Saint Camber's help in healing

[revanne]

I've just been rereading some of King Javan's Year (or at least as far as I can cope with before it gets too sad) and I seem to find a discrepancy between what healers can do in the earlier centuries and what is possible later. One might expect that the earlier healers, with centuries of tradition behind them and years of training would be able to do more than their later untrained counterparts but this doesn't seem to be the case. Notably neither Tavis nor Oriel seem to be able to do very much to actually heal Javan's club foot, just soothe away the pain and muscle strain whereas Dhugal, in far from ideal circumstances and with no training and little experience, is able to heal his own broken ankle and, even more difficult, Kelson's fractured skull and swollen brain tissue.

The difference seems to be that in the later centuries those healing, or at least Duncan, Alaric and Dhugal, are described as sensing, and sometimes seeing, ghostly hands encompassing their own which are assumed to be those of St Camber.

So my question is: is the restored gift of healing the same as that previously practised or does it now have the added dimension of saintly intervention. If so, does this last or is it just as healing is re-established and/or is it simply applicable to the descendants of Camber?

[Shiral]

I've just been rereading some of King Javan's Year (or at least as far as I can cope with before it gets too sad) and I seem to find a discrepancy between what healers can do in the earlier centuries and what is possible later. One might expect that the earlier healers, with centuries of tradition behind them and years of training would be able to do more than their later untrained counterparts but this doesn't seem to be the case. Notably neither Tavis nor Oriel seem to be able to do very much to actually heal Javan's club foot, just soothe away the pain and muscle strain whereas Dhugal, in far from ideal circumstances and with no training and little experience, is able to heal his own broken ankle and, even more difficult, Kelson's fractured skull and swollen brain tissue.

The difference seems to be that in the later centuries those healing, or at least Duncan, Alaric and Dhugal, are described as sensing, and sometimes seeing, ghostly hands encompassing their own which are assumed to be those of St Camber.

So my question is: is the restored gift of healing the same as that previously practised or does it now have the added dimension of saintly intervention. If so, does this last or is it just as healing is re-established and/or is it simply applicable to the descendants of Camber?

Revanne, I think there's a distinction to be made here between birth defects like Javan's club foot, and a temporary injury such as a knife wound or broken bone. Granted the clubfoot is a  disadvantage for Javan, but it's also his normality.  He was born with it and dealt with it all his life.  A nuisance, but not really an injury.

An injury  such as Dhugal's broken bone or Kelson's skull fracture  is NOT something either of them were born with, but temporary damage caused by their going over the waterfall.  Injuries that don't kill at once eventually heal on their own--not always cleanly or properly, but the body is always at work to restore itself, even if slowly. Healers just have the advantage of being able to speed up the process and also to make sure the injured arm, leg or head heals so that there is no permanent damage.

Melissa

[Laurna]

I love this question, Revanne.

In defense of Oriel and Tavis, Javan's clubfoot is a birth defect. In modern times, doctors know to adjust the foot back to a normal position by braces just after the baby is born. Sometime surgery is involved. In medieval times would anyone have known to do that? As I am thinking about it, I suppose Healers could have cured it if they had done daily manipulations and healing just after Javan's birth. Didn't they try to do that somewhat, though as I recall that was not until Javan was much older which at that point only gave pain relief. It should have been done as a baby when the bones were still soft and growing.

The later Healings by Alaric, Duncan and Dhugal were all about fixing injuries and returning the body to it's pre-injured condition. I don't know if there is ever a healing of a congenital birth defect. Also Alaric comments that his attempts to Heal did not always work. That is because he did not have years of training. I believe that it is Camber's knowledge for having worked with Rhys that allowed the knowledge that he knew to help the Healer of Kelson's time.  Without those ghostly hands encompassing their own, I wonder if our Kelsonian Healers would have been able to heal at all, that is until they finally put in the time to train. As I recall it is also Azim who assists Dhugal to Heal Matias and it is his knowledge that helps them succeed.

I also personally believe that Camber only appears to those who are his descendants. There may have been other Healers in Kelson's time, but without training and without Camber's ghostly assistance, they would not have been able to use their talent to any good degree. That is why Warren is such an oddity. Was Camber helping him too?

[DesertRose]

I also personally believe that Camber only appears to those who are his descendants. There may have been other Healers in Kelson's time, but without training and without Camber's ghostly assistance, they would not have been able to use their talent to any good degree. That is why Warren is such an oddity. Was Camber helping him too?

I don't know what to make of Warin de Grey (and I'm not sure KK has solved the mystery of his abilities herself!), but I do think that Camber peeks in on the Haldanes as well as his own descendants (and it's possible that someone descended from Camber [or more than one] has married into the Haldane line by Kelson's time, rendering the answer "yes" or "both," LOL).

[ReikiDeryni]

Warin de Grey is most likely a descendant of switched off Deryni, as was Bethane. As for Camber, he probably can go where ever he wants.

[Kareina]

Warin de Grey is most likely a descendant of switched off Deryni, as was Bethane. As for Camber, he probably can go where ever he wants.

If Warin de Grey were a descendant of switched off Deryni, then when they did the deep reading of him, he would have registered as Deryni, wouldn't he?  But he was very clearly not.

On the other hand, I don't recall off the top of my head if switched off Deryni read as Deryni during such a deep reading if the reader isn't one of those people who know how to flip the switch. Nor do I know if that switch is purely mental, and thus children conceived and born after their parents are born would be born switched on (which could be a problem with a precious child we idling magic while too young to know what they are doing, and with no one around with the power to do anything about it), or if that switch somehow effects the body on a gene level, so that their subsequent children would be born with that switch off.

[whitelaughter]

Healing - heck all miracles - are what happens naturally, intensified. Water into wine? Happens every year. Heal a broken ankle? Yes, it would have healed given time. But the clubbed foot? It wouldn't heal naturally, so the Healers were stumped.

I've been mulling over that specific example for decades, and I suggest that a Deryni Healer could have Healed it by mucking around in Joram's mind/with a mirror by tricking the body into using the 'blueprint' for the healthy foot and simply mirror imaging it, so that the body thought that it was healing the healthy foot. Still, either no one thought of that, or for some reason it wouldn't work.

But given Camber's known fascination with the Healing Arts, it wouldn't surprise me if an untrained Healer with Camber in the driving seat could achieve things equal or even better than the experts of the golden age - remember, Evaine kills herself so that he'll have access to Heaven: where Camber would get some truly awesome training.

[ReikiDeryni]

Deryni could not detect that anybody had been Deryni in the Heir to Camber trilogy without knowing where to look and then it was still difficult. That problem would have still existed at the time of Warin de Grey also.

[whitelaughter]

Deryni could not detect that anybody had been Deryni in the Heir to Camber trilogy without knowing where to look and then it was still difficult. That problem would have still existed at the time of Warin de Grey also.

Source for this? Certainly Wencit has no problems determining that Bran Coris is not Deryni, but instead of Haldane descent.

[ReikiDeryni]

The Heirs of St. Camber is my source for the citation on Warin de Grey abilities. Wencit's reading of Bran would most likely fall into the same category. Haldanes have Deryni blood in their bloodlines according to the books.

[DesertRose]

Deryni could not detect that anybody had been Deryni in the Heir to Camber trilogy without knowing where to look and then it was still difficult. That problem would have still existed at the time of Warin de Grey also.

Source for this? Certainly Wencit has no problems determining that Bran Coris is not Deryni, but instead of Haldane descent.

The Heirs of St. Camber is my source for the citation on Warin de Grey abilities. Wencit's reading of Bran would most likely fall into the same category. Haldanes have Deryni blood in their bloodlines according to the books.

I legitimately don't recall this with any certainty, but I don't think any fully-trained (by Kelson-era standards, which were a good deal lower than in Camber's time) Deryni ever examined Warin.  Morgan did, but he hedged his assertion that Warin was not Deryni (KK even calls attention to this bit in Deryni Magic, IIRC), and Warin rides off into the sunset with no further mention of him after the end of High Deryni, so I doubt we'll ever know whether or not he was Deryni.

And I think @reiki deryni 's earlier comment (the first one I quoted) was in reference to the Deryni "saved" by the Baptizer movement, that no one could detect that those Deryni whose powers had been "removed" had ever been Deryni, except those few who knew where to look for the "on/off switch" and even then, they had to know where they were looking and look carefully to find it.  A cursory scan would miss it.

[ReikiDeryni]

I still think Warin was a descendant of a "switch-off"ed deryni, because this subject of descendants still having deryni or deryni like powers was discussed in the Heirs series specifically. Wencit and Bran holds almost to the same track but with a possibility of diluted deryni blood. Obviously without modern science and genetics it is based more on supposition and anecdotal evidence given in Katherine's books.

[revanne]

My guess too is that Warin is a descendant of a blocked Deryni. By the time in question there is a lot of uncertainty about how Deryni inheritance works - even the CC argue about the status and powers of half- Deryni, and healing powers are an unknown factor. Not to mention the issue as to whether Haldane power can be possessed by more than one person at once.

So maybe Morgan sees something that he doesn't recognise and jumps to his conclusion. Which, much as I love Morgan would hardly be unusual. And as regards Wencit, I wouldn't believe anything he  said to anyone.

[DesertRose]

I don't disagree with either of you, @reiki deryni and @revanne and, to put on my English-major hat, the argument that Warin is Deryni but descended from those whose powers had been Blocked in the Statutes of Ramos era can be supported from the text, because IIRC, the only person who ever attempted to Mind-See Warin was Morgan, who, as he himself admitted, didn't have anything approximating full training in the use of his Deryni abilities (and in his time, "full training" was a good deal less extensive than in the time of Camber and his contemporaries).