The spacious dining halls of Castle Hurst were currently filled with all manner of guardsmen and clerics who served under the command of Lord Orvyn Hurst. The cause for such a feast was yet unknown by the attendees, but this was ignored by those summoned as they drowned away their accumulated stress on the good lord's coin. The festivities never had the chance to get started as the hired bards were suddenly escorted out of the hall at the start of the night's proceedings. Silence fell as the Lord rose from his seat at the main table, his presence acknowledged to the deadened joy from the knights.
“Welcome my loyal men. I have called you here as thanks for your dedicated service in the name of your lord and his accompanying lands.” His words received a round of pessimistic cheering from the soldiers, but were quickly silenced by a raised hand. “As you know my daughter has been suffering for some near three years from some unknown ailment, as of now I see a beacon of hope. Tomorrow, a doctor will be removing a fragment of cursed idolatry that has become lodged in her head.” The murmurs started again, only to be stopped by the thud of flesh being thrown onto the stone floor. “What lays on the ground are fish summoned from some accursed plane, attracted by the foul thing lodged in her skull.”
Early on in their tribulations as to their decision, both Oryvn and Richard discovered that if the creatures were killed with-in their plane of reality, the fish-like demon's body would remain and become visible to anyone, regardless of supernatural sight. Gathering a few extra demonic corpses was simple enough and the emotional shock would prepare the soldiers for what is to come. “By the lord's guiding grace, they will hopefully leave our lands without incident once the corrupting presence has been removed. However, if something goes awry, I call upon you to all act as shields. Not for your lord, but for your fellow man. Tomorrow, armed with some holy incense you will patrol the city armed for battle. Should you hear a single horn after the initial sound, prepare for the worst. Should you hear it blow twice, we shall thank the lord for his continued guidance for the worst will have passed. Tonight, we eat well, drink well and sleep well. You need to be ready to fight hell itself, so that we can be free from its demonic grasp!” Now filled with purpose and hope the hall echoed with loud cheers, reverberating around the halls.
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It almost seemed fitting that a room given such high importance as an audience room for other nobility, would serve as a briefing room for the up-coming surgery. The town's local doctor and the personal physician of the Hurst family, one Lionel Wood, sat in on the visiting expert's discussion. Although he was skeptical of her medical knowledge, he still had a duty of care to the future lady of the house to be present at such a meeting. At least, in his view, this doctor was considerably more thorough and trust-worthy than the trove of dubious doctors who had preceded her.
The young doctor's plan comprised of her sedating her patient with a generous dosage of Dwale*, before cutting into the back of her skull. After clearing the blood, she was to create additional holes in the skull to get a better hold on the supposed cursed item. Once carefully removed her priest would bless the area and apply holy water to the site. The surgery would then finish with the doctor stitching the bisected skin back together before applying some numbing herbs, similar in composition to Dwale, to the region. The stitching would of course be removed later.
Lionel often found himself nodding along in agreement to various elements of the proposed surgery, most of the input that he could offer was minor changes to methodology. His role was delegated to one of support and quartermaster, creating the necessary environment to minimise risk. Her uncompromising hygienic requirements extended to that of the operating room, asking for the staff to clean it thrice over with certain herbs to remove dirt as it were. It was quite apparent that she was a firm believer in Miasma theory, as was his own medical opinion, and gave little weight to Humorist notions of the four fluids that needed to be kept in balance**. Whereas his own dismissal was attributed to poor results, her own critiques of Humoral ideas stemmed from her occult knowledge, labelling it as “likely the result of poor understanding of arcane flow.” With little push back, the local expert gave his endorsement of the procedure, silently praying that this would end the poor girl's suffering.
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Both Lady Mirabel Hurst and young Dustin Hurst knelt in prayer with-in the small private prayer room of the local chapel, guided by the most senior priest that resided with-in their lands. Each repetition, each psalm, each hymn and each prayer offering little in the way of calming down the anxious atmosphere. The echoes of the singular horn permeated throughout the town, announcing to those with-in the trusted circle that the surgery had begun.
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What was once a secondary audience chamber had been quickly converted into an operating room, outfitted with various blessed charms and powerful herbs to contain any stray magic which might leave the patient's body. The usually decorative furniture had been carefully stacked to the side to make room for a quickly repurposed operating table, what it had been repurposed from was better left unmentioned. Lying on the newly placed bedding was Godiva, being securely bound in place by thick leather straps and drinking the Dwale offered to her. It did not take long for her body to become limp as Victoria began her surgery under the watchful eye of the house physician.
The confirmation of the patient's lack of consciousness from assisting physician was the signal to start cutting in. With minimal knowledge of cranial surgery, Richard could not tell how fast or slow Victoria was proceeding with surgery. The doctor's insistence on cleanliness did hamper the relative speed of the operation, often having Lionel hold back the ever-clotting blood from the incision site and discarding the cloth into a bowl of boiling water. Even her smaller assistant wordlessly ferried the used tools to a boiling pot after every use, removing anything remaining on the blade. Still the pace was still relatively quick, reaching the offending object quickly after cutting in thanks in part to her meticulous planning.
The five present in the room all held baited breaths as the bony spine was carefully extracted from the wound. The tension remained as the surgeon took her time, minimizing any damage the needle sized object would cause on the way out. Once removed it was placed into a sealed wooden box, and wandering cleric began his religious chants that sent a glowing light flowing into the exposed brain-matter. The temporary glimpse that Richard saw of the fragile looking bone object, gave him slight pause that such a small object could cause so much unrest.
The two doctors, now satisfied as to the state of their operation, quickly sewed the two bloodied folds of skin together and further treated with herbal salve. Only when the last signs of heavy bleeding had completely stopped, was the signal was given to the staff outside the door to sound the horn for a successful surgery. Now all they could do was monitor the patient's body through her unconscious state and pray that it would be all over.
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The various townsfolk bowed or saluted before the fully armored lord of the land as he marched along with his patrols, using the cover of an inspection for both his presence and attire. Even a mile from his daughter, he still could count numerous of the accursed devil fish anywhere that held water. It had not been long since the initial horn had been blown, signaling that his daughter was now asleep, and they had began to remove that cursed thing from her skull. His nerves did not have to wait much longer as the second round of horns echoed across his lands, sending the fish into a state of mild confusion.
The larger of the fish, came to the sudden realisation that they were far from their normal abode, quickly swimming away or disappearing into their own plane of existence beyond the reach of the herbal incense. Several of the smaller creatures lingered, aimlessly swimming around whatever source of liquid they inhabited. Whatever potential danger the creatures held did not come to pass, reverting to their natural tendencies like sheep with an open fence-gate.
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Godiva slowly blinked herself awake on her comfortable woolen bed, still drowsy from the strong-tasting medicine the doctor had given her. With her senses returning a throbbing pain pulsated from the back of her head, instinctively her hand reached for the source of the discomfort only to be stopped by a gentle hand. Due in part to the lingering sedative, it took a while to realize that she was now free from the hellish constraints she had been trapped in for years. Although slow, from years of unrefined usage of her muscles, she slowly clenched and unclenched her hands. Slowly she turned her head, tears now flowing, to look at the pale hand that had prevented her from touching her wrappings.
Before she could say anything further, her mother swept in crying tears of joy that her daughter had recovered so much just by removing a needle. She felt cradled by her mother's embrace, so much so that the doctor had to repeated remind her to not to touch the bandages. She was released from her mother's grip to find the rest of her family standing behind her, similarly ecstatic at her swift recovery. The doctor excused herself to allow for their reunion, reminding them once again to not touch the bandages and that her associate would be around later to ask her some questions.