Most healers could practise for decades without consequence, but to heal injuries that cheated death came with a price. It was called the Toll. To heal a mortal wound or reanimate the dead required vitality, a drop of life itself. The greater the scale of the work, the greater the cost. Healing came with the highest cost; that was why the Faith considered it a purifying act and allowed its practice while forbidding all other forms of vivimancy. Becoming a healer would slowly carve away Helena’s life span, like a candle being burned at both ends. Someday, she didn’t know when, her resonance
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