"Why are you asking me, it's his allergy. It's a good idea in theory if that's a good barely-noticeable distance for him."

"I can feel it at all from a lot further away than that," Vanyel says. "If it's miles away it wouldn't hurt, I don't think, but – maybe you'd better get Yfandes to run you a full mile out, just for the first try." 

Leareth raises his eyebrows. "Is Yfandes going to allow me to ride her?" 

:Yes. Why not?: She heads toward the backyard door. :Come on: 

Cam follows to supervise.

Vanyel gets out one of his little papers and looks at it somewhat dubiously while Leareth retrieves his two embroidery hoops for demo Gates and mounts Yfandes. He shrugs, puts it under his tongue, and watches them ride out until they're barely visible.

"...All right, here we go." He rubs his hands together. "It'll be fine. Even if the drug doesn't do anything, a tiny Gate a mile away isn't that bad." He seems to be reassuring himself out loud more than talking to Cam. 

"If it does wind up hurting you lastingly at all we can try, like, painkillers."

"Oh, right, that's a thing." Vanyel frowns. "It might be doing something – I'm worrying about it but I'm not actually feeling nervous." 

"Sounds about right!"

The Gate is small enough and far enough away that the only indication when it goes up is Vanyel's sudden intake of breath. "–I'm fine," he says quickly. "It's - weird, I can tell it's a Gate and I keep expecting it to be bad and it isn't really? I could probably relax more." He takes a breath, lets it out, rolls his shoulders around. "...Still fine. Maybe I'll tell him to do another one a bit closer. How long does the drug last?" 

"Bout half an hour. You might want to do a few but don't push your luck too hard, yeah?"

"It's only been five minutes, I can fit in a few." He Mindspeaks to Yfandes. "All right, we're going to do a half mile. Also, Cam, you're brilliant. It didn't occur to me that this might be fixable, I was – I don't even know what I was planning, once I knew you thought Gates could fix your problem, I guess I thought I'd just be really miserable while we were working on it." 

"We could have at least had you far away!"

"I would've felt really bad about not helping." 

"You're allergic! No, it's worse than that, you're so traumatized you spontaneously generated an allergy-like response that can incapacitate you for days!"

"What? Look, it's a really stupid annoying problem and I've spent most of my life trying to ignore it, it's kind of a habit!" 

"A stupid annoying problem you try to ignore that can incapacitate you for days? It's not exactly a knee that twinges when it's going to rain!"

"It's only for days if I have to raise a Gate myself and go through it and I get unlucky or I was really tired going into it – one time I had to Gate back to Valdemar and fight a battle less than twelve candlemarks later and it was fine." 

"Oh, well, that's clearly nothing then."

:I heard that, Chosen: Yfandes sends to both of them, now visibly closer and still again. :It was NOT FINE. Also, quit it, you're supposed to be trying to relax. Are you sure you're up for trying another one?:

Vanyel sighs. :Yes, 'Fandes, I will relax and I am up for trying another one: 

Cam hangs out in case Vanyel needs analgesics.

The glow of the Gate forming is close enough to be visible this time.

Simultaneously with it lighting up, Vanyel yelps and swears. The Gate vanishes instantly and Yfandes is galloping toward them. 

Cam offers him a Bar-recommended pill for the pain.

"...I think I'm all right now that it's down?" Vanyel accepts the pill anyway. "Gah. I don't know what I did wrong that time."