The Aedyran Envoy is a uniquely peculiar sight, and Giatta can’t stop staring.

She tries not to be obvious. A generous favor has been done for her- because of the Envoy, she has the means to pursue her work and her theories, not to mention a place to sleep now that she has been so abruptly banished from her home. To greet that trust with poor manners is hardly her intention.

And yet the book in her lap sits opened and ignored, its pages ruffling in the breeze as Giatta’s attention is fully fixed upon the woman standing by the campfire.

This is the first night the two of them have been left alone together. If this were like previous evenings in camp, the night air would be filled with quiet chatter and friendly bickering to distract Giatta’s wandering thoughts, and the sirens of the unknown would not sing out quite so loudly. On this evening, however, Marius has set off on a hunt, and Kai has disappeared to ponder alone what he found in Tama’s cabin. Now it is only Giatta, and the Envoy.

Helfella, she calls herself during the informal hours spent at camp. Just Helfella. A pretty name, and one which carries an irony that Giatta both recognizes and enjoys.

Clouds above obscure the stars and waning moon, but the flickering campfire and luminescent glow of the towering adra work together well enough to illuminate the Envoy’s- Helfella’s- godlike features. Giatta knows it is impolite to stare; she still can’t help it. Even in a crowd of people, Helfella draws the eye, but out here? Alone and with no distractions?

It’s impossible to look away.

Giatta’s eyes flick to the godlike again and again, as her mind works furiously to catalogue and analyze every detail of her face. The skin that ripples across her face in a declaration of fluorescent pastels; the large fronds that bloom into billowing fans over her eyes; the ridges and caps and rings that continue on, winding around her head, growing as one with her living flesh. Helfella is like the dreamthralls who have been sprouting up all too frequently, yet her mind is her own. She is an amalgamation of familiar flora and fungi that thrive in the soil of these Lands, yet she walks among them as a stranger. She…

She has, finally, noticed Giatta’s staring.

At least, Giatta is fairly certain that’s what’s happened. The fronds fanning out from Helfella’s cheekbones envelop her eyes completely, making it difficult to track where her attention lies. But her head is tilted towards Giatta, and Giatta’s skin is prickling with the intuition of someone being watched.

Those suspicions are confirmed when the woman asks, in her polished-marble accent, “Did you need something?”

She doesn’t sound offended, not really, but Giatta gives her a small, apologetic smile anyway. Just in case. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to stare.”

“Yes, you do,” Helfella replies, simple and matter-of-fact and maybe even a little bit bemused. “But I’m used to stares.”

“The attention gets tiresome, I imagine.”

“Often, yes. But I don’t mind so much, when it’s from someone I like. I just hope it’s for a good reason.”

Her tone is light, cordial. Not flirting, not quite, not yet. Helfella is charming, in her own way, but far too cautious, and Giatta can sense that wariness in her now- that Aedyran moderation, fighting hard against a scholar’s natural curiosity. Perhaps that’s another reason Giatta finds herself so endeared by the godlike- she can tell Helfella is just as interested in her work (in her) in return, despite her efforts not to be.

She has to be. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be working together as they are now. Otherwise, she wouldn’t move to sit down next to Giatta, close enough that their knees brush against each other, and she wouldn’t ask, “You have questions, don’t you?”

Such a short time they’ve had together, and she already knows Giatta so well.

Not that Giatta is particularly difficult to predict, herself. It should be easy for anyone to see that yes, she’s bursting with questions, and all it takes is the barest hint at an invitation for her to lean forward and let them spill all too eagerly from her lips.

“Your sight- how does it work? Forgive me for starting with the obvious, but…you can see, can’t you? That would imply the presence of eyes, but I don’t understand how they receive information. And these growths- have they changed over time? Are they affected by weather? Do they have any sensory receptors? Are they poisonous?”

She has more, but Helfella holds up a hand and Giatta pauses. She waits, in anticipatory limbo, as Helfella considers her questions and then carefully delivers her answers. “Okay. In order: The specifics, as I know them, are complicated. I see best when it’s dim, in the twilight hours or in low lamplight; harsh lighting makes things more difficult. I get migraines. The worst of them will leave me functionally blind, sometimes for hours.

“Nobody really knows what I have for eyes, as adequately answering that question would require dissection, and I’d rather that be conducted post-mortum. The growths have grown in size over time but their overall presence relative to the rest of my body has remained consistent. Weather appears irrelevant to their growth or health, aside from the aforementioned effects of light. They do have feeling, but it’s more akin to the sensitivity of cartilage than that of skin.” A smile tugs at the edge of Helfella’s mouth, and she chuckles as she finishes, “And I wish they were poisonous- maybe then, the bears here would stop trying to take a bite out of me.”

Giatta smiles. Some part of her itches to fetch her journals, so that she may take notes for later…but she also doesn’t want to move from this spot, with the heat of the campfire on one side and the faint warmth of Helfella’s body sitting so close on the other. “Fascinating. Let’s start from the beginning- how complicated are we talking?”

“How much can you keep up with?”

“Just try me.”

The challenge brings a smile to Helfella’s face, and she complies. She starts small, telling Giatta about the mechanics, the biology, the botany, keeping most of it basic at first. Gradually, her explanations turn long and winding, prodded on by Giatta’s questions; she describes things like optic reception and the intake of light by her fronds, of rewired nerves and connections winding through her body and her brain. Giatta’s questions seem to put her at ease, as she realizes that this Fioran can keep up perfectly well with any Aedyran scholar- better, Giatta would claim, and soon enough Helfella doesn’t dare dispute her.

Time is lost as their conversation deepens. Eventually, Helfella even ventures into the slightly more philosophical idea that nobody is quite certain whether what she does is really seeing, but she has nothing to compare it to, and in the end it serves her well enough. Still, she seems almost embarrassed by this fact, for reasons Giatta can’t begin to fathom.

Because she is, as Giatta stated before, fascinating. Her body, her mind, all of it.

And her soul must be even moreso.

“You know your stuff,” Giatta admits when her first slew of questions has been satisfied, and Helfella releases a breathy laugh.

“I should hope so. It’s my body.” She reaches up to fidget thoughtfully at the wavy ridges which ripple over her face. “That’s how I got started with my own studies, in fact. I spent my childhood under the watch of healers and scholars, all trying to figure me out. I wanted to know what they knew. I wanted to figure myself out.”

“An admirable desire,” Giatta murmurs. She hovers on the edge of her next question; she already suspects the answer. But she’s come this far already, so she ventures forth. “Have you ever delved into your soul for answers?”

“You’re…speaking of animancy?”

“I am.”

For the first time, Helfella falters before delivering an answer. Her shoulders stiffen ever so slightly, and when she does speak her words are formal and rehearsed. “I’ve looked into the theory. Anyone would. But I’m well aware that anything further would be ill-advised, and I would never do anything so foolishly dangerous while under the fercönyng’s employ.”

It’s all the usual prattle Giatta has come to expect from Aedyrans. A few days ago, she might have even thought the words were sincere. But Giatta doesn’t believe the woman who just spent an hour talking through the finer points of scientific discoveries has never toed the lines of the acceptable, so she leans forward and drops her voice to a conspiratorial whisper.

“You do realize this emperor of yours isn’t around to hear you right now?”

Helfella’s mouth twitches. Emotions aren’t easy to read on her mushroom-enshrined face, but Giatta senses some kind of internal argument playing out in her mind, until at last she leans in close and admits, “I have had a…curiosity, towards animancy. When I was a young student at university, I thought I could- I still don’t know, exactly. I didn’t have any of the equipment to conduct experiments myself. Bragganhyl has been rather strict about those things ever since some students got themselves into a mess over it, but the point is, I did study the subject. I even…I even got into contact with a researcher who specialized in utilizing animancy to influence godlike souls.

Giatta gives a playful, delighted gasp. “Oh, how scandalous.”

“Tease me if you must, but it was. His name was Giacolo, and he was controversial even outside of Aedyr. But his work with godlikes-”

“-was phenomenal,” Giatta finishes, her jests forgotten as she realizes whom Helfella is speaking of. “He pioneered the study of chimes! You collaborated with him?”

“I wouldn’t go that far, but we shared ideas,” Helfella says, sounding proud in spite of herself. “We never managed to meet in person, of course. He wouldn’t have been allowed in Aedyr even if he desired it.”

“Still, it’s no so small feat to catch his attention. Especially while amidst your prickly countrymen.” Giatta rests her chin in her hands and grants Helfella an inviting smile. “It’s promising, to know you’re so much more daring than your comrades.”

“To an extent,” Helfella clarifies, though she still seems to enjoy the praise.

“I promise, it’s not as frightening as your Empire makes it sound. In fact, I’d be happy to tinker with your soul, should you ever find yourself in the mood.”

Giatta means it as a jest, mostly, though it is a genuine offer. She just doesn’t predict that Helfella will take her seriously. She realizes her miscalculation immediately, made evident in the immediate, instinctual flinch in Helfella as she shifts herself farther away.

Damn. Giatta has always known, intellectually, the people beyond her small sphere in Fior have narrowed their minds when it comes to things like animancy. Yet it still surprises her to see that truth in action, especially in a mind so sharp as Helfella’s.

“Is that a no, then?” she asks, and despite her efforts to salvage the lighthearted mood, the disappointment in her voice proves impossible to hide.

“It’s nothing personal,” Helfella says, but that stiff tone has returned to her voice, and she doesn’t move to recover the distance she’s put between them. “I’m simply no longer interested in such things. I can’t be. I shouldn’t even be working with you, honestly, but given the extenuating circumstances, that much can be pardoned. Anything more…you have to understand, there are rules.”

“Rules are made to be broken!” Giatta insists, as earnest as she’s ever been.

But in this, Helfella will not be moved. “Not in Aedyr. Certainly not for me. Following rules is what’s kept me safe all these years.” She turns her head away from Giatta and lifts her face towards the stars above. “It’s about walking the line, saying the right words and doing the right things- and if you do all that, you stay out of prison, and you manage to salvage your reputation and your career, and you even earn the favor of the crown. But even then, people don’t stop watching you. Some people can get away with pushing boundaries, but for those of us who are already anomalies…it’s smarter not to fight against the current.”

Having made her speech, she sighs, and turns her face to Giatta. Whatever expression she wears remains largely hidden, but there seems to be something sad in the resigned smile on her face. “I’ve always been smarter than I am brave.”

Giatta shakes her  head. “I don’t know about that. You’re here, aren’t you?”

Helfella merely tilts her head in something between a nod and a shrug, her expression still inscrutable. Giatta studies her carefully, desperate to know what’s running through that mind of hers. She finds herself wanting to give this strange woman some form of comfort; she finds herself wanting to unravel her like one of the metaphysical mysteries she has built her work around. Giatta’s churning thoughts are interrupted when Helfella suddenly holds her hand out, palm up, as if in offering.

“I can’t offer up my soul. But…would you like to feel?”

Giatta likes to think herself as a difficult woman to surprise, but at that, her eyebrows shoot up. “Feel?”

“Feel me,” Helfella clarifies. “People think it’s impolite to ask, but I know they wonder what it all feels like. You’ve wondered, haven’t you?”

For a rare moment, Giatta is speechless. Then she laughs. “You’ll let me inspect your body, but not your soul?”

“Is that so strange?”

“It is,” Giatta says, and she moves closer. “But you won’t catch me complaining.”

She puts her hand in Helfella’s, and she allows the godlike to guide her fingers up to her face, where mushroom caps make frills and ripples and ridges of her skin. The fronds over her eyes are the most noticeable of her features, rising up past her brows in brilliant, scalloped pastels. This close, however, Giatta finds new details that had previously escaped her notice. Sprinkled amidst Helfella’s formations are freckles and moles, these perfectly ordinary marks made notable by their placement amongst godlike elements. Giatta’s fingers press lightly against the odd flesh, soft and inquisitive, testing the give of Helfella’s spongy fungal skin, following the path of her freckles.

“Magnificent,” Giatta mutters under her breath. “Is it sensitive?”

“No more than typical cartilage. ” Helfella’s voice is quiet, as if she’s afraid to breathe too deeply with Giatta’s touch against her skin. Giatta’s thumb sweeps along her cheekbone, and the fronds over her eyes flutter ever so slightly. “Strange, I know.”

“Strange, indeed,” Giatta agrees, because it is true- and yet, the longer she looks, the more the effect of Helfella’s appearance is allowed to settle into something eccentric and oddly beautiful on her face. “Strange and fascinating. You are intriguing, Envoy. You even returned from the dead, or so people say.”

“I did.” Giatta could swear Helfella’s skin grows warmer beneath her fingers, right before she adds, “Would you like to see?”

“Really?” Giatta can’t hide her enthusiasm. “You know, you may come to regret indulging me so much.”

“I’ll take the risk- especially for the sake of our resident healer satisfying her professional curiosity. You never know what useful things you might learn, isn’t that right?” For all her rationality and justifications, the grin on her face looks so genuine that Giatta can’t help but chuckle.

“That’s exactly right.”

Helfella needs no further encouragement; she takes Giatta’s hand and pulls her gently away from the fire, back toward their row of stick-and-blanket tents. There’s still no sign of Kai or Marius, and the tent doesn’t fully close, anyway- yet as Helfella settles down on a blanket there is a new and undeniable sense of privacy, of intimacy, which settles over the two women.

Despite the darkness, Helfella works quickly. She’s still wearing the fur-lined bracers she’d uncovered from an old hunter’s hideaway earlier that day, but it only takes moments to loosen them from her wrists and set them aside. Next comes her neatly trimmed vest, unlaced and shrugged off her shoulders, falling to the ground below without a second glance and soon followed by her dark purple undershirt.

And then it is just Helfella, in her trousers and her breastband, her skin bare and exposed for Giatta to inspect.

Giatta, for her part, does not miss a beat. She moves in close and presses her searching touch against Helfella’s abdomen, grazing her fingers over soft skin and raised ridges. Helfella’s growths are smaller here, and less concentrated than on her face and scalp, but her skin is still mottled and colored in a curious rainbow of freckles and moles that hover somewhere in the space between flesh and fungal.

“It was an arrow, yes?” Giatta asks, and Helfella nods.

“A poisoned arrow. Here.” She takes Giatta’s hand and guides her to the spot, her stomach softly falling and rising with her quick breaths. There is no scar to be seen, no remaining wound to be detected at all; just a tiny forest of lichen, spiraling around the point where Helfella presses Giatta’s fingers against her skin.

“Does it hurt?” Giatta asks softly.

“No. I don’t even remember it much.”

She’s lying, Giatta suspects, but she doesn’t call her on it. It seems kinder to let the moment pass, and so she does, and focuses instead on the way Helfella shivers as she moves her fingers up the godlike’s stomach.

“Ticklish?” she asks, and Helfella laughs even as she shakes her head, and she doesn’t protest as Giatta moves in closer.

Moves her hands slowly upwards.

Moves to position herself between Helfella’s legs, and the two of them curl around each other on the blanket.

“I’m glad for the chance of such a personal exploration, by the way,” Giatta murmurs, “if you don’t mind me saying.”

“I don’t mind at all- like I said, I’m used to being poked and prodded.” She smirks, just as a little, as if to let Giatta know she’s joking, but Giatta won’t let that one go.

“So this is a typical day for you, then? Should I be jealous?”

That makes Helfella laugh, soft and wondrous. “Oh, no. No, you’re…different.”

The statement makes Giatta smile. She lifts her hand to Helfella’s face, this time cradling her cheek, and she realizes in that moment just how much she wants to kiss this woman.

Giatta has never been shy about pursuing what she wants.

She’s certain that Helfella wants it, too, yet as she moves in close, Helfella moves away- just slightly, but enough to make Giatta halt her advance, her nose just barely brushing against Helfella’s. The smile is gone from the godlike’s face now, and she turns her head away from Giatta.

“I’m sorry,” Helfella says, her voice barely a whisper, and Giatta pulls back farther, shaking her head.

“No, I’m sorry-”

“No, it’s not- I want- I just can’t. I shouldn’t.”

“Of course.” Giatta puts in the effort to keep her tone light and friendly; there’s no real reason to be offended, not over someone she’s known such a short time. “There’s nothing to worry about. I mean it.”

“I’m sorry,” Helfella repeats, anyway. “It’s just- when I’m around you, it’s a little too easy to forget who I am, and why I’m here. You’re dangerous, you know.”

Giatta raises an eyebrow. “Because I’m a terrifying animancer?”

Helfella shakes her head, her voice rueful. “Because I’ve only known you for three days, and you’re already the most interesting person I’ve ever met.”

“Me?” In spite of everything, Giatta must admit the flattery goes straight to her head.

“You,” Helfella agrees simply. “Because…you’re not wrong. Because I do trust you. I just can’t afford to be tempted right now.”

Some part of Giatta wants to push back against that, but another, wiser part knows now is not the time. Still, she eyes Helfella speculatively, and in light of the reassurance that the Envoy is not uninterested, she allows herself a certain amount of coy confidence. “Someday, then. I’ve been told I can be quite persistent.”

Helfella lets out a surprised laugh. “Is that a threat?”

“You’re a smart one,” Giatta says sweetly. “I’ll let you figure it out for yourself.”

She leaves Helfella there in her tent, the godlike still smiling in clear spite of herself. The thought does occur to Giatta that she herself hasn’t the faintest idea what she’s getting into with this person- this Aedyran who clings to such strange rules, this woman who already has such a hold on Giatta’s attentions.

But for all her faults, Giatta has never feared the unknown; rather, she delights in the prospect of discovery, whatever form it may take. This just another pursuit, another path on which she is tugged along by her insatiable curiosity, and she’s looking forward to finding out where it leads.