Savil nudges her stallion closer and reaches for Vanyel's hand. :Wh...at?: she sends, slowly. 

:My teacher taught me. It was his ancestor, or a group that his ancestor had been in, that developed the technique. They weren't actually good people and they mostly used it for things like bringing back rich people to torture the locations of their hidden wealth out of them. But eventually the ancestor was killed by an angry mob. And my teacher found his notes a long time later, after his fiancee was killed. He hunted down rumors until he found them, and he brought her back. They left his hometown so people wouldn't realize, and they can't help that many people because people would scream about evil animated corpses if they knew, but when they found us they taught us. So I know how. And we're really good at it, because the invocation invokes Yog-Sothoth and Yog-Sothoth is our non-human parent.:

Savil swallows. 

:W-why: her mindvoice isn't very steady at first, :why would I be mad? I can see how that could help a lot of people – that part is wonderful. And I can see why you couldn't speak of it, back home. I'm...not sure that you ought speak of it to most people here, either. But of course I'm not mad. Just...absorbing it: She looks pretty shaken. And Vanyel is still stiff and silent and unmoving. 

:You, um, it's not that there's a why, exactly, it's just, lots of people would be mad, and I, sometimes people are reasonable but only to a point. I'm--I'm glad you're not mad but you looked kind of, upset or something.:

:No, of course I'm not upset: Savil seems to realize how obviously false a claim this is. :...I mean, I'm not upset with you. It, um, the subject brings up a sore spot for a few of us: 

:Oh. I--whoever it is--was--is--will be? I'm sorry. I, um. I'm not good at...social finesse.:

Savil gets tangled up in the was-is-will-be and just blinks helplessly at her. :I'm sorry, what?: 

:Sorry for your loss?:

That's a lot more comprehensible. :Your, er, condolences are accepted: She takes a breath, lets it out. :Let's keep heading for the campsite, we're not too far: 

:If I think of anything else really big to say I'll wait to say it until we're not in motion.:

They ride in awkward silence for a while and then Moondance gamely starts asking Lucy more questions about medicine in her world.

Sometimes she can give enthusiastic non-jargony answers and sometimes the answer is "there's equipment for that and I don't know how it works" and sometimes the answer is "there's equipment for that and I don't know how to recreate it but I can replicate its function with magic" and sometimes the answer is "I don't know."

Vanyel doesn't say another word for the rest of the journey, but Savil and even Starwind break in occasionally, and three or four hours later they reach the better campsite. There's a river, and a nice dry cave nearby with the remains of a fire-pit hinting it's been used for a camp before. The adults take down the Companions' saddlebags and start unpacking and setting up while Vanyel sits against the wall of the cave and hugs his knees to his chest. 

Lucy shifts back to human form and puts her dress back on behind some trees. 

She hesitates, nibbling her lip, then goes to find Vanyel. 

:I can leave if you want. But sometimes it helps to talk.:

He doesn't say anything or even look at her, but he doesn't tell her to go away either. 

...She sits down beside him. 

:When I was thirteen, my grandfather died. He had helped raise us with as much love and care as Mom did, and we were all grieving. But it wasn't just sad. It was trouble. The people he had been buying cows from to feed me didn't trust Wilbur, and the food dwindled. I got hungrier. There's a reason I'm so gung-ho about eating things like wyrsa and basilisk even besides not wanting to waste lives, and it's what happened as a result. Having it get harder to think when you're really hungry is normal, so I've been led to believe. So I didn't think about it much, at the time. But when a human gets so hungry they can't think at all they just pass out. It turns out...I don't. I just stop--understanding what people are, and why you never ever eat them. That's the only time it ever, ever happened. After I lost Mom that way, I've never let it get anywhere near there again.:

Vanyel doesn't move, or say anything. He doesn't look horrified though. Or disturbed, or scared of her. 

A little after she finishes, he starts crying. He still doesn't move at all, or show any indication that he wants her to leave. Just...cries, almost in silence. 

She hugs her knees. She doesn't cry like he's crying, but tears roll down her cheeks. 

Eventually, he stops crying, sniffles, dabs at his eyes with his sleeve. :S-sorry: Even his mindvoice is shaky. 

:You never have to apologize to me for crying. Some things just aren't okay. And there's no virtue in pretending they are.

He looks up at her, wide-open startled eyes, like - like she understands, like there's something hanging in the air between them that only the two of them can see, it's not a happy light in his eyes but it is there...

...and then he bursts into tears again and curls up in a tiny ball, shaking. 

She definitely wants to hug him and she has no idea if that's in any way a good idea. 

...

She calls softly to her brother in English, low enough to not interrupt the crying but loud enough for her brother's hearing to catch. 

...Sure, okay. 

He goes to find Savil. 

Savil comes over with Wilbur a minute or so later. She looks very concerned when she sees Vanyel, but not in a way that suggests she's upset with either of them about it. 

:What is it?: she sends, excluding Vanyel from the Mindspeech link. 

:Uh. I just wanted to know if he was a hugs person. He looks like he needs one but.: