The Healer

[Zevka]

Name: Jasper Hooklaw
Category: Healer
Species: Stoat
Age: 30
Gender: Male
 
War raged around the preoccupied stoat, dropping beasts left and right. Out of the corner of his eye, Jasper counted the fallen hordebeasts: two weasels, a rat, and now a fox. He hurriedly tied a strip of cloth round the bloodied leg of a battle-shocked ferret, then moved to one of the weasels. It was Balgar, a close acquaintance. Jasper?s paws moved automatically, searching for indications of injury. A telltale black ooze betrayed a gut wound and the stoat stopped.
 
?Can ya fix me, mate?? Balgar?s voice rasped.
 
Jasper shook his head. ?I?m sorry.? He slipped the weasel?s dirk from its sheath and wrapped the hordebeast?s paws firmly around the hilt, leaning close. ?End it quick.?
 
The stoat stood and sprinted for the next victim, distracting himself with new injuries. A cracked skull, broken leg, and severed paw later, Jasper dashed into an open stretch of road to pull a wounded horde rat to safety. Arrows peppered the mud around them until they reached a small copse of trees. Jasper propped the rat up against the trunk of an ash, feeling at the rodent?s body, dismissing minor wounds until he found a broken shaft protruding from the left thigh. He cursed.
 
?Is it bad?? The rat grimaced.
 
?Eh, could be worse.? Jasper shrugged, ?I just hate arrows.? He continued to speak more to himself than the rat. ?Best to push them all the way through most times, ?cept when bone?s blocking the way. Then there?s little choice but to pull the thing out.? Jasper grabbed the cracked shaft and gave it a wiggle. The rat yelped but the arrow held firm, its tip embedded deep in the femur.
 
The medic glanced up as a trio of hordebeasts ran past. ?Uh oh. Front line?s pulling back.? He moved more urgently, retrieving a pair of specially designed forceps from his satchel and plunged a narrow, clawless finger into the puncture. The rat let loose another shriek of pain and seized the healer by the collar, eyes protruding and teeth grinding.
 
?Bite down on something if you must.? Jasper instructed determinedly. ?I?ve got to finish this now.? He had felt the pulse of a major artery, and knew the razor-sharp arrowhead could not remain where it was. The rat sank his yellow teeth into a scabbard as the stoat jammed the forceps in, seizing the bone-bound arrowhead and pulling with all his strength. Both beasts roared as the stoat yanked and tugged until finally the remnant of arrow jerked loose, landing Jasper on his tail. He quickly treated and wrapped the wound, then offered his paw and a shoulder for the rat to lean on.
 
?Now if we?re lucky, we??
 
?Eeee-aye-eeee!? He was cut off mid-sentence by a war cry.
 
A weasel appeared mere yards from the tree where they crouched then was lanced abruptly through the torso by an exuberant otter warrior. He fell with a rattling gasp and the otter turned his crazed eyes on the stoat and wounded rat.
 
?Get out of here, doc,? the rat growled, drawing his cutlass and leaning against the tree for support. ?There?re plenty more what?ll be needin? your aid.?
 
The otter tried to free the lance, stuck fast in the body of their dead comrade.
 
Jasper drew his own sword. It was thin and springy, like himself. ?I?m not about to let you get butchered after working so hard to keep you alive.? He stepped in front of his patient.
 
The otter gave up on the lance and drew his sword, charging the stoat with a bestial cry. Jasper deflected the first blow, redirected the second, then turned the third to his advantage, bringing the otter close. With swift precision, he brought the thin blade up, slicing just behind the beast?s lower jaw to sever vein and artery. The otter plunged past him, turned, and collapsed.
 
The rat gaped at the blood-spattered healer. ?Vulpuz?s veneers, Doc! I didn?t know you could fight.?
 
Jasper helped the rat hobble back toward camp. ?When I have to. Now shut up and move.?
 
They had walked barely four steps when an arrow thudded suddenly into the rat?s back. He grunted and fell.
 
?No no no!? Jasper gripped the hordebeast by his coat as he writhed and gurgled on the muddy ground.
 
?Medic!? a faraway voice implored.
 
Jasper waited a moment longer as the rat faded, then stood, wiping a paw across his face.
 
?Damn arrows.?
 
He dashed off in the direction of the next cry.



----------

Character Name: Kentrith Hapley
Category: The Healer
Species: Fox
Gender: Male
Age: At time of prologue, 32 seasons old. At time of application, 22 seasons old

Ken reared back as arterial spray hit him square in the eyes. He quickly wiped his eyes clear, bearing his fangs in a silent growl, bending back over the gash in the leg before him. ?Where is that thread?? he barked, pulling the needle that had been sterilizing in the fire. He hoped to sew the nick in the small blood vessel before the hare bled to death, but his helpers seemed slower than usual. The black-tipped ears twitched in irritation. This was what came of working here. His assistants never lasted very long, then he would have to train the new ones all over again.

Take this one for example. The timid mouse crept up to him, shoving the newly made strands at him. He glared at her. How by Hellgates had she survived two seasons in this place? Taking the flax thread, he deftly threaded the needle, and instructing a burly hedgehog to hold the writhing hare still, he began to sew. He cursed as the poorly made thread snapped, forcing him to tie it again.?

?Twould be stronger if you used hair,? came a dry voice from behind him. Ken didn?t need to turn to see who watched his battle to save the broken fighting beast before him.

"Are you volunteering your own coat, Nire?? Ken bit out, working to keep his paws steady as he closed the gushing artery, then began on the muscle around it. The hare might limp ever more, but he would keep the leg. Maybe.

The lord of the crater was silent as Ken stitched up the leg, slathered it with his green poultice, then turned to a stoat that had been shot between the ribs. Ken was fairly certain that they hadn?t bothered to dig the crossbow bolt out. He pulled out his leather case and extracted his special knife, one of his own design. The sharp blade widened the wound enough to where his sharp eyes could pick out the sliver of wood, and he used his special pincers to slide the foreign object out. Once it was safe in the waiting bowl, he used more of the inferior suture material to sew the stoat back up, and more poultice to draw out any poison.

?I was thinking your tail would provide adequate material,? Nire finally replied, his slit-pupiled eyes studying the young fox. Glancing down at the instruments that Ken was hurriedly cleaning before another beast was dropped before him, he purred, ?I was also thinking that your skill with a knife would be fascinating to watch in the ring.?

Ken froze with the blade of his knife submerged in boiling water. He lifted his head to stared at Nire, afraid that he was serious. At last, voice forcefully steady, Ken replied, ?You can have either a healer, or a fighter. Not both. I go into the ring, and I refuse to patch up those I slice open myself.?

?You sliced that one open,? the lynx pointed out, jerking his chin toward the unconscious stoat.

Ken took a wet cloth, causing the mouse assistant to squeak as he snapped it out of her paws, and wiped off his paws and muzzle.

?Kentrith,? Nire said suddenly, his voice vicious. ?You have been here for two seasons, and not once have you stepped in the ring. You spend your time sewing up fallen champions, in an effort to give them one last glory day. A wasteful gesture, I warrant.? He rubbed his whiskers thoughtfully. ?I might change the rules, so that there are no fallen champions. Only those who win earn the right to healing.?

Ken slowly straightened, trying to swallow the lump in his throat. ?And those who lose??

The lynx leered evilly. ?They will never need a healer again.? He raised one brow at him. ?Then what will you do??

Ken watched the retreating figure, the bloody room around him fading away in a mist of red rage. He knew what Nire wanted him to do, was going to force him to do. Anything for a show, Ken thought bitterly. Would he ever return to the days of his youth? Well he remembered watching his mother at work, her paws tending to wounded beasts, the entire process seeming like magic to him.

He stared at the gleaming instruments in his paws. Perhaps it was time to join the fight. Perhaps that was indeed the only way out of here, besides death.


-----------------
Name: Maeve
Species: Ferret
Age: 16
Gender: Female
Category: The Healer

"Keep that mess away from me!"
 
Maeve's compress gushed from the side with raw mushrooms, twigs, and a few millipedes fighting for a way out. The ferret tried applying the rank wrap along her twin sister's wounded leg. She received a kick, a sable leg plowing into a silvered stomach, for her efforts.
 
Rilla yelped after lashing out. Her crying redoubled once Maeve recovered and bumbled over with the seething compress still in her paws. The linen ribbons about Maeve's wrists quivered though her muzzle and slave collar remained still.
 
"I got the arrowhead out. We're almost done." Maeve knelt down and dodged flailing ferret limbs. "'All blood and blessings in balance.'"
 
"No, no, NO! You can't say that; you're not mum! We should've never left the bleedin' mines. She's gone for good and you're. You're."
 
"She's not gone for good. We'll find her at the northern quarry. You heard the hares."
 
"Quiet."
 
"I know you heard too."
 
"No, the quiet!"
 
Mossflower Woods normally surged with the songs of flirting sparrows and the crunch of leaves under footpaws. Yet, now, silence reigned in the viridian rush. Both sisters craned their long necks in search of movement, or a sign, or any reason the world stopped.
 
An arrow hitting the dirt beside them answered.
 
"Blighters over yonder! EULALIA!"
 
The twins ran well before the hare warcry sounded. At first Rilla kept up with Maeve's wobbly stride. Then a yard grew between them, then their sprint became more a gallop.
 
"We're...dead..." Rilla's panting increased in time with the leg wound's weeping. "Let's...just...give...up..."
 
Maeve picked up Rilla and renewed the escape. The underbrush of Mossflower hungered for the silver ferret's footpaws, but she hopped through twists in the wood the doughier hares could not fit through. With a little distance, Maeve dove down a dry river's bank and scooted backwards, tucking into the long grass and overhang.
 
The Long Patrol hares vaulted the stream bed. When the warcries and overhead bobtails vanished, Rilla peeked up from the tall river bank grass.
 
"You, you saved us! You."
 
Maeve rolled from the grass and her sister gasped. Three arrows peppered Maeve's back, two to one shoulder and one clean to the rump. Rilla frantically pawed at the air, unsure what to do.
 
"The arrows..." Maeve grunted with the effort of speech. "They...they went through."
 
"I know, I know! I'm sorry. I shouldn't have stopped, I shouldn't have-"
 
"It's okay. 'All blood and blessings...'"
 
Rilla's panic died, and she kissed Maeve's drenched forehead. "Tell me what to do."
 
Every instruction came clear despite Maeve's injuries: Break off both ends of the arrows, slide the shaft through, and then the compress. Bank mud, bitter herbs from their supply, and long grass to bind. Maeve sighed with release as Rilla applied the cool mud.
 
"You're just like mum, you know." Rilla picked a few mites from the compress. "Patient. Kind. Strong."
 
"I'm none of those things. But I'm tryin'."
"At least you are. I was so useless. I should've never followed. You'll find her and save us all."
 
Rilla pawed at the iron sealed slave collar around her throat.
 
"No, Rilla. I..." Maeve sniffed and stood. "I'm nothing special. We'll find mum and she'll know how to free the whole family."
 
The moment they climbed the bank they found the Long Patrol hares had snuck up on them in complete silence. The leader, a befeathered jack with hose too bright and high for a soldier, stepped forward with a scoff.
 
"Real touching, gels. Bubbler of the highest order, eh wot!" The soldiers all sniggered. "Right bit of sport, but the foot is a game and the game is a foot! Back to the mines with the both of you. Iron Rillasn't chisel itself, donchaknow!"
 
Maeve backed up towards the bank's edge, where they could hop down and renew the chase. She tugged at Rilla's tunic to pull her back with.
 
Rilla picked up hefty stick and held it like a sword.
 
"Run, Maeve." Rilla swung at the air before the hares, and the whole lot laughed a riot as they drew their weapons. "Find her!"
 
Maeve reached for her sister, but Rilla pushed her away and turned to smack a hare soldier on the arm. The hares circled sable Rilla and forgot about silver Maeve entirely. She spotted another stick on the ground, and a particularly large rock fit for bashing a hare's skull.
 
Instead, as one screamed and swung, the other chose balance and ran north.