Vanyel doesn't try to deny it. He lets Moondance coax some soup into him and then ease him back into the bed and tuck him in. 

"Rest," Moondance says. "Your only work now is to recover, brother, and I am not going anywhere." A soft intake of breath. "It is - very hard. But you have lost so many of those you love already. Starwind would wish that I stay at your side." 

They stand at the edge of Lórien's garden. Jisa glances at Stef. "All right. Here goes. We go in and want to find him, or expect to find him...?"

"Just about." And Stef walks forward, looking for Lórien. 

And there is Lórien. CHILDREN. 

That's kind of condescending but it doesn't seem like it'll help her aims to get offended. "We need to ask your help with something very important. You know how humans from our world sometimes have Gifts?" 

YES.

"We have a problem that needs mages to solve and - we don't have any, because Vanyel went to Velgarth and got hurt and is trapped there. Can you tell that I have three Gifts active and one in potential? That one is mage-gift and I need to have it awakened so I can reach Vanyel and help him. It's very important." 

I REGRET THAT I CANNOT ASSIST YOU IN THIS. iT WOULD HURT YOU VERY BADLY.

"There's no way you can help and then help heal me from it? Or make it hurt less badly? Or - I mean, Vanyel's Gift was awakened that way, and it did hurt him but he recovered. That would be worth it." 

I UNDERSTAND WHY YOU WOULD DESIRE TO HAVE SUCH PAIN INFLICTED FOR SOME LATER GOAL. BUT THIS IS NOT IN MY NATURE. I HEAL PEOPLE. I DO NOT HARM PEOPLE.

She is mildly worried that asking is going to lead to him trying to stop her but it seems better to know. "If I, um, find some other way of doing it, would you heal me afterward?" 

I WOULD.

"All right. Thank you very much for answering our questions about this." She bows to him and they head out. 

"Great," she says once they've left the garden. "Now we have to ride all the way back." 

"It was worth asking. And at least we know he can heal you."

Treven is waiting for them with his Companion. He doesn't wait for them to speak. "No luck?" 

"No. It was worth asking." 

Telumë picks his way through dense jungle. He's a bit further north, now, in Jkatha, because he's pretty sure there's a records cache somewhere in this region. It is very annoying that he has to figure out almost from first principles where his past self would have put one. 

In this swamp (full of mosquitos and biting flies)? In this rainforest (full of birds and frogs and piranhas and the occasional hungry leopard)? In this little hamlet of houses on stilts? In this long muddy stretch of navigable river, with only occasional hostile hippos?

His past self had a system for this and - well, obviously it can't be too trivial, it has to be the case that random people can't find it, but why couldn't it be something he could figure out a bit faster?

Probably he's working at a disadvantage, since half of his retained memories are from another world. 

It's a good thing he was finally able to reverse-engineer the trick for awakening his own potential during the weeks on the road, on stolen horses that he eventually abandoned when he headed off-road into the wilderness, because he would probably have several different insect-borne diseases by now if not for self-Healing.

He's looking for - some kind of notable landmark, he's pretty sure. Not the kind people travel from all over the known world to see, in fact it's probably rather obscure-looking, but something there's only one of in an entire region.

There's a building crumbled mostly to rubble on a tall hill over to the east of him.

That looks - hmm, interesting. He can't tell what it used to be, yet, but it's the most interesting bit of scenery he's passed in a while, so he trudges uphill toward it. Stops for a drink of river water, disinfected with magic but still gross-tasting, and keeps going. 

It looks like it used to have a tower, a big dome, and maybe some complicated machinery. It's been abandoned for a long time, though.

An observatory. 

It's not the first maybe-unique landmark he's passed, and he did the usual search around the others just in the case, but it's the first one that clicks - that feels like something his past self would have looked at, appraised, and known that a future version of him, stripped of all specifics, would nonetheless recognize it on seeing it again. 

He starts the search-pattern again. The cache won't be right underneath, too obvious still, but he's looking for the best natural feature that would make a useful entry-point to an underground cave or cellar, within about a half-mile radius around the site. 

There are some even-more-ruined houses at the base of the hill; most of them don't have basements, but one does. It is impossible to access because so much mud has washed in.