An Owl's Rise

She wanted to both close herself off again as she had been before and reach out to make new connections.

'There is nothing I can do this time. Melisandre will know what to do and then I can just get over this fever.' Evelyn thought as the hallways flew by her vision.

Soon enough Katrina had brought Evelyn to Melisandre's room and frantically knocked on the door.

"I am busy brewing right now. Come back in twenty minutes and I should be done." They heard Melisandre say from the other side of the door.

"Lady Melisandre it is an emergency! Evelyn is sick and healing potions do not have any effect!" Katrina called out.

Only a couple seconds afterwards the door was pulled open and Melisandre in her haste actually ripped it off its henges.

Without a glance at Katrina, she looked down at Evelyn and closely examined her.

"She does not have any of the signs of magic degradation fever at least." Melisandre said with a relived sigh. "Bring her inside and give me a few minutes to prepare a place for her to rest. I have a couple of ideas of what might be wrong, but I will need to examine her to be sure."

While Evelyn waited Katrina held her in her arms and she could hear things being tossed around further back in Melisandre's brewing room.

"Follow me. I have prepared a place to set her down."

Nodding her head, Katrina followed behind Melisandre and went over to her lab.

There one of the tables that was normally fully covered in items had been cleared away and a long cushion had been placed on it.

Carefully, Katrina put Evelyn down and Melisandre dismissed her.

"If I need either your help or Anneli's I will contact you. For now, go about the rest of your day as normal."

"Understood." Katrina said.

She then moved to leave, but before she left, she gave Evelyn one last concerned glance.

"Melisandre, it really is not a big deal as Katrina made it out to be. I am just feeling a bit warm and lightheaded. I am sure I will be fine in a little while." Evelyn said, trying to brush off the situation.

"Don't make light of this. It is very rare for a beast at the awakened rank to get sick. The magical energy within you protects you from most diseases, and the few that could affect you would likely fail due to the heavenly flame. I imagine that no disease could take its heat. No. what is wrong with you must have something to do with your magical energy."

After saying this she quickly examined Evelyn by sending a bit of her magical energy inside her. Which Evelyn honestly felt was sickening and felt worse than whatever was wrong with her.

"It is as I thought. Your magical energy is in disorder. Luckily it does not seem to be from any external stimuli or even from the two items that have latched themselves onto your body and soul. I have only ever heard of this happening and never seen it before, but you must be incredibly unsure and torn about something incredibly important that you define yourself by. Your magical energy has gone out of control because you are stuck between choosing two wholly different paths. Your emotions have great impact on your magical energy and yours are in turmoil."

Hearing all of this Evelyn thought it made sense to a degree but could not completely wrap her head around it.

She had experienced great emotional distress before. Like when her new family was killed and when she found out Mason had already left this world before her.

Yet neither of those times did she end up getting sick.

But when Evelyn brought this up to Melisandre, she clarified why.

"It is not just that you are experiencing strong emotions. It is because they are at odds with each other. I am not sure what you are so conflicted about. But until you resolve it your magical energy is only going to become more unstable until you lose all control, and your body is ravaged from the inside. Now I can prepare something to help sooth you and take the edge off, but ultimately you will have to work out the problems that have brought you to this state yourself. Of course, if you wish to confide in me, I can offer you advice as well."

Melisandre waited for a few moments looking at Evelyn with a caring expression, that for some reason made her hurt even more.

"No, I think I can figure it out on my own." Evelyn said obstinately.

Frowning, Melisandre had been hoping she would tell her what was causing her such emotional turmoil but forcing her would likely only make the situation worse.

"Very well. I will gather a few things that may help you focus your mind. While I do, try to understand what is dragging you in two different directions."

Quickly Melisandre left the room and allowed Evelyn to be alone. She had told her what she knew about Evelyn's condition and could only pray that she could deal with the chaos that had formed in her heart and mind.

Thankfully Melisandre's words let Evelyn understand where the root of the problem was coming from.

She was disoriented from trying to decide whether to truly get close to others again, or simply use them as she needed in order to not feel pain should she ever lose them as she had multiple times in the past.

Except while she logically understood the problem, actually getting her emotions under control was a far harder task than she realized.