Breakdown of L'elfe a la potion, mais il oublie qui soigner.
il
he
mais
but
qui
who
avoir
to have
oublier
to forget
le
him, it (masculine direct object pronoun)
l'elfe
the elf (m)
la potion
the potion
soigner
to heal (treat, care for)
Questions & Answers about L'elfe a la potion, mais il oublie qui soigner.
Why is soigner in the infinitive here instead of being conjugated?
This sentence uses an indirect question: a question word (qui) followed by an infinitive (soigner). Just like in English ('who to heal'), you can use the infinitive when the person doing the forgetting is the same person doing the healing.
I thought qui was only for subjects. Can it act as the object here ('whom to heal')?
Yes! When referring to people, qui can be used as a direct object ('whom') in an indirect question like this one. If the elf didn't know what to heal (a thing), you would use quoi instead (il oublie quoi soigner).
Doesn't the verb oublier normally need the preposition de?
You are right that to say 'he forgets to heal', you would normally need de (il oublie de soigner). However, when you insert a question word like qui, où (where), or comment (how) to form an indirect question, you drop that preposition.
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