Kes closed her eyes moment and then looked off over towards the city, seeing the smoke from the mines in the sky, even this early in the morning. ”Believe it or not, I think everyone, myself included, and even all the men in that city you were raised in, know just how that feels… Even though I doubt many of them would have been as brave as you’ve just been to admit it.” She told him, meeting his eyes again with what understanding she could offer.

”I think it’s time we had a morning meal, don’t you asasha?” Anara was asking Lanam, and that feeling of being in two places at once became stronger again. Not the harmony, but closer to it. That sense seemed to vary, clam, appear, and recede like the air currents around them, and Kes couldn’t exactly tell the whys.

Lanam smiled. ”Can I help?” She asked Anara hopefully.

”You most definitely can.” Anara smiled to their daughter.

”…Likely not.” Artem admitted, a little distracted as he watched Anara pick up her daughter in her arms. ”Will…” Anara’s eyes met Artem’s a moment, then caught Kes’s. ”Will you be able to heal her as well? Her eyes, I mean?” He asked, referring to Lanam.

”I…” Kes spoke and her and Anara’s eyes held locked on each other. Neither of them had thought of it in these last brief moments since waking and discovering what had occurred while they’d slept, and Kes could feel the intense wave of hope that sprung up from Anara’s heart at the thought what she, they, might be able to give that to their daughter. ”I very much hope so.” She answered honestly for both of them, the hope blooming in her too, though she still saw Lanam’s blindness differently than her wife did. To her, it had never mattered even slightly. To her society, it would never have occurred to them to make an issue of it. Whereas, in Anara’s society, it was… something that had been made a part of her wife’s reality all her life. Feelings like that, they were, Kes had come to understand, not something that could simply be banished or easily altered… at least not completely.

Artem sighed as Kes took his hand and led him back towards the house with the others for breakfast. ”For what it’s worth, I hope so too.” Artem spoke. Kes didn’t mean to, but she picked up then that Artem still wasn’t completely convinced she wasn’t a goddess, or, if not a goddess, at least touched by the gods, or descended from one. Kes still hadn’t really decided what she thought about the idea of deities, though she did find herself thinking about it every once in a while. She had nothing to truly base and informed theory on, true. Her own people revered the Caretaker, of course, but did that mean he was a deity to them? Kes didn’t know for sure. There were similarities. She didn’t seriously think Artem’s thoughts about her had much chance of being true… though, she supposed it did actually fit the framework of Kazon beliefs. What if there actually were a kind of being like that, on that scale, that could make worlds, make peoples, as easily as… as falling to sleep one night with someone you loved and sharing a dream? Couldn’t people, deities, like that have made her own people too? And couldn’t they have perhaps bestowed different gifts upon them? Had her own people at one point broken faith with their creators as the Kazon legends said Anara’s people did once? Was it even remotely possible that something like that could be the reason her world was a desert now? Yesterday… Yesterday she might have never thought such a thing… Today…? She had to admit to herself that she was secretly, at least partially, awestruck by some of the things she found herself able to do now, not least of which was the recovery of Anara’s full range of sight.

In one way, it was amazing, and comforting, to know she could do such things. That she could use her abilities to help her loved ones to such fantastic extents. In another way though, it was daunting to think about… What harm could she do without even meaning to? The thought of that… That she might unintentionally harm Anara or their children… That was a terror that had only been growing in the back of her mind day by day. Anara knew those doubts, but had seemingly unshakable faith in her. That was a heady feeling, but one Kes was determined not to let herself take too much to heart. She had to be careful. Very careful… The trouble with that was, of course, was how was she to know what being careful truly was in regards to this? She had no way of know what the long-term effects of the mental bond she now shared with Anara would be. Given what had happened when she’d first tried severing it though, she was sure that she wasn’t about to consider going backwards at this point. For one thing, she in no way wanted to, and for another, it seemed like it would be too much of a risk.

Maybe she really did just have to take it on faith as Anara was doing…?