"Yeah, they do. I don't recognize the fish, but... I have been meaning to ask. Does natural non-treated water is safe around here? It doesn't melt you."

"...No, it doesn't dissolve you. All your water is dangerous like the pools you mentioned?" He isn't getting too descriptive of the other properties of those pools due to the listening ears. "Most of our water is air drawn. It's safer that way - no chance of poison, and it doesn't take much mana. It's pure." 

"All water, even water from the air if you're not using the right power can be dangerous. I can't even beging to especulate how much this must impact your world on top of your mortality problem."

"Well, unless its a property of your people rather than the water, ours should be safe." 

There's a cold water barrel, and also hot water in a rune-etched barrel. Jaim depresses the spout handle on the hot water barrel and fills his cup. He pulls a tin from a pouch and measures out a pinch of leaves, which he puts in his infuser and drops in the water. 

"Tea?" He offers. 

"Yes." He accepts. But first he tests the waters. With a drop on his little finger. It's safe.

He nods, sets another pinch of tea leaves inside one of the infusers next to the hot water barrel, and fills a cup for him. 

They find Ilek, and eat their meals. A soldier comes to find them as they are finishing, informing them that a room has been prepared for Zephyrinus. 

"I would still like more explanations if that isn't a problem."

"Accepting won't indebt you to the Commander - right now you're here as part of my party, not as an individual guest of the base." He glances up at the soldier who nods, understanding the message that this is the case. 

"I won't ask anything from you other than that you remember what you learn among us, and that you keep in mind the dangers the people of this world live with when you return home." All of the people, not just the Cialin, both from the war and from being single-shaped in general. Nothing, he has gathered, which Zephyrinus had not already intended to do. 

Nod. "Thank you. I will try to repay to the best of my capabilities."

He nods, appreciative. 

The soldier leads them back to the command center, where the VIP quarters can be found on the second floor. Ilek and Jaim follow, as their rooms are in the same area. 

The rooms are simple affairs, containing one queen sized bed, a desk, a small sitting area, and a small bathroom - with running water, given this fort is well established.

Once they arrive the soldier leaves them be. Ilek retreats into his room.

"If there's anything else you'd like to know, you're welcome to come in," Jaim tells him, hovering outside his own door. 

"Sure. I am still largely clueless about your world. And I should learn a non-zero amount of your language."

"A good point," he says of the latter statement. 

His room has the same layout as the one Zephyrinus was offered, and the same colour scheme. They're very inn-like, really. The main difference is in the small number of his belongings set out on the desk. 

He waves Zephyrinus over to the small sitting area containing a loveseat and a single chair, and continues to the desk to make another cup of tea using his kettle - a mana heated one he brought from Sanctuary. 

He drinks a lot of tea. His job is stressful, alright?

"I'm afraid I haven't often had to teach a language. The people of Sanctuary learn Cial as children, and Sanctuary itself has translation like the kind I'm using tied up in its wards. I could try speaking each sentance twice, with and without my runestone active?" 

He takes the loveseat (on the assumption that Jaim will take the chair). "That would work. A list of common phrases with their phonetic pronunciations would also be good."

He can do that. He sets the kettle to boil and runs through a list of common phrases, alternating his use of the runestone so Zephyrinus can more easily hear his actual words. Included is a list of names and places he can add to the end of the words 'can you direct me to'. 

"Any specific questions you have about the world in general?" He asks, finally half-collapsing in the chair, his tea set on the table beside it. He rubs gently at a bruise spanning his whole left side and carefully stretches out his shoulders with a quiet noise of relief. 

He looks concerned at the bruise. "Is healing magic common? I don't really know what else to ask."

"Healing...? Oh! Yes, it is. I could get this healed, but the healers are busy with the more serious injuries from the fight earlier, and my pool is too low to waste on a bruise. It'll heal on its own, or I can deal with it once I've recovered some." 

"Yes, okay. But how common is healing for the average person? Pools - my kind - also restore your body to full health if you stay long enough and changing shapes does some patching up. And I am trying to get a sense of how bad the situation is without them."

He smiles, amused and charmed by his focus. He is reminded of Caen, before... everything. 

"Simple healing magic is in the reach of just about anyone who can spin a thread of life magic together. Fixing minor cuts, light bruising, skinned knees - all are simple enough for free magic, which requires no more education than the early meditation most children learn to find their mana pool. 

"More complicated things should be accomplished through actual structured spells, which must be studied. Most villages have at least one healer who learned at least through an apprenticeship, if not at the Academy. Larger towns and cities have healing houses and hospitals, where those adept in life magic work under masters to see to the needs of the people. 

"Though, healing in Cialin hospitals is not free as it is in Sanctuary. Payment goes to upkeep, along with various donations. In Sanctuary the hospitals are funded from the treasury.

"More extreme injuries, such as amputation, punctured lungs, and sicknesses especially, require the attention of masters, who are not exctly common. There are three at the hospital in the capital, and five in Sanctuary. The Cialin military boasts a total of six.

"I know little about this matter within the Empire, unfortuntely. I suspect they have less coverage, if only because of their suppression of formal non-military training among the commoners." 

"Ooh, is there an easy way to check if I could learn your kind of magic." Zephyrinus asks, showing for the first time something like excitement in his voice. "Ah, and earlier you mentioned that your king might want to learn from me, but I don't expect my kind of magic to be teachable in any meaningful way."

He grins, though the following mention of the King dims it. Still, "I'm not sure," he admits, "But there's no reason not to try!" 

As for the other question, "If you told him you couldn't teach him it's likely he would choose to believe this to be a lie," he says. 

"What? And the whole thing about being from another world would be just garnish?"

He shrugs, "He wouldn't make a fuss about it, he simply would think you weren't cooperating. Other world or not, he wouldn't want to believe there was something he wanted which he could not have." The man is childish in that way. 

Zephyrinus also finds this childish, but doesn't comment. "He in theory could acquire shapes and my kind of power, it just conditional of access to my world, as opposed to me teaching him. I guess, there is nothing to be done about him being unable to acquire a shift-dance. Even mine would come with, well, the side effect of giving him a twin."

He huffs a laugh, "A good thing - I wouldn't wish to give Rael more family to control if it were possible." 

"That aside - you were asking about our magic? I can give you the basic lesson on finding your pool, if you'd like." 

"Yes. It's an obvious experiment."