Mender

chapter eleven

Mary

"Jax!" I instinctively lunged for him and was only stopped by the several men who surged forward in preparation for exactly that. "Jax! What happened?! Who did this?!" Rattling off questions and demanding answers, I grappled with the arms holding me back.

"Mary, you have to calm down! You're not going to be able to help him like that!" Barnes tried to explain, moving in front of my captors to take control of the situation. Calmly guiding the men towards the backroom, he ushered Jax past me, stopping to console me with a shoulder rub. "Please, calm down and come back." He said in a low voice, before throwing the curtains closed behind him and the men.

Wide-eyed and terrified, I struggled to breathe through lungs that, all of a sudden, felt too small. Ah, I'm hyperventilating. Oh, gods. Scanning the room in a frenzy, when I finally found something suitable, I pointed to it and motioned with my head for someone to get it, because right now I couldn't move my legs.

Eager to assist, someone immediately brought me what I wanted. Taking the canvas bag full of lady's mantle from the hunter's hand, I poured the flowers out and put the bag to my mouth. Rapidly breathing in and out of the bag, I tried to calm myself. Think happy thoughts, Mary. Those flowers you just dumped are really pretty, yeah? I bet they'd look great as accents in the living room back at the house. Mary, remember how good Phyllis' apple pie tasted.

Mmm! "So good!"

Scaring a few men with my outburst, I eventually slowed my breathing to a near normal pace. "You're panicking Mary. Barnes is right: you need to calm down. Imagine if you had tried to heal him without thinking; you might've made it worse for the both of you." I reprimanded myself aloud.

Healing magic is a double-edged sword.

Tapping my fingers against the sides of my legs, I tried to keep my trembling under control by following a rhythm. Taking a moment to do so, when I finally saw some results, I gathered myself with a few deep breaths and gingerly muscled the curtain aside.

Steeling myself, I approached the group of men struggling to carefully extract Jax from the slab of wood he'd been tied to. They unwound several thin blankets and lifted him from the plank. And though I tried to keep my emotions in check, tears slipped through the cracks as I listened to his pained breathing and shuddered breaths. Attempting to contain a shudder of my own, I tensed my muscles as tight as I could wind them.

Scaring the crap out of me, Barnes grabbed me by the shoulder. Putting comforting strength in his grip, he spoke softly. "Please, relax Mary," he pleaded. "You're the only one who can heal major injuries, so if you can't calm down he won't get the help he needs."

I knew he was right. Damnit, Mary. Get yourself together girl. Your own assistant is making more sense than you are.

Wiping my eyes and fanning the sweat forming along my brows, I gave Barnes a nod and weaved through the gap the tense men had formed for me by Jax's bedside.

Stepping closer and closer, my eyes welled the closer I got. Stumbling into the support of Barnes, who'd followed me, I steadied my footing and finally stole a glance at Jax. As much as it pained me to see...he needed my help right now.

So, through misted eyes and steeled nerves, I tried my best to remain cool while I observed his condition. Of course, the most eye-catching feature was his face. My gods. What happened to him? His face was a mass of blue and black flesh. In as many places where his skull caved in, just as many bones poked through the dead skin in other spots.

Wondering about the rest of his body, I didn't feel uncomfortable having the surrounding men help me strip him. Most of them, at one point or another, had the same experience, and this was much too somber an occasion to care in the first place.

Examining the rest of him, I breathed a long sigh of relief. There wasn't anything serious. Luckily, besides his face, the rest of him was uninjured, bar a few scrapes along his heels where his shoes had worn through.

With my focus now narrowed down to his face, I did a thorough examination and relayed the major information to Barnes as I picked them out. His face needed a meticulous cleaning and any open injuries needed disinfecting, immediately. His bones would need to be reset, and that would fall onto me when Barnes finished the preliminary cleaning. Lifting his eyelids, I noted the same symptoms the other man showed. Dilated eyes. No motion. Lingering just a second on the beautiful green around his pupils, I let the lids drop and his eyes closed.

He's got a concussion. Okay. I closed my eyes a moment and prayed he'd be alright. Gods please...help him through this.

Leaving his hand with a kiss, I let Barnes take over the prep work. He'd need a few minutes to get everything ready for me, so I turned to the last cot.

The boy lay face down, trembling from what was probably shock. The gashes along his back were fresh. Probably not even a day old. Noting the three slashes, I wondered whether or not he'd been attacked. "What happened to the boy?" I asked the group waiting to the side.

Holden, the same man who had first brought the boy, stepped forward. He was the Hunt lead before and after Jax and I moved here. Strong, steady, and serious, the man may not be as strong as Jax, but he was still the lead for a reason. "We found him two miles inside the forest," he explained. "When I saw him, he was lying face down. And by the time I got close enough to call out to him, the kid passed out." Motioning his head, "That's when I saw the claw marks on his back."

So he was attacked.

"Whatever got him, got him good, because those gashes run deep. The boy's lucky to be alive." Eeking anger into his undertone, he added, "It's not just the claws; look at the rest of him." He sighed. "Please see what you can do to help the kid. I'm not sure what happened, but we think he helped Jax; he's got rope burn along his palms and we found Jax not too far away from him. That's enough reason to do all we can. Right now, we've got people following the trail the boy left behind when he was dragging Jax along, so I'll be sure to tell you what we find."

"Thanks, Holden. Could you actually have someone bring me a few buckets of clean hot water and a sterile cloth?" Nodding his head, instead of asking someone else like he had the authority to do, he went to the task himself. He was always reliable when there was work to be done.

"Guys." Lifting the bundle of blankets that'd been placed on the boy, I gestured for some men to help me strip him down. We ran into a snag with his shirt though. It was slow work; it had small buttons along the front which made it tedious to remove. Even when they were undone, the shirt's fabric stuck to parts of his body that had been cut and then healed around the material.

"Thank gods he's asleep," I thought aloud. Pulling this off was going to hurt a lot. With the mens' help, we peeled the shirt off. Whatever damage was done I could just heal any-

Unconscious of it, my hand flew to my mouth. "Oh, my gods!"

What happened to him? What the shirt had been stuck to were boils and blisters that had pussed over and dried to the shirt like an adhesive. Not only that but there were portions of material that had fallen into gaping holes and the flesh had healed around it, so we had to actually rip the shirt out.

Having removed that, I finally got to see how bad his condition was. First off, his arm was broken. The damage was so bad, it looked as if he had been using his arm while it was broken. Running a hand along his arm, his body was hot to the touch, almost as if he had a fever. Or worse. Infection after infection laid itself across his body, from his hands - which were nearly entirely yellow - to his chest, he was riddled with maggots and dead tissue.

"Ugh!" Nose rankled by the putrid smell of rotting flesh, one of the more stomach sensitive men pulled back from the table. And while he purged his lunch into the waste bin, Holden gave the back of his head a thump as he came back from the front room, cleaning equipment in hand. Returning to the table, he gave me one of the medical rags and set three small buckets of water onto the floor near my feet.

"Here ya' go ma'am." Grabbing three more rags and passing them along to the other hunters, he looked to me to take the lead. "Since your assistant's busy, I figured we could help ya' out." Noting the resolute faces around me, I gave the men a smile. "Thank you. Well, just like Jax, before I can anything serious we need to get him cleaned up." Dipping the rag into the boiled water, I started wiping the boy's hands. These needed to be done first.

Wincing at the strength I put into rubbing his wounds, the men were hesitant to use too much strength and hurt the kid. Rolling my eyes at the delicate hunters, I explained my harsh treatment while I continued to rub along. "Guys, I need to make sure it's a thorough scrub, so you'll have to be a little rough." I scraped back an infected scab and puss oozed out of his finger. "You see these infections? He needs as deep a cleaning as we can get to, and I'm gonna use magic to heal him back up after we finish, so just make sure he's spick and span. Gods, what kind of men are you? Fletchers?"

Partially concerned for the child and partially insulted, the men began scrubbing with a vigor that left the boy's skin red but clean nonetheless. But the more we scrubbed the more horror the boy's body unveiled. Cleaning along his rib cage, my hand ran into bumps where broken bones had pushed muscle into the skin. There wasn't an unbruised spot on his body that was wide enough to put my hand over.

Quite a few minutes passed before his front was clean enough to work on. Flipping him over we did the same thing for his back, which wasn't much besides the three immense cuts along the right side. The wounds were so deep I had to reach inside with my fingers up to the second digits.

His shoulder was dislocated but that was an easy enough fix. Scrubbing the rest of his backside, we flipped him back over again. Satisfied with the prep, I decided it was time to finally get to some damn business.

"Alright guys, thank you for all the help, but this is where you need to go," I announced. "It's too crowded in here for me to focus. So let's get a move on boys."

Crestfallen that they wouldn't be able to see the magic show, Holden had to grab a few lingerers by the neck and guide them through the curtained wall. Turning around to give me one last "good luck" he closed the drape behind him, leaving the room empty besides me and Barnes, who'd just finished cleaning and bandaging Jax.

"He's all ready for you, Mary." He said, quietly. Grabbing a chair, he placed it at the side of Jax's cot. Giving a thank you, I sat down and took a long breath. Without the chatter, I finally had time to think. Time I wish I didn't have, to be honest. Settling into the chair my fingers rattled against the wood.

Calm down, girl. What are you?

A badass.

Damn right. Are badasses worried about anything?

I'm worried about Jax.

Whatever girl, he'll be fine. You just need to calm down enough to help him. Right?

Yeah, I know. You're right. Releasing a few pre-game shivers, I slapped my cheeks. "I got this."

Reflecting my anxiety, Barnes paced at my side, ticking away as he rattled off. "Ar-Are you go-gonna be alight? I-Is there an-anything else you need? If-If there is, I-I'm right here." He stuttered, and almost amused, I wondered when he'd ever get used to this kind of work. The boy was still squeamish after all this time.

I shook my head, "No Barnes, just watch what I do okay. Treat this like you would a magic lesson and focus on me. Calm down and watch."

Okay, girl, it's all you now. I know this is Jax, but get yourself together. Breathe. Placing my right hand on my chest I sucked in several long breaths in a pattern of three.

Breath. Breath. Breath.

Admittedly anxious, I continued to focus on my breathing while I stretched my left hand, so that it just hovered over Jax's face by a mere inch.

Breath. Breath. Breath.

I closed my eyes and centered my attention on the cadence of my pittering heartbeat.

Focus, girl.

Breath. Breath. Breath.

Feeling the mana around my heart, I Drew. Despite my faltering heartbeat, I Drew more, and more, and more. Opening my eyes to concentrate on Jax's face, I watched white dots float from my chest like dandelion spores in the wind. Relieved I still managed to Draw despite my agitation, I willed the string of white magic to Jax.

My heart quivered. Okay. Now's the hard part.

Continuing to Draw, I let the mana run from a trickle to a stream, and over the span of just minutes, his bruises healed, going from a dark blue to his usual tan, and then the scrapes mended over, and the cuts pulled themselves together, until all that was left was the bone damage and the tooth repair.

"Every time I see it, it's still breathtaking." Barnes sighed in amazement. Changing his tune however as he saw the sweat drip from my face. "Just be careful you don't Draw too much, Mary." He warned.

Aware of the danger myself, I knew I couldn't treat him all at once. The bones were going to take a while, and I didn't have much left in me. My heartbeat was fluttering too fast, and I still had more work to do.

Twisting the chair around to face the other cot, I had Barned turn the boy so I could get to his back. This needed to be taken care of soon. Everything else could wait till tomorrow, but these cuts were too serious to let go.

Placing a hand along the wounds, I tried to calm my breathing and feel for my core. Since my magic was based on life, I had to Draw from life...and there was no better Source than myself.

Feeling my heart already palpitate in my chest, I worried if I had enough energy to treat the gashes enough to stabilize him for the night. Since I dropped out of school to runaway with Jax, I really wasn't skilled enough to Draw from anything else yet, so I used my own life. If I wanted to help them any more than this, without doing serious damage to myself, I'd need some rest.

A little nervous, I Drew again. Warmed up already, this time was easier to Draw than the last, so the stream was immediate. Pure white mana traveled through the air and closed in on the claw marks. Muscles shivering, I concentrated on closing the wounds. Soaking the mana in, the depth of his wounds shrank as it slowly closed up.

At this point, my heart was shuddering and my hand fell into spasms. "Uhh." A groan slipped out and black specks began to bite at my vision as a migraine set in. "Ugh."

"Mary!"Quick to come to my aid, Barnes shook me to sense. "Stop Mary! He's fine! He'll be fine! You need to rest!" He pinched my arm until it was too uncomfortable to focus. The gushing stream of mana slowed to an unhurried trickle that ultimately cut off as I slumped back into my chair.

Drenched in sweat and clutching my chest, I exhaled the thought I always had after intensive healing.

"My gods...why did I want to be a mender?"