“Food is done. The day is still young. Let’s see what you got.” Elias leaned forward in the kitchen chair, blowing out the candlelight and moving the salt and pepper to the side.

“Not much since you and your mother had your fun.” Sasha couldn’t help it. She bite back the bile. It was time for the confession. “It was a nice touch giving back what you took.”

“Don’t thank me yet. Let me examine what you got from my mother first.”

He stretched out his hand to her, and she reluctantly put hers in his.

“The lines in yours glow, although the magic almost have left you. Amazing”, Elias said and he trailed the grooves in her hand, touching each of her fingers. He closed his eyes, concentrating. “The magic my mother gave you is old, its traces weak. You have to help me.”

Sasha knew what he was doing. She wasn’t raised and surrounded by healers to be left in the dark. What she couldn’t fathom was the strength of the healing power in him. He was too young to hold such power, and the orb had been too dark for him to hold such light.

“I can feel its warmth, it’s in my stomach, but I can’t get it to my fingertips, it doesn’t answer me”, she said and sighed deeply. She felt out of her element.

“Hmm. I see. May I?” Elias asked, and moved the chair closer to hers. His hand lowered towards her belly.

The air crackled. He sat too close, his magic surrounding her as a blanket. She smiled and shook her head.

“What do I gain?” Sasha asked, stopping his hand. Don’t trust him sister Ivy had said, as if.

“The possibility to fulfil the first assignment. If you do it well I will give back more of your magic.” He let her stolen magic flow at his fingertips, so close to her that she could feel her own smell. “If you fail you will be stuck with the magic my mother forced upon you, not ever being able to use your own again.”

“You don’t know that.” He was so sure of himself. Knowing nothing of other healers, he did not even recognise the strength neither in Ivy nor in her. Why should she accept the help he was offering? “No gain, no touching.”

“So, you are a gambler?” Elias asked and he smiled. His eyes shifted in colour, the yellow in them visible. “What do you have to put in the stakes?”

“I play by your rules now, but you owe me a fight, and if I win that one, I will pick a favour”, Sasha said.

“You want to fight me?” Elias looked at her in disbelief. He shook his head. “Call me stupid, but I want to fight you”, he said and laid his hand on her belly, the green in his eyes disappearing completely.

She had agreed, so she collected the magic to a tight ball, letting it heat up her inside. The magic she had gotten from the queen was like a dead leaf, timeless and down to earth. It reminded her of her mother. He stroked her belly smoothly.

“This belongs to Aaliyah. I’ve heard of her, but I have actually never met her. It was taken long before I was born.” Elias said. “It’s singing the songs of longing.”

“Of what is it longing?”

“Of death”, Elias said. “Come, we will have to go to the graveyard.”

They went down in a corner of the graveyard where no one usually where. No flowers and no lights. The small trees were old, and hadn’t been cut for ages. In front of her was a grey stone, a single name was written on it.

“Aaliyah”, Sasha said. “The keeper of men.”

“She was well known. They all pined after her, like drug addicts.”

“And she kept them hanging around?”

“Until death”, Elias said and pointed towards the smaller stones sitting in a circle around hers. “The magic you got belongs to her. You have to give it back.”

“Give it back?”

“Yes Sasha. That is what I want of you. When you learn to give you will have earned it. Not until you have mastered that you will be able to call on your magic.”

“She is fucking dead Elias!” She yelled at him, the sound supressed by the graveyard. “Come on, give me something else.”

Anger was building up inside her. She hated to be weak. This was not a show of magic. It was a trick of the mind, solving puzzles he had constructed. It was, as far as Sasha was concerned, not fair play. He never intended to give her her magic back.

“No. I have made up my mind. I will heal you on my terms.” He took his hands in hers, clamping them hard, and his magic was sealing her fate. “When your fingertips glow I will know. Don’t come to me until then.”

He let her go and turned around.

“Elias!” she called after him.

He stopped, looking at her.

“I will not change my mind”, he stated.

“No”, she agreed, “but you owe me a fucking fight.”