The Spider’s Ballet

Ensi and Cherry were arriving at the hospital that rose some thirty stories tall. This building, unlike many of the others, appeared well kept. Ensi greeted several members of the staff as they made their way in. Nurses and doctors alike wore the look of sleepless nights. None seemed to be bothered enough to pay proper attention to them when they walked in. Cherry smiled with understanding towards them as she breathed in the smell of antiseptic deeply.

One nurse in scrubs approached Ensi with her display clutched to her chest, speaking quickly but clearly as she rushed by. “He is on the roof, as he wants to be when he is on the verge of berating everyone.” Ensi showed no surprise as he moved his guest up the stairs onto the rooftop. A stout older man in a white coat with white sparse hair looked out over the city while resting his arms on the raised ledge of the roof. The cigarette hanging from the lip of his square jaw was half ash. He looked at them through thick spectacles.

He spoke in a grizzled tone, “Alright boy, I got it from here.” Ensi, perturbed by this, was muttering about filthy habits before moving back down the stairs. The old man gauged Cherry, who stood with arms crossed. “Yea, you will do. I’m Hobe, and I’m banking on you being the first competent help I’ve had in a minute. My professionals,” he enunciated professionals with purpose, “have never had to deal with the horrific injury or trauma that we’ve had come our way the past few months.”

Cherry moved her hands down to her side. “I can assure you I’m well equipped.”

Hobe grunts. “Good. I read the notes and you lot want to help with the Devil Beast deal. Which is great. Go visit the trauma ward and see for yourself what we are up against. Come back to me with any questions. Walstaff is putting an odd amount of trust in strangers to help us. But it ain’t like he has much choice. The damned descendant born here dragged most of the young blood from Leoris out to the war effort only to die like a beaten dog. The hunters are so thinned out they are pulling from the other trades to keep us fed and investigate the threat. Damned mess. I’ll be in my office going over charts and making notes for the staff. You will find me there.” The old man moved stiffly before limping down the stairs with no intention of showing Cherry where the trauma ward was located.

Cherry made her way through the hospital, asking the staff for directions along the way. The patients she saw on the upper floors were all resting, with no signs of distress. This changed as soon as she came upon the trauma ward. The staff wore grave expressions and the doors to the rooms were almost all closed. She flagged down a doctor, briefly introducing herself and stating her intention to look over charts and interview some patients.

She pawed her way through several charts outside of the rooms and looked in on the patients before she came upon a distinction in the residents here. All the injured parties were male. All maimed and disfigured. After a while, she came upon one chart that read conscious and coherent. Optical trauma, facial disfigurement, severe emotional distress. Thinking she may be able to glean some information, Cherry opened the door to the room.

The man in the bed sat up and turned his uncovered eye towards her, bandaged from head to neck. Blood had been pulling beneath the cloth. He asked, “Can you please change them? I can feel them sticking.”

Cherry smiled and headed over to the sink in the room to wash her hands. She searched the cabinet for gauze, fresh bandages, and scissors. The wounded man said, “You are new here? I don’t want to scare you, but most of the nurses and doctors here can’t stand the sight of what is underneath here.” He pointed to his face.

Cherry found what she was looking for and pulled a stool up beside him. “My name is Cherry. I’ve done triage on the frontline. I’m here to assist doctor Hobe. You won’t be scaring me today.”

Beneath cracked lips he said, “Good, you aren’t fucking useless. Forgive me, I think they are doing the best they can. The name is Tarrich. I was a rebuilder before the hunters dragged me out to the damned deep of the woods and left me half dead.”

Cherry cut the bandages loose. The left side of his face, including where his eye used to be, was a mass of pulp. Tarrich took a sharp breath as she used a gentle touch to clean it with a damp cloth before dabbing disinfectant at the bleeding bits of his wound and the crude sutures. “I’m sorry that happened, Tarrich. Can you tell me about the attack? I brought a special friend with me that is going to help hunt the beast.”

“Trackers from the lodge approached some of us sturdier builders. They gave us spears and took us out with them. I couldn’t tell you if we were getting close to the beast or if it just found us. I’ll never forget the sound. Like a pickaxe striking the ground. All we could see was the bark being stripped from the surrounding trees, as if being struck by lightning. The first hunter that fell was a pretty lass. It quickly impaled her. She slumped to the ground. The rest of us weren’t so lucky. I looked next to me at my buddy. He turned to me with his tongue wagging where his jaw used to be. Before I could scream, I grabbed at my face, as it felt like it was on fire. I felt warmth running down my neck. I rolled on the ground and underneath a fallen tree. All I could see were too many teeth. Too many arms. Too many damned claws. The trackers pulled their chrism rifles and fired upon it. It did nothing, and they too got ripped apart limb from limb. I blacked out and woke up here with my wife crying as they worked to save what they could of me. I hope that special friend of yours brought some cannons or some crazy shit.”

Tarrich fell silent, and a tear rolled down his cheek. Cherry finished his bandages and gripped his hand. “Crazy shit, for sure. I’ll bring some of my personal ointments next time. It will help with the healing. That is the best I can do.”

Tarrich looked down. “Best news I’ve had all week.” Cherry gave his hand a squeeze before leaving the room and continuing her rounds through the ward.

At the van parked at the dock, Demalyn had set out several tables with trinkets, oils, tinctures, and replicas of Farland antiquity. A few people were quietly browsing when Ensi and Yulsif both walked up to Demalyn, who had sat back in her chair, pulling fruit scented tobacco from her long pipe.

She looked at Ensi with a dull expression. “I thought you were keeping my friends in town out of trouble.”

Ensi shrugged at her. “I’m not a babysitter. That woman Cherry will be busy for a while at the hospital and that guy Desdin seemed preoccupied in the archives. He offered to treat me to lunch at a cafe if I came and invited you along.”

Demalyn gave the deputies a mischievous grin. “Sure. If you can help me get some business here and be a walking advertisement for me. Which of you would like to be my experiment?”

Ensi and Yulsif traded concerned looks. Yulsif was the more timid of the two and submitted to his looming fate. Demalyn patted at a reclining chair beside her. “Make yourself comfortable and tell me what you want to improve most about yourself. Mood? Confidence maybe?” She asked as Yulsif smirked at the slight to his confidence. “Gotcha, roll up your sleeve. And don’t worry, it won’t be a permanent mark.”

Yulsif bore a sudden look of concern. “What do you mean, mark?”

Demalyn said, “I specialize in marking. A sort of tattoo. They practice it in the Farland and across smaller settlements throughout the world. They can help with things like chronic pain, fertility, protection, warding from evil spirits if you believe in that. But mine are most special and guaranteed to work.”

Demalyn gripped a black orb at the table in front of her with her right arm. The bracelet of vines crept and formed around the orb and then grew up on her arm all the way to her shoulder. Ensi’s disinterest changed to paying close attention while Yulsif moved nervously in his seat trying to keep his smile. Some shoppers also noticed and moved to watch the show. The orb had a slight purple hue form in its center, and a purple shadow seemed to coalesce around it. As she lifted the orb, the vines and shadow formed a tip pointing out.

Ensi looked entranced by the hum of the deep purple. He asked, “What is that glow it is emitting? It is darker than any color I’ve seen chrism give off”

“Not quite chrism which flows like white lava when liquid, illuminates in blue glow, and cracks like neon purple when volatile. I call this instead the regal spirit. Its strong purple hue emits its own violet shadow and remains stable,” she said with a grin. “In the north and in places where time has stopped, it would be a common sight.”

She placed the orb against Yulsif’s arm and applied light pressure. She closed her eyes while feigning exaggerated intensity and said, “And now I will form the image of what I believe will be confidence for you and grant you its mark.” The light wrapped around his arm, and when she pulled away, she proudly exclaimed. “And a bunny rabbit!” A small insignificant purple mark of a small smiling bunny glowed faintly. Yulsif appeared taken aback, and the gathered crowd laughed and clapped at the spectacle, with children peering through the crowd and giggling as they pointed at the glowing bunny mark.

People began picking up items and approaching the table to make their purchases. “Alright boys, help me wrap up this sale and we’ll go to this cafe thing.” Yulsif sulked as he began helping to wrap gifts in paper while an amused Ensi did the same. A few customers inquired about appointments to get what they hoped were real markings. Demalyn assured them that any purchase made was sure to be genuine before sheepishly looking back at Yulsif.

Desdin was turning pages in a large tome laid out before him. He closed the book and sighed as Ingrid approached the table, settling her head atop her hands. “Ready for lunch?”

“Absolutely. That sounds far more productive than anything I’m doing here,” he said while closing a book.

“I wasn’t sure if you’d find anything you didn’t already know about Dragsil in those books if you’ve already visited other archives within the Union. Did the Farland tell stories about him?” She asked with sincerity.

Desdin folded his arms and sat back. “We told stories about all the Oldest. The stories about Dragsil were interesting to us in particular because of his interactions with the Fallen. Many of our historians referenced the Roots of Dragsil as a place of immense knowledge and a potential alternative to the hubs of the Union. It was meant to be a place that all the races of this continent could share. However, the story of how he left the Oldest is much the same with us as it is with you. He gathered the knowledge of the heavens and left the pantheon to share its wisdom with the Fallen. The Fallen, however, took from him with greed and devoured his being. In retaliation, the Oldest pushed them back to the Devil Lands and sealed them behind the Glass Road, where Ouren became their keeper. My father devoted a good deal of his life to uncovering the mysteries of Dragsil hoping to better relationships between the nations.”

Ingrid listened with interest. “I’ve never seen reference to any sort of roots before. Most of our scholars agree that Dragsil’s ultimate resting place was somewhere in the Devil Lands.”

Desdin looked away for a moment. “Definitely not there.”

“You seem oddly confident in that,” she said with a raised eyebrow.

Changing the subject, Desdin stood up and began walking towards the stairs. “About that lunch, Ensi should grab my other friend to meet us.”

The pair left the archives and met up with their friends before walking a short distance to a cafe with an open table on the outside. Demalyn nudged Desdin. “So, did we make a new friend?” Desdin shrugged as if he didn’t understand the question. “Cherry is going to love this.”

They looked over the menu like gluttons before ordering too much food and having a casual chat about the town, along with random gossip about Leoris’ better known individuals. Demalyn and Ingrid seemed to share similar enthusiasm towards these subjects, as if hearing the outrageous stories was an entirely new experience for them. Desdin kept quiet and smiled every so often. Ensi was content with his meal but seemed to chime in to confirm that some of Yulsif’s gossip was, in fact, true.

Ingrid asked with a blunt approach, “Do you believe that the two of you will ever return to the Farland? Once your service to your family finishes?”

Demalyn took a sip from her drink and looked over at Desdin, who said, “I would like to. The state of the Farland after losing the war to Dakken four years ago is stabilizing, I read. They lost the eleven wardens, but the provisional government is working to keep the clans together and repair relations with the Union and Dragonshead.”

Ensi added in, “Several of the wardens work for the Union now. I’ve heard that Esthea made herself essential to matters at the capital.”

Desdin squirmed with discomfort at the mention of the name Esthea. “Yes, she is engaged to Seric, the chief commander of the Union military. A marriage of descendants from different nations. It is a good thing for the continent, I’m sure.”

Yulsif also inquired into the subject, “Weren’t all eleven of the wardens descendants? That military might alone was enough to give every nation pause.”

Desdin corrected Yulsif, “All but one was a descendant of the Oldest. The eleventh warden.”

Demalyn brought the conversation back to local matters after that before a small group armed with various weapons approached their table. They wore cloaks with gold pins at the neck of animals ranging from wolves to deer to hawks. Yulsif stood up to address them, but a large hand emerged from a cloak and firmly placed him in his seat. Yulsif tried to stand again, to no avail.

The man pressing down on his shoulder had a shaved head with a full beard. He grinned ear to ear. “Relax deputy. We are only here to greet our gracious visitors. Seems we found the right ones,” he said before looking over at Ensi, who was frowning at his glare. “Hey man, we haven’t seen you at the lodge lately. Vilsin asks about you every so often. You should dump this day care nonsense and come join us.”

Ensi waved his hand in front of his face. “No thanks. I don’t care about going outside the town, much less hanging around your boastful lot.”

The big man’s confidence seemed to swell the more he talked. “Too bad. Vilsin said you had talent and, well, we are short on it. We don’t need people who prefer the work of cowards.”

Desdin and Demalyn had only moved to pick at their food or draw from their cups as the scene played out. “And you two should pay more attention to your gracious hosts. I’m here to offer an invitation from Vilsin. He wants our guests to join us for dinner at the guild hall tonight. We promise a fine feast. And if you two deputies need to babysit, you are welcome to come along.” The walking mountain of flesh slapped Yulsif on the shoulder and looked over at Ingrid and winked. “You too, of course.”

He lumbered off with his entourage in tow. He shouted back, “I hope to see you all there! We will feast with or without you.”

Yulsif stirred in frustration in his seat while stammering out, “I should let the sheriff know. He had sent a note to Vilsin to meet with him regarding a cooperation on the hunt but hadn’t heard back. I guess this is Vilsin’s reply.”

Desdin glanced up, showing no indication of being worried. “Don’t bother. I will show up for dinner and entertain. We all should. Sounds like this town could use a distraction from the Fallen, and I’m eager to show that we can help. So don’t worry your sheriff with the small stuff and let’s enjoy our day. Any concerns, Demalyn?”

Demalyn chuckled with snark. “None. I’m innocent. You get to tell Cherry all the details later on. Don’t let me get in the way of the fun.” Ingrid looked nervously at Yulsif whose eyes turned with unease to Ensi who had gone back to his plate before saying, “Well, at least we will eat well today.”

Cherry finished her rounds in the trauma ward and had been wandering around, looking for Hobe’s office. She followed the faint smell of tobacco and soon found him at his desk. He had her notes pulled up, scrolling and pausing here and there. He glanced up at her through his spectacles. “Where did you learn triage and surgery from?”

Cherry sat before him and crossed her legs in front of his desk. Pulling her jacket off and loosening her tie. She tried deflecting the conversation by asking, “Do you mind sharing some of the whiskey you’ve been having a go at?”

Hobe grunted in acknowledgement. “Keen sense of smell, too.” He sat out a glass before filling it and sliding it across the desk to her. “Cliffhold brandy. Sweet stuff. Just enough to keep my nerve about me.”

Cherry took a sip while answering his question from before. “I learned most of my trade on the field and out of necessity. I was gifted with deft hands. My family wanted me to take to the arts, but I was far more interested in seeing what kind of trouble my hands could get me into. Before I knew it, I was volunteering for things that would place me and my friends in danger. I didn’t want to lose someone, so I learned how to stitch and repair the body.” She took a larger sip.

Hobe had continued looking through her notes before saying, “I traveled often in my youth to learn how to heal the sick. The science, the magic, and some of the mystery behind it. Doctors don’t keep enemies, so I’d often compare cases with my peers from abroad. Every school was different. The Union applies a bit of it all, which is a good practice. By doing so, we produced medicines for all kinds of ailments. Anyone that I met from the Lux, however, took a harsh scientific approach to it all. They were always clinical. Everything had a label and a diagnosis with a numbered value.”

He swiped the notes away, as he could surmise he had caught Cherry’s attention. She had stopped taking sips from her drink and had set the glass down. He shifted the subject. “May I see your hands?”

She pulled her gloves away, one finger at a time. The entirety of her hands was a mass of scar tissue. He commented, “You know the Farland rarely, if ever, uses chrism weapons. Of course, the injury could result from misfire from one of our many faulty Union rifles or cannons. Oldest curse whoever thought to weaponise chrism. The Lux was experimenting with chrism although we have yet to have an open conflict with them to see their advances with it. On my last outing, I met with a colleague that had snuck over from the Lux to trade notes. He told me they had been working on using chrism in something called awakening. Something to make up for their lack of descendants if they engaged the Union in a proper war. Many deaths resulted from the procedure, but it scarred those that survived for life.”

Cherry placed her gloves back on and, with a cool demeanor, took to her drink again. “The point of your story, doctor?”

Hobe put his hands up as a white flag. “Most of us older folk were around before this age of descendants began. There was no conflict. In fact, some of us sympathized with the Warden King of the Farland, Jonah. First born descendant of this age of them. Charismatic bastard wouldn’t stop going on about wanting to raise people up and unite the continent. All descendants are born with this predisposition for great things, no matter the cost. But I still trust people. I like the Union. This is a good place to live. And I believe you folks are here to help.”

Cherry presented an earnest visage. “In all honesty, yes, we are here to help for all known intents and purposes. We will assist this town while we are here. I promise.”

Hobe relaxed from his stiff posturing and said, “I can tell from your notes. Thank you from one doctor to another.”