Chapter 1.10 - In which Healer Clements has strange customers

Roger

Month 9, Day 28, Tuesday 6:00 a.m.

Roger Clements woke to the sound of someone pounding insistently on his door before the sun had even fully risen. He would have ignored the clamor, except for the same reason that he didn’t wear noise-muffling ear plugs to sleep. Sometimes, people came to him at odd hours with emergencies where some unfortunate life hung on the line.

If Roger declined to treat them—no matter how justified his need for proper rest was—Healer Nidson would get that insufferable superior expression on his face. The man might even talk about how he put his own life on the line as a battlefield healer for the army, and now made visits to the injured so that people didn’t have to haul a broken and dying person to his clinic.

And then Nidson might make a pointed comment about how his training and meticulous preparation lowered his rate of misdiagnosis, mistreatment, and long-term complications.

Even the thought had Roger scowling as he forced his protesting body out of bed and pulled on clothes that wouldn’t embarrass him to open the door in. “It was only that one time!” he muttered to himself. “A couple minor mistakes now and then are to be expected, when you treat dozens of people every day, all of them whining about the same issues in different ways, sick with every manner of putrid ailment under the sun. Not all of us can afford multiple assistants to boss about like some sort of army sergeant, who are conveniently available to take all the blame if anything ever goes wrong.” His tone grew harsher as the irritation put some warmth into his bones. “No, Radiant Maiden forbid that Hugh Nidson ever be brought down a peg or two. Chopped off at the knees would be more appropriate, put him at eye level with the rest of us mortals…”

Providing Healer Nidson with any more ammunition to act superior to Roger was unacceptable. And so Roger opened the door and peered out into the gloom—the light of the nearest street lamp barely reached his house. Roger resolved once again to get a light for his doorstep, and once again changed his mind immediately as he remembered that some hooligan would just steal the light crystal out of it.

Huddling in the cold were a dark-skinned man and boy. Both brightened when they saw Roger. Both also seemed totally uninjured. Arguably, they were visibly tense, so perhaps they wished for Roger to follow them to someone in dire straights elsewhere. Roger lifted a hand to them, palm outward, and forestalled any pleas. “Any who need treatment must be brought to me. I do not make house calls…or street call.” Not without enough gold on offer, which these two didn’t look the type to have, and the offer of protection, which they also didn’t look like they could provide.

The older customer waved his hands, which were covered in some rather nice leather gloves that had Roger increasing his estimation of their monetary capabilities. “No house or street calls necessary. It’s my son who needs an examination.”

With saint-like self control, Roger held in some pointed comments about how they had woken him at such an evil hour for only an examination. But he was already awake, and might as well make some coin from it. “Come in,” he offered, standing to the side. “What seems to be the problem?”

The father spoke as he walked in, his son trailing behind him. “Percival has had a rather strange and worrisome run-in with a hag and some unknown magic. Are you experienced with—” The man cut off as he spotted Count Fluffbutt the Bloodthirsty, Roger’s cat. He slid into a crouched, ready position, as if preparing to pounce or wrestle.

Count Fluffbutt eyed the customer curiously, licked one paw, and dragged it over his ear.

Still crouched, the man snapped, “He has a cat! Percy, the door.”

Roger sidled protectively in between Count Fluffbutt and the crazy man as the boy hurried inside and closed the door firmly behind himself, knocked the latch, and then tested it with a tug on the handle. Only then did the two customers relax.

Roger had a moment of lingering fear for Count Fluffbutt, but with the door closed, their interest in his beloved pet disappeared as swiftly as it had arrived. Roger waited a moment, just in case one of them was about to rub their hands together gleefully and say, “Now that you’re trapped in here with us…” but they just looked at him expectantly.

“Where is your examination room, Healer Clement?” the father asked.

Roger coughed and gestured with his arm through the side door. “What can I help you with?” he asked again.

“My son may have been cursed, or otherwise affected by some kind of nefarious magic. Are you familiar with talisman work? We still have the pouch, though the contents seem to have escaped. And we were hoping you could do a thorough examination of a rather worrying mark that appeared on Percy when the talisman activated.” Without even asking, the rude father pushed one of Roger’s artifact away from the edge of its spot on a high bookshelf, as if he was Roger’s ex mother-in-law, sticking her nose into all his things and “cleaning” judgmentally during every visit.

The boy moved to one of the customer seats in front of Roger’s examination table, first grabbing it by the arms and testing it for structural integrity, and then running his hand over the surface as if checking for dust or splinters.

That was it. Roger couldn’t stay silent any longer. “I assure you, the furniture is perfectly clean. No leftover blood, or bodily fluids, or whatever your obsessive compulsive tendencies are worried about.”

The boy had the decency to flush, at least. “Oh, no, it’s not that at all! I’m sure you’re very clean, it’s just—”

The father stepped forward, smiling genially. “I’m sorry, it’s just that Percy has had several chairs collapse out from under him, or stab him with hidden splinters, needles, and one time even a nail. We’ve become a bit wary about him sitting down before the seat has been checked thoroughly. There’s nothing quite like a nasty surprise in the buttocks!” he said, laughing jovially.

That was the stupidest excuse Roger had ever heard, and in his heart, the price for this consultation rose by a few silver. “Why don’t you explain your symptoms from the beginning?” He said, sitting down at the comfortable chair on the other side of the examination table and pressing his fingers together in a way that he knew made him look more discerning.

“My son’s luck is worse than the average child’s, and it has been since he was born. Yesterday, he met a hag on the side of the street who sold him a good luck talisman before fleeing when the coppers arrived. It could be that she simply didn’t have a license to set up a roadside stall there, but based on the things that happened afterward, I’m worried that the circumstances are more nefarious.”

Percy’s father kept his hands still around the front of the chair’s armrests and his feet flat on the floor, but the tension in his voice suggested that someone with less self-control might have been bouncing his knees or twitching his fingers. “When Percy tried to activate the talisman later that day, it released a large cloud of moths.”

“More than should have fit inside the pouch,” the boy added, pulling out a tattered piece of cloth as evidence.

“My son panicked and presumably knocked himself out.”

Roger eyed the boy dubiously, who flushed and raised a hand to a contusion on his forehead.

“When Percy woke, he had been marked.” The man looked to his son with an encouraging nod.

The boy rolled back his left sleeve to reveal a stylized tattoo of a butterfly on his wrist. “I know it looks like a tattoo, but I don’t remember getting one. I didn’t have a receipt, and I wasn’t missing any coin. It was already healed when I woke up, but no signs of any healing salve remained on the skin. The tattoo just…appeared out of nowhere.”

“It is probably relevant that the design is of a moth, the same insect that came out of the talisman,” the father added. Both customers turned toward Roger expectantly.

“I see…” Roger said slowly. “And what symptoms have you been experiencing?”

The two shared a look. “Umm, no symptoms?” the boy said. “Except, my luck does seem to have gotten better. It’s too early to tell for sure, of course.”

Roger stood up and retrieved his examination artifact. A few minutes later, he reported the results. “You don’t seem to be suffering from any deleterious effects. You have a few bumps, nasty bruises, and scrapes, and your body is experiencing a minor heightened immune response, but that’s all. All things I can fix up in a jiffy, with some potions and salves.”

The boy and his father shared another meaningful look. “But what about the tattoo?” the boy asked.

The father agreed. “Can’t you check if it’s magical? Is it really giving him good luck, or is it some kind of curse mark? Maybe the hag can use it to harm him later, from afar, with an invisible, sympathetic magical link. That’s what it’s called, right?”

Roger brought out two more diagnostic artifacts, his brightest light crystal lamp, and a large magnifying glass. After another few minutes of silent, eager staring from the duo, he said, “There are no signs of any glyphs or numerological symbols. Those should be necessary if there were a spell array. Other than that, the most common indication of magic would be a small amount of excess heat leaking from the area. Increased blood-flow could hint at something strange, but your arm is normal. When I place the appendage inside the generalized warding box, the artifact doesn’t activate to fight any nefarious effects off.”

Roger turned off his searingly bright lamp. “There is no perfect way to quantify the existence of magic itself, only its applied effects or the energy it may involuntarily discharge. However, all signs point this being a perfectly mundane tattoo.”

“Are you sure the warding artifact is actually working? It couldn’t be out of a charge, could it?” the father asked.

Roger stared at him for a long moment, unable to completely hide his feelings. “It’s working,” he said shortly.

“Well, what about the talisman itself?” the boy asked, pushing the tatty pouch toward Roger.

Roger picked it up between his forefinger and thumb, eyeing the filthy thing dubiously.“How much did you say you paid for this?”

“One gold,” the boy admitted, looking away and fiddling with his glasses.

At least he had the sense be embarrassed. Roger ran it through the same tests, and found, again—obviously—absolutely no signs of magic, despite the fact that many of the embroidered glyphs were real, if somewhat rare.

But again, the two protested that he must be missing something. He wondered, suddenly, if perhaps they just couldn’t bear the fact that they’d spent an entire gold on something worthless. He cleared his throat hesitantly. “You do realize that luck magic doesn’t actually exist?” he asked.

When the two layman stared at him blankly, Roger pushed the little pouch back toward the boy with his forefinger and explained. “The whole category of luck-affecting magic is somewhat of a scam,” he said gently. “With magic, you can help to nudge outcomes in one direction or the other, but it’s for simple things. A talisman to help you pass a test cannot actually affect the outcome of the test in any way. At most, it will help to refresh your mind and keep you energized and focused. ‘Good luck’ is too general. What does that mean? Protection from physical and emotional harm, great and small, and increased chances to have fortuitous encounters while avoiding danger? There are so many possibilities, so much nuance, there’s no way to pack all of those ideas into a single spell. Anything that purports to do so is lying. Talismans are really only another type of ward, and those require specifics.”

The boy seemed quite confused, while the father crossed his arms. “Do you often deal with curses?” the man asked.

Roger harrumphed, crossing his arms over his chest in return. “I deal with plenty of people who think they’ve been cursed. I can assure you, real curses, blood magic, whatever you may suspect, are much rarer than fear mongering rumors might have you believe. And, again, such a thing would have a specificeffect. General ‘bad luck,’ is a myth.”

The man stared at him for a long moment, and then asked, “Do you have a recommendation for a local cursebreaker?” The implication of, ‘someone more knowledgeable,’ was clear, and Roger decided he’d had enough abuse for one morning.

After demanding payment for his work and his trouble, he kicked the bizarre duo out.

Count Fluffbutt the Bloodthirsty tried to escape for a nice morning stroll, and they rudely slammed the door in his whiskered face.

Author Note: This is one of my favorite chapters in this book!