Aionia opened her eyes to see the woman desperately trying to pull her wrist away from her grasp. She no longer felt the freezing sensation, or maybe that was just because her arm from elbow down was completely numb. Despite that, she still held a firm grip on the woman's arm.

"Tell me what's going on," Aionia commanded her, her voice just as firm as her grip. The woman gave no response, other than her consistent pulls and tugs to be free. Aionia slowly pulled her closer.

"Tell me. What's going. On." She said again, her tone laced with ice. When the woman still didn't comply, Aionia took a deep breath and pulled her closer once more.

"You will tell me what happened by the well, you will tell me what happened with my sister, and you will tell me what happened just now. Do I make myself clear?" Aionia ordered, every drip of warmth to her voice evaporated up into the clouds. The pale while woman looked up at her to face her.

Aionia noticed that her liquidy eyes looked even glossier than before, a thick glaze sweeped over them. The area around them was becoming a desaturated blue. She blinked, once twice, three times, and Aionia could see what looked like black water hanging from the side of her eyes. When Aionia realized what she was doing, she felt a sharp twinge of guilt and regret cutting up her insides. The woman was crying.

Aionia discovered that while she may have become immune to the pain, the woman may have not. Aionia's tight grip on her was probably burning her flesh to the bone, and the pain was most likely only increasing due to her aggressive manner. The guilt was enough to make Aionia almost loosen her grip, but she managed to stay persistent in her goal. She couldn't show any signs of weakness or stopping, in case it was all a ploy.

"If you promise to tell me what you've done, I will let go. Okay?" Aionia told her a little bit softer, letting the warmth rain back down. The woman nodded silently, her black tears dripping down her increasingly blue face.

"Do you swear on the Styx you'll stay and explain?" Aionia asked once more, confirming the deal. She heard the woman whisper a quiet "yes", and Aionia let her grip loosen halfway. The woman stared up at her patiently, the teardrops collecting at her chin and falling to the floor.

Aionia her hand fall from the woman's wrist, the numbness immediately returning when she did so. Her arms became dead weight, and she looked on to see the still crying woman staring at her wrist. She looked horrified, and when Aionia looked at it too, she was horrified as well.

It really had burned to the bone, a deep hand shaped hole in her skin clearly showing. Despite that, there didn't seem to be any blood coming out, for a reason that Aionia as not sure of, and wrote it off as just more magical things she'd have to take note of. The woman's bones were as white as her skin, and muscles the same sort of blue as her cheeks and lips. Aionia hadn't seen anything like it before, and wished she hadn't. Sure, she had seen dead or wounded animals before, but the weird discolouration added an extra element of uncomfort and creepiness that Aionia could never have anticipated.

She turned away, sick to her stomach at the sight of it, and also feeling an immense amount of guilt welling up inside her. She had caused this. She had caused this poor woman's wrist and arm to be burnt to a crisp, probably putting her in massive amounts of pain. And for what? Some measly information? Aionia would've buried her face in her hands if she could move them. All the guilt and regret and disgust was making her physically sick. She fell to her knees from the pain, hitting the invisible floor beneath her and forgetting to uphold her formidable demeanour in front of the woman.

She closed her eyes, and saw the usual black flash to a bright red multiple times. She didn't dare to reopen them until she was sure the red and stopped, wishing she could use her arms to clutch her stomach or to block the light from somewhere around her. All she could do was cringe and try to move her body as close together as possible. When the red had stopped, Aionia opened up her eyes to see a black chiton in front of her. She looked up to see the woman who had once been in her position, kneeling in pain, standing up in front of her and looking down at her.

"Ah, how the tables have turned," the woman laughed. Aionia braced herself for something bad to happen to her, despite her not detecting any maliciousness in the laugh. She watched as the woman knelt down to face her, her face full of nothing but pity and benevolence. Aionia gasped when she saw that the woman's wrist was completely healed, silver bracelet back on and everything. The woman let out another small laugh at her surprised expression.

"I... I don't understand.." Aionia sputtered, speechless. "Why are you being kind? I burnt your wrist.. It was all gorey and.. gross." Aionia didn't know that she had been subconsciously bring her head down until the woman lifted her chin up with the hand from her now healed wrist.

"Hey. I'll explain it all to you, alright? You made me swear on the Styx, anyways." The woman smiled kindly, and picked up Aionia's numb arms. "Do you want me to fix these?" She asked her, and Aionia's eyes darted around before she gave a small nod. For whatever reason, Aionia couldn't bring herself to look her in the eyes, or even at her in general. The woman set down her right arm, and took her left one in both hands.

"You're gonna want to look away. Also, this may hurt a bit. Scream as loudly as you want." The woman said that last line so casually that Aionia felt like she was dreaming. She turned her head to face away as instructed, and closed her eyes once more. She didn't feel anything at first, only seeing the red returning. But soon enough, she started to feel a burning sensation in her arm, very opposed to the coldness she was used to feeling when touching the woman. The heat picked up, and Aionia soon understood what she meant by screaming.

Aionia had already shown so much weakness and vulnerability to the woman that she felt that she had to keep what shreds of dignity were left. Although she really wished she did, she kept quiet, feeling her eyes beginning to water. She felt the burning spread throughout her arm, hoping that it'd be over soon. She started to let out deep breaths, her voice shaking with every moment going by.

Aionia felt her arm cooling down after what seemed like an eternity of burning and roasting. The woman told her she could turn back around, and Aionia did so. She carefully began to lift of her arm and wiggle her fingers. They stung a bit, but other than that, they were working perfectly.

"What.. what did you do?" She asked her.

"I healed it of course!" The reply was far too vague for Aionia's liking.

"No, how did you summon that heat? And how did you use it to heal me?" She asked once more, hoping for a better answer.

"Ah, well. I guess right now is as good a time as ever to answer all your questions." The woman sat down to look at Aionia face to face.

"Let's begin with your first two questions. To summon heat or flames, I simply have to will it to appear." She held up her hand, putting her fingers all together. She closed her eyes for a split second, and when she reopened them, a blue flame was hovering over them like the the flame from a candle. When she snapped her fingers, the flame was gone just as fast as it appeared. Aionia watched in amazement, her eyes wider than ever before.

"And to answer that other one, I can change its properties at will, as long as they remain in the realm of possibilities of its regular uses. So, I wasn't really healing you, per se, I was using the heat to wake up your nerves." The woman gave a small smile. "Now, what's next on your agenda?"

Aionia was startled to see her patiently waiting a response. She had been so caught up in the explanation and demonstration that she forgot all her questions.

"Who are you?" Was the only thing she could manage to sputter in the scrambled brain of hers. She watched the woman sigh.

"The age-old question. I'll tell you my name. It's Styx." She waited for Aionia's response.

"Styx? Like the river? The one you swore on?" Aionia's puzzled expression only got more cartoonish.

"Exactly. I, uh, used to be the naiad of the river." Styx's eyes darted around for a second or two. "It's a long story, and I'm sure you have more pressing questions. What's next?"

Aionia took a moment to remember her original questions. A naiad? Sure, naiads were powerful, but their power stemmed from the from the water they resided in. Aionia was pretty sure that fire wasn't something that you could get from a river. Then again, she didn't really know much about Hades rivers in general. Maybe the Styx was made of fire.

"Wait, you used to be? What happened? Are there any other naiads there?" Aionia spat out before she could stop herself. She watched Styx close her eyes.

"The Styx knows only one naiad, and she is sitting right in front of you. The river's water is unlike your regular mortal water, and the only nymphs capable of living there have to be born in the underworld as goes for all the other Hades rivers. Does that suffice as an answer to your question?"

"Hm.... No! You only answered the last one!" Aionia called her out.

"You really want me to answer the others?" Styx asked once more, hoping the mortal would change her mind.

"Yeah. I wouldn't have asked them otherwise. Now tell me." Aionia reaffirmed Styx's worries.

"Fine."