whole again.”

By the end of the third it was no longer dripping blood, but looked like a month-old scar.

“What was whole, be whole again.”

Fourth chant complete, my hand had stopped itching, my body was cool, but not chilled to the point of shivering, and the drain had stopped.

“You can let go now.”

Surprisingly, it was my dad that fainted, right after he let go of my wrist, landing in the grass with a thump.

My mom looked at him and my hands, “Clean yourself up, Grint. I’ll check on him.”

I walked over to the pump, rinsed off my hands, got them both wet with cold water, and gently touched them to either side of my dad’s head, which was now resting in mom’s lap.

He came awake fairly quickly.

“Oh, that was odd to watch. Your hand got kinda blurry, and the flesh was writhing as the wound closed.”

“I’ve never watched it, really. I’ve only used it intentionally on that sunburn and the water that blistered my leg at Henrig’s, and then just now. And just now, I closed my eyes so I could concentrate better.”

“Well, kiddo,” my mom said, “I guess next we have to know if you can teach anyone else.”

“Uh. Yes. But maybe we shouldn’t let dad do the cutting, after what happened with mine.”

"It wasn't the blood, son, it was the shock. I've tended your scrapes your whole life. It just was so shocking, watching the hand heal up in front of my eyes."

Honestly, at this point I’m not sure which result will be worse for the future. Sharing the ability will likely bring massive disruption to our lives. Not being able to share the ability will require we keep this ability a secret for the rest of our lives, and that will be extremely difficult, if not downright impossible.