A handful of minutes later, Jori determined that Dr. Everrest had somehow managed to take all the clinic’s Issi accelerants with her to treat the force practitioner. “Sorry about that. I probably should have given you the painkiller the moment I found it, huh?”

“It doesn’t hurt that badly.” Elach said as he accepted the silver vial. He uncorked it and sniffed at it, an extremely bitter medicinal smell assaulting his nostrils.“Do I drink all of this in one go?”

“If you don’t want to feel any pain for about a week, then yes.” Jori laughed. “No, take it in little sips whenever the pain starts to get intrusive. And make sure your Issi doesn’t attack it, or else it won’t be killing your pain any time soon.”

“Alright. Do I have to do anything special to fix my shoulder?” Elach asked.

“No, nothing special. That’s the problem with treating practitioners; unless something’s gone so horribly wrong that your body can’t fix itself, it’s way safer to let your Issi do all the repairs. It might take longer, depending on the person’s Issi, but the risk of your body rejecting its own Issi is next to none.” Jori explained. “That’s why you had to put those seeds in your gums to regrow your teeth; your body wouldn’t do that on its own. But repairing a fractured shoulder? Your body knows how to do that.”

The painkiller tasted like nothing, which was a step up from what Elach was expecting. He shivered as he felt the Issi working its way into his stomach, spreading into his bloodstream and numbing as it went. “This stuff works fast.”

“That it does.” Jori said with a nod, then frowned. “Wait. How did your teeth already grow back?”

“I don’t really know.” Elach admitted. “I’m going to go see if Shar and the doctor need any help.”

Help was the last thing the doctor needed, and space was the first. She sent Elach back to his hotel room after a question about his teeth, to which Elach just shrugged, and Shar tagged along as she was no longer needed as life support. She expressed a desire to meet the manifestations Elach was travelling with, stating that she’d closed down the library for the night after the incident. She lamented the fact that she’d had to attack the agony practitioner, sighing in resignation at the fact that her contract would most likely be null and void since she harmed someone from the Gilded Night. Elach pointed out that the practitioner most likely wasn’t a local, but Shar just shook her head sadly. If they’d been a true local, she would have been instantly ejected from the pillar and sent directly to a court hearing. Otherwise, the Gilded Night would send a representative to review the case.

Elach held his tongue in pointing out that he was technically one of Hoalt’s representatives. He didn’t want to get Shar’s hopes up just to send them crashing down when someone else showed up.

“I’m opening the door.” Elach said as he knocked on the door to his rented room. “I have someone with me, so don’t do anything too weird until she leaves.”

The door creaked open to reveal a perfectly clean room, with Y’talla and Flow sitting innocently on the bed. The spine was still laid out on the floor, just where he’d left it, but none of the beast parts they’d been dealing with were there.

“Hey, Elach.” Y’talla said with a wave. Flow piped up with a question, and Y’talla voiced it for Shar. “Where’d you find another wisp manifestation? Flow wants to know. I want to know too.”

Shar stared down at the spine with a blank expression. “How did you get that?”

“Elach killed a monster made from all that straware and that popped out of it.” Y’talla explained before Elach could get a word out. “Killed it all by himself, since Flow and I were hypnotized by it.”

“One of Lavassil’s tricks.” Shar muttered, bending down to put a hand on the spine. “But… corrupted. How interesting.” She looked at Elach, then down at the spine again. “Do you have space in your container for another focus?”

“Well, yeah.” Elach rubbed his shoulder. “I was kind of thinking that it would make a pretty powerful focus, but I didn’t want to be selfish about this. If it would help Y’talla or Flow more, one of them should get it.”

“It wouldn’t do anything for them. What I can sense of their Issi has nothing in common with this construct, so they wouldn’t gain anything from consuming or studying it. But as a focus, I can’t even begin to wonder what it would do for you. Your Issi touched this in some way, almost as if the spine is trying to devour your Issi while your Issi tries to corrupt the spine. A stalemate of power.” Shar brushed off her knees as she stood. “It will take a long, long time for your Issi to integrate with the spine. You’ll have to fight for every inch of progress, but if you can overcome that, you’ll have an extremely powerful construct as a focus.”

“It’s useless for us, in case you were wondering.” Y’talla interjected. “We played around with it for a while, but neither of us got any good feelings from it, and I have pretty much the same Issi as you do. So it’s gotta be something about you, not our Issi.”

“If nobody has any complaints…” Elach trailed off, spreading his arms as he waited for any complaints. None came. “Alright, the spine’s becoming a focus.”

He leaned down and pressed his hand to the spine, focusing his Issi on it and transferring it to his headspace. It took a few seconds, chains wrapping around it in the same way he’d taken in Y’talla the day before, and then it was gone. Shar gaped at him as if he’d suddenly grown two heads, stunned into silence. He raised an eyebrow.

“Why’re you looking at me like that?”

“You just… how…” Shar struggled for words, gesturing sharply at the space where the spine had been and at Elach inturn. “That’s not supposed to take a few seconds. It’s a long process to get something into your headspace to make it into a focus. Not something you can just… do.”

“Nobody ever told me that.” Elach shot Y’talla a questioning look. “Did you know that?”

“I don’t have to make focuses. Foci. Whichever of those two is right.” Y’talla answered. “Us manifestations can just make our bodies do what we want. Apparently. All I can do is push my Issi out, and that’s it.”

“You… how…” Shar laughed incredulously. “You don’t know how to use your Issi at all?”

Flow chimed in that they didn’t know anything either.

“How is that even possible?! You know what, no. That’s not right. You two feel like you haven’t been manifested for that long at all, so I’m not going to be a jerk. Would you two like me to help you get used to your Issi? You’re stuck here until Elach clears the twentieth zone, and I can at least get you to a point that you might be able to help him.” Shar offered.

“Really? Thank you!” Y’talla said instantly, bouncing off the bed and scampering over to hug Shar. “Elach’s still new to all of this, too, so he doesn’t know how to help us. And I’m not that great at doing what I know I need to do, even though I know it should be easy. Oh, and Flow’s not used to their form at all. They used to look really different, and their Issi doesn’t flow the same in their new body.”

“Is that why you can’t talk?” Shar asked. Flow nodded, solving a question Elach hadn’t even thought of yet. “Interesting. Your form should be what comes naturally to you, but if it doesn’t feel right to you, you might need to force some changes. Come with me to my room; it’s much bigger, so I’ll have enough space to actually get started on training you two.”

“You three go on ahead, I have to empty out our chest.” Elach said as Y’talla beelined for the door. Flow flapped over to Shar, landing on her shoulder and gripping on with their talons. Shar winced as they touched her, but looked at Flow in surprise when it didn’t hurt at all. “What room number are you, Shar?”

“R-031. The R stands for resident.” Shar cracked the door, leading Y’talla out. “Tell whoever’s at the desk that you’re visiting Shar.”

“Will do.” Elach said, bending down and unlatching the chest. He rummaged through the few possessions he’d stashed, noting that their supply of straware had diminished. Either Y’talla made her laurel, or Flow ate some of it. Maybe both. Two minutes later Elach had gathered everything into his pack and stored it so nothing would get damaged in transit. He stuck his head out into the hallway, stretched his arms before wincing as his injured arm wouldn’t go above his shoulder, and chained himself to the stairwell.

Maybe it was time for a little rest.