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Tess hadn’t recognized him when he was surrounded by the darkness, but there’s no mistaking the person currently lying on the ground nearby for anyone but who he is. She’s found her brother. She’ll have to let his mother and Al know, since they’re the ones who asked her to look for him in the first place, but that can wait. She wants to make sure he’s okay first.
She’s grateful she didn’t recognize Erin sooner, in a way. If she’d been able to tell it was him through the dark miasma, she would have been next to him in a flash, and judging by how her new friends had been affected by the strange darkness that had surrounded him, it’s probably for the best that she’d been just far enough away to avoid getting hit.
Tess glances away from Erin to look over her new traveling companions. She hadn’t been planning to travel with them long; the idea of being one of the very first people to see the ground under where the Storm used to be was irresistible, and since the two others were headed that way anyway, she'd decided to travel with them just for long enough to take a look around before striking out on her own again. The fact that she’s found Erin may complicate that plan, but for now she fidgets and wonders at her new companions’ ability to keep still. Neither of them seem to feel the need to move at all; Kendal seems content to watch their fire, and Alinua’s hidden herself in a literal tree. Tess shakes her head and stretches. She can’t imagine willingly staying in such a cramped space for any length of time at all.
She can’t blame Alinua for being wary, although Tess had tried to convince her that hiding in a tree wasn’t necessary. Whatever Erin’s gotten himself into certainly doesn’t seem good, and for the others, who didn’t spend years on end looking after Erin, it’s not hard to imagine that Erin had been attacking. Even with all those years of knowing her brother, the thought had crossed Tess’s mind. She knows him better than that, though. It’s been a long time since she’s last seen her brother—he’s cut his hair, grown stronger, escaped his father’s house, grown up—but Tess can’t imagine Erin ever choosing to attack innocent people.
When Erin finally does wake up, she gives him a little wave.
“Tess?” He inhales like he’s about to say more before he notices Kendal with a startled yelp. "Who are you?"
The conversation quickly moves on, and Tess is too concerned by the panicked look in Erin's eyes as he takes in his state to bother asking about what he was going to say. It's funny to watch his bewilderment at Kendal not recognizing the name Ruunaser (funny enough that Tess doesn't bother to chime in; besides, Erin loves explaining things to people, even if he is indignant that his identity needs to be explained and isn't already known), but her worry for Erin keeps her from enjoying the moment as much as she might have in better circumstances.
~~~
The only way she manages to convince him to travel with them is by promising to keep her distance. Kendal and Alinua both have ways to protect themselves from whatever took up residence in Erin's head, but Tess's only defense is her ability to get out of the way. Tess doesn't like the agreement at all, but it keeps Erin nearby, which means she still has a shot at convincing him to change his mind.
She spends the day slowly trying to get Erin to calm down about her presence somewhat, so when she wakes up to the other part of the camp erupting in a burst of dark energy, she can't help but be a bit annoyed that it's going to be even harder to convince Erin to let her get close to him. She wants to follow him as she watches whatever's possessing him take him into the caves, but she knows she's going to need the others' help if she's actually going to be of any help, so she finds Kendal and together they help Alinua get back on her feet.
When they find Erin, they find him surrounded by sparks. It isn't long at all before Tess notices that the lightning is coming from Erin, and when she does, her heart sinks. She knows Erin's too practical to do this to himself without good reason, but she'd never wanted to see her brother electrocuting himself (she'd never wanted him to have any reason to do so, either).
At least it's lightning. Tess can deal with lightning much easier than she can deal with a mysterious dark force that ravages all life it touches. Kendal and Alinua work together to knock Erin out and Tess catches him, scooping him up into her arms and carrying him up to the surface to recover. Once they've reached the surface and Erin is resting, Tess reluctantly settles herself a decent distance away, since it seems that Erin's most likely to lose control when he's asleep. She'll give him a hug when he's awake and ready for it.
~~~
Erin keeps himself composed as he thanks the other three for their help, but Tess can tell it’s a near thing. With the group’s traveling plans reaffirmed, Alinua and Kendal drift away to talk about something, Tess shifts to sit closer to her brother.
“Stay away.” Erin doesn’t meet her eyes. “This is the second time I’ve nearly killed you.”
“You shocked yourself pretty good,” Tess says. “I think I’ll be fine for a bit.”
Erin tries to protest, spluttering his way through an argument that Tess is only alive because she'd been far enough away from him in camp (which, in his defense, is true) and saying that she needed to be more careful. Tess thinks that second bit is nonsense. She knows how to handle herself (she's been going out and exploring the world on her own ever since she was Sparked, after all). Out of consideration for Erin's preferences, she doesn't move any closer, but she also doesn't move farther away.
"I missed you," she says eventually, realizing that Erin isn't about to break the awkward silence beginning to form.
Erin still won't look at her. "I wish you didn't have to find me like this."
His head is low enough that his hair is covering most of his face, so Tess can't see his expression, but she can guess what he's thinking well enough. One of his hands is pressed against his chest, where the mark is, and he's curled in on himself like he'll explode the second he lets a single muscle relax. Tess has seen him like this before—when his illness was flaring up, or when his headaches reached particularly horrific pain levels, or when Galen was threatening him or Tess—but it's been years.
"I wish you weren't in pain, too."
He finally turns her way, a withering look in his eye. "You know that's not what I meant."
He's right; she does know that. She knows he's blaming himself for getting in over his head, and telling himself that everyone else is blaming him too. For all Erin's genius, and for all Tess does wish he'd take better care of himself, he's wrong about that.
"It doesn't even hurt that much," he says, covering his eyes with the hand not balled up in his shirt. "Not compared to other things I've dealt with."
"That doesn't mean anything!" Tess cuts herself off before she says something she shouldn't. Erin knows that he's dealt with more pain than most people do in their lives. He doesn't need her reminding him of that. "Listen, I'm glad to see you. And whatever that thing is, that's gotten into your head, that doesn't change that."
"It should change it."
Tess isn't sure she's ever met anyone else so determined to blame himself for everything bad in the world. She takes a few deep breaths, and tries to change the subject. "I like what you did with your hair."
Erin doesn't deign to answer. The minutes stretch on.
"Will you let me hug you?" Tess asks.
Erin scrambles up. "No. We don't know when I'll lose control again."
"I'm willing to take that risk." She gets up slowly, and walks over slowly, giving him plenty of time to move away. "I'd like to hug you, if you'll let me."
Erin takes a few steps forward and crumbles into her arms. Tess catches him and holds him tight, letting him cry into her shoulder for a while before carefully lowering them both back to the ground.
"I'm scared," he whispers. For him to admit it, he must be terrified.
"That's okay." Tess runs her fingers through his hair as he cries, whispering, "You're going to be okay." His hair used to be longer; part of her wonders why he cut it. She hopes Galen hadn't gotten too mad, if he'd seen.
How much has she missed? She'll never regret leaving, not for a second—that house was worse for her than it was for Erin, even though Galen was terrible to him, too—but she does wish she could know what it had been like for Erin after she left. She's glad she can be here for Erin now, though, and that she can be there for him out of her own free will.
They stay like that, Erin held close in Tess's strong arms, for a long time. At one point, Alinua and Kendal come back, but Tess waves them away again. Erin wouldn't want their new friends to see him like this, even though it's a completely reasonable reaction to being possessed and nearly dying.
Eventually, Erin stops crying, but he doesn't pull away. "Did you ever find your family?" he asks, wiping at his face and trying to make himself seem slightly more put-together despite the fact that he's still curled up in Tess's lap.
Tess smiles. He's asking for a distraction, and she has plenty of fun stories from her travels to distract him with. "Yeah," she says. "I found them."
"Was it nice?" Erin mutters, his speech slowed and muddied by exhaustion.
"It was. Everyone was so happy to see me, and the whole place felt safe, and full of love." All of Tess's memories from her visit to Ironhill are a thick haze of emotion. Feeling valued, feeling safe, feeling warm, feeling restless, by the end; wishing it could have been her home, but knowing it wasn't.
"Sounds really nice..." Erin's eyes are closed now, and his body is beginning to unspool somewhat. "Why'd you leave?" He mutters something else, like he's about to say something on the topic, but he falls fully asleep halfway through the muddled words, and Tess lets him sleep.
Ironhill was nice. Tess will always be glad she went there, and she'll always wished she could have lived there, but she doesn't regret leaving. It wasn't home anymore, it couldn't be home anymore, and she's seen so many amazing things that she never would have seen if she'd forced herself to stay put. "My home is larger than one place now," she whispers to Erin, "and I needed to see as much of it as I could."
Erin doesn't answer; she'd been careful to talk quietly enough that she wouldn't wake him up. He'll be awfully sore if he sleeps in this position for too long, though, so she gently picks him up and lays him on the ground, spreading a blanket over him to keep him warm. She can't lie and say she's not concerned about whatever Erin's gotten himself into here—anything that could make Erin this obviously scared is definitely something to take seriously. Still, she knows what he's capable of, and she knows what she's capable of, and it's pretty clear that their new friends are capable of a lot, too. As she leaves Erin to his rest and goes to where her supplies are laid out to get some sleep herself, she can't help but be optimistic that everything will be okay in the end.