Healer of the Hospes
Lepius
He circled the recovery room for the fourth time, then took a deep breath.
The last emergency patient needed tending to, and it was a soldier. More importantly, a human. Lepius had already poured in enough mana for the bleeding to stop, but there was a risk it would reopen, and he would give up his honour as a healer before that would happen.
But right now… he leaned back onto a wall, cradling his head.
Eldertrees save me… why does mana dilation exist….
With every lap around the room, some of the pounding faded away, and the shapes of his patients became clearer. But it was now the fifth lap, and those shapes still lacked their edges. He rubbed his temple. There was still more in him, he was sure.
At least he wasn’t under the eye of the High Priestess. If she had known he was using this much mana at once, he would’ve been locked away from the recovery room.
Enough. Time to get healing.
His mana tried to tug him back to the wall, but something else pulled him harder. The cries of that patient. Swordsworn Deitfreid.
He pushed off the wall and finished the lap, which ended with the Swordsworn. The human was breathing in short puffs, propped up on his side as a light from a sunstone above glared down at the wound. Even after an initial treatment, it still looked a nasty thing.
A bovine guard, the few that had steel, had found a gap in the soldier’s chainmail and boiled leather. It had gone through maybe five inches.
He steadied his breathing as he readied his hands above the soldier. The man whimpered, then writhed on the bed.
“Hold him still, Nurse Seigfreid.”
The nurse did as he commanded, and whispered something to the injured. Deitfreid relaxed a little. Now was the time, and he held his hands just above the wound, and took one long breath.
I can do this. Just a normal wound.
And he did it.
His hands pressed down onto it, and everything rushed into a blend in his head. His focus diverged a thousand ways. All the capillaries, the vessels and veins punctured and trying to stitch back together, the blood and the bile and stomach acid and expanding and contracting muscles and every cell as it split, died, split, died, the gold man in the pool of his blood-
He jerked backwards and fell.
The nurse yelled out for help, but some others were already close by, and they hauled him up by his armpits and got him on a cot, too.
What… what… everything’s… oh, no…
His head pounded. Both of his hands came to rest on his temples, and they compressed his head, trying to squeeze it down so that the pain did not echo so loud in his mind. The ache soon followed after his hands, and it had him gasping on the cot. He heard shouting and people dropping bowls.
“What’s going on? What’s going on? Out of my way, angry dryad female coming through!”
And as that familiar warmth approached him, the ache abated a little. He could just about blink open his eyes to see someone tall sweeping through the crowd gathered around him.
“Ah, Ms. Rosemary. We’re, uh, not sure, he just… collapsed for some reason.”
“Looks like mana dilation. Lad’s got a bad headache, I can see it in his face.”
Be quiet, man. Don’t be a snitch-
A calf popped it’s head up, “Yeah! The tree-man was running around everywhere, and everyone felt better. He has to be uber powerful, just like Great Healer Laird!”
Rosemary’s voice could freeze lava, “Hmm. Mana dilation, huh. Even though I told him to stop when he started tapping into his reserves. Hmm, interesting.”
But even if her voice was cold, her hands were warm. They rested on his head, and after a couple of breaths, the throbbing in his head slowed down, and he could open his eyes fully to see what was before him. When the picture came into focus, he almost wished she had never come to fix him.
Rosemary stared down at him, almost squinting from how narrow her eyes were.
“And our healer awakes. Shall he jump up and overexert himself again, find himself in another case of mana dilation?”
“I’m… I’m sorry…” he said, and it was barely a whisper, “I… I couldn’t heal him. I…”
And he couldn’t hold it in anymore.
He needed to be outside, away from all the stares, all the human eyes piercing through him, and even Rosemary herself. Somehow, he got to his feet. Rosemary tried to shove him back into bed, but he stumbled away, pushing through the crowd, bumping into beds and falling over, but nothing could stop him from his escape. He burst out through the doors.
Outside, the air was chill, heralding the dusk.
He wiped his eyes and swallowed back what was coming up his throat. Everything was trying to leave him, all the bile and tears, everything he had eaten that day, and he didn’t blame them. What kind of a healer was he? He couldn’t even heal one human without thinking of the gold man, without it breaking down his focus like a hammer to a wall.
He found a spot in a shaded area of the clearing, and laid back. The grass pushed him up, up towards the sky above, coloured in every shade of red. The sun was about to descend. He took in one breath, then another, just like the High Priestess had taught him.
One at a time.
Above, the clouds stared back. How he wished he could join them so high up, lounging far above the canvas of broken wheels that were spinning all over, wondering why the little folk made life so hard for themselves.
Rosemary appeared and sat next to him.
“Hey… how are you feeling? I’m sorry if I sounded a little harsh, I was just angry.”
He didn’t take his eyes off the clouds, “It’s fine. I just needed a little air.”
“Forgive me, though?”
Somehow, Rosemary managed to make him chuckle. Just a little bit. “No.”
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She blinked. Then, she smacked his arm, “Hmph. How am I supposed to earn it, then?”
A thousand things ran through his head at her earnest tone, but one thing held him captive longest. It was that memory of Andura. Just before she had left for Yurth, on the village’s day of love, when she was putting on her final touches in her room.
“Listen, he is mad for you.”
“Can you tell me that again?”
He closed his eyes.
“Can you tell me… tell me I’m not a failure of a healer?”
“Why would you be? You’ve just overseen the recovery of almost a thousand people, around four hundred bovines and five hundred-ish soldiers. Well, not all of them are injured, but most of them are, and everyone’s healing and happy-”
“Sorry, Rosie, but… I… I don’t need all of that. I just need one thing. Tell me… tell me I’m not a failure.”
Rosemary twitched at the word failure. She grabbed his hand and held it close to her, “You’re not a failure. We’re not failures.”
“Ah… yeah, we aren’t.”
“No. We’re a team. And if we do fail, which we won’t… we’ll fail together.”
They laid back in silence for a while, watching the clouds lounge. Then, he decided to speak it aloud, for if he didn’t, it would fester and grow inside him and be another of the voices that dragged him down into the darkness.
“I… I couldn’t heal humans well. I could touch up a knee or a bruise here or there, but… but whenever I tried to stitch up a big wound, like that soldier a moment ago … all I remember is the gold man. All the veins, all the muscles, the same bodies.”
Rosemary let the words spread out for a while before she responded.
“I don’t know anything about that, my sapling. But what I do know,” she turned over and looked him in the eye, “is that you are the bravest, best healer I know. And sometimes healers need breaks too. You’re not all-powerful just because you can save a life.”
“But people expect me to be, and then when I don’t, I’ve failed-”
“No, hush. You’ve asked me to say it, and I already have, but I’ll say it again – we are no failures. There is no failure I see in you, only a silly sapling who wants to do the brave things he can’t yet do. But one day you’ll do them. And all the other things, like you told me this afternoon.”
“One day?”
“One day. One day, you’ll be the next Great Healer. And I’ll have to sort out all the lines of patients knocking on our door, and all the little acolytes barging in to learn from the wise Lepius the Sage.”
He chuckled. “I’m no sage.”
“Not today. You know what you are today? You’re a tired little sapling who needs rest.”
“The human… he still needs help… his wounds are still not completely stitched over…”
Rosemary sighed and cast her eyes up to the sky, as if she was asking for divine guidance. The clouds did not answer, bored as they were. She turned back to him and gave him a look reminiscent of Mother when he tried to lie between his teeth, and then she nodded.
“You may. But not yet. Sleep here a while, next to me. The human is stable, he can wait a while. No one’s getting healed if the healer breaks down.”
“Okay.”
“And when you do go in and do your healer things, know I am with you. I love you.”
“I love you too.”
An hour later, under Karra’s chants of Great Healer Laird, Rosemary’s smile, Junni’s poker face, and Bendeit with his arms crossed… he begged, just this once, for himself to forget the gold man, and be the healer again.
And he did.
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Karra
“Mother, didn’t I tell you how wonderful Lepius was?!”
“Mm. You did, Karra.”
She bounced next to her mother, watching the rest of the bovines filter back to their beds and prepare for the night. Elders were sat in the corner with the Clan mages, no doubt discussing the mana circle, and parents were tucking in their calves as they demanded one more round on the waterslide, even if their voices were feeble and half-asleep. The hall was winding down for night.
“So? Rosemary was super cool, and you just saw Lepius clearing up that big gash like it was nothing. Did… did my father do things like that?”
Her mother sipped from a cup of grassmilk, and swirled it around in her mouth for a while. Afterwards, she said, “Yes. He did do things like that.”
“Well, tell me about it, Mother! You know how much I love hearing about them!”
“Ah, you cheeky thing. Let’s see, then. I… uh, alright. Do you remember running around, getting things like bandages and honey for your father?”
She bobbed her head. How could she ever forget? She would forget her own name before she would allow those stories to slip away.
“Well, one day… a passerby, an adventurer, came in with a big wound. Blood leaking out everywhere, and your father sprung right into action.”
Karra saw stars, “Really? And he healed him straight away, didn’t he?”
“By Laarsh, he did. And when he finished it all, he called you to bring him the bandages and honey, just to dab on the little scar he had left, because while your father could heal much, he knew to be smart. No need to waste mana to heal over something so small, as you know.”
“Laarsh, Father was so smart…. I wish, I wish he hadn’t died, Mother. So he could teach me to be smart, too.”
Her mother had a blank face on, the one she wore when she played those card games with the elders, and she said, “Yeah. I wish so, too. But you are smart, my dear.”
They lapsed into silence for a while, and when they spoke again their words clashed in the air.
“So, Mother, how-”
“Did you talk-”
They both stopped, but her mother gestured at her to go first.
“How is the bruise, Mother? You said a soldier hit you with the pommel of his sword?”
Junni massaged the lump on her head. A nurse had given her a branch of thyme like the rest of those designated ‘mild’, and Karra saw it was slotted behind her left ear.
“The bruise is fine. It will fade in time. That Lepius didn’t come to check on me personally, though.”
Karra pouted, “Oh, Mother. You know he has to deal with so many patients, he has to treat the worst ones first.”
“Are you saying your mother doesn’t have the worst wound here?”
Karra giggled and nudged her mother, “Not unless you count a bruised ego.”
“My, my. You’re getting bolder, aren’t you? Talking back to me, your mother.”
Her ears flattened down on her hair, and she looked down to blush, “Sorry, Mother. I didn’t… I didn’t know what came over me. I shouldn’t have-”
“Don’t be silly. If I wasn’t so surprised, I would be laughing. What’s got you so talkative, anyways?”
Karra turned to look at Lepius, talking to two of his nurses, and Rosemary, pushing a cart heavy with carrot stew. Her mother turned to follow her gaze, and she saw her eyes soften, just a bit. Karra hid her little fist-pump behind her back.
“Hmm. They’re not too bad, I suppose.”
“Mother… what were you going to say, before I interrupted?”
Her mother waved a hand, “We both interrupted each other. You don’t always have to take the blame for everything. And I was going to ask if you had talked to that Sergeant yet, the one you threw an apple at.”
“Oh… um, he took me running, in the late afternoon.”
“Yes,” her mother’s lips quirked up, “I was there, remember? But it might be best to go talk to him a final time. Just to make sure there’s no bad blood after his great wound.”
So she set off for Sergeant Bendeit.
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Bendeit
“You did well, Deitfreid.”
The lad coughed up the last of it as Bendeit held up the half-filled bowl. When the lad pushed it away, he clapped him on the back and poured the vomit in the communal waste. The bowl he set aside. And then he set him back in bed, waved off his soldiers-turned-nurses who tried to help, and wiped off what remained on his chin and lips. Deitfreid grasped for his arm.
“Sarge, I’m fine, right?”
“Yeah, you’re fine, kid. No need to worry. You’ll be heading back home soon, after that wound clears up.”
“Did I – cough – did I do well in the fighting? I trained hard yesterday.”
Bendeit allowed the lad a rare smile, “You did well. Better than I expected, but you’ll need to work on your footing. If your squad hadn’t pulled you out faster, that bovine guard would’ve finished you off.”
Deitfreid groaned and covered his face with his hands, “Outdone! Outdone by a bovine! I’ll never live to see the end of this!”
“Well, at least you’re living. Small steps, kid.”
“Ugh… and sir… about the joke I made, in front of-”
“Don’t worry about it, lad. We were all running pretty high on it. I shouldn’t have headbutted you that hard, either.”
Deitfreid finally settled back after that, and Bendeit gestured for the other nurses to clean up the rest. As he walked to the next soldier strapped to bed, he saw someone approaching. A bovine. He stood a bit taller when he caught sight of that dappled white fur, then began to smoothen his moustache.
“Bovine Karra. What brings you?”
She trembled under his gaze.
“Um, hi, Sergeant Bendeit. I just wanted… wanted to check to see if you were okay, I guess?”
“Chest, Bovine Karra.”
She blinked and looked down. “Huh?”
“If you are to say something, say it with your chest. Don’t mumble away like you don’t mean it.”
“Um, okay! How… how do I-”
“Back straight! Arms at your sides, Bovine Karra!”
Half the soldiers around him, out of sheer instinct, shot up from their slumped positions. Karra, who was on the receiving end of his shout, stood up so straight it was like lightning had struck her dumb. Even her fur was standing up at his call. He tried not to let his smile show, and hid it under his moustache.
“Now, say it.”
She took a breath, and her voice did tremble, but he nodded at it nonetheless, “I, Bovine Karra, have hit you with an apple! I want to check if you are feeling well or not!”
“Good. Next time you speak to someone, you talk like that. Hear me?”
She nodded and relaxed her shoulders slightly, looking down, “Okay, Sir.”
“Hey – hey. You’re already looking away. You know down? It’s time for some lessons. It’s not dusk yet, and we still have some time. Follow me.”
Knocking him out? Apologizing without looking into his eyes?
Time to discipline this little thing.